Category: Posts

7 Reasons That We Should Grow Vegetables In Our Lungs

If you haven’t been near a news source for the past couple of days, you’re probably looking at the title and thinking “er…what!”, or something similar. So, in case you missed it yesterday, the BBC website – amongst many others – carried this amazing news: A pea plant grew in a man’s lung. He didn’t grow it deliberately, and doctors (killjoys) removed it while it was still quite small. But this story demonstrates that it is possible to grow vegetables in our lungs. I’ve given it some thought, and it’s actually a good idea. Here are seven reasons why.

1. You Will Always Have Food With You. There’ll be no more worrying about where your next meal is coming from, and you’ll also lessen the likelihood that you’ll snack on food that is bad for you. After all, you’ll be growing fresh, healthy vegetables in your lungs, and you’ll be eating that instead of snacking on late-night-pizza. So you’ll be healthier too.

2. Oxygen. Plants are amongst Earth’s major sources of oxygen. Where better then, to house an oxygen-making plant, than in your own lungs. You’ll be able to get some of your oxygen directly, without breathing as much. Maybe you’ll be able to hold your breath for a long time. Perhaps you’ll be able to swim underwater for longer distances. David Walliams will probably attempt to swim the English Channel underwater and David Blaine will be able to stage ever-more-spectacular death-defying stunts, which will continue to confound and irritate all right-thinking members of humanity.

And now that I’ve accidentally mentioned David Blaine, I feel obliged to say this. David, you are thirty-seven years old. The world’s oldest living person is 114 years old. So you aren’t even a third of a way toward equalling her death-defying accomplishments; shut up and stop showing off.

3. Vegetarians. In cases where planes have crashed in remote locations and people have become stranded for long periods of time without a food source, vegetarians fare badly. When their omnivorous companions’ minds turn to cannibalism, their thoughts do not. If we grow vegetables in our lungs though, vegetarians will have something to eat too, while their friends are eating their…er…other friends.

4. Space. Not the final frontier, but the amount of room that we have in our gardens. If we’re growing vegetables in our lungs then we’ll have a lot more room in our gardens. And also, the lung-vegetables seem to require no earth, so we’ll need less mud in our gardens. And frankly, the mud is the worst bit. No one will miss it.

5. Uncles. The phrases, “I’m going to have a pee” and, “I’m just off for a leak”, when uttered before disappearing to spend time alone will become ambiguous and will be the source of much humour. We may tire of it quickly, but we will hear it nonetheless. From uncles. “How are you, Uncle Richard?”. “Fine son, I’m full of beans.” It’s always uncles.

6. Smoking. Smokers will have even more incentive to give up, as their smoking will surely adversely affect their lung-vegetable crop*. Either that or the silly people will try to grow tobacco plants in there**.

7. Cauliflower. The centre of a cauliflower resembles the human brain. The brain is an internal organ and, as such, it’s always a little strange to be able to see it. If we were to grow cauliflowers in our lungs, then we would rid ourselves of the terrifying spectre of massed ranks of what are apparently brains, sitting in fields. I always wake up screaming at the point in my dream where the horse chases me through the cauliflower field. Always. And if we grow cauliflowers in our lungs that dream may go away. Though I’m not going to advocate growing horses in our lungs of course, that would be silly.

*This is not based on data from an official scientific study.

**This is wholly based on the conjecture of a man who may have become slightly carried away with his theme.

August 12, 2010
7 Reasons That This Is Not A Circular

A buff envelope has arrived. It bears the legend, “THIS IS NOT A CIRCULAR”. But I already know that. I can tell.

I made this in Photoshop to protect confidential information and to prevent the internet from stealing my soul. (I am referring to the envelope. I did not construct Milton Keynes in Photoshop)

1. It Has A Puzzling Series Of Numbers And Letters Above My Name. No one receives circulars with baffling and impenetrable sets of numbers on them – unless they subscribe to a sudoko magazine – so it’s definitely not a circular. The reference numbers and letters are a puzzle in themselves though: Why are there so many of them? Does this organisation really need a forty-six character indexing system? Is it merely coincidence that my waist size and the amount of times I’ve eaten trifle in the past six months are contained within the numbers? Is this what happened to Dan Brown?

