Gripe of the Day

A less-than-totally-serious look at the problems of society, the human condition and the world in general.

My wry observations on life - just my opinions - but I am right.

People walking with mobile phones. Having had a break in London this week, I was shocked (and bruised) by how many people walk along at peak times looking down at their phones, texting, possibly reading or playing a game. I was walked into so many times, by people who seemed to think the pavement was only for them. Apart from anything it’s dangerous and you could walk into a road or – hopefully – a lamp post, but at the very least you’re going to walk into other people. The whole mobile phone thing is out of control. Digital technology is no longer part of our lives; it is our lives.

Road works. Roadworks are the bane of my life and I’m quietly confident they are the bane of yours too. The whole country seems to be grinding to a halt at the moment, while men in hard hats stand in the road drinking tea or coning off whole lanes of the motorway for no apparent reason.

Where I live there are major roadworks on every arterial route in and out of the town centre. Surely they should only disrupt one major route at a time? It’s got to the point whereby you have to think carefully about whether you can leave the house or not, or you run the risk of getting caught in a traffic jam in the blazing heat with your engine steaming, listening to various different types of tinny music from other cars from people who like to share, or little children in the car in front repeatedly waving at you, or people throwing litter out of their windows and virtually everyone texting and checking Facebook.

I am only ever one short car journey away from the Michael Douglas character in the film, Falling Down. (I have only seen the film once at the cinema in 1993 – I couldn’t watch it again – it was too much like watching my future autobiography.)

In truth, I don’t actually get road rage… I have the same amount of rage whether I’m behind the wheel or not. I’m very much a proponent of feet first, then public transport and cars as a last resort, which would chop the gridlocking in half. If everyone had this philosophy the world would be a much better place.

We’ve got to drive to an out-of-the-way theatre tonight – we should probably have set off yesterday.

Middle-age spread. As we all know, age is just a number… It’s just that the number keeps getting bigger. My waistline is also just a number… and that’s following suit. Actually, I’m not overweight for my height, but I'd rather not carry all the weight round my middle. I need to tone up, but I find exercising for the sake of it so tedious, so my best option is to try and cut down on food – one cake instead of eight. It's going to be tricky.

Time flying. Some things fly: birds, balloons. Some things don’t: rocks, people. Some things shouldn’t: planes and most of all time. But it does, my friends, it flies. Tempus fugit. It’s April already – we’re cruising towards the end of April. Where does the time go? It feels like it was only Christmas about twenty minutes ago. I can’t believe we’re almost a third of the way through the year! If time goes faster when you get older I must be ancient.

Scientific studies suggest that it is the level of neural activity registering that dictates how long any given measurement of time appears to last. A new experience will notch up more "memory points" so the day will be memorable and therefore appear longer. A lazy Sunday when you do nothing in particular might be nice at the time and just what you need, but it won’t register or be discernible from all those other lazy Sundays.

So, use your time wisely. Be active and try new things! Live life to the full!

(NB. If you’re planning to travel to other planets or even galaxies, be aware that time actually isn’t a constant and the further away you get from a main gravitational source, such as the Earth or Sun, the faster time actually moves. Isn’t that amazing! Conversely, try watching X Factor… that always makes time slow down for me.)

Flip-flops. My reasoning: flip-flops are just wrong! Surely this is one that everyone agrees with. They're wrong! End of.

Very well, I will expand. Let me start with a confession. I have some flip-flops. Yes, I do. I use them for travelling to the shower block on campsites. If the showers are a bit dodgy I keep them on. That’s all I use them for. Flip-flops are fine for beach use and various other occasions; in the right setting I don’t have an issue. My gripe is about men wearing flip-flops in inappropriate settings, such as shopping centres. I’ve admitted flip-flops have a place in society, but it’s not there!

What can be right about a type of footwear that flies off if you try to run? That announces your (slow) approach long before you’re in visual range? That can be pink, yellow or turquoise? Even the name is ludicrous. They're named after the annoying noise they make!

Flip-flops: just say no!

Crocs. Following on from my previous Gripe... Crocs... The one type of footwear that makes flip-flops seem less offensive. I mean… why would you?

When other people insist on telling you their dreams. What’s worse than waking up in the small hours after a nightmare – in a cold sweat, with a racing heart and shaking with fear? I’ll tell you what… someone else telling you about their experience of waking up in the small hours after a nightmare – in a cold sweat, with a racing heart and shaking with fear.

Your own dreams are generally an LSD trip-like montage of seemingly random images that make little sense, but someone else recounting unconnected and illogical images from their dreams is just too much. Perhaps you believe it’s a coded message from your inner psyche: your Id conversing with your Superego, or maybe you think it’s a load of utter bollocks, either way my advice is to delete it from your neuro-hard-drive and tell no one.

If you absolutely must tell your partner, friend, family member, priest, counsellor, councillor, dog, cat or Argos Helpline, please save time by keeping it short and to the point. Or just tell yourself while looking in a mirror; that’s a very dream-like sort of image and probably very Freudian.

You may believe that if you can unscramble the dream there could be a hidden meaning in it; I put it to you that's just wishful thinking. You can find a meaning in a piece of toast if you look hard enough.

A cautionary tale: Martin Luther King famously told people about his dreams… and sadly it didn’t end well.

