Rule the World

No. 016: Insects

2005-07-11T00:10:00.000Z

When I rule the world: we'll have an insect census, and possibly organise some species-wide wipe-outs.

I've made no secret of the fact that I sometimes think [insert deity name of choice] dropped the ball when it came to planning the world - my plans for organising the world's weather are far superior to what we currently have in place. And while I can fully appreciate the whole zen 'a butterfly flapping its wings in the Amazon causes a tsunami in the South Pacific' view of the world, I just don't understand why we have some insects.

Bees, I can understand. They flit from flower to flower, gaily pollenating, and as a pleasant side-effect we get to eat honey. No complaints about that. And spiders, I'm OK with. Obviously, I don't want them crawling on me, and I'm not sure why some of them need to be big and/or poisonous, but they eat flies, so good on them. You'll never catch me killing a spider if it makes the mistake of straying into my living room - I catch it in a glass and set it free outside.

But can anybody suggest a reason for mosquitoes? They just bite people, making them itchy, miserable, or dead. What good do they do? And flies? Yes, they provide a valuable spider food source, but what else are they here for? They spread disease. They're not good.

And don't get me started on cockroaches. Nothing fills me with more horror than the sight of a cockroach. I managed to avoid them altogether until a couple of years ago, when we were holidaying just north of Durban - prime roach country. I'd innocently turn on the bedroom light in the evening and be confronted with a scary prehistoric-looking creepy-crawly, scuttling at me. And they're invincible. It's a well-known fact that scientists predict cockroaches would survive nuclear fallout. They definitely survive flyspray. I'd empty half a tin of Black Flag into the bedroom atmosphere and shut the door, but I'd never find a dead cockroach as a result. Either they stagger away and die elsewhere, or they just laugh dismissively, make rude gestures with their cockroachy hands, and scuttle off to cause fear and loathing elsewhere. My lungs suffer, the stress probably reduces my life, the flyspray helps further erode the ozone layer, but the cockroaches are undaunted.

Why do we have cockroaches? Why?

Regular readers will remember we live in the country. In the summer, our cottage seems to be Bug Central. We came home yesterday afternoon after a weekend away, and as the sun was shining and the temperature was mild we opened all the windows. And promptly shut them again, as some random little insects decided to move in with 10 million of their closest friends. I don't even know what these bugs are: they're tiny (about the size of a Times New Roman 10point letter 'l', if you want to be precise), they don't seem to fly but can cling to the ceiling, and they really want to be wherever I am. So I did what any normal person would: shut the windows and break out the flyspray. I then spent the rest of the evening vacuuming up bug corpses, and in bug circles I'm probably akin to Hitler.

What were those weird little bugs? Why must they persecute me? When I'm in charge they're going to have to plead their cause or accept that their time on earth is over.

No. 015: Supermarkets

2005-05-26T00:28:00.000Z

When I rule the world: going to the supermarket won't be such a chore.

I don't hate supermarket shopping, but when it's really crowded, and the shelves haven't been stocked well, and there's a huge queue at the checkout, I can get a little antsy about the whole experience. Add a trolley with a wonky wheel into the mix and I can easily lose my sense of humour entirely.

However, supermarket shopping will continue to be a necessary evil (until Monkey and I can make our fortune and afford to hire a nice retired couple to tend a vegetable patch, milk a cow, cure bacon, and bake bread for us). I'm pretty OK with the fact that my 'To The Manor Born' lifestyle may still be a fair way off, so in the meantime - and to make life better for everybody else forced to go to the supermarket - I propose a few changes.

Try Before You Buy - to make sure the grapes aren't sour. Sure, a lot of people do this anyway, but it's technically stealing. And besides, I'd also like to try things like bananas before I buy them - oh, and apples! I hate buying apples that look crunchy from the outside, but turn out to be a big mushy disappointment. Friendly assistants will be on hand to manage the food-testing procedure, so freeloaders don't just turn up and eat their three square meals a day in the Produce aisles. We might need to offer this service in the Biscuits aisle as well, because nothing sucks the big kumara more than risking it all on a new brand of cookie, only to find it's more floury than chewy. And at the Deli counter, because who can recognise the best ham just by sight? This would also be a great service in the Wine aisle.

