In my day... it was safe to walk the streets

Having lustily devoured a fine roast topside and 3 with some freshly mixed Colman’s English, a giant slab of Yorkshire pud, and an apple crumble (with dollops of Mr. Bird’s finest) there was no better aid to gentle digestion of a Sunday afternoon than a gentle perambulation through the suburban byways. (The pubs, of course, were shut, and football was played at 3 o’clock on a Saturday, so a swift constitutional was the only viable alternative to trying to decipher the Norman Wisdom film on the goggle-box through a cacophony of multi-toned snoring).

And it was not only a mild concession to fitness, it was also a voyeurs paradise – tantalising insights into the human condition could be sneakily snatched every ten yards, from teenagers heavy petting on the sofa while dad dozed beneath the fluttering pages of the Sunday People, to Mr. Wilkins at No. 47 vigorously ironing in his corset and suspenders (if he wasn’t away polishing his woggle at scout camp). It beat ‘Play for Today’ into a jauntily cocked hat.

Nothing hindered one’s progress save a stray leaf from a recently trimmed privet, or a retired major (who would invariably offer a cheery salute) taking Monty the Lab for a spot of recreational squirrel chasing.

Pure pleasure. And a far cry from the absolute hell the poor pedestrian has to put up with today.

A few years ago, fed up with either the misery of being stuck behind a delivery truck or a very poorly parked Panda for half an hour, or having my arm ripped rudely from its sockets as I hung on bravely while the driver did his best Lewis Hamilton impression, I decided to give up the bus in favour of Shanks’s esteemed pony. More bloody fool me.

I’ve learnt to avoid the potholes and cracked paving slabs that are waiting for a budget that will never come, and lie in wait to send me arse over tip. I can just about negotiate the lumps, bumps, gullies and gutters created by hundreds of criss-crossing cable TV installations. I can skirt graciously round the coned off, litter-filled holes that mysteriously appear overnight. And I’ve developed a sixth sense that stops me sliding, banana-skin like, on pools of urban fox-shit, and giving the local builders their much anticipated morning slapstick comedy instalment. (If we’re going to have to live with these beasts in the city [that’s foxes, not builders, you understand], shouldn’t we make sure they get some fibre in their diet? They currently seem to survive on left over vindaloos, and consequently poo in odd coloured puddles).

But still, I seem to spend most of my journey walking in the road.

Sometimes because it’s simply impossible to climb over all the green, wine-bottle filled boxes, the white bags that pour plastic detritus all over the pavement, and the orange bags that spew garden waste into the gutter.

Sometimes it’s to avoid the black bags of rubbish that were carelessly put out after 6.30 am, and thus missed and left ‘til next week, or it’s to get past the piles of stinking household rubbish that have spewed from their bags, as they were carelessly missed by the catcher in the dust-bin men’s game of urban basketball.

Sometimes it’s to avoid the head-phoned half-wits who are too busy texting to look where they are going.

But mostly, it’s to avoid the bloody tank sized buggies.

Endless streams of marauding mothers and nattering nannies hurtle towards you, pushing things that Boudicca would have happily taken into battle. And worse still, they now have tiny outriders on little 3-wheeled scooters stationed at either side, to ensure that passing is all-but impossible. So we’re forced to leap for our lives, and take our chances with the traffic.

They career towards you, their faces and gilet swathed breasts puffed up with pride – mocking us singleton’s with an attitude that screams, ‘Bow before me, for I am fertile! These are the products of my loins, and we shall ride roughshod over all who dare to obstruct our journey!’

Well, do you know what? Mrs. there isn’t enough Guinness in the world that could make me find you yummy, mummy? I may well be on my way to the station all on my Jack Jones, but I have a couple off-spring of my own, thank-you. And they were brought up with a sight better manners than yours, it would seem, and a bit of respect for other people and their personal space.

Still, feeling somewhat guilty that when these boisterous little blighters grow up they’ll have to live with the terrible cock-up we’ve made of this once fine planet, I manage to bite my lip, and soldier on.

Until the silent assassin appears, that is.

One tiny step of the straight and narrow, and bang! they’ve hit you. Right up the bloody jacksy. Clattered into you on their bloody shiny new bikes.