Cold calls. A few weeks ago I had: “Hi, I’ve been informed you’ve recently had an accident.” Which is a blatant lie, because I haven’t had an accident and you weren’t informed, but for every hundred calls they make with that patter, someone is going to fall for it. Or already will have fallen… if you see what I mean…

Cold callers are parasites. Give them the cold shoulder. They’re only after your lolly. Freeze them out!

White van men. White vans are notorious for being driven badly and driven too quickly by workmen. Sometimes it’s one overall-wearing bloke and his dog – the dog occupying the passenger seat and map reading while ogling women. Sometimes there are about eight workmen jammed across the front seats and the dashboard is covered with a sea of Greggs bags.

So how come I get stuck behind the only white van that seems to have been hijacked by a pensioner on a sight-seeing trip of rural Cheshire? He clearly has a fondness for the brakes… either that or he’s trying to call for help using Morse code via the brake lights.

For twenty miles or so we trundle along on A-class roads where the speed limit is either derestricted or fifty. The fastest we achieve – on a downhill stretch – is a heady 34 mph, after which he thankfully turns off, probably to try and unwind after he’d nearly broken the Dawdle Barrier.

I don’t expect people to speed. I don’t expect people to drive dangerously. I do expect people to drive at a suitable, safe speed, which is usually something approaching the speed limit for that particular road, conditions permitting. When someone drives sixteen miles below the speed limit on a clear straight road in daylight – to me – it screams that they’re not a competent driver. However, I decided to quash my frustrations and put a positive spin on it – at least I got to spend longer in the beautiful Cheshire countryside.

British summertime. I remember as a child, six weeks off school in the summer and sunshine virtually every day. If it rained it caused a national outcry; children stood in the window staring out in a state of shock and horror, waiting for speed-dial to be invented so they could call the Samaritans repeatedly until the raincloud crisis passed. And before long it DID pass and normal sunny service would resume.

It’s not just me looking back through rose-tinted Ray-Bans either. The family photo album proves it, whilst also proving the existence of flares and very bad hair.

We “played out” all the time; for six weeks we only went home for food. Most of today’s kids seem to be glued to their computers in their darkened bedrooms, so maybe the summer has taken Umbridge and gone somewhere where it will be appreciated.

RIP British summertime.

Filter coffee. In this day and age of the patented Gurglesteam coffee machine, when coffee is freshly ground and handed to you by a barrister or solicitor, there is just no need for old fashioned filter coffee. It sits there in its glass pot, stewing away like a flooded ashtray, becoming more bitter and foul by the hour.

I usually have an Americano – black; that being a shot of espresso with added hot water. It isn’t at all the same as a cup of effluent from the Cona filter pot. It’s a small point, but revolutions have been started over less. Let me spell it out for you: filter coffee – it’s evil!

The small print. Very few of us, surely, ever read the small print… it’s tedious and long-winded and intentionally unfathomable. It’s only there so that another person can screw you over at a later date. Also, furthermore and foremost, the small print is too small… you have to squint or change to your reading glasses. And the jargon is impenetrable… the party of the first part, the third part, the co-respondent, hereby, thereby, henceforth, whenceforth, et cetera, ad infinitum. The small print – it goes on forever… and ever… or longer… and life is really too short.

© This blog is intended solely for amusement and any opinions expressed herein are the property of the author, who – henceforth – will be referred to as the party of the first part. This blog is copyright protected and the contents remain the property of the party of the first part. Any reference to persons living or dead or otherwise is purely coincidental on the part of the party of the first part. This blog may not be read in a public place or broadcast by any medium, especially Derek Acorah. To reprint or reuse any portion of this blog the express permission of the party of the first part must be obtained in writing. The reader’s statutory rights are not affected. Henceforth the reader shall be referred to as the party of the second part. If you read this far: well done! If you didn’t: I told you you wouldn’t read all the small print.

Cars. Being male, you are expected to have an interest in cars, as though it is bound up in your DNA, part of your genetic make-up and synonymous with testosterone. Even if you aren’t an Alpha-male who can lift a bonnet and jiggle as though he knows what he’s doing, you are still expected to LIKE cars. Well, I DON’T like cars. I have no interest in them whatsoever. My chosen mode of transport is walking, but when I need to use a vehicle my only requirement is that it functions and can convey me from A to B. Or at least part of the way to B and I’ll walk the rest of the way.

When people talk about their new car or their dream car or Top Gear I just switch off and start counting the molecules in a beer mat. Consequently, I retain very little information about vehicular modes of transport. I identify a car principally by colour, then by size and rough shape: “It’s blue, biggish and quite square.” This can be quite embarrassing when trying to describe your own car to a mechanic who has asked for the make and model.

I think way too much attention is given to the type of car you drive. Cas are fundamentally a means to an end, a conveyance, a convenience. They are just a tool… usually driven by tools.

People who talk through programmes but go silent for the adverts. I hate adverts, I really do. I generally only watch telly socially and there is nothing more annoying than watching a programme with friends or family and they talk all the way through it, but the moment the adverts come on, they’re glued to the screen. Even when you try and initiate a conversation they blank you, as they appear to have gone into an almost catatonic state, as though Derren Brown*# has been jiggling their limited mind-waves about. It drives me up the wall!

* Other TV mind-reading showmen are available.

# But none are as good!

The best a man can get. (Homo-erotic adverts.) Adverts for male grooming products always make me laugh. They tend to show a muscular young man smiling and splashing water on himself in slow motion, with little regard for how much of the bathroom he soaks.

