Excuse number one refers to the very technological marvel on which you are now reading these very words: as in, the PC started making funny noises last week. I took it into our local be-chipped sorcerer and explained the problem thus: "It's making a sort of grindy, groaning noise." He looked suitably impressed when I ventured that there was probably something wrong with the mainspring or the distributor cap. Or at least I think he was impressed, although that funny look on his face might’ve meant something else entirely, I mean, who's to know?

Anyway, he took it away and did something to it and it's working again. As we handed over the cash he did try to explain what the problem was, but I lost interest after he started getting technical using phrases like "The problem with your PC was.." and I stared out of the window, drooling quietly, until he gave up and finished.

Excuse number two refers to your dear Editor’s birthday. No names, no pack drill, no dates, but suffice to say, I’ve now reached an age some distance away from being a teenager. Unless I was a Galapagos-based turtle, which I’m not. To hint at my true age, let me just say that one of my kids gave me a homeopathic cure for arthritis as a birthday present. Next year, I’m expecting a follow up present of a really nice zimmer frame I’ve had my eye on for sometime.

Birthdays are always loaded with ceremony and this year was no exception: I’ve had my mojo chip surgically removed. This relatively painless operation follows on from a surgical intervention a mere decade ago that removed my dancing in public chip - much to the relief of my kids. In the intervening years my insistence on cutting a rug to the sounds of popular beat combos of the day has been quite properly confined to the hours of darkness and located some distance away from the easily embarrassed presence of my offspring. As to the mojo chip, its removal this year means that I’m no longer prey to public, and frankly, acutely embarrassing verbal expressions of the male libido.

Again, this selfless act on my part is mainly designed to spare my kids the toe-curling experience of imagining that someone of my advancing years actually thinks about you-know-what. The kids actually being forced to imagine that their parents actually, like, you know, did "it", is obviously far too stressful to even contemplate and we must therefore move swiftly on.

Suffice to say, I’m allowed to publicly voice appreciation for the comely features of someone like Maura Tierney off ER because, according to my son, she’s "like, really old", but vocalising similar sentiments about the scantily-dressed maidens who disport themselves in a quite frankly unnecessarily lascivious manner on MTV videos is completely out. I’m going to monitor the situation further over the coming years and if I start thinking Judith Chalmers looks really hot then further, more drastic action, might be required.

Housekeeping. If you can be arsed swivelling your eyeballs to your right, you’ll see that What Are You Like has been updated, with additions to the list of academic institutions that brain box JT readers attend or work at. Keep contributions coming.

Finally, my SO and our webmistress has sprung for a trip to Bruges at the end of this month as a birthday present, which is fuckin’ brilliant. We’ll be travelling via the ferry that departs Rosyth and the SO will have her camera at the ready to fire off some shots of the two bridges. If you’re living in Foreign and fancy a few photos of these utterly iconic structures, let us know and we’ll mail them off to you.

The publishers of The JT however cannot be held responsible for Foreign based readers perusing said photos, getting a really tight knot in the stomach and struggling to hold back the tears.

Meanwhile…

Son to SO: "Mum , I don’t think the PC’s better yet, I can still hear grindy , groaning noises."