In my day... people dressed the part

"Clothes maketh the man", according to Mark Twain. "Naked people", he pointed out, "have little or no influence on society."

And how right he was - not only in the sense that he might well have been describing the current 'Emperor's new clothes' scenario, in which the British public have collectively come to the horrible realization that the pompous, preening peacocks that we let control our lives for so long were in fact standing there tackle-out and impotent all along (I suggest you don’t dwell on that image for too long, unless you're in desperate need of an emetic), but also in the sense that the clobber people choose should give us damn good, instant indication of what type of cove is in our midst.

There is, of course, a school of thought that says one shouldn't judge people by their appearance, but, well… bollocks. Life's too short, and you've got to start somewhere, haven't you?

Which is why life was so much simpler when people dressed the part.

In the good old days a hulking great leather clad, shaven-headed bloke, muscled up to the nines and pierced and tattooed up to the eyeballs was more likely than not looking for trouble.

These days someone fitting that description is more likely to be looking for his boyfriend in the soft furnishing department at Laura Ashley.

And the two blokes strolling down the high street in light pastel polo shirts, designer strides and Italian loafers are probably a builder and his mate (that's mate in a strictly hetero-sexual, fry-up, pie 'n' mash, I'll have seven sugars in mine, love, you-don't-get-many-of-those-to-the-pound-darlin', hod-carrying, lager drinking sort of way, you understand).

What's wrong with a study pair of plaster splattered overalls, for heaven's sake?

In simpler times you could spot a teacher hoving into view from a good 500 hundred yards - the leather patches on the sleeves of the moth-eaten tweed jacket glinting in the watery sunlight and the cloud of chalk dust wafting up from the threadbare brown corduroys was a dead give away.

Now they're just as likely to have dreadlocks and tie-die t-shirts or sharp-cut suits and skinny ties. Staff common rooms must look like the green room at Glastonbury.

A rolled-up brolly, a shiny-arsed pinstripe and a neatly folded FT was the mark of a complete merchant banker - but suddenly they've all gone incognito. Thank God their collective penchant for either Barbours, mustard cords and burgundy v-necks, or designer rugby shirts with the collars turned up and a light cashmere sweater knotted coyly over the shoulders means we still know exactly where to direct our not inconsiderable ire.

I recently popped down the local high street to buy a paper. Or at least I thought I had. Barely a few strides around the corner and I thought I was nearing base camp on Everest.

Why on earth have middle-aged men decided to dress like mountain climbers? Hulking great boots, cargo pants and fleeces may well be the very thing for a hike through Nepal, but this is bloody Ealing for Christ's sake, and if little old ladies can successfully navigate their way to the newsagents without the need for a Sherpa, then I'm sure you can too.

Surely one of the joys of middle age is the marvelous realization that you're no longer burdened by the need to dress to impress. Forget 'explorer at Gap' - sling on your favourite tea-stained t-shirt and cardie and relax, for goodness sakes - then we'll all know where we stand.

Sartorially, it's all gone horribly wrong. Cricketers wear pyjamas, news readers lounge across desks like up-market hookers, film stars dress like students and students dress like their dads (because their peter-pan dads still insist on dressing like students).

Try this simple test - if your first thought on seeing a skateboard is, 'a plank on a roller skate? You could really do yourself a mischief on one of those', rather than, 'wow, that looks like a really fun way to get about', then three-quarter length shorts, t-shirts with witty slogans on, flip-flops, beads and bracelets aren't for you. Trust me.

So what are we to do?

As far as I can see, we have two options.

1. We get rid of all these dreadful designer shops that are trying to be all things to all men (and women) and leading us up the garden path (neatly disguised as a catwalk) and set up shops that are designated solely by profession. So there's an outlet where bankers can buy bowlers, one where fine artists can buy smocks and berets, one where piss-artists can buy piss-stained jeans and jumpers with permanently wet elbows, one where builders can buy ill fitting, low slung jeans, one where train drivers can buy caps, boiler suits and little red scarves to tie round their necks, and one where eccentrics can buy bright patterned suits, large fedoras, capes, cravats and silver topped canes.

Or…

2. We accept that all bets are off and use our imagination. Forget turning up for your middle-management marketing meeting dressed like a surfer. Dress like a penguin instead. Give up the urge to dress like Marlon Brando in The Wild One in a desperate attempt to recapture your youth and embrace Carmen Miranda as a role model. Then life really would be fun. The budget delivered by a man dressed as Darth Vader would bring a smile to everyone's face (and still create the essential sense of foreboding). And it would be hard to get angry with a traffic warden with a white face, a red nose, an orange wig and three feet long shoes (even though you'd expect the doors to fly off your car the moment you started the engine).

Shit, did I say Marlon Brando in the Wild One? That's me. Not to mention Jimmy Dean in Rebel without a Cause. Unless anyone's got a bowl of fruit to hand that I can balance on my head, maybe we're fine as we are…

In my day...

.... you only found mobile discos at church halls.

Seven thirty, every other Saturday night, a beige ford estate car would pull into the church car park, laden with everything a hormone ridden adolescent needed to guarantee an evening of ecstasy.

Well, almost everything.

It contained two record decks, a pair of wood effect speakers, a string of flashing Christmas tree lights, a glitter ball, a slide projector that threw blurred images from a lava lamp onto the peeling wall paper, a cardboard box full of the very latest 45s, and a bloke with a pageboy haircut, red glasses, a waistcoat, a cravat and a string of plastic love beads, who at weekends disappeared into a red phone-box as Ron, the timid jobbing electrician, and emerged as 'Rocking Ronnie - the demon of the decks'.

