I SPEND far too much of my life sitting down and staring at a screen, so I decided to go to the cinema, because it’s good to get out of your comfort zone occasionally.

For the record, it was Black Panther I went to see, partly because I had heard it was good, but mostly so that I could indulge in one of my favourite activities – laughing at the people who leave before the mid-credits and end-credits scenes of Marvel movies. These are like people who leave five minutes before the end of a play, if such people even exist.

I chose to go alone, because nobody could – or, more likely, would – go with me. Going to the cinema alone is great, because you get to choose exactly which snacks you want to buy without engaging in serious and rancorous negotiations, and you get a full large drink to yourself, which is a brilliant move when you are forced to sit in one place for two and a half hours.

Anyway, I decided to go to an arthouse cinema, because I thought it would make me feel more grown-up about going to see a film about a man who dresses up in a bullet-proof panther suit and flies spaceships in a society where women get to do cool stuff without anybody commenting on it. Unbelievable.

I fetched up at the box office and confidently asked for one ticket to see Black Panther.

“Just one?” asked the man behind the counter, impertinently, in my view. I tried not to look hurt. “Yes, just one,” I said.

“Where would you like to sit?” he asked, “Front, middle, or back?” “Back,” I said. It’s the best place to sit.

“Just one person, back row?” confirmed the box office man. I took my ticket and marched off, like a perfectly normal solo cinemagoer. After all, it wasn’t as if anybody knew me there.

I walked straight into a couple of friends of my late mother. They greeted me warmly while looking over my shoulder to see with whom I was visiting the cinema. “I’m on my own,” I explained. They looked at my sympathetically. “I do it quite a lot!” I explained. Somehow that did not reduce the intensity of their sympathetic glare.

“What are you seeing? We’ve been to see The Shape Of Water,” they asked.

“Black Panther.”

They recoiled briefly, as one would when confronted by the 46-year-old son of a much-missed friend who is openly going to see what is essentially a child’s film without any of his own children, but recovered, wished me well, and sent me on my way.

Armed with a bucket of cola, I approached the usherette, who checked my ticket and told me I was sitting on seat 26 of the back row. This appeared to be non-negotiable, so I went to the back row…

Come with me now as I explain my route to my seat. First I disrupt a group of friends, if you can imagine such a concept, sitting in the five seats nearest the aisle, all of whom do that thing with their legs instead of standing up. Then I walk past 10 empty seats, before meeting a young and nervous-looking woman, who is sitting in seat 25.

My allocated place is next to hers, then beyond mine are another nine or 10 vacant seats. Ideally I would sit in part of the empty section, and not next to this nervous-looking woman. But my ticket states I must sit in seat 26, for which I am grateful to Box Office Man.

I compromise by sitting in such a way that I leave about half of my seat unoccupied, while slurping through a straw. Then Nervous-looking Woman’s boyfriend appears, sitting in seat 24. If I move now, what message does that send?

The lights go down. There is nobody in seats 27-36. I smoothly shimmy into seat 27. It’s all going to be OK. I even spread out a bit, like the worst man on a bus.

And then a man and woman approach me from the left. They’re in seats 27 and 28, as they point out to me.

So I return to seat 26, sitting on the back row, between two young couples, all of whom think I am a creep and/or idiot, watching a film that does not require absolute concentration at all times…

This is why I like my comfort zone.