The voice-overs always stress the manly male-ness of these male-orientated men’s products for men. Men’s grooming products generally have bold, strong, male names, such as Steel, Atomic, Gunshot, Stud, Thrust and Tackle. The brand colours are black or gunmetal grey.

Of course, in reality most grooming products are uni-sex; it’s the same gunk in a different coloured bottle, but they’re marketed completely differently. Men’s products are manly and made for men who are men, with men’s grooming needs. Women’s toiletries are in soft focus and smell like flowers and come in pretty bottles, because they’re worth it.

Advertisers also try to man-up what would previously have been considered very feminine beauty regimes, so a man can now moisturise or exfoliate in the gym showers, with only minor ridicule from men who do it in the privacy of their own homes. Even the phrase “male grooming” is testosterone-boosted, because the female equivalents are called “beauty products”.

Shaving though, is the realm of men. Exclusively men. Shaving adverts are solely for men, men who shave, men who are men. Men who shave and then look in the mirror approvingly and run a hand across their face.

Many women use razors, but by law they have to use lightweight, pink razors with a single blade, whereas men’s razors are big and heavy and black or blue, they have three blades and they’re named after speed or power. These are manly razors for men. They are designed by men, for men. Only men can use them. Women must not use men’s razors… or they’d die.

When people talk about cars… at you. I’m happy for people to talk about cars, of course, but I’m not interested to join in, which is odd, because I know quite a bit about them. The colour, for example. This varies from vehicle to vehicle, but I’m usually pretty good at that. I know many of the basic features: steering wheel, the four outside wheels, the exhaust, the boot and bonnet. Then there’s the cup holder (optional), various mirrors inside and out, the fuelly bit and most importantly, the music maker, which is a CD player usually. Or a gramophone in the type of vehicles I can afford.

Probably the most popular question that’s thrown at you about your vehicle is regarding fuel consumption: “How many miles to the gallon does it do?” or the quick fire version: “What’s your MPG?” My answer is always: I haven’t got a clue. Don’t know, don’t care. If it’s bad there’s not a lot I can do about it. I just put fuel in, hopefully the right kind, and (touch wood) it’ll make the thing work. Oh, and I don’t need to know the torque, because I hardly ever tow tractors up steep hills these days.

Catalogue models. Men standing in a line in their undies, with an arm on their friend’s shoulder, all looking at the camera, smiling big, white, toothy grins, as though it’s the most natural thing in the world, when it really isn't.

Smiling women standing chatting in their lacy bra and knickers. When exactly would this happen? Except perhaps in a teenage boy’s fantasy.

Catalogues like this were the erotica for generations of teens. Sadly, after two minutes’ research, it looks as though this type of group pose is now a thing of our ludicrous past. Shame, there’s not a lot funnier than a photo of a carefully positioned line of people pretending to share an unheard joke in their vest and pants.

Teasmades. This came to me the other day, when doing my Gripe of the Day. For those young enough not to have experienced this bizarre phenomenon, a “Teasmade” was a sort of alarm clock that you set with your wake up time and it made you a cup of tea.

I think “Teasmade” is a brand name, but – like Hoover and Tannoy – it has become the generic name for the product. I am very surprised to see, after a quick Google search, that they still make them! I thought they’d gone out with the Jackson 5.

My parents were once given one, but only used it for a very short time. It was massive – it would have used less space to build a fully equipped kitchen in their bedroom. The water and milk sat there all night; in our house this wasn’t such an issue for the milk going off, as our house was like a fridge; when you opened the front door the light came on automatically. We only had the heating on for royal visits or for an hour on Christmas day… but that hour constituted a present. The radiators were like modern art – they hung there, didn’t look good, did nothing and said nothing to anyone.

I’m quite particular about my hot beverages, but a poor one is worse than none at all. A Teasmade is never going to make a perfect brew... and that's why less that 3% of the population have even heard of one.

(Please note: If you feel inspired to do some research, take care with the spelling and don't erroneously add an extra "e"; tapping “TeaseMaid” into Google will unearth quite different results.)

Flat Screen TVs. Yes, they’re amazing in many ways, but all I really want from a telly is to be able to see it and hear it. I don’t want 3D, HD, quadrophonic all-around Technicolor interstellar sound or a Teasmade.*

* Other terrible inventions are also available.

I don’t need these various embellishments, because I know I’m watching a TV and I have an imagination. Very few other people need all these gismos either, because their focus is divided between Facebook, Twitter and so forth. (So Forth © is the new social networking site I’ve created. It’s specifically for people who don’t want to keep in touch with the friends they don’t have.)

In the olden days… not when life was in black and white, it was colour but a bit grainy… the standard screen-size was 22 inches. If you got special dispensation from the Queen you could have a 26 inch, which was the top of the range. They were massive brutes that weighed a tonne. (At the time they weighted a ton.) Floors needed to be strengthened to be able to hold them, which is why no one had a TV upstairs and why it was one TV per house or the property would be liable to subsidence.

Today, a flat screen TV can fill a whole wall, which is good, because it can cover up the hole in said wall that you had to have knocked through to get the TV into the building.

