My former best friend and I had a Friday ritual: the gym followed by lunch at a café across the street where Einstein used to dine. In between bites of club sandwich slathered in mayonnaise, we would talk. We knew each other better than our own selves.

One of us would go down a rabbit hole. Or both of us would go down a rabbit hole. Then that phrase “škoda mluvit” would stop us. A waste of breath.

The doom and gloom we had invited to sit with us at the table would get up and leave.