Yesterday the man on the front desk at Magdalen College told me a story about a group of people in their twilight years who, when asked to pay the £4.50 entry free last week, presented ‘student’ cards entitling them to the £1 discount stated on the sign at the front door.

They weren’t from an establishment as distinguished as Oxford University, (or anywhere he’d ever heard of, for that matter) nor did they seem too sure of what they were actually studying. But, as the print technically stated they were students, he was happy to honour the discount.

Mind you, he also told me he didn’t have the heart to break it to them that they were actually entitled to an OAP discount anyway.

What is it about getting a deal, that we all love so much? Take petrol as an example.

I can’t tell you how many people I know who will go out of their way to get cheaper petrol. You know, seemingly sane adults who are happy to add several extra miles to their journey in order to save a few pennies.

You should see the looks of complete disdain they shoot at me when I admit I have no idea what price fuel was when I last filled up.

For example, last night I put £25 of fuel in my car. I did it at the petrol station near the ice rink in Oxford. I have no idea what the price of the fuel was, nor could I even tell you if there is a sign at the front displaying that price.

There probably is, but the only reason I stopped there was because I knew I had about four miles left before the tank ran completely dry.

My rationale for not knowing what petrol costs is because it wouldn’t do me any good anyway.

The way I see it, I have a car, it needs petrol to run, and the cheapest way to get that is to fill it up at a garage on the way.

Admittedly, maths isn’t my strength, but if there’s one thing I do know, it’s that it will definitely cost me more money than I could possibly hope to save if I drove an extra 20 miles out of my way to fill up at the cheapest petrol station around.

It’s like when you go to the supermarket to buy one item and you discover it is on a ‘buy 3 for 2’ offer.

All you have to do is spend far more than you ever intended, to get something you never wanted (and will probably have to throw out) to get something free!

Mind you, imagine if petrol stations offered the same deal. Fill up twice and get a third tank for free.

I’d be willing to drive to Swindon for that. No, actually I wouldn’t. Reading maybe... Swindon no.