I was sitting on an outside terrace at the weekend, with three generations of my girlfriend’s family: her, her mother, her daughter. Age range, 4-64. Suddenly I saw a grey shape scurry across the concrete floor and behind a large brick, which was laid up against the wall of the house. “I saw… a thing,” I said. “What sort of thing?” “I’m not sure. A blurred scurrying thing went behind that brick.” “I hate ‘things’,” said the mother. “Could it have been a rat?” We carried on looking at the brick. Then, from out the side, above a dry leaf stuck between the brick and the wall, emerged a tiny pointy snout. “A shrew!” exclaimed the mother. Shrews aren’t scary. But this one was certainly scared. Its nose twitched around for a few seconds more, and then it pushed its whole body into the open. The leaf rustled, and the animal did an amazingly quick u-turn back behind the safety of the brick. We all roared with laughter: pure, slapstick, no-matter-what-age laughter. Then the snout appeared again, then the whole body, then the rustle of the leaf, then another u-turn back to safety. More laughter. The shrew repeated its act eight times, each as funny as the last. Then, on the ninth attempt, somehow it built up the courage to leave its shelter and belted a yard or so behind another brick the other side of the door. We clapped, tears in our eyes. I admired the courage of the little beast, which had provided me with my own personal Robert the Bruce moment, and made me ponder the nature of comedy. Enjoy the week.