Steerable Trolleys - because trolley rage is a serious problem in today's supermarkets. Why do so many trolleys have wonky wheels? At the supermarket last week I had a trolley which had a permanent left turn thing going on. I didn't realise quite how bad it was until I'd made it past the Produce aisles and already had a few goodies in my trolley, so it was too late to go back for a swap (or, I couldn't be bothered). By the end of the shop I was so sick of the crappy trolley that, when my shopping accidentally set off the shoplifting sensor as I left, I nearly ran the security guard over with the trolley and fled the scene. When I'm in charge special trolley mechanics will operate an ongoing trolley service programme. And trolleys will all have the handy customised partitions to hold bottles of wine and bunches of flowers.

Spam Removal - because who buys that shit? I've never seen anybody with a can of Spam in their trolley. I'm starting to suspect that Spam is a cover for some illicit drug smuggling enterprise taking place in supermarkets worldwide. I don't want that kind of caper at my supermarkets. That Spam is just taking up space that could be filled with exotic chocolates from foreign lands.

Grocery Packing - because, frighteningly, this isn't an automatic service. In New Zealand most supermarkets will pack your stuff for you, and in South Africa you often get teams of packers working on your shopping, but in here England it's almost unheard-of. Sure, they'll occasionally ask you if you want help with your packing, but they do it with such an obvious 'you pathetic fool who will muck up the simple task of packing' tone to their voices that most people feel too intimidated to say yes, and instead chirpily say they can manage it themselves. But there's a certain skill to efficiently packing a supermarket bag. I didn't have the kind of parents who believe that teenagers must suffer through undignified weekend jobs, and so I didn't do a tour of duty at a supermarket, and now I'm a bad packer. Monkey and I pack like we've never been to the supermarket before. Monkey has a bad habit of putting things like flyspray in the same bag as fresh bread, whereas I try to keep all my grocery categories separate and end up with a big packing backlog because I'm waiting for a block of cheese to make my dairy bag complete. A guaranteed packer would relieve us of a lot of stress.

Traffic Flow - because you've always got some fool who does their shopping all backwards, and is forever crashing into you around corners. Of course, it would be easier if supermarkets were designed a little better. Frozen stuff should ALWAYS come last! And ideally fruit and vegetables would come second-to-last, as there's no sense in putting strawberries in your trolley at the beginning of the shopping trip, only to have them squashed into jam after you accidentally hurl a tin of baked beans onto them a few aisles later.

Off-peak Bonuses - because supermarkets get too busy in the weekends (in England, anyway). Supermarkets have to restock in the wee small hours, and a lot of places now capitalise on this by having a couple of check-out chicks at work and catering to the shift work crowd, but I think they could incentivise people to shop at anti-social hours - perhaps with a 10% discount on their bill? This would help thin the crowds on Saturday mornings.

Child Wrangling - because other people's children are a nightmare at the supermarket. In fact, I'm sure a lot of mothers would admit their own kids are horrible to deal with at the supermarket as well. The solution? Free supermarket creches, so the little horrors are kept occupied while their parents get the shopping done, thus saving the world from tantrums in the Ice Cream aisle. Childless people will definitely spend more time shopping if they don't get exposed to children at the supermarket, and so the creches will pay for themselves.

Treat Management - because supermarkets make it difficult for us to be good. No more chocolate at the check-outs! You'll have to ask somebody for it. This person will be the Chocolate Manager (also responsible for Ice Cream and Chips), and they'll want to see what else you're buying before they fetch you a Snickers. If your trolley's full of pizza and beer then they might send you back to the Produce aisle for some carrots or something, to balance things out.

Background Music - because I'm enjoying my shopping a great deal more now I wear my iPod around the aisles. Trust me, it's hilarious to have Gwen Stefani singing 'this shit is BANANAS! B-A-N-A-N-A-S!' whilst actually buying bananas! The irony! Ha!

Better Lighting - because some single people still like to think they could meet their One True Love whilst reaching for the chicken breasts. And because the rest of us don't relish catching a haggard, strip-lit glimpse of ourselves in the background Ham mirrors at the Deli Counter.

And - obviously - there will be no mushrooms for sale. If you want to buy weird shit like that you'll have to make your own arrangements.

No. 014: Fashion Magazines

2005-05-17T16:33:00.000Z

When I rule the world: I'll sort out fashion magazines.