All that was needed now was a gaggle of girls and a bottle of cider, purchased from the offy by the one kid in the class who could grow a moustache, and the world was your oyster. Or your Vesta boil-in-the-bag curry, at least.

It was something to look forward to.

And now the glamour has all gone. Because now you find mobile discos absolutely everywhere.

You simply can't avoid having your ears assaulted by the bloody things. Just walk past any one of our charming English traffic jams and you'll hear what I mean.

In fact, you don't even need to walk past one. Stick you head out of the window now and I'll guarantee that you'll get the message. Delivered at about four hundred decibels.

And it's not just rap boys in jacked up Ford escorts that are determined to announce their presence by attempting to rattle your eyeballs out of their sockets. Now every bastard's at it.

If you ever wondered what an unholy jam session between Pavarotti, Abba, Frank Sinatra, Motorhead, Puff Daddy, Dizzee Rascal and Glen Cambell would sound like, simply seek out your nearest traffic queue.

Actually, don't waste your energy on the walk. Simply turn your radio up full and spin the tuner randomly, while banging repeatedly with a lump hammer on a saucepan placed over your head and you'll get the idea.

Don't get me wrong - I like music. All sorts of music. I just don't want it thrust down my lugholes with such ferocity that I end up spitting out all of my fillings, drenched in boiling blood, before I get to the tube station.

And if it's that ear-splitting on the outside, what the hell must it be like on the inside? How do these people stay alive? Why don't their bones vibrate to dust and leave a lifeless sack of organs clamped beneath the seat belt?

And how on earth can you drive with all that racket going on? Come to think of it, I know the answer to that one. Like an arsehole.

The truth is, none of them are actually playing music for their own enjoyment. They're saying, 'Look at me!.... Look at me!' See my nice car… hear how hip I am, or how classy I am, or how different I am…

Well guess what? We don't care. We don't give a shit if you idolize the latest crack addict who's managed to rhyme whore with bedroom floor. We don't care if you can hum every bar of Beethoven's fifth sodding symphony. We don’t give a toss if you can religiously recite some indie idol's dismal sixth form poetry. We're not impressed that you stubbornly reject modern trends and cling hopelessly to your old Led Zeppelin records. And we'd rather that you saved your sing-along to the sound track of Mama Mia for your pink tiled bathroom (as long as you don't live next door).

We just want to walk the streets in peace, listening to the birds sing.

And no, I don't mean Girls-a-bloody-loud.

In my day...

...men could carry suitcases.

And not just carry them.

They could lump them up high onto roof-racks, man-handle them into luggage compartments, and hump them up endless flights of stairs. They could stagger, a bulging leather receptacle full of Typhoo tea and knitted bathing costumes clamped in each hand, up and down road after road of serried ranks of Bournemouth boarding houses, searching for the elusive 'vacancies' sign with nary a whimper.

They would trudge across miles of hot sticky tarmac at obscure Spanish airports (no namby-pamby courtesy buses in those days, thank-you) with the entire family's luggage and buckets and spades grasped in their sweaty palms, whistling the top-ten tune of the day with gay abandon.

Not a whinge. Not a moan. Because they were men. And carrying suitcases was what men did.

But that was then. Nowadays, the average bloke seems unable to carry even his tiny little wallet with him unless it has wheels. And a big, girly extendable handle.

You see them everywhere, trundling their pathetic designer cases behind them, splattered with the blood from a hundred innocent shins that have been assaulted blithely along the way.

They mince along with their faceless, square little dogs snapping obediently at their heels, unable to lift anything heavier than a mobile - and even that's usually clamped in a belt holster and 'blue-toothed' up so they can blather away at the top of their voices to apparently no-one, like an terrifying invasion of care in the community lunatics. With slavering dogs.

They take up double the space on tubes and trains, and mean you've usually missed your stop by the time you've clambered over them, like a sad, injured and crestfallen contestant on an urban version of 'It's-a-Knockout'.

And what about the noise? The cacophony created by a coach load of tourists' puny plastic wheels clattering over London's hap-hazard paving stones (specifically laid with at least a centimeter height difference between each, so we can all still enjoy the old-English custom of tittering behind our hands as unsuspecting punters are sent sprawling in headlong, gurning Norman Wisdom-esque fashion) is enough to make you hack your ears off with a discarded Starbucks' plastic spoon.

And that's if the cheap little wheels are mercifully intact. When they're down to the bare metal it's like listening to dozens of Edward Scissorhands grimly sliding down a Matterhorn sized blackboard. Or Joe Pasquale getting kicked repeatedly in the nuts.

So what are the heavyweight essentials that have to be carted around these days that have suddenly made the humble carrying handle sadly redundant?

Has everyone taken up power lifting? Are they all carrying their money around in big gold bars instead of putting it in banks? I doubt it.

Looking inside any one of these offensive articles and all you probably find is a half-eaten sandwich, a banana and a copy of the FT. Hidden inside 'Razzle'.

It's not big (often small enough to slip into a proper man-sized pocket). And it's certainly not clever.

The only people, in the good old days, that were allowed wheels and handles, were air hostesses. Which made life easy.

These days, if you stroll up to someone and casually enquire if they fancy joining the mile-high club it's likely to be an accountant from Bromley.

And sex with them, I believe, is banned by law at ground level, let alone 35,000 feet.

So come on lads, do everyone a favour.

And get a grip.

Photos from flickr, by malias and gobbo 1000