When you have a useful thing worth money and regularly leave it outdoors, ingenuity and an angle grinder will come for you in the end. You have to see yourself not so much as the bike’s owner as its foster carer, and just hope its next home will appreciate it.

Zoe Williams’s bike has been stolen. It’s an experience I’ve had too often, though I’m relieved to say that the last time was 30 years ago.