I like fashion, and I like pretty pictures. However, I'm sick of seeing photos of twig-like 15 year olds, posed in clothes I'm supposed to want. I'm fed up with reading an article about skincare, only featuring products the magazine's been paid to reference, illustrated by a photo of an impossibly airbrushed tweenie. I'm bored with articles which idolise vapid actresses and stupid socialites, merely because they look good in a designer frock.

So I will keep the magazines, but I'll put the models out to pasture. If the clothes don't look good on real people, they won't get photographed. Every month the fashion editors will spend a day on the street, recruiting normal women for a day of modelling. Top make-up artists and hairstylists will make them look the best they can, and then great photographers will shoot them. The resulting photos won't be airbrushed, and the rest of us will be able to look at them and say, 'wow, those clothes look nice on real people! Cool!'

The models will be diverse. Some might - gasp! - have unshaved legs! Some will be tiny, and some will be fat. They could even have grey hair, and wrinkles. They will get to keep the clothes they are photographed wearing.

Fashion magazines have always claimed their models are so skinny because the designers only send them sample clothes in tiny sizes, but this bullshit won't work when I'm in charge. After all, they don't make the models squeeze their size nine feet into size two shoes, do they? If the designer isn't prepared to dress proper-sized women of all dimensions, they won't get any publicity.

And I'll remove the influence beauty companies have on the content. Beauty companies will be welcome to send free products to the magazines, but they'll have to send enough for free samples to be sent to lots of readers, who will then submit no-holds-barred product reviews. Nice photos of real women will be used to illustrate the eventual articles. Stupid and pointless products like moisturising underarm deodorant will not be given any attention. Who cares about the moisture content of underarm skin? Women have to stop being made to feel like they must spend life freaking out about random body parts.

And fashion magazines will be a little less serious and earnest. There are more important things in life than what skirt length is in vogue, and it would be nice if magazines would acknowledge that women are interested in other things as well. They could start by looking for advertising revenue from other things, like cars and banking, since women do actually spend money on these things as well. The magazines could even feature interviews with women who have done more than act in a romantic comedy! Imagine!

No. 013: Mushrooms

2005-05-16T22:02:00.000Z

When I rule the world: you're going to have to lose your taste for mushrooms.

There are two things I won't eat - seafood and mushrooms. Seafood, I regret not liking. It used to disagree with me when I was young, and so I've grown up without a taste for it. I always have a vague plan to start eating it, because I'm fully aware of the great health benefits associated with fish.

However, mushrooms are the Devil's own vegetable. They're fungus! They grow on manure! It's just to normal to want to eat them.

The smell of mushrooms cooking will send me running from a house, hand clasped over my mouth, bile rising in my throat. And if you sit next to me in a restaurant and order a smelly mushroom dish I may turn green. I'll certainly lose all affection for you. At the tender age of eight I developed a mild dislike for my maternal grandmother when she forced me to drink mushroom soup. She's been dead a few years now, but the memory of the soup lingers.

And people who think they can sneak mushrooms into pasta dishes or whatever without me noticing are in for nasty shock. I've been forced to live in constant danger, always scared that I'll go to dinner at a friend's house and be fed a mushroom-heavy dish. When I eat out and order anything more complicated than cornflakes I check it's mushroom-free. If I'm told mushrooms do feature, I request they're left out of the dish. If the meal arrives in front of me with mushrooms still in situ, I send it back. There will be no public mushroom consumption.

When I'm in charge eating mushrooms will be as socially unacceptable as ... I don't know ... picking your nose and eating it. You'll still be able to eat mushrooms, but you'll have to eat them in the privacy of your own home. You'll also need to ensure you have a seven-day mushroom-free period before I come around for a visit, so that horrid mushroomy smell is aired out of your curtains.

No. 012: Toilet Paper

2005-05-16T10:40:00.000Z

When I rule the world: all toilet paper will be two-ply. Three-ply toilet paper is wasteful and extravagant, and one-ply toilet paper is inadequate. I will immediately ban that horrible shiny one-ply toilet paper favoured in public bathrooms.

Ideally, toilet paper will be white. I don't understand the need for coloured or patterned paper - it is, after all, just something to wipe your bottom with. Consumers will be encouraged to save the price difference between white paper and fancy paper, and invest the money in books to read whilst on the toilet.