2. It’s From Rhyll. Circulars tend to be fun, exciting things that you’ve subscribed to, and are happy to receive. They don’t come from Ryhll: Home of nothing fun and exciting (It’s the town motto).

3. It Says “PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL” On It. It doesn’t just say “private and confidential”; it shouts it with great portent, in a bold, roman font in capital letters. This is presumably to instil terror into the heart of any ne’er do well that may be thinking of breaking into the letter. It commands non-addressees not to open it. The contents couldn’t be safer if they digitally encoded them and gave them to MI5. Really, they couldn’t.

4. I Can See That It’s Not A Circular. It’s got four corners. It’s a rectangular.

5. Because My Name Is Spelled Correctly. It’s an easy giveaway. No circular – The Chap magazine, the Isle of Wight Donkey Sanctuary newsletter, Tiramisu Consumers Monthly, the Rohan catalogue (as soon as I finish writing this, I’m going to subscribe to more interesting things, I promise) – ever spells my name correctly. It’s the law. Some of them (I’m thinking of you, Font Magazine) manage to spell both of my names incorrectly – and my address – though it is done very neatly and tastefully.

6. It’s In A Buff Envelope. No fun personal correspondence comes in a buff envelope. None. In fact, nothing exciting comes in a buff envelope. White envelopes, yes. Yellow envelopes, yes. Purple envelopes, yes…every colour other than buff, which isn’t even a colour, except on envelopes. Has anyone ever painted their house buff? No, they haven’t. That would be silly. And dull.

7. Because I Don’t Want To Open It. I feel an instinctive aversion to opening the envelope. It looks like it contains something really boring. This never happens with circulars, except the Toolstation catalogue (white envelope), which always reminds me that I should be hammering and banging at something, and that I don’t own enough power-tools (to build a nuclear submarine). If you want me to open the envelope print, “THIS IS A CIRCULAR” on it, or add a picture of a happy dog to the front. That may fool me. Then I won’t ignore it while I write about it before heading off to do something more interesting than reading it. Visiting a quilt museum, for example.

August 11, 2010
7 Reasons This Poster Frustrates Me So

1. It’s Quicker By Rail. I’m sure it was, 75 years ago. Sadly, given the fact that my last foray on a train took a good deal longer than it took Neil Armstrong to get to the moon, I would suggest times have changed. And not for the better. It’s frustrating that this poster would now have to say, ‘It’s Quicker By Rail (Unless You Meet A Cow)’.

2. It Oozes Frenchness. This isn’t my usual anti-France and all things French rant, in fact, it’s made me think of Grace Kelly. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, unless you happen to be writing this in front of your girlfriend. Now, I’ll be the first to acknowledge that Grace Kelly isn’t French – or at least a close second behind her – but in the film To Catch A Thief, she did spend an awful lot of time poncing around with Cary Grant on the French Riviera. And frustratingly, this picture reminds me of that poncing. And if there are two things I can’t stand, it’s poncing and the French. Together.

3. The Woman. While the man looks like he’s a man, the woman looks like a statue. It’s disappointing for those of us who take female equality so seriously. You would never find 7 Reasons being so vindictive. That’s why, at all times, 50% of us are strictly male lesbians.

4. Visit Scarborough. It looks quite nice in the poster. If I had been alive back in 1927, I may have got on the train. Unfortunately, having found a photo of its current state and transposed it over the poster, I can see that it hasn’t really changed much. Which is why I now have little option but to pay the £108.40 and take the 5 hour 40 minute journey (plus cows).

5. Chivalry. I am naïve. I believe it when the older generation say, ‘it wasn’t like this in my day’. They are usually talking about manners. Or sex. But that was the wrong club at the wrong time, so really it’s just manners. People used to say ‘please’ and ‘thank you’, though not necessarily at the same time, and men with walking sticks would most definitely offer them to women with bad backs. Sadly, though this poster indicates that in fact man couldn’t care less. Which means the older generation have lied to me. Either that or this woman is in fact a statue.

