Why our leading physicist enjoys doing the dishes – and more

Our dish washer packed up and I have been helping with the dishes. And strangely, enjoying it. The novelist Anthony Burgess enjoyed it too. The world’s leading theoretical physicist Carlo Rovelli, another in the club, has explained why. “It is,” he says, “one of those (rare) human activities where you start with a disgusting mess, immerse yourself in an easy task that relaxes your mind and end up with everything nice and clean and neat.” Rovelli is at the cutting edge of physics and a marvellous explicator of science. His Seven Brief Lessons on Physics is a masterpiece while The Order of Time dips into Proust and The Grateful Dead (Rovelli was a practising hippie) to make his point.