People who use the last of a toilet roll and fail to replace it will be severely punished. Is there anything more annoying? I think not. Even in somebody else's bathroom it should not be beyond the wit of man to have a quick look in the cupboards and find a new roll. Failure to do so shows a highly inconsiderate attitude towards your fellow toilet-users, who may not notice the lack of paper until they're in desperate need of it. And besides, looking for a replacement roll in your friends’ bathroom cupboards gives you an excellent opportunity to uncover their secret stash of pile ointment and facial hair bleach.

People who start a new roll without actually putting it on the holder will not be tolerated. This smacks of simple laziness. You're sitting there anyway, so how difficult is it to put the new roll on the holder and throw away the cardboard insert from the old roll?

Toilet paper will be universally hung so the end is over the roll, instead of under. This is clearly the correct toilet paper-hanging method, as practiced by all good hotels. Folding the end of the roll into a tidy point will be optional.

(And a mildly related point: a strict shut door policy will be encouraged for toilet visits. There is such a thing as too much sharing, you know.)

No. 011: Gym Etiquette

2005-05-14T17:53:00.000Z

When I rule the world: standards of gym behaviour will be strictly enforced.

Don't get me wrong - it's great that people go to the gym at all. Regular exercise keeps us healthy, helps control weight, does wonders for our mood, and is a great way to maintain good bone density, thus preventing us from breaking our hips when we're old. However, some people don't seem to know how to behave in a gym, or in a communal changing area. To help these people I will widely circulate the following guidelines.

Wipe down gym equipment after you've used it. Nobody wants to sit in a puddle of your sweat, or grasp handles slick with your sweatiness. Always take a gym towel with you, and enthusiastically use it whenever you get off a machine. If you haven't left any sweat you probably didn't work hard enough, so get back on and do another set of ten.

Concentrate on what you're doing. People who go to the gym and then spend the time hardly moving on a stationary bike whilst chatting loudly to a nearby friend are very distracting. And if you can hold a constant conversation you're not going fast enough, so get those legs moving until you're out of breath.

Don't lift weights too heavy for you. It makes the rest of the gym anxious that a vein will burst open in your forehead. And if you have to dramatically drop the dumb-bell to the ground with a resounding thump at the end of your reps, it's definitely too heavy. The crashing noise disturbs people. You run the risk of an edgy person like Monkey having an ugly 'Nam-like flashback and attacking you. It's not worth it.

Don't wear make-up at the gym. It's not a pick-up joint, and if you don't look sweaty and crappy by the end of it - you guessed it - you haven't worked hard enough.

Dress appropriately. Men who sweat a lot should not wear vest tops, as the sweat will splatter on nearby people and make them throw up. Jiggly women should not wear lycra. Apparently some gym instructors have a saying: 'Lycra is a right, not a privilege'.

Don't take the 'calories used' readouts too literally. The cross-trainer may swear that you've just used 500 calories, but that doesn't mean you now have free reign to scoff a big pizza. I once read that a high proportion of people who start exercising to lose weight actually end up gaining it, because they overestimate how many calories they've burned, and underestimate how many calories they eat.

Don't spend twenty minutes in the gym, twenty minutes stretching, and twenty minutes in the sauna, and then complain in the changing rooms that you never lose weight, and then go to the cafe and have a big fat muffin. It just annoys people and makes them think you're stupid.

In the pool, choose a lane where other people are swimming the same stroke as you. Don't jump in with a fast freestyler like Monkey and then begin a sedate dry-haired breaststroke, without waiting for him to finish a length and realise you're in there with him. He'll swim in to you and hurt you if he doesn't see you in time. If he does see you, he'll accidentally-on-purpose try to splash you and ruin your 'do.

In a yoga class, don't get there early and then sit around, having a loud and boring conversation with your friend. Most people get to yoga early so they can chill in the corpse pose, getting themselves ready for Downward Dog and Plough. They want to relax. Your voice is nasal and whiny, and not relaxing. And beware that, when I rule the world, people who leave a yoga class before the end, thus interrupting the final relaxation, will be banned from all future classes.