6. It’s Joe. This man is Joe Scarborough. He’s the host of Morning Joe on MSNBC. In a past life he was also a politician. The only reason I know this is because I found numerous pictures of him while searching for a photo for Reason 4. Rather frustratingly, forever more, I will hold this useless piece of information about Joe Scarborough in my mind. No doubt at the expense of some fascinating fact about sausages.

7. The Man. He reminds me of Piers Morgan. And I’m not sure why. Which means it’s doubly frustrating. And as doubly frustrating things tend to do, they will no doubt occupy my mind for the rest of the day. Which in turn, of course, means I will be dreaming about Piers bloody Morgan tonight. Thank you BBC News Magazine. Not what I call a public service.

August 10, 2010
7 Reasons Whitstable Is A Bit Strange

I don’t know. Maybe I caught the place on a bad day, but my goodness, there are some strange people there. I mean really, really strange.

1. The Conversations. “Have you heard from your friends in Iceland?” “Oh, well not since the last time.”

2. The Stall Owners. “Would you like a picnic?” As chat-up lines go, this is quite forward. No introductions. Just straight in there, “Would you like a picnic?” I replied no, at which point the stall owner said, “Peppermint! Why did I say picnic?” She then stared at me. For far too long.

3. The Fish & Chip Shop Queue. Apparently, Whitstable adheres to the philosophy that states, ‘if you see a queue, get in it’. That would explain why I spent ten minutes standing behind two people who had absolutely no intention of buying fish. Or chips. Or even one of those small wooden forks. Idiots.

4. The Weird Family. A mother who screams when attacked by fake wasps and chucks drink down her top. A son who runs slower than he walks. Another son who gets in a strop and starts throwing stones towards his family. A father who sits down and bends the wooden bench. A youngest son who keeps going on about seeing a King Charles Spaniel. And when I say he keeps going on about it, I mean on and on and on and on. And on. Just shut up already! It’s a dog. Not a bloody Tyrannosaurus Rex.

5. The Dogs. There are millions of them. And not a single one gave me a whiff out of courtesy. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I wanted a dog to give me a whiff, it’s just that they usually do. As a rule, dogs do not like me. And because of this rule they usually attack me. What is wrong with Whitstable’s dogs?

6. The Mens. I don’t want to spoil anyone’s breakfast here, but Whitstable, it would appear, has the worst designed urinal in the world. And yes, urinal. Singular. Just one. Hidden round the corner from the entrance. That of course means any unsuspecting visitor would automatically assume there were a whole raft of urinals inside. And so in they wander. Only to be confronted by an old fella being held by an old fella.

7. The Holiday-Makers. You know when Daniel Craig walked out of the water in Casino Royale and 65% of the female population went a bit weak at the knees? Well, every single holiday-maker in Whitstable seems to think they are Daniel Craig. And as a result I felt weak in the stomach.

August 9, 2010
7 Reasons They Treat Me With Suspicion In The Pharmacy

My girlfriend asked me to pick a prescription up for her. Oh dear.

1. The Set-Up. ‘Hello,’ I say, ‘I’ve come to pick a prescription up for my girlfriend’. ‘Okay,’ the pharmacist replies. This is good. I had worried the pharmacist might treat me with suspicion. But men picking up prescriptions for their girlfriends is obviously something he sees a lot. ‘What’s the name?’ he asks me. ‘Claire Elizabeth Quinn,’ I say. Or at least that is what I meant to say. Instead I can’t quite get the words out and end up saying, ‘Clar Lizabet Queen’. ‘Pardon,’ he replies, now viewing me with slight suspicion.

2. The Name. I know my girlfriend’s name. I know it off by heart. I have said it hundreds of times. I should just say it again. I can do that. Only I don’t. I actually look at the piece of paper I have in my hand and read from it. I am reading my girlfriend’s name out! I am acting as if I don’t know her! I look up and the pharmacist is looking at me. He is actually looking right at me. As if I’m a bit insane. Either that or as if I am someone trying to pick up drugs that aren’t mine.