I remember when I started work… in a TV shop... and bought my very own telly to have in my bedroom, which at the time was an event that could make the local news. It was a silver 14 inch Ferguson and I loved it. I could have taken the electrics out and lived in it, it was so big. It lasted for years. The screen was perfectly large enough and you could see it from anywhere in the room. My current flat screen TV has an 18 inch screen, which by today’s standards is tiny. The main problem, apart from the sound, which seems to be filtered through an old sock, is that unless I sit in one particular place, I can’t see the screen: it’s just blank. I don’t mean one particular chair, I have to sit bolt upright directly in front of the screen. If I’m tired I can’t lounge or put my feet up, or I can’t see the screen. So watching telly isn’t a relaxing, unwinding event at the end of a long day, it’s a spectator sport demanding stamina and fortitude.

If I do slouch, because I’m tired, I have to make do with just the sound. Bad sound. So it’s like listening to the wireless during the war years.

If I have friends round to watch a movie (which is American for film) then the only way we can all see the screen is by standing in a line directly in front of the TV and looking over each other’s shoulders. I’m exaggerating, of course. (I don’t have friends round.)

So, flat screen TVs; bigger isn’t always better. Regardless of what they say.

Technology generally – Laptops specifically. I’m not a fan of technology. It’s faddy and irritating and intermittent. It saves us a lot of time… but it costs us a lot of time as well. And a lot of money.

Computers are useful tools, of course, but that’s all they are to me. I resent the time I have to spend getting to grips with upgrades that have been forced upon me. Once I’m up to speed with a phone or a computer, I don’t want to upgrade and have to go through the whole learning process again, so I generally have both for many years. When they develop minor faults, I put up with them as long as possible.

My old laptop, for example, was a Hewlett Packard – an excellent machine which served me faithfully for a long time, but it should have gone in the bin ages ago, because the keyboard had worn out and certain keys no longer worked. The first to go was the number 6.

So, according to my laptop, the central character played by Patrick McGoohan in The Prisoner, was Number __ . (He was not a number, he was a free man!) [Go on, Google it if you don’t get it.] The number of the beast was ____ . England won the World Cup in 19__ . Boxing Day falls on the 2_th December and so on.

I’m not one for New Year, but at the end of 2016 I celebrated with joy in my heart, knowing that after midnight I would actually be able to type the year. 2016 was a bad year… in that, according to my laptop, it didn’t actually exist; it was 201_. But I would be able to type 2017! Hallelujah! I would just have to avoid the 6th, 16th and 26th of each month. (I now have a new laptop, so - as you can see - I can type 6 with impunity!)

More recently, certain letters were intermittently going on the blink as well:

I h d been typin for ome time thou h, before I re li ed, which w re lly nnoyin . ee?

So, technology – a necessary evil… but evil nevertheless.

Swearing. (If you are easily offended, look the other fucking way now.) Yes readers, let’s take an in-depth look at swearing.

I don’t mind swearing, when it’s in context. If someone stubs their toe and they scream: “Fucking hell!” I’m fine with that, as it’s a natural reaction. But you hear scallies on the bus saying things like: “So I fucking got me fucking Giro and I fucking went in fucking Primark and I bought some fucking trackie fucking bottoms. Shit twat bollocks.” The swearing here is so over-used it has no meaning or impact, it’s just four-letter aural wallpaper. So, scallies everywhere, before you speak you need to think: “If I was in a play, how would my use of swearing and vernacular linguistics come across to the audience?” and I think you’ll find it will dramatically improve your speech.

I read an Amazon customer review the other day – of a Bill Bryson book. The reviewer said they were appalled by all Bill’s swearing and were glad they had read it before giving it to their 18 year old nephew. Several points: Bill doesn’t swear that much, but admittedly he does more than I would have thought he would, but it is always in context and not gratuitous. More importantly, your 18 year old nephew will know and be using more swear words than you’ve had hot dinners! You don’t need to worry about “protecting” the youth from swearing! Lastly, reading a book you were intending to give as a present! You fucking skinflint!

Well, I think we’ve covered all aspects of swearing admirably. To recap, I think swearing has a place in our lives, because sometimes you need to swear. I think it has a place in drama, because sometimes you need to use it to make a dramatic point. If a character is gunned down and another character reacts with: “Oh heck!” you’ve lost a moment. But I do think less is more: when you use swearing less it has a much more dramatic or comedic effect.

Anyway, just my opinion. If you don’t like it you can fuck off.

Growing Up in the War Years. Even though I didn’t… it often felt like I did. There was hardship and rationing. There was life under an oppressive regime. (The Thatcher Years) There were bombings. (The IRA) And there was even a sort of self-imposed curfew (Thanks to the Yorkshire Ripper.)

My parents were young children in the war. Even after the war, rationing continued and there was much hardship, so being frugal was a way of life and it became ingrained. That’s not a problem; it’s to be expected and respected.

Throughout my childhood, money was scarce. My mum in particular, as was very often the case with mums at the time, had a “make do and mend” mentality, which I fully admire. You didn’t throw things away, you darned them, you repaired them or, if it was beyond repair and you absolutely had to throw it away, the chances are you didn’t replace it and you did without. I fully embrace that and really despise the throwaway society we now live in.

I was all for hand-me-down clothes; many of our clothes were second-hand. I didn’t have any issue with that, except when it came to undies. A remember a pair of mustard coloured Y-fronts, which were bad anyway, but who wants used undies? Mind you, they were third-hand by the time they were passed on to my brother.

