'Stupid fish!' I say. 'They will rue the day!'

Richard goes off to find a fishing rod, and I sit down with the book Marc has given me as a holiday present. It is entitled The Book of Predictions, by Irving Wallace, Amy Wallace, and a bloke whose name used to be Wallace but who inexplicably changed it to Wallechinsky. Those are the worst type of Wallace. Sometimes I think we should take them off the mailing list. The book was written in 1981 and features a variety of different experts predicting how the future will turn out. It is possibly the most fascinating book I have ever read.

'By 1988', it screams, the US will have destroyed the Soviet Union 'along with 100,000,000 Soviet citizens', prompting the UN to set up new headquarters on the moon. The world will be brought to its knees in the early 1990s because of the terrifying war between Iceland and Malta. Basketball will be stopped because we are all so tall that people grow weary of watching burly giants stuffing small balls into tiny nets. A computer will make its own scientific discovery in 1989 and be nominated for the Nobel Prize! Robots will clash in space! All disease solved by '91!

How exciting the future used to be!

'Are you going to sit there reading all day, or are you going to be a man?' asks Marc, suddenly there. I put the book down. I am going to be a man!

We stand, the three of us, facing our old enemy - the sea. None of us has really fished before, but how hard can it be? Not as hard as it will be when all fish die, in 1993, that's for sure.

We cast our newly untangled line into the water. It goes maybe four feet. This is fine for now. Subtlety is key: get the fish used to the idea of a line, and then strike like the panther. But nothing happens for a very long time and we get bored. Suddenly, Marc remembers something.

'We're supposed to use bait, aren't we?' he says.

'Bring me a worm!' yells Richard. 'And I will bring you a fish!'

We all feel really manly - just as this weekend was intended to make us feel. Marc runs off to fetch a spade and I pick up my book again. The strange thing about the future, I think, wisely, is that it's always thrilling until you're old enough to realise that none of it has happened yet. It's almost as if no one's bothering to work on the technology to bring us magic carpets any more.

'This is the best I could do,' says Marc, holding the United Kingdom's smallest worm. Richard attaches it to the hook and flicks the line back into the water. The line goes four feet again. The worm goes considerably further.