3. The Search. After what seems like a five minute pause, the Pharmacist starts looking for the prescription. And he keeps looking. And he keeps looking. But he can’t find it! He turns back to me. I know what he’s thinking. He’s thinking, ‘Is this guy genuine?’ But what is worse, he knows, that I know, that he is thinking, ‘Is this guy genuine?’. I shuffle uncomfortably.

4. The Pharmacist’s Assistant. The pharmacist calls for back-up. It appears in the form of a woman from behind me. I hadn’t even seen her when I walked in. Was she hiding? Was she a body language expert? Could she identify a prescription stealer just by looking at someone’s shoulders? Oh, this is stupid. Why am I feeling conscious? I really am Clar Lizabet Queen’s boyfriend. ‘Just a minute,’ she says to me. Oh my goodness! She’s going to call the police!

5. The Address. But she doesn’t call the police. Instead she shouts out from a room to the back of the pharmacy, ‘What’s the address?’ Oh no! What’s the address? I can’t remember the address! I can’t remember my address! I feel a knot tighten in my stomach. ‘Stay calm’, I tell myself, ‘just focus’. I take a deep breath, open my mouth and give her my address. It’s definitely the right address. I’m sure it’s the right address. I think.

6. The Wait. But then all there is silence. No confirmation that I had indeed named my address correctly. Just silence. And then the pharmacist goes to the back of the shop and suddenly I am alone. And the silence is all around me. What are they doing? I look around. I see women’s things. The pharmacy is full of women’s things! Thankfully the pharmacist’s assistant reappears. ‘It won’t be a minute,’ she says. ‘Thanks,’ I reply. But I’m not really thankful because she has gone to her place of hiding in the front of the shop again and I can feel her staring into my back.

7. The Handover. Eventually the pharmacist himself appears and hands me the prescription. But I can tell he’s still not sure. He’s still not sure about me. He’s loathed to hand it over to me. It seems ever-so-slightly like it’s stuck to his hand. I feel bad snatching it from him. I give him my thanks and leave the pharmacy. My walk home turns into a jog. I hide in the garden.

August 4, 2010
7 Reasons to Make Your own Pizza

Making your own pizza is amazing. It’s fun, produces tasty results, and is a more self-satisfying activity than cooking almost anything else, no matter how complicated or tasty. Here are seven reasons to make your own pizza.

1. Environment. If you make your own pizza, then chances are that you’ll be doing it in your own home. This is good. Your own home is nicer than visiting your local takeaway and you probably won’t see a fight there. You also won’t see overweight couples attired in sportswear eating something unidentifiable from a polystyrene box, and there’ll be little chance of witnessing kebab-meat rotating on a pole, which will prevent nightmares. You can order a pizza by phone, of course, but then a moped just takes it to someone else’s house instead. Someone in New Earswick (we have no idea where this is either) gets all of our pizzas. It’s a reciprocal arrangement; we get all of their taxis. Anyway, I digress; not having to visit a takeaway to enjoy a pizza at home will make you feel ever so slightly smug.

2. Bonding. Making pizzas is something that you and your partner can do together. You can also make pizzas with children, who seem to find the whole experience very enjoyable indeed. They’ll have loads of fun putting the ingredients on top of the pizza and, however they arrange it, it will always resemble something rude, which will give you a laugh. Of course, you won’t be able to share the joke with them, and being in on the joke always makes people feel smug.

3. Healthy. Because you’re choosing your own ingredients, your pizza can be healthy. The total cheese content can be limited to a few slices of Buffalo mozzarella, rather than coming loaded with plastic-y processed cheese, more salt than you would expect to find in a minor ocean, and weird globules of fat sitting on top of it. Eating healthy pizza will prolong your life; meaning that you can be smug for longer.

