Charles Nevin: The Third Leader

What happened to the simple life?

And then there's what you can buy. Complicated, isn't it? Did you see that Dixons are going to stop selling non-digital cameras? They don't do video recorders any more, either. You must remember videos. Big clumpy things the size of an old mobile phone. You used to rent them at Blockbusters, which is now losing money because everyone's paying to view. Meanwhile HMV are having to give lessons on downloading in their shops. And I still haven't mastered Nectar points. It would drive you to drink, if petrol wasn't so dear. Still, at least they're going to be open 24 hours.

But what are we going to talk about for 24 hours? There's quite a few long silences already, once we've disposed of this new fad for cold bitter, the Tottenham ayatollah's holiday at his mum's, and Kate Moss and Pete Doherty. Perhaps we could watch old videos.

And now I see that Peter Mandelson has put a trade block on Chinese pullovers, so it could be a cold winter. The Chinese, for their part, are importing British butlers. Marvellous. We've just had the annual warning about jellyfish invading Spain. And, in The Sun, an astronomer has revealed an outline of Victor Meldrew traced in the stars. No, I don't, either.