There’s a problem that confronts anyone who goes away before Christmas and arrives back after New Year.

This year I was away for longer than usual, so I knew it was bound to happen.

You arrive back to a doormat of mail, and among the bank statements, plastic bags for recycled clothes and pizza leaflets there are Christmas cards from people you’d forgotten to send one to.

I knew this would be inevitable when I returned to Carlisle last week, but I was pleased to find there was only one this year.

I emailed the friend who had sent it, apologised for having not sent her one myself, and explained, truthfully, that I didn’t have her address.

I didn’t admit that for a few minutes I couldn’t remember who she was. Over the years I’ve known more than one woman called Fiona.

There are many wonderful things about “the most wonderful time of the year” and Christmas cards are one of my favourites. They’re a reminder how much more pleasing it is to receive a handwritten item of mail through your letterbox than a message on your computer.

It’s the one time when what the technophiles like to call “snail mail” comes back and shows it will probably never die out. Who really wants to receive a Christmas e-card?

I generally buy more Christmas cards than I need, to be on the safe side. As I dug out stamps and address book for this year’s crop I discovered a dozen or so spare ones I’d bought at Christmas 2018, ready for this Christmas, and had lost.

Still at least I’m ready for Christmas 2020. After all there are only 349 days to go.

They say this is the best time of year to buy cards, decorations or wrapping paper, when they’re all being flogged off cheaply – provided you remember where you put them.

It’s the excuse I make to myself for buying more books. I inherited many books from my grandfathers, people have a tendency to buy me them as presents, and I’m by nature quite a slow reader. So I’ve probably got enough to keep me going until retirement.

But if I see one I expect to read one day I’ll tell myself I may as well get it while it’s available.

I may acquire them at a faster rate than I read them but it’s not necessarily a bad idea.

Whatever can be done early should be done early.

That’s behind one resolution I have made this year and seem to be keeping to so far: not to put off to tomorrow what you can do today.

As you get older you reach the conclusion that time is the most precious commodity we have, and it’s criminal to waste it.

Yet when I look back I see a life of crime – the crime of procrastination.

I never used to be that bad.

At primary school, I never allowed myself to go out and play football with the other kids nearby until I’d got my homework out of the way.

By the time I’d finished most of them were going in for their tea, but at least I had cleared the decks and didn’t have to think about school again until the morning.

It wasn’t until university that I perfected the art of procrastination. There is much more for a student to do than study.

By the time the more important tasks were out of the way – drinking, working on the student paper, chasing but failing to catch members of the opposite

sex – there wasn’t always much of it left for academic work.

That’s why the college library was open 24 hours a day. We used to speak of an “essay crisis”, in which you rushed to get work completed with only seconds to spare. A tutor once warned me that if I pursued a career in journalism I’d have an essay crisis for the rest of my working life.

Of course news reports have to be left to the last minute because they have to be as up to date as possible. Nobody wants last week’s news.

Bad habits acquired at university can be hard to shake off, so I should follow the example of my nearest shops.

They’re not putting anything off too late.

The first chocolate eggs were appearing on Christmas Eve. Now they’re joined on the shelves by hot cross buns with sell-by dates the week before Easter.

Still, let’s not procrastinate. Before we know it it’ll be 2021.