4. Garnish. Rather than the flavourless offerings of the takeaway or the supermarket, your homemade pizza can be topped with herbs from your own garden, which will taste fresh and great. Using herbs from your own garden will elevate you to a whole new level of smuggery: You may even begin to pronounce herbs, ‘erbs, which will propel you serenely across the line between being merely smug and being a smug git.

5. Cost. The ingredients for a home-made pizza cost far less than buying a pre-made pizza from a supermarket or takeaway. And eventually you can spend the money you’ve saved on a yurt, a folding bicycle, a chimenea, orange trousers or any other must-have accoutrement that takes your fancy.

6. Dough. If you have a bread-maker, you can also make your own dough really easily. You can make it with brown or wholemeal flour, instead of the ubiquitous white stuff and you can also spin it around your head and generally hurl it about your kitchen, while pretending to be Italian. This is more fun than almost anything. David Cameron has a bread-maker.

7. Self-Sufficiency. A pizza-topping can be constructed from many ingredients that you can grow in your garden. And if you get a buffalo, you’ll be almost entirely self-sufficient. Anyone know how to milk one of these?

August 3, 2010
7 Reasons foursquare And I Are Going To Have A Tricky Relationship

I have heard quite a bit about foursquare in recent weeks. Yesterday there was a piece in The Sunday Times about it. I read it. I didn’t understand it. This morning I signed up. Unfortunately, foursquare took this as a sign that I would like to be bullied. Bad move foursquare. You picked the wrong man on the wrong day. I was not in the mood.

1. foursquare Would Like To Connect To Your facebook Account. Yes, well Jonathan Lee wouldn’t. We’ve only just met and, quite frankly, I don’t trust you. You’re from New York. I’ve heard about what New Yorkers do with vital statistics and you’re certainly not doing the same to mine.

2. i) foursquare Would Like To Connect To Your twitter Account. Okay, you may do this on the basis that anything I put on twitter is public anyway. Now what? Oh, that’s nice, three of my twitter friends are already on foursquare. Or, as they are otherwise known, ‘three people I have never met’.

2. ii) foursquare Would Like To Add Your twitter Friends. Jonathan Lee wouldn’t. It’s one thing adding people you don’t know on twitter, quite another using an application that promotes stalking. If it’s all the same with you, I will remain foursquare friendless. You don’t recommend that? Yes, well I don’t recommend unicycling along a high-wire while kitted out in bondage gear, but we all have our differences don’t we?

3. foursquare Offers Rewards To Frequent ‘Checkers-in’. The rewards can range from ‘half-off’ drinks, to free admission to museums. Jonathan Lee is not impressed. If this relationship is going to work, you need to understand that I don’t consider having my drink halved as a ‘reward’. I consider it a mild-nuisance at best. And, at worst, tiresome.

4. foursquare iPhone App Would Like To Add Your Current Location. Jonathan Lee doesn’t. He is very happy doing some work at home without the whole of foursquare’s Jehovah Witness community knowing where he is.

5. foursquare Will Only Let You Become A Mayor If You Upload A Photo. Jonathan Lee tells you to shove your photo where the foursquare don’t shine. If Jonathan Lee wants to become a mayor without a photo, he bloody well will. And he doesn’t take kindly to some Yank telling him otherwise.

6. foursquare Recommends You Head Out And Earn Some Badges. Jonathan Lee likes collecting badges. Unfortunately, Jonathan Lee doesn’t like collecting badges if all he has to do is ‘check-in’ everytime he goes to Pizza Hut. Where is the challenge in that? At Cubs he had to jump over things and try not to burn things and look through a telescope at things and post melons through the old lady’s letterbox because she wouldn’t open the door. That was a challenge. Earning a badge for continuous checking-in at Pizza Hut is the kind of politically correct, everyone’s-a-winner, no-such-thing-as-losers, nanny-stated, liberalisation that Jonathan Lee deplores. And Pizza Hut is miles away.

7. foursquare Recommends The fiddme App. Jonathan Lee read the recommendation as the fiddle me app. He has now deleted it. Don’t waste my bloody time foursquare.

