When we are looking forward to something, time always seems to pass very slowly, just as it does when we are standing impatiently waiting for the kettle to come to the boil.
‘This is awful!’ said Mary. ‘Jack promised to phone me this evening and the bell just won’t ring. If I have to wait much longer I shall scream!’
‘If I were you, dear,’ her mother advised, ‘I should get on with something else. As dear old Granny used to say, a watched pot never boils.’