Dad grew vegetables in the garden and mum was always very economical with food shopping. She went to a special supermarket, near to where the Gallagher brothers of Oasis lived, which specialised in food that had passed its sell by date. (Can you imagine that now? Strangely, they closed down.) For years I though Mr Kipling French Fancies were biscuits, because ours had always gone dry. We had small meals and if you were still hungry, which I always was, you could “fill up on bread”, which I didn’t. One of mum’s catchphrases was: “If you’re not hungry for bread, you’re not hungry for cake.” Another was: “It’s only a bit of mould! If you don’t like it, scrape it off!”

We were never allowed to put the heating on; we were told that ice on the inside of the window was decoration for Christmas. For Easter, instead of Easter Eggs, we got practical gifts like socks. (Socks!) Biscuits were rationed and even counted. Afters was half a yoghourt. After a kitchen fire (a chip pan) we still had to eat the smoke damaged cereal, which tasted, naturally enough, of smoke. If they’d marketed them as “beechwood smoked wheatabix” and charged more it would have been considered a delicacy.

So, my gripe is about hardships as a child, which weren’t good at the time, but I now understand and appreciate. All these things I remember with humour and fondness. Being cold and hungry now takes me instantly back to my childhood. These things gave me an understanding of value, of money, of scrimping. I hate waste of any kind and I think that’s a very good thing.

Moaning. You probably think I’m a right negative, moaning bastard, don’t you?

As long as we’re clear.

Hell Is Other People. Jean-Paul Sartre famously said this, or rather wrote it, as it was a line from a play. However, it has been misunderstood and Sartre was at pains to point this out himself. I’m not too sure why – hell might not be all people, but it’s certainly many people.

Campsites. My first plan, when I got a camper van, was to pull up at the roadside and stay overnight. I loved the idea of parking up wherever you want to – in your home – and settling there for the night with an amazing view.

I soon discovered this is A: mainly illegal – but it does depend on local by-laws and B: can, on occasion, be terrifying, when you think you’re going to be ritually sacrificed or gangbanged into next week. In Wiltshire I was told that there was a certain layby where the police would not move you on if you parked up overnight, so I duly parked there, but it was an A road and all night huge lorries came past weighing and doing a tonne – metric or otherwise. My van was shaken violently in the slip stream and it felt like they were going to crash into me – I didn’t get a wink of sleep.

So, I tend to go on sites now. But that isn’t what I want at all, to be surrounded by other vans and have people walking past your window all the time – for me it isn’t what camping is all about.

There are annoying rituals on sites; caravans/vans that have their own built-in toilets have a sort of cassette on wheels which contains the waste, like a Lidl shopping trolley, which they drag after them to the emptying point. It sounds like nails down a blackboard. I wake up early, but no matter what time I get up there is always the sound of some anxious soul taking their sewage for a walk; it’s possibly a competition to see who can be up at the emptying point the earliest. But every morning they set off eagerly on their pilgrimage and gather at the waste point like flies round… well, like flies.

Those without an on-board bathroom have to share a toilet block – it’s a block if you’re lucky; I have been on sites where there is one singular toilet – not nice. Whatever time you go to the toilet block in the morning it will be full of pensioners, probably because there is no Post Office nearby for them to queue outside. On my last trip, one old man brought his own radio into the shower and sang to some rock classic from yesteryear, really badly, as though he was auditioning for Old Boyzone. I thought it was nice he was so uninhibited actually.

My parents used to belong to a camping and caravan rally association; they would hire a school field or a carpark – usually in really horrible, industrial places – and turn up in their vans and park in a circle, then go in and out of each other’s vans looking at their new cupboard doors and shower curtains and so on. It was all very odd and there was something a bit unsavoury and suspect about the whole thing, a sort of swingers’ mentality – but swinging for people who just didn’t have the energy.

But, I digress… So, campsites I feel are a necessary evil – they cost money, but keep you safe(r) and dogger-free. But the words Trailer Trash always spring to mind.

Babies. The things people say about the aforementioned. Including, “Don’t they look like Uncle Donald?” No, it looks like a baby. “Oh, he’s got your ears.” No, it looks like a baby. “She looks like her mum!” No, it looks like a baby! And possibly Winston Churchill. Hopefully minus cigar.

Traffic Wardens. Who doesn’t hate traffic wardens? Well, me actually. My gripe isn’t traffic wardens themselves, but the people who hate them. Most people have an issue with these uniformed Nazis of the Street, because they come along and put tickets on their cars when they’re illegally parked. The nerve!

But wait – I’ve discovered an easy way to thwart their evil, world-dominating plans: don’t park on yellow lines or in restricted areas or cause an obstruction or outstay the time that you’ve paid for in a car park! It’s really easy and can save you a fortune, a court appearance and an ulcer!

Camping. (In tents.) I’ve been camping most of my life… Partly because it’s cheap… or free if you wild camp… and partly because I thought I liked it. But I was wrong.

As a child, I wanted to camp on the moors or a remote island, like the Famous Five; it seemed so exciting, with beds made of heather and lashings of ginger beer. When I finally did go, it wasn't like that at all, it was cold and hard, you didn’t get any sleep and you woke up feeling cold and wet and aching all over, and the thin sheet of nylon above you was frosted over with your own condensed and frozen breath. It’s not a holiday, it’s a punishment.

I thought, when wild camping, it would be so magical to open your tent flap in the morning and see a view over the cliffs to the sea, a lighthouse, seagulls, the sunrise... In reality, you open your tent and stare, shivering into the cold grey light of day; you feel drugged because you haven’t slept at all and you can barely move because your back and limbs are wracked with pain. The only view you really want to see if your bedroom ceiling, briefly, before you fall asleep.