August 2, 2010
7 Reasons I Should Sue Disney

Disney might have a reputation for making child friendly animations, but each and every one of them gave me nightmares. And I can’t be alone. The animators did some bloody scary things when they were colouring in.

Nightmare 1. Snow White And The Seven Dwarves. The Queen in Snow White concocts a potion and turns into my then next-door neighbour. As a result of not being able to bring myself to go next door, Disney owe me £45.75. (Or 22 tennis balls, one football and three badminton shuttlecocks).

[youtube l9GJtM9lN-I Snow White – Queen Becomes The Witch]

Nightmare 2. Jungle Book. The slippery snake that is Kaa decides to make his eyes go all funny. Disney owe me two years worth of eyes as that is how long I spent not looking directly at people.

[youtube TRASn4tcXFE Jungle Book – Kaa Hypnotizes Mowgli]

Nightmare 3. The Little Mermaid. The ugliest creation ever. And she wanted to hurt Ariel. Disney owe me a £5000 Hackett voucher for the clothes I ruined using lesser quality soap powders. They only have themselves to blame. If they’d called her Daz…

[youtube LG8qwzUE1jE The Little Mermaid – Ursula The Witch]

Nightmare 4. Fantasia. The whole film was nightmare enough. How long did it last? Two weeks or something? This scene inparticular gave me the creeps though. Dancing broomsticks. Well, actually, not just dancing broomsticks. Dancing broomsticks and a haunting musical accompaniment. Disney owe me house cleaner.

[youtube R-7Qar1lFjo Fantasia – The Sorcerer’s Apprentice]

Nightmare 5. Lady And The Tramp. Not only did the siamese cats look scary, the bloody song made them terrifying. Disney owe me a pet.

[youtube TpPGE_SKtA4 Lady And The Tramp – Siamese Cats]

Nightmare 6. Dumbo. Elephants made out of bubbles. Need I say more. This is probably the single most scary act in any Disney film ever. Disney owe me 3000 litres of soapy water as this is how much I threw out instead of making bubbles from it. You know, just in case.

[youtube RJv2Mugm2RI Dumbo – Pink Elephants On Parade]

Nightmare 7. Bambi’s Mum Dies. Why? Why did this have to happen? What had Bambi’s mum done to the bastard who shot her? From the very moment I saw this – when cinema tickets cost about £1.90 – I was scarred. Disney owe me a deer. Called ‘Mother’.

[youtube -eHr-9_6hCg Bambi – Bambi’s Mum Dies]

July 30, 2010
7 Reasons To Keep Calm And Carry On

1. Decorum. Because a hubbub or a brouhaha would be unseemly.

2. Because You’re British. It’s what’s expected of you. It’s what comes naturally. Your reaction to an unforseen and potentially frightening event should be one of unflappable fortitude and apparent indifference. No flapping. Got that?

3. Consequences. If you should flap then someone with a plummy voice will be forced to administer a swift slap and command you to “pull yourself together”. That constitutes a scene. No one wants a scene.

4. Tradition. It’s what that formidable lady, Great Aunt Harriet, would have wanted. She kept calm, probably in a winceyette nightgown. I doubt there was much carrying on though.

5. Because It’s Relevant. It’s an iconic slogan that’s rooted deep in the past – though it was never actually used during World War II – but its message still holds good today. Why worry about that double-dip recession that you can’t do much to influence? Why worry about potential terrorist activity that you can’t stop? Why worry about the man peering over your shoulder as you read this? No, on second thoughts, do worry about him. He’s probably up to no good.

6. Because The French Do Neither. We keep calm and carry on. The French do not: They je ne sais quoi. On bicycles, probably.

7. Because You Are Told To. Your poster demands it of you; your greetings card demands it of you; your t-shirt demands it of you; your mug demands it of you; the coaster on which your mug sits demands it of you; your key ring demands it of you; your fridge magnet demands it of you; your shopping bag demands it of you; your deckchair demands it of you; your cuff-links demand it of you; your sticking-plasters demand it of you; your tea-towel demands it of you; your chocolate bar demands it of you; your flight-bag demands it of you; your apron demands it of you; your rug demands it of you. It’s bloody everywhere. Seriously, if one more person buys me anything else that says “Keep Calm And Carry On” on it, I won’t be held responsible for my actions. I will freak out and stop.