When I asked one Star Wars helmeted, lycra clad idiot why he didn’t use the road, I was quickly informed, amongst a novel combination of expletives, that it was too bleedin’ busy. And dangerous to boot. Well pardon me. I’ll skip in and out of the 4x4s instead, mate, and leave you to complete your private Tour de France on a pedestrian free pavement.

Worse still, my fume-filled stroll back from Hangar Lane station now has to be completed backwards. I kid you not. Because business suited buffoons and orange vested workmen come hurtling up behind you at such lightning speed that any attempt to step aside and avoid overgrown hedges and discarded carrier bags of empty lager tins would result in permanent, painful injury. And being run over is one thing, but being run over by a cyclist is just plain embarrassing.

My cry of, ‘Get a f**king bell!’, is usually met with ‘Get f**king stuffed!’. So I fear drastic measures will have to be called for. It’s war.

Maybe a box of tacks, liberally sprinkled, 007 like, to puncture a tyre or too? A sturdy walking stick that could be wielded, Steed-like, and thrust between the spokes?

Surely no court in the land would convict you.

And it beats walking in the road.

In my day... people kept themselves to themselves

Decorum. Not a word you hear a lot of these days. You hear just about every other word in the dictionary, mind you. And many that are far too rude to be included. All at a volume that makes Brian Blessed sound like the world champion whisperer.


Sit in any cafe or bar, in the glorious days of yore, and you could while away many a long hour musing on what was going on inside your fellow imbibers’ heads.


Was the bloke with the moustache thinking about potting his petunias, or plotting to put Penelope behind the bar in a compromising position? Was the lady in the twin-set and pearls wondering when her secret lover would arrive, or wondering whether the bloke with the moustache might tickle her fancy?

Was the big bloke in the corner an out of work all-in wrestler, or sitting there grappling with his urge to wear chiffon and high heels and have his best friends call him Shirley?

We never knew...

But it was an innocently entertaining game, that could be played anywhere – on buses and trains, or while promenading down the pavement on your morning constitutional.

The world was your oyster, and full of mystery.

Now there’s no amusement to be had in a muse – because everyone seems to be gripped by an uncontrollable urge to divulge every sordid little detail of their (no longer) private life.

Just what is it about mobile phones that makes everyone else in the room suddenly disappear?

Listen....

I don’t want to know where the doctor put his finger when you had your medical. Or whether you enjoyed it. And I definitely don’t want to know if your friend takes up your generous suggestion to re-create the procedure later (I just hope he’s qualified). So please, next time, either settle for sending a text, or get a different bus.

I’m not interested in how much Columbian marching powder you need delivering for the weekend (though I might be if worked for Mr. Peel’s finest, which might be worth bearing in mind). And I don’t want to know how far Terry tried to go with Tracy at Tammy’s party (or whether the slag, as your best friend now seems to be affectionately known, let him).

I don’t want to know how much you need to borrow. Or what you’re having for dinner. Or what time you went to bed. Or with whom. I’m not in the slightest bit impressed by how much you earn. And I don’t want to wade through the sea of names you’ve just dropped when I leave the premises. I don’t care what time the getaway driver is supposed to turn up. And I don’t want to know how much you owe the revenue (even if that’s why you need to do the bank job). I don’t care how much you want to shag your wife’s sister (unless we’re related. God forbid). I don’t care if you’re pretending to be at a meeting so you can stay in the pub with Mary from accounts (who’s just told her best mate Sandy, by the way, while you were on the blower, that she’s stuck with an arsehole from the office and will try and get away by nine). And I don’t give a toss if Pete’s ‘disrespected you’ or what you’re going to do to him when you find him (though I must admit you’re ability to use ‘fuck’ as a verb, adverb, adjective and noun is fairly impressive). You clever little fucker.

I really, really don’t want to know any of this. At all. Because it’s none of my business.

I’ve got enough things of my own to worry about, thank you. Like when I’m ever going to find a bit of peace and quiet.

Oh for a return to polite society. When personal details stayed that way. When people understood that there was a proper time and place for everything.

And when people could spot the difference between ‘telephone’ and ‘megaphone’.

In my day... pubs were community centres.