If you're a gym instructor, try to look fit. I did a Bodypump class recently, and the instructor was very jiggly and a dreadful advertisement for the class - I was in better shape than her, and I'm no Linda Hamilton. Gym instructors should also endeavour not to fool people into thinking they've somehow 'earned' treats by attending. The aforementioned instructor spent the whole class using such quasi-motivational phrases as 'two more sets and you can have that curry tonight', and 'think about all the chocolate you're going to eat', despite the fact that Bodypump is unaerobic and so doesn't burn the same kind of calories as, say, a Spinning class. She was also a complete geek, telling us to imagine sitting on Pierce Brosnon's knee when doing squats. I prefer my Secret Celebrity Boyfriends to be a little less wrinkly.

After a shower or a swim, dry yourself in the designated area instead of padding wetly to your locker and turning the changing room into a swamp. Wet socks annoy people and make them hate you.

You don't have to get dressed under a towel, but try to limit gratuitous nudity. It's one thing to rub a bit of body lotion on your shins while half-naked, but it's quite another to sit, nude, for half an hour, liberally anointing yourself with Johnson and Johnson's finest. At least put your knickers on. And there's seldom any reason to stand buck-naked in front of a communal mirror and apply make-up.

Speaking of make-up, be mindful of the fact that several other people want to use that mirror as well. Try to cut your cosmetic routine down a bit. If you need forty different products to sculpt, bronze and highlight your face into submission, you may have issues beyond the scope of this manifesto.

Save some grooming for your own bathroom. Plucking one stray eyebrow hair? Fine. Squeezing spots, taming unruly whiskers, or attempting surgery on ingrown nasties in your bikini area? A little unsavoury.

Of course, in my world gym instructors will be helpful and friendly, gyms won't be populated by muscle-bound freaks hogging the hand weights, and changing rooms will be purged of perky women with envy-inducing fabulous bodies.

No. 010: Mouth Breathing

2005-05-03T17:18:00.000Z

When I rule the world: mouth breathing will be outlawed.

Man, if there's one thing I hate it's mouth breathing. I hate the sound of people breathing through their mouths, and I will do everything in my power to one day help mouth breathers breathe through their noses, like normal people.

Why is your nose there, if not to breathe through? It's not just there to prop up your sunglasses. Mouths are busy. They have to talk, and eat, and speak, and kiss. When you kiss a mouth breather they won't smooch for long before thinking they're suffocating and breaking away. Mouth breathing kills the moment.

There are actual medical reasons why people should break their mouth breathing habit, and also several reasons that just make sense to me:

Oxygen absorption is lower when you're a mouth breather. That can't be good.

Mouth breathing increases the likelihood of loud snoring, irregular breathing, and serious conditions like Sleep Apnea and heart conditions. Most of those are bad for you. Snoring is very bad for you if you snore so much that your hapless spouse one day puts a pillow over your head and presses hard.

Mouth breathing freaks the brain out, tricking it into thinking that carbon dioxide is being lost too quickly. Nose breathing calms the brain down. It's good to keep your brain calm, as it can then remember things better and generally serve you well. Stressed-out brains forget where the car keys are, and are useless at remembering your ATM PIN.

Air is breathed unfiltered when it's breathed through the mouth, as the mouth lacks those handy little filter hair things present up your nose. That's why nose breathing is the way forward: it's what the nose was designed to do!

You lose more water from your body when you're a mouth breather. People always tell us to drink more water, but it's a big fat waste of time if you're just breathing it all out again. If you mouth breathe all the time you'll probably end up with dehydrated skin, and wrinkles. Nose breathers are probably sexier.

You have a better sense of smell if you're not a mouth breather. I can vouch for this, as I'm a nose breather and have a highly sensitive sense of smell. Of course, this can sometimes be a curse - I'm particularly sensitive to cooking smells, and hate the smell of cigarette smoke. But it also means I have a keen appreciation for nice flowers and lovely perfumes.

Mouth breathers are more susceptible to colds, as the germs don't get caught and dealt with in the nasal mucus. This probably means that nose breathers live longer and are generally more hale and hearty.

There's a strong connection between mouth breathing and asthma, and most breathing cures for asthma centre on retraining yourself to be a nose breather. That's got to be better for you than steroids. Apparently one cure even involves taping your mouth shut at night, so you have to breathe through your nose. That's pretty hardcore.

In my experience, mouth breathers have smellier breath than nose breathers.