After decades of thinking I enjoyed camping, I suddenly realised I didn’t. It was a glorious revelation – I don’t know why it took me so long. I bought a camper van instead and have never looked back. Except when reversing.

Apostrophe’s. (It really hurt me to put that apostrophe in the title, but I thought it was a good gag. If you don’t [contraction of “do not” – apostrophe denotes missing letter] get why it’s [contraction of “it is”] wrong, you should stop reading now and go and put the kettle on. It should, of course, be “Apostrophes” [plural].)

I don’t [contraction] think apostrophes are difficult, so why do so many people – and businesses – have such a problem with them. It would be E-Z to blame it on textspeak, which I h8, but I think the problem goes way back, before Mr and Mrs Text had even met. Perhaps schools [plural – no apostrophe] don’t [contraction] spend enough time on them.

Spotting apostrophe errors is a little hobby of mine. It’s [contraction] quite shocking how many businesses misuse them in their titles and strap lines. Sams Fish n’ Chips, for example. [There should be 3 apostrophes in this.] Rock n’ Roll is another common on along the same lines. [There should be 2 apostrophes in this.]

Shame of shames, our councils don’t [contraction] use apostrophes in street names, so you might have DAVID BECKHAMS WAY for example. [1 apostrophe missing.]

Where it gets a bit trickier, is with double plurals, such as “the boys’ balls” [the balls of more than one boy]. But enough of boys and their balls. Well, apostrophe addicts, this is so much fun – I’m [contraction] sure we’ve [contraction] all got an apostrophe-related tale to tell, we could go on about it all night. But let’s [contraction] not.

’’’’’ These are spare apostrophes, in case I’ve [contraction] missed any in the text above.

Go on, Google Apostrophes. You know you want to.

Corporate Anarchy plc. I’ve long since forgotten which band it was, but it was a big, successful, stadium-rock sort of band – and on their merchandise list, I mean “merch” as we have to call it now, they were selling baseball caps with the anarchist “A” symbol on, for £35. (Thirty-five pounds!) It absolutely incensed me. Why would some stadium rocking moron with too much money to spend want to further reduce his IQ by overheating his head beneath a £35 hat? With an anarchist symbol on it! If you’re at a stadium event buying obscenely overpriced merchandise you aren’t an anarchist, so wear something more appropriate, such as a white cone-shaped hat with a big “D” on it.

Valentine’s Day. Well, it was only when typing the date on my last gripe that I realised it was Valentine’s Day. I hadn’t forgotten… honestly. We don’t do VD. Oh, unfortunate, I’d better stick to long hand: Valentine’s Day. For us every day is Valentine’s Day. Sickening, isn’t it? But it’s actually true. Well, that's the theory.

I hate the commercialism surrounding Valentine’s Day. If you want to show affection to your partner, then buy them a gift or do something nice - today, any day, every day. It doesn’t have to be on a certain day that society dictates, when the price of a bunch of red roses shoots up from a fiver to thirty quid. I’m not just being a miser, though I don’t like to throw money around needlessly, but honestly, the marketing hype surrounding Valentine’s Day appals me. Make every day special!

“Going Forward.” Maybe two years ago, this was the biggest buzz expression amongst business people and management types, who banged it into conversation at every opportunity, sometimes several times in one sentence, so that – going forward – it lost all meaning.

It was almost like a competition, to see who could say it the most at a meeting; junior staff cottoned-on and tried to lever it into conversation to impress their managers, who just felt annoyed because an underling was using a management expression. “Going forward” was a bandwagon that everyone jumped on. “Going forward” was an exclusive club that virtually everyone was in. “Going forward” was and is an expression that – I’m very pleased to report – I’ve never used, without the addition of “inverted commas” or italics; when ripping the piss out of someone.

“Going forward” (are you getting sick of it yet?) could be employed in a variety of ways and for a variety of purposes by important business people. If you used it, it showed you were bang up to the minute with last year’s management parlance.

It could be used to answer awkward questions from your staff, when you didn’t know the answer:

“Going forward… yes probably.”

It could be used to give you extra thinking time when faced with a difficult question:

“Going forward… Err, no thanks. I mean, yes please. Two sugars.”

It could be used to give you extra thinking time when faced with a very difficult question:

“Going forward… I’m not really sure.”

And it could be used to try and reframe bad news:

“It’ll be bad in the short-term... but going forward it’ll be worse.”

I suspect some overpaid management guru thought this was a very positive expression to be used at every opportunity, because “Going forward” implies motion, it suggests there is a future, it is a positive part-statement. It’s basically corporate bullshit that last year’s management types were taught at a “motivate and lie to your staff” seminar, so they all started to bandy it around like it was going out of fashion. And guess what? It went out of fashion. Probably because that same management guru suddenly realised it had been adopted by the workforce and was being so over-used that it had become a joke, almost a comedy catchphrase. It’s a shame, because counting its use brightened many a boring meeting. And it was a very useful indicator of character, because using the expression “going forward” became shorthand for “I’m an absolute twat.”

Chuggers. Charity muggers. You know the ones; they’re everywhere, in every town centre, lurking, ready to pounce. They usually wear a tabard bearing the charity name and logo; all the main charities seem to use them now. They leap out at you while you’re struggling along with your Maris Pipers. They smile a ridiculously false smile and say: “Hi-yaaa. How are you today? Can you spare me a moment?” Then they try and sign you up for a sizeable monthly standing order for the charity, of which they get a percentage.