When the boiler went on the blink, we didn't have to prize the yellow pages out from its invaluable role as a replacement bed-leg. We didn't have to trawl through thousands of pages of Google results listing every 'water system on-site service maintenance manager' from Aberdeen to Ashby-de-la-Zouch (who would no-doubt turn up sometime between 9 and 5, somewhere between Monday and Friday, if you asked nicely and paid through the nose. Or through PayPal). And we didn't have an anxiety attack because we couldn't find a suitable app on our i-phones.

We simply went down the boozer. And there, as sure as eggs is eggs (or egg-nog is egg-nog), standing at the bar enjoying a well earned restorative would be Mr. Pipe the Plumber. After enquiring about the health of his good lady, his offspring and his luck at the bookies, all one had to do was replenish his glass and a mutually beneficial arrangement could be reached in a trice. For cash. No questions asked.

Next to him would, likely as not, be the friendly local electrician, enjoying a foaming ale with a carpenter or two, an errant gardener, and a brickie or three. And a quick glance around the hostelry would reveal that all human life was there; the cab driver spending his tips, the road sweeper idling away the day until clocking-off time, the milkman trying to stay awake, and sober 'til tea-time, the worn-out mother sneaking a quick G&T before trudging back to the school gates, the retired schoolmaster knocking off the times cryptic, the odd business man knocking-off his secretary. And best of all, everyone knew each other. (Let's just hope no-one knew the business man's wife).

That was the joy of a local. And there used to be one on every high-street. Which is why they were so aptly named.

These days, where once there was a haven where problems could be solved, where the world could be put to rights, where trade could be bartered, and where genuine human interaction could take place, there's now more likely to be a coffee shop where wi-fi internet action can take place, and where everyone can jabber incessantly into mobile phones, instead of actually talking to each other.

Or your local may have been converted into designer flats, for people who are too busy to spend time with their other halves, let alone their friends and neighbours.

Or it might have become a florist. Or an antique emporium. Or a holistic bloody health centre.

Or, worst of all, it may have been taken over by a thinks-he's-a-celebrity chef or an entrepreneurial chain who know more about how we like to conduct our social lives than we do.

We don't want a quick, affordable pint or two and a chat to our mates, you see. Oh no, we want cloudy designer lagers with an alcohol strength that could floor Desperate Dan, and a selection of wines from every corner of the world, whose prices comfortably exceed their vintage. ('I'd recommend the £20.09 Chardonnay Madame. Really? Is that for a large glass or small?)

Blokes don't want to stand at the bar and chew the fat (that's pork scratchings to you) with their cronies and the friendly landlord - we'd much prefer to sit and discuss the football at sanded down refectory tables with fat candles belching acrid smoke and impossibly tiny vases of flowers between us.

We don't want to have a genial conversation. We want to bellow at the top of our voices over the cds chosen by the horribly hip bar staff, who are at least 25 years younger than any of the clientele.

We want to have to stand in the gangway trying not to look at the couple indulging in heavy petting on the carefully distressed leather sofa, because we're too embarrassed to sit opposite. (That's the sofa underneath the shelf of bought-by-the-yard antique books, not the one under the shelf of bought-by-the-yard interesting artifacts and ironically witty enamel signs, you understand).

And we don't want a snack; we want a four star, four course meal, that we have to order by contorting our bodies into impossible, slipped-disc inducing shapes to read the scrawled blackboards propped artfully around the room. And we want it served on breadboards. By Thai girls. Or surly but sultry Latvians.

And we don't want places that are open to everyone, of every class and creed. We want places for people like us. People who appreciate soft lighting and fine wines, and want to enjoy their Beluga Bellinis and chilled Martinis in peace.

So up with the 'no work clothes' signs and the 'smart dress only signs'. And up with the prices. That should keep the riff-raff out.

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... all you needed was a quiet day in bed.

We all get a touch of the vapours every now and again.

A day when everything goes just a little bit wobbly. When the rat race seems like a marathon too far, and you realise that you haven't got the stamina of an Ethiopian.

When you gingerly (or blondly, or brunettely, or mousily, or baldly) half open an eye then clamp it back shut at the sheer horror of it all.

