I have recorded a great deal in these pages. 
Much that I should not have done. Much that is not worth recording. 
Yet there is one fact worth recording:
I have had as varied a life as one could conceive and  
I have experienced things which the ordinary course of events 
would never have brought my way.
If I have not profited there is none but myself to blame.
 
The Fringes of Power
John Colville