Lara Croft and me

On Facebook the past can become the present with alarming ease.

An old friend (or rather a young friend whom I have known for a long time:thanks Ed) has posted a reminder of my afternoon a decade ago with the virtual explorer, video-game icon and 'spokesmodel' Lara Croft.

It is one of those reminders that in darker moments one may think will alone survive when every other record of  one's existence has vanished.

I am certain that when my esteemed Times colleague, Keith Blackmore, first suggested that I be interviewed by Lara, I had no idea of whom he was talking.

I may have affected some knowledge. It was wise for newspaper editors in those early electronic days to pretend familiarity with computer games which one's children, while playing them with enthusiasm, were unlikely to share with their parents.

 But I am sure I knew nothing of the character whose creators had decided to write a King Tut scene into her script.

So her script became my script. Yes my script - unless anyone watching now might think that the Editor of The Times ever spoke to anyone, even the most renowned female Indiana Jones in cyberspace, as he now appears to have done.