Following retirement, budgets need to be planned carefully so whilst on the subject of hotels there’s the matter of the ‘freebies’ to be accounted for. I no longer get the coffee sachets, tea bags, shampoos etc. which if you bear in mind ten years at four nights a week and me with a view ‘I’ve paid for it I may as well have it’ provided a plentiful supply.


So what can I say, probably that if the Nescafe production line ever stops, give me a ring I have a few left, quite a few. I am not sure why I even collected the ‘full fat’ coffee as we only drink decaf. In fact the only person I know who drinks ‘full fat’ is my brother-in-law Howie and at the present rate he will be 119 years old before I need to buy any more.


The tea bags used to go quite quickly at home but Christine took to Earl Grey (posh, you see) so I have a number of those left as well now. Cadbury’s chocolate drinks and Horlicks - yes lots of them left but the problem comes in the biscuit department. We have none left, we ate them at week ends so now this is drain on our pension whenever we have old Aunty Joan or Christine sister Lynne popping in for a cup of tea. Everyone else we know pops in for Wine or Gin and don't care about biscuits.


Likewise the little shampoo bottles have all gone so this too becomes an additional cost - but only for my shampoo. Christine, of course, always used the best and would not dream of using the hotel bottles so she now shops for the cheapo shampoos for me because ‘this is what your hair is used to’.


Bars of soap, yes lots of them left. Conditioner yes lots and lots of them, do blokes use conditioner? Even plenty of hand cream. But what I really wonder is what I'm going to do with 243 shower caps or even the 27 sewing kits.


Of course some hotel chains have become wise, probably as a result of my activities and fitted shampoo and soap dispensers on the walls, these were much harder to remove... No I never did - never had a screwdriver with me. In fact the Hilton Group put them in long slim vials which looked nice in the room but had no secure stopper so they couldn’t be removed.


Some hotels are much better than others. The Suites on the M57 provide cafettieres with two packets of coffee per night together with biscuits. Excellent to use on the weekend. Order a coffee at the Boxmore Lodge at Hemel Hempstead and the plate of chocolates provided are superb. You can’t eat them as you have just had the best fillet steak in any hotel in the country and followed it with an excellent plate of cheese and biscuits so you take them home for the weekend as well.


A full comparison of hotels will follow at some stage but I need to plan my Black Book for the next week.