He could not stand the sight of a watch and, indeed, had not a single one in his house. ‘A watch’, he would say, ‘is expensive and stupid.’ He judged time, especially mealtimes – the only ones that really mattered to him – by his two saucepans, one of which was full of peas when he woke up. He filled the other, pea by pea, with a single, regular and assiduous movement. In this way he found his bearings through a day measured saucepan by saucepan. ‘Every fifteen pans,’ he said, ‘I need a snack. It’s quite simple.’
