I must be mellowing, though, because when I saw the new 118118 advert featuring Ray Parker Jr I actually laughed at one point. I know full well that it’s going to get irritating in no time but for now I’ll just recall the “I ain’t afraid of no goats” and chuckle.

That is all.

I’m hoping that even as I type, in innumerable garden sheds and workshops across the country, that most British of characters - the boffin - is busy at work, trying to harness the energy generated by Moral Outrage. Good chaps. Once this has been harness our energy problems will be over and given that the instigation of the outrages - with the obvious exception of Jeremy Clarkson - leave a comparatively light carbon footprint, global warming should soon be a thing of the past too.

Recent weeks have proven that the Knee Jerk Reactor (as it’ll bound to be called) is capable of using historical catalysts and this is excellent news. As long as the media is sensible enough to regulate the flow of outrage, the UK will be free of dependency on fossil fuels in no time.

Incidentally, I was fortunate enough to have BBC Breakfast on yesterday morning when they accidentally played the un-bleeped version of Christian Bale’s rant. Laugh? I almost wet myself. Not at the clip - droll as it was - but, rather, at the facial expressions of the two presenters at the first un-bleeped “fucking”. It occurred to be that the word they were most likely to be hearing in their earpieces at that time was “fuck”.

To get back on track, though, you’re probably wondering how we’re going to become fossil fuel-free as long as there are vehicles to be moved. Fear not, eager students, for I have also solved that issue.

The answer is, of course, to encourage bad driving. That shouldn’t be difficult at all. A variant of the KJR - the Road Rage Reactor - will be installed in all cars and will feed off every driver’s “I don’t believe what that idiot just did” to keep the roads flowing. Drivers of commercial vehicles will be required by law to overtake only on long, uphill stretches of dual carriageway, fake speed cameras will be installed to rile those who believe that speed limits are optional and the use of indicators is to be punishable by radishing (or “rhaphanidosis” if you want to be pedantic). Pedants, in fact, will be positively encouraged thanks to their our gift of irritation.

Unfortunately the media will, as a result, have to target all its output at the lowest common denominator. Fortunately that’s not going to require much of change in most cases.

I accept that there remains the minor issue of creating the first viable KJR but I’ve done the hard bit. It over to you now, boffins. Carry on.

Sine 7th January (I just checked) there’s been a steady stream of shite arriving from companies and websites as diverse as Hilton Hotels, seetickets.com, Canon, Phillips and Jimi, all mentioning the dreaded V word. I know only too well that it’s going to get worse for the next seven days.

What a load of commercialised pap. It’s that bloody Chaucer’s fault, apparently. I could rant on (and on) but find that even-star has already covered all the salient points.

Load of crap.

“It’s not another concrete monstrosity, is it?”

“No, no. Come on.”

I was led out to the area of undergrowth which is the current area of tidying up to find a clutch of eggs. Eleven of them, in fact, which had been hidden away from view under a tangle of goodness knows what.

By the size, they’re far too large to have come from the moorhen which took temporary residence back in 2006 (and Maurice was male, to boot) so I can only assume that they were a gift from the female mallard who spent a week or so in the garden last summer, having been bullied away from the nearby duckpond - or so I’d thought at the time.

There’s still of lot of clearing left to be done, so who knows what hidden treasure remains to be unearthed …