'There’s a genuine relief at the age of 34 to be able to say, I’m tired. I’m going to go home to bed'

Marian Keyes often uses a phrase that her grandmother used to say: “I don’t have the houlding out.”

It basically means one doesn’t have the stamina required to endure long periods of time being sociable; weddings are tricky, as are weekends away with large groups of people with nowhere to hide when you need to stare at a wall in silence for an hour or so.