Boredom created Bond

If James Bond creator Ian Fleming were alive today, I reckon he'd fly Ryanair.

Fleming wrote all his Bond novels at Goldeneye, his villa in Jamaica.

Sounds glamorous. It wasn't.

The place has no hot water, no glass in the windows, basic furniture. His wife hated it. Friends called it "awful." But that was the point.

He had nothing to do but sit at the typewriter. Hammer out 2,000 words a morning, stop at noon, swim, repeat. Turns out, Boredom created Bond.

I think I've found my equivalent.

Ryanair is ruthlessly efficient at removing options.

No WiFi. No entertainment. No legroom. No apologies. My neck hurts. Every interaction is a carefully choreographed game of avoiding surcharges.

I used to avoid them at all costs. Now, while I'm definitely not embracing Ryanair, I'm gently holding their hand from time to time.

My attention span has taken a beating lately. Yours too, I imagine.

But on a Ryanair flight, there's nothing to tug at. You can listen to something. You can read. You can write. That's it.

It's one of the best ways I've found to clear the backlog.

I'm not sure I'll create one of the world's most iconic franchises at 30,000 feet. Then again, Fleming called his own books "piffle." You never know what boredom will produce.

P.S. The first draft of this post was written - where else? - on a Ryanair flight. Alas, not to Jamaica.