While writing this column I've been searching for a second copy of a book I own - so that I can safely lend it out to someone and not have to expect it back. I'm quite sure that I know precisely where that copy is located - within, if not under, a pile of papers and magazines. But I've ventured into that pile about four times in the past few weeks, and it seems that if the book is really there I'm going to have to dismantle the pile entirely in order to find it ... or discover that I'm mistaken. At present I prefer not finding the book to either of the other two options.