Oh, yes, this will stand alonside the Aeneid, the collected works of Shakespeare and, er, well, this blog - why not? - as a monument to Mankind. I refer, of course, to one of "those bloody magazines" that appear through my letterbox virtually every other morning. The conversation goes something like this:
From up stairs: "Was that the postman?"
From downstairs: "I hope so or the IRA are pushing letter-bombs through the front door!"
From upstairs: "Well! What is it?
From downstairs: "Another of those bloody magazines!"
From upstairs: (Silence)
You know the sort of magazines I mean, those ones with a thousand and one gadgets to get you through every aspect of life from garden to bedroom, via kitchen, toilet, bathroom, dining-room and living-room, and which are transported effortlessly from front door mat to kitchen waste bin in seconds.
Except for today, that is!
Today, and yes I know it says much about my social life, but I actually sat down and read one. My flabber has been well and truly gasted! Mentally, I have already spent several hundred pounds on devices that until today I had not realised were absolutely and vitally necessary to my well-being. In fact, I don't know how I've managed without them!
For example, I am looking at an implement with a long arm and a sort of suction pad on the end with which you can change light bulbs without standing on the bed and then losing your footing because of the bounce in the mattress and falling shoulder first onto the floor - as I did a couple of years ago! Then there was a sort of spring-loaded cable-thingie which you can bend round your neck so that the two ends of it which contain lights are pointing directly at the book you are reading - brilliant! Then there was the cleverest clever-thing since the greatest clever-thing ever was invented which you can attach to you 'phone and which will instantly record the numbers of any those wretched nuisance calls that plague us all and there-after block them!
Then there was a cooker-thingie in which you can steam, braise, deep fry, roast, grill, slow cook and simmer, and, although it doesn't actually say this, I'm sure it will do the washing up for you, too! Turn a page or two and there you will find devices to do up buttons if, like me, you are beginning to suffer with arthritis; a needle-threader which I just know the 'Memsahib' will find very useful because she has been telling me for years that the only reason she doesn't repair my shirts is that she can't thread a needle any more. Finally, there is a powder to shake over your bald patch which will 'fuse your follicles' - sounds exciting - and thus cover up your bald patch; and most important of all to us older chaps there are a variety of high absorbant incontinence shields and disposable "securi-briefs".
Frankly, People, I read this magazine from cover to cover and it truly is a monument to Man's ingenuity and also a tribute to capitalism, for remember, this mag represents the creative activity of God knows how many people in trying to design what other people might need and want. Yes, of course, they're only in it for the money but I'm glad that they are because at least it shows that they are thinking of me, alright, a generalised 'me' but still, me - as in me, me, me!