When the thought of having to mix, one more time, with the mass of paranoid humanity that lurks outside your front door fills you with unbearable nausea and the nagging feeling that venturing into the world today will surely end in tears. Probably with your name in the headlines. And possibly a lengthy jail sentence.

When life, frankly, just seems too bloody difficult.

You're not actually ill, of course. You don't need a doctor, or a therapist, or an emergency reiki practitioner. And it's not finally time to do the decent thing and press the trusty service revolver in the desk drawer into action.

You just need a rest. A bit of a lie down. Some nice peace and quiet.

Some bloody chance.

If you haven't been kept awake all night by copulating urban foxes doing their spookily accurate impression of a small child being tortured, or jolted into twitching consciousness by next door's departing dinner guests playing Colonel Bogey on their car horn as they prepare to wend their Blue Nun enlivened way home, you've got it all to come.

Believe me.

I don't mind birds, really I don't. But in the old days I'm sure they whistled tunes. Now all they seem to do is impressions of mobile phones. 'Listen! I think I just heard the first Nokia of spring…or is it an early summer Samsung?' The same four notes over and over, and over again, without the merciful release of a message service kicking in to shut the irritating sod up. And once a tiding of magpies gets going you'd swear there were terrorists on your roof top unleashing round after round from their AK 47s. I wish I had one.

And postmen now moonlight as skip delivery drivers. I know this, because they patently deliver their skips before they start their day (or shall we say morning) jobs

The sound of a ton of rusty iron being dropped onto concrete from six feet at six in the morning takes some beating as an alarm call. You can't exactly ignore it. Before you realize it you've leaped out of bed, hidden the wife and kids under the stairs and painted the windows white, fearing another Hiroshima.

And paper boys need oiling. They never used to squeak. But that was before papers came with 17 different sections and the poor sods had to resort to industrial trolleys to avoid forever walking like the hunchback of Notre dame.

And maybe I've led a sheltered life, but though there are lots of things I've contemplated doing at seven in the morning (they can't arrest you for contemplation yet, can they? Can they?) erecting a shed isn't one of them. Surely you have to build up to that sort of thing. Have a bit of breakfast. And a cup of tea. Do some sketches and calculations on the back of an envelope. Hang around a DIY shop rubbing your chin and wielding an extendable tape measure. Have another cup of tea.

You certainly don't start hammering, willy nilly, at 7 in the morning.

Unless, of course you're trying to compete with the builders who have already started at half a dozen of the other houses in the street, knocking up loft extensions, conservatories and bloody garden pagodas, whilst having to bellow at each other in Polish to get above the din being created by the music played by the DJ on 'radio halfwit', who's inane twitterings are going to echo round your room for the next 8 hours.

Still, it's probably best that you're awake. Because your mobile's going to ping with texts from Nigerians looking for someone to help them bank their inheritance, and calls from people wanting to know if you're happy with your gas supplier.

As if anyone could ever be happy with a gas supplier.

The door bell will ring, and outside there'll be a man with a large, exciting looking package. But it won't be for you. It's always for the people 2 doors down that you've never met.

The postman will come about eleven and ask you to sign for a letter. That won't be for you either. And he won't apologise for the skip.

A bloke will come to check your meter. Ten minutes after you've been offered your third copy of 'Watchtower'. A small child wearing a homemade, mis-spelt 'official' laminated badge will call round to sell you dusters. School children will use your wall for football training, while their mates blabber incessantly on their mobiles. And a breakdown truck will stop right outside your house and flash orange disco lights in your bedroom for a good two hours.

A lorry will reverse down the entire length of your street time after time, bleeping like a heart monitor attached to a fading, spluttering patient.

The council, who haven't done any work in your street in living memory, will send someone round to lift the paving slabs in front of your house. Then put them back with a rubber lump hammer. While two blokes from a TV cable company holler at each other from either end of the street while they play tug-of-war with an unfeasibly long piece of green tubing.

Some greaseball will decide it's a good day to adjust the exhaust on his motorbike, and test drive it round the block. And everyone will blow their horns at him.

The kids will come home, go off in a sulk, slam their bedroom doors and belt out music that makes your teeth rattle to avoid the horrors of actual conversation with their parents.

And the wife will have a go at you for malingering.

Still, it beats working.

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