It’s a shame we even need charities. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate charities; I love charities. Most of them. Some are self-serving, whilst some do amazing work. But it says a lot about us as a society, that we need charities to look after all the issues that the government doesn’t. There is a saying: a society gets all the charities it deserves. Profound.

I am in favour of many of the charities these Chuggers work for and I actually give quite a bit to charity on a monthly basis, but I’ve chosen myself what I will give to and have arranged a standing order on my own, where all the money goes to the charity in question.

I have no problem saying no to Chuggers, but then five paces later another one leaps out and tries to get you. Everyone hates Chuggers. Chuggers hate chuggers. They are sweetly smiling urban parasites. Give me a flock of pigeons anyday.

Shop assistants answering the phone when they’re supposed to be serving you. A phone call shouldn’t take precedence over a real, live person in your shop, standing at the counter waiting to put money into your business, but so often a shop assistant will break off from serving you to answer the phone. It sends me from 0-60, which, in a built-up area is generally double the speed limit. If you do that you’ve lost my custom; by the time you hang up I'll have gone.

Age: Middle Age. I’m in my forties. Surprisingly, it’s not a bad age to be. Being young isn’t all that; you lack experience and you tend to lack confidence. (Or you're cocksure and arrogant - and that's even worse.) People often feel the need to rebel – just because they’re young and they feel they ought to. I’m all for rebelling, but there should be a purpose, or it’s just pointless and a bit pathetic… and you end up being a rebel without a cause. (What a great title for a film!)

When you’re middle-aged you tend to have a better idea of who you are. You don’t have to try to be anything. You’re old and wise enough to just be. And if someone asks something of you, you feel comfortable to say “Err... no!” or “How late?” or “How much?” And it’s OK to complain. No, compulsory to complain.

I wasn’t very good at being young, but I think I’ve made middle-age fashionable. Hang in there, it’ll catch on, I’m telling you.

Sexting. I was just thinking: “That’s funny, I haven’t had any junk mail recently offering me deals on Viagra* and other medication or incontinence products or offers of sex.” But then into my junk box popped an email, obviously computer generated, because it began with “Hi Freeman! How would you like to sext?” I haven’t had one of these emails for a while and was starting to feel neglected.

Sext – a new(ish) phrase, obviously sex and text. (I get it. The concept that is, not the sex text. I’ve never had a sex text. Sigh.)

There are many angles I could go off on now, such as the erosion of language. “The destruction of language is a beautiful thing.” George Orwell wrote in 1984, in which George is warning of the dangers of “the party” eroding language, because without language the Proles cannot voice their dissatisfaction and rise up.

But, the point I acually want to make is about… (takes a glance from side to side, then mouths the word): sex. Sex is everywhere in our modern society. It bombards us from all angles – and advertising is one of the biggest perpetrators. Sex sells. There is sex on television, in films, on billboards, in music, in the Cosmo quiz and the FHM advice column and dropping uninvited into our inbox with alarming regularity. Sex is all around us, in every conceivable medium. And even if it wasn’t, it would still be in our thoughts – twenty-four hours a day. Or longer. It’s absolutely everywhere.

So – here’s my question: (Long pause.) If it's so prevalent in our society... why is no one actually doing it?

Throwaway Society. My parents had a vacuum cleaner for the first twenty-five years of their married life. It was a large grey/brown cylinder called something catchy like a “Vacuum-o-matic”, though there was nothing “o-matic” about it, as that implies it was automatic… and it wasn’t. In fact, CarpetDuo would be a better brand name, because it was so big it took two people to negotiate it round the house, so you would have to enlist the services of a family member or neighbour. We also had to hire a garage to park it in at night. It was seemingly constructed from one of the fuel tanks from the Apollo 11 mission, but what a piece of machinery! It was really reliable, never had a fault and it sucked the carpets to within an inch of their lives. It didn’t break down in the end, but mum and dad decided – in a moment of giddy affluence – to upgrade and buy a new vacuum cleaner. Bad move! From then on, they had to buy a new one very 53 weeks. They were always cheap and nasty and broke down as soon as they were out of guarantee. To repair them would cost more than the price of a new one, so it wasn’t really an option.

My dad’s stereo, which he called the “radiogram”, was the size of a coffin. It had a teak finish and you stored your records* inside it. (Big black CDs that played on both sides. They scratched easily and often you would get an unintentional dub-mix of your favourite track if you weren’t careful.) The radiogram was huge; it was a piece of furniture. It was kept in the dining room, so – as a house only had one telly in those days – when in the dining room you could sit and stare at the radiogram. You could admire its dove-tail joints and its well-polished finish. I don’t remember what happened to it, but I think my dad must have sold it when they sold the house to downsize to a flat, because it never, ever had a fault. Unlike the countless hifis they’ve had since.

Everything was bigger then and sturdily built. Answering the phone a few times in an afternoon was the modern equivalent of a trip to the gym. If you were broken into you could use the handset as quite a lethal weapon. You couldn’t screen your calls, but the phone didn’t ring that often, so when it did you wanted to answer. And it was never anyone trying to interfere with your PPI or sell you double-glazing.

I’m not saying things were better in the past – they weren’t. But now our economy foolishly relies on us buying a constant stream of cheap crap. Nothing is built to last and landfill sites are full of plastic tat that couldn’t be repaired. It’s a throwaway society and – ecologically – that’s a disaster.