July 29, 2010
7 Reasons That the Summer 2010 Lakeland Catalogue is Amazing

The Lakeland summer 2010 catalogue only arrived at our house yesterday. I don’t know how I’ve survived the early part of the summer without it. It provides us all with a glimpse into the future. In fact, it’s amazing. Here are seven reasons why.

1. The Dishwasher Smellkiller. This amazing device kills dishwasher odours stone-dead. I’ve never used one before, so the inside of my dishwasher must stink to high-heaven. I’ve always foolishly assumed that the only way to remove smells effectively is to sterilise the cause of them. And the only device I have that’s capable of sterilising things on a large scale is my dishwasher. And I can’t very well put my dishwasher into that, can I? But now the people at Lakeland have solved the problem of pungent sterile environments with the dishwasher smellkiller. They’re amazing, they think of everything.

2. Improved: Fridge & Freezer Defroster. It’s not just a fridge and freezer defroster; it’s an improved fridge and freezer defroster! I feel like a caveman. This may surprise or appal you, but I’ve been defrosting my freezer by just turning the power off and wandering away from it. I must be backwards.

3. The Metallic Shelf Liner. Because nothing in your kitchen will say homely and wholesome more than lining your cupboards with a detailed industrial diamond plate metal texture. It’s what Mad Max would do. It’s repositionable too, enabling you to move it about within your cupboards, making it both stylish and fun.

4. The Three Pan Protectors. Sometimes, due to space issues, you may be forced to stack pans inside each other. With a heavy heart and nagging conscience, you’ll place a pan inside another pan, knowing, just knowing, the devastation that your reckless action may cause, but wait…just wait! The good people of Lakeland have the solution to all pan-damage. They will provide you with three machine washable pan protectors for only £4.99! And they don’t resemble sanitary towels in the slightest.

5. In The Bedroom. There comes a point, later in the catalogue, when the lettering changes to pink and the “in the bedroom” section begins. I must say, I felt a frisson of excitement when I saw this. Ah, at last, the bedroom. What wondrous, sensual gadgets do Lakeland have in store for the bedroom? The Lakeland goose-feather-erotic-tickler? The Lakeland hand-held telescopic five-way mirror? The Lakeland ambient cellulite-flattering nightlight? No. More unexpected than any of those things. Brace yourself. It’s the Lakeland padded trouser hanger.

It’s not a device for hanging your padded trousers on (I fervently hope). It’s a padded device for hanging your ordinary trousers on. Because they need insulating from the harsh, cold, metallic bars of the conventional trouser-hanger. Otherwise, what are we? Savages?

6. The Perfect Tear Kitchen Roll Holder. It’ll banish ‘unravelling roll syndrome’ from your kitchen forever. I know I feel relieved. The catalogue picture demonstrates how it works: You just tear off the metal knob at the top with one hand, and that will put a stop to the problem of kitchen-roll-unravelling. It’s a wonder of the modern age. There’s even testimony. Frances S of London has “…suggested it to many friends…” presumably before they attempted to drown themselves in their soup, but wait…Frances S isn’t the stupefying dullard that she might initially appear to be, as she goes on to reveal that, “…you really can tear off one sheet, while juggling pans, babies, cats or whatever else you need to deal with.” Wow! She’s awesome! Frances S is a cat-and-baby juggler. Who wouldn’t pay to see that? I wish they’d put a picture of that in.

7. The Over-Door Storage Rack. “Oh No!” I can hear you thinking. “He’s going to make fun of the over-door storage rack“. Not bloody likely. After all, the giant has one of those in his kitchen, as this lady discovered.

And that’s it. I’ve reached seven reasons. And I didn’t even get the chance to mention the castor cups which “stop unsightly dints” or the willow stair basket. I’ve left the pictures so that you may marvel at them both.

July 27, 2010