#0049. HALLOWEEN.

It's the paedophiles I feel sorry for.

There they are, minding their own, possibly tending to the puppies, when a gang of pre-teen kids wearing make-up on knock on their door and ask them for sweets.

I mean, what's a child molester to do?

#0048. THE SHOWER RADIO.

In my house, shower radios outnumber showers by a ratio of 4:1. From the moment I enter that front door, I am never more than six feet away from a waterproof FM transistor. And yet still my mother continues to bombard me with them. Taking into account birthdays and Christmases, she's averaged around one shower radio a year since the turn of the millennium.

Don't get me wrong, I like the radio. I even like listening to the radio while I'm in the shower. It's just that I've never felt the need to have the radio physically in the shower with me.

I tend to find that if I place an everyday land-based radio, say, somewhere else in the bathroom, and then turn that radio up, I find can hear it while I'm in the shower.

Amazing really.

#0047. T-SHIRTS WITH WRITING ACROSS THE WOTSITS.

All my life I've been conditioned to fight my natural instinct to gawp at the female wotsits. "Talk to the face, not the wotsits," they tell me. Which is absolutely fine. Even if it never feels truly natural.

Then they come out with these T-shirts with writing directly across the wotsits. Now I'm confused -- I want to read the pithy, potentially hilarious slogan (I'm a self-diagnosed 'read-o-phile'; I once read a paella box on the toilet) and yet it contravenes every social convention I know.

It's not fair. It's like women are inviting me to look at their wotsits so they can catch me doing it. I'll tell you what it is -- it's entrapment.

Well guess what -- from now on, I'm reading the slogan and I don't care who knows it. So lock up your wotsits ladies, there's a read-o-phile on the loose.

#0046. TALL GRANDMOTHERS.

If you do happen to have a tall grandmother, I've just got one thing to say: unlucky.

#0045. AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION.

Trust me -- you don't want to be standing between me and the exit during pantomime season. Because I will literally scratch a child's eyes out before I get up on that stage to perform the Macarena.

I don't give a shit who you are -- Puss in Boots, Dandini, Prince Charming -- if you come at me with that microphone and try to drag me up on stage, I'll drop you like a used condom.

And motherfucker, don't even think about trying the whole "Come on ladies and gentlemen, give him a bit of encouragement" bullshit.

Just know this: touch me one more time and -- panto or no panto -- I will bite your face.

#0044. CHRISTMAS PORNOGRAPHY.

Amazing but true -- it might only be the 17th October, but they're already rolling out the Christmas pornography. I swear it gets earlier every year.

There are three basic scenarios here -- 1. Father Christmas boning an elf (a woman with big tits wearing a green hat) 2. Father Christmas boning a reindeer (a woman with big tits wearing antlers) or 3. Father Christmas boning Mrs Christmas (pictured). I'm telling you, the way he goes at it, it's a wonder he ever gets any toys delivered.

I hate Christmas pornography. And I'll tell you why -- there's a part of my brain for sex, and there's a part of my brain for Christmas. My sex-brain thinks exclusively about getting freaky; my Christmas-brain thinks exclusively about playing board games with my nan and watching Toy Story.

Either I'm randy or I'm festive. I can't be both.

#0043. DAVINA McCALL'S GARNIER NUTRISSE ADVERTS.

"And it'll sort out you greys."

"You mean yours!"

(CHUCKLING) "Bye mum."

If you haven't seen these adverts, they largely involve TV's Davina McCall flouncing about a rough approximation of your typical celebrity home (half space station, half Ikea catalogue) blowing off to her mum about the state of her of hair.

I say 'mum'. We never actually see this 'mum'. She's either on the other end of the phone, or -- more worryingly -- just floating in the air, a disembodied voice, both everywhere and nowhere at the same time, always available to pass comment on the healing properties of Garnier Nutrisse.

Do you know what I think? I think Davina doesn't have a mum. I think Davina's gone mental, and the whole thing is a Norman Bates-style internal monologue between her and herself.

"I am still youthful and attractive, aren't I mum?"

"Yes dear."

"Thanks mum."

"That's OK dear."

"Oh by the way mum, I was thinking of bringing someone up to the house…"

#0042. THAT JOB FILE THEY'RE ALL KEEPING.

"We're sorry to inform you that your application has not been successful. We will, however, keep a copy of your application on file should a suitable position arise in future."

I'd like to see this 'file' they're keeping. Because from what I can gather, it consists pretty much entirely of half-arsed job applications from shitbrains and losers who didn't actually want the job in the first place. When is it that they're ever dipping into this little goldmine?

"OK, we need a new H.R. manager. Just take a quick look in the old file… Oh my god. Apparently this bloke turned up half an hour late for the interview in a pair of bikini bottoms, then touched himself for a bit and fell asleep. Let's get him in!"

#0041. DABBLING IN 'THE BROWN ARTS'.

Never take laxatives. In fact, never take any tablet that's advertised as altering the frequency with which you 'make toilet.' Because your stool cycle is like an office chair -- once you start fucking around with it, you can never get it back to how it was before.

First I took laxatives to make me go. Then I started going too much. So I took Imodium. Then I stopped going all together. For days. Days and days. So I took another laxative…

And so I unwittingly become drug-dependent -- hooked on an endless cycle of 'uppers' to get me started and 'downers' to make me stop again.

So the next time a seemingly nice man in a white coat offers you a harmless little pill to take all your cares away, just say no kids.

#0040. MY FACE, WHILE GAMING.

I am one of God's natural-born gamers. I love to game. I live to game. My hands in repose instinctively form into control pad-shaped claws. If I'm not sat at home gaming, I'm sat on a train gaming. I have a Nintendo Wii, a Nintendo GameCube, a Nintendo DS, a PlayStation2 and a PlayStation Portable. Oh, and a dance-mat. And there is nothing gay about that.

There's just one thing I hate about gaming: having to stare at my big fat stupid reflection in the computer screen. It wouldn't be so bad, but the human face isn't at its best when gaming. It's a unique kind of gormlessness -- an unsightly mix of concentration and fear.

Everyone has a 'Sports Face', a facial expression they only pull when engaged in sporting activity. My particularly Sports Face is most pronounced when playing table tennis. According to opponents, my face tightens into an angry, squinty knot, like the tied end of a red balloon.

But, you know, at least I don't have to spend an hour and a half on a train staring at it. So if you see a man on 8.47 from Northampton to London Euston, gaming his little heart out and wearing a balaclava, that'll be me.

#0039. EMERGENCY MUGS.

I have a very healthy stockpile of mugs (not that I'm boasting). But sometimes even eight matching polka-dot print Debenhams coffee cups (OK, maybe just a little) isn't enough. It's then that I have to break out my emergency mug.

I do so incredibly reluctantly. I will literally drink tea out of a wine glass before I use the Brian mug. Sometimes I'll go thirsty rather than use it. But it least I acknowledge its existence -- it's like my girlfriend hates it so much she refuses to even recognise its status as a mug. As far as she's concerned, if the Brian mug is the last mug in cupboard, the cupboard is empty.

But I can't throw it away. Because I know that the moment I do, I'll find myself at three in the morning, parched and marooned in the middle of the wash-cycle, drinking milk from a saucepan. If nothing else, the emergency mug can spare us such indignities.