Hygge. This is a Danish word, pronounced hue-gah (apparently) for which there is no direct and totally accurate translation, but it means roughly creating a special moment, feeling or atmosphere. Your hygge moment might be having a hot chocolate and putting on your fluffy slippers and lighting a scented candle – all of which makes you feel warm and special and snuggly. Ahh… (I’ll just add – that’s not my idea of a hygge moment, but you get the drift.)

My gripe is that hygge has now become the latest fad: Waterstones is full of books on how to hygge-up your home and how to hygge yourself into next week. We are all supposed to be working hygge moments into our lives, to make us special. What annoys me is the way that something that the human animal has done forever has been rebranded and is suddenly a must-do craze.

I’m being quite pedantic, because I should applaud anything that promotes happiness and well-being… but it all smacks of self-indulgence to me and an affectation, making an everyday occurrence into a “thing” and giving it a new name, so that the simple act of having a brew has to be labelled as something else and made into a relaxation technique. But I suppose if it works for you, in these stressful times, then it’s all well and good.

Along the same lines was the rebranding of “chilling”, which really annoys me.

“What are you doing tonight, Andy?”

“Oh, just chilling.”

What that means is nothing; I’m doing nothing. I’ve got no friends and I’m doing fuck all. But now that it’s rebranded as chilling, doing absolutely nothing is no longer lazy or slovenly or a waste of time, but is an event. Even worse is the expression chillaxing: chilling/relaxing, but no one has ever actually said that for real and survived.

Urinals. Come on, they’re taking the piss! Alright, not urinals themselves, they serve a very useful purpose, but Urinal Etiquette is a nightmare.

But while we’re on the subject, urinals are often way too close together, so you’re rubbing shoulders with the chaps on either side. That’s not good. Very often there are no dividers, so it’s all a little bit too friendly. But I digress…

So, when you go into the toilets, the rules are that you don’t go directly next to anyone else, unless there’s no choice. If there is only one urinal – this is the best-case scenario – the decision, at least, is out of your hands. If there are two, likewise, you use one or the other. Three is getting trickier; if you go in and find One and Three occupied – that’s good etiquette, well done fellas – so you have to go in the middle, only to find out that man One and Three are actually friends and they conduct a conversation over you. That’s very off-putting.

Four urinals is the worst scenario. If two out of four urinals are occupied, chances are you have to choose who you stand next to. This is very awkward, because the implication is you're going next to the one you like the look of.

Five or more urinals is usually preferable, unless you stand at one end and the next bloke comes in and stands right next to you… this is wrong. (A similar etiquette exists for people who sit next to you in an otherwise empty bus/railway carriage/restaurant/waiting room, but they’re generally not exposing their genitals.)

Urinal etiquette is all very primal and feral really. We all know these rules, but they’re implanted, they’re subconscious, we don’t even think about them. In reality, we’re no different to animals, marking our territory and working out our place in the pack. The most natural thing to do would be to go into the toilets and wee on all the other men, thus scent-marking them, so you’re the top dog. Mind you, men’s toilets are so often swimming with piss that maybe that is what some men do.

4x4s. By that, of course, I mean four-wheel drive vehicles, not multiplication.

This morning I was nearly run from the road by the smallest, wizened old man driving the biggest car imaginable. He clearly couldn't handle the car and looked absolutely terrified – clinging to the wheel, knuckles white, eyes wide, dentures chattering. He couldn’t drive properly and couldn’t steer, even though there was very little traffic on the road, so how bad would he be in heavy traffic or if there was a potential situation? I followed him for a couple of miles – not purposely stalking him, you understand, we just happened to be going in the same direction – he was weaving all over the place. Possibly because he couldn’t see over the wheel.

In the afternoon, in the same area, a middle-aged woman decided to join the lane I was in on the dual carriageway. Now usually that’s fine, except she tried to insert her shiny black 4x4 into exactly the same spot that my van was occupying. Worse still, I don’t think she had even noticed my big white van at all. I slammed on my brakes and she sailed on obliviously.

So, here’s my 4x4 solution:

Part 1: Cars should not be a status symbol. 4x4s should be for people who actually need four-wheel drive vehicles – and by that I mean because they live up Snowdon or Ben Nevis; they should not be used for an emergency dash to Waitrose, because you’re out of brioche and camembert.

Part 2: People should be forced to drive the type and size of car that they can manage to drive (and park) safely. This will slash congestion, because most people will lose their license immediately and 87% of the remaining drivers will be buzzing along in Robin Reliants.

Simple.

Clowns. They’re just creepy! I don’t have a morbid fear or anything like that, but clowns – who are meant to be funny and silly - are actually very sinister. They paint on a smile, but there’s no smile underneath. Their eyes aren’t smiling. I know they're traditional and I should like them for that, but… shudder… clowns are just plain wrong!

Portmanteaus. Following on from yesterday’s gripe I have come to realise that I loathe and detest portmanteaus, which is the making of a new term from two words, as in staycation – stay plus vacation, or chillaxing – chilling plus relaxing. What annoys me is that these terms are specifically designed to elevate the ordinary into something special. Chillaxing is basically lounging around in your pants and doing nothing. Humans have always done this, why did it need a special new name? Because it now has a proper name it is justified and acceptable. It is a way of glorifying the un-glorious. It’s so typical of our cosseting, pampering, needy, me-time, look-at-me, love me society.