Vaping in the toilet cubicle on a train is beneath me. This is a line I have drawn. First, it’s not allowed, but second – and much more importantly – the idea of savouring an intake of breath in a train toilet feels like a degradation too far. Worse still, I have always been plagued by images of a smoke detector going off and the arcane mechanism of the train toilet door somehow opening to reveal me there to my fellow passengers, wreathed in a cloud of my own shame.

I am pathetically addicted to my vape. I am not proud of this, but it is what it is. Or more accurately, it dawned on me as I walked into WH Smith at Euston station a few weeks ago, I am pathetically addicted to nicotine.

Nicotine is available in other forms. For the first time, staring down the barrel of a six-hour train journey to Edinburgh, and with my “never the toilet” rule in mind, my eye was drawn towards the selection of nicotine pouches.

You’ve probably seen these around. Hockey puck-sized plastic packets in bright colours behind the counter of supermarkets. They contain little sachets for tucking under your gum, where they funnel nicotine into your bloodstream. They have skyrocketed in popularity in recent times. The leading brand in the US, Zyn, reported a 62%........

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