I won't just heartlessly set mouth breathers adrift to fend for themselves. I think I'll set up nose breathing workshops at schools, so every child grows up breathing properly. And I'll have adult training sessions available as well. And the world will no longer know the horror of mouth breathers, and peace will reign.

No. 009: Brassieres

2005-04-29T08:38:00.000Z

When I rule the world: certain regulations will be put in place to govern the wearing of bras.

Most post-pubescent women wear bras (or upper-decker-flopper-stoppers, or over-shoulder-boulder-holders). However, a lot of women seem to struggle with the concept of when and how to wear a bra, and which bra to wear for which occasion. I will set up a crack team of Breast Police to enforce the following bra-related rules and to regulate the bra-making industry.

Bras must be worn in public unless the subject is a B cup or less, in which case a vest with built-in bra support may be substituted (as long as the subject is not running around anywhere, threatening to give herself a black eye). However, the subject does not have to wear a bra in the privacy of her own home if there's no risk of visitors.

Dark-coloured bras must not be worn under light-coloured clothing. An elementary bra-wearing law, but one which is frequently broken.

Bras with a lot of lace detail are not to be worn under clingy clothing. The effect is of lumpy, rippled breasts, and it isn't pretty. Save lacy bras for wearing under thicker clothing, and wear seamless bras under clingy clothes.

A controversial one, this: bra straps may be on show. However, they should not be white-turned-grey from too many washings. They should ideally be a pretty colour which complements the subject's outfit, and should be thin. Not all bra straps are created equal.

Bras must fit properly, and women will be required to have their sizing checked every time they buy underwear. Breasts should not bulge over the top of the cup - go up a size. And back straps should not carve out great shelves of fat and leave welts on the skin - again, go up a size. There's no shame in it. I was a 34D six months ago, but after a lot of exercise I've lost fat and gained muscle, and now I'm 36B.

Sports bras must be worn whenever the subject undertakes any exercise. Nobody wants to kick their breasts around in the shower as an old lady.

Strapless bra technology must advance to provide comfortable bras that stay up when the subject wants to dance.

Bra manufacturers will be required to make pretty and fashionable bras for all sizes, from AA to GG. Pretty bras are a right, not a privilege.

The Breast Police will be other women, so pervy guys who think their life's calling is to ogle breasts should consider another career. If they see a subject with an inappropriate bra, they will take discreet action by passing the subject a small card, detailing their bra misdemeanor. The subject will then call a freephone number for bra advice and support.

No. 008: Old People

2005-04-28T17:26:00.000Z

When I rule the world: old people will be treated better.

Old people get a bit of a rough deal. Mind you, they bring some of it on themselves. Kidding! I am the first to admit that old people can have sometimes have frustrating habits, but I don't think that excuses the way a lot of them live in poverty, existing on a miserable pension, with nobody to visit them from one year to the next.

Most old people have interesting stories to tell - stories which could help the younger generation. The difficulty lies in convincing the old person in your life that stories about their wartime adventures are more interesting than a three-hour story about how their cabbages are coming along. It seems like old people forget what they used to find interesting when they were young. I don't think, for example, that my 90-year-old Nanna spent her youth discussing the wind for which her city is famous keeps people healthy because it blows all the germs away, but whenever I see her she never fails to tell me all about it. She usually follows it up with a tale of limited adventure involving a trip to the opera and her great-granddaughter, who was apparently precocious enough to find her own way to the bathroom during the intermission. And she's a sprightly and highly alert example of the grandmother group, so I shudder to think what more aged specimens are inflicting on their hapless families.

There may be nothing wrong with innocent stories like these on the first telling, but when you start feeling your grandmother is set on a continuous repeat loop and only has ten things to say it can become difficult to convince yourself to visit her. Added disincentives will usually involve questionable cookery and a slightly blase approach to kitchen hygiene.

But you should persevere! Grit your teeth and look beyond the smeared teacup. Better still, ask for some alcohol - grandmothers like mine have a heavy hand with the vodka bottle. Even the most mundane story of octogenarian adventure can take on a new shine after a couple of stiff drinks.

My Nanna has great stories, if you can get her focused to tell them. She's lived in the same city for over 75 years. She's lived in a time where the way society views women has changed beyond all measure. When she was newly married her father would visit once a week to scrub her kitchen floor for her, but also once told her she was a disgrace because she walked around in public with a pregnant stomach on show (not naked, obviously. Nanna was never that much of a raver). She was thought daring as a teenager because she chose to walk down the street where the Chinese people of the city lived, even thought her mother had issued dire threats about the fate of people who strayed down there.

My grandfather also had great stories, but he had little chance of getting a word in when my grandmother was on the scene, and now, sadly, he's dead. It's advisable to spend time with grandparents separately if you want to get any sense out of them, as people who have been married for more than ten years seem to form a strange double-act, where they both make noise without saying much.

I will increase pensions across the board, so old people don't have to worry about where their next packet of biscuits is coming from. This should help break their habit of, for example, buying bad birthday presents from charity shops.

And we'll have special training at school to develop our 'listening to old people' skills. It's tricky sometimes to gently direct conversation away from the girl with the funny hair on the bus, and back to the topic of interest, be it family history or whatever. And perhaps I'll bring in some kind of red card system, so when an old person tells you about their cat for the forty-seventh time that day you can just give them a quick visual reminder not to bore you with the same story.

Everybody over the age of 65 will automatically get a free cleaner, neatly solving the kitchen hygiene issues and prompting younger members of the family to visit more often. Those who require it may also get a cook. My Nanna will be on this list.

And old people who still feel social - like my Nanna - will be offered part-time jobs as bartenders. We'll all party like there's no tomorrow if my Nanna's pouring the drinks.

No. 007: Tattoos

2005-04-27T15:48:00.000Z

When I rule the world: it will be much more difficult to get a tattoo.

I'll be honest here - I can't even begin to see the appeal of tattoos. Paying somebody to draw on you using a painful version of a permanent marker seems an odd thing to do to me, but I can appreciate that some people, for whatever reason, want to decorate their skin with their lover's name or their favourite aquatic creature. I just want to make sure people really think about what they're doing.

From what I've heard a lot of people live to regret their tattoos. What seems whimsical at 18 just looks stupid at 35, when you're having to explain to all and sundry why you have Ren and Stimpy cavorting on your left shoulder blade. And, sadly, a lot of tattoos proclaiming a lover's name seem to last considerably longer than the relationship, and then you're left in the same boat as Angelina Jolie, having to wake up every day with your batshit crazy ex-husband's hill-billy name on your bicep.

Then there are the tattoos that distort as time, gravity and circumstance change your body. A perky dolphin tattooed on a flat teenaged stomach can easily turn into a Orca whale post-pregnancy. Not pretty.

Perhaps worst of all are the foreign tattoos - the Hindi word, or Japanese or Chinese symbol. Even David Beckham, with all his millions, couldn't avoid his tattoo being mis-spelt. Apparently a lot of people are walking around with Japanese symbols that they think say 'peace', 'love', or whatever, but which really say 'stupid', or 'smelly bum'. (I may have lied about that last translation.)

I can't fully express the contempt I feel for the likes of Mike Tyson and Robbie Williams and their Maori tattoos. In brief: they're complete dickheads, and they devalue a culture they don't understand by cherry-picking design elements to try to look tough.

Sure, you can try to disguise a regrettable tattoo by turning it into something else, but it seems these attempts are usually forlorn and misguided - Exhibit A being Johnny Depp's 'Wino forever' tattoo. And good luck covering that big black tribal band with a coronet of flowers. Or you can get tattoos lasered off, but that costs a lot, has mixed degrees of success, and probably doesn't tickle.

So my tattoo regulations will not just check that the recipient is chronologically old enough to get a tattoo - they will also investigate the lifestyle and impulsiveness of the person. The aim will be to try and establish whether the prospective human canvas is inclined to do rash things they later want to change. Several questions will need to be answered, like:

When did you last colour your hair? How long did that colour last before you changed it? Do you change your hair colour as often as some people change their underwear?

How many times have you had your ears pierced? Do you still wear earrings in all the holes, or have you allowed some of them to close? Do you ... I don't know ... REGRET those extra holes?

(if the person wants a tribal band tattoo or Maori or Polynesian tattoo) What do you actually know about the tribe, or the culture? Do you have any tribal affiliations at all, or do you just think it looks cool? Are you prepared to have your tribal tattoo done 'old school'?

(if the person wants a foreign symbol or foreign word tattoo) What do you think that symbol/word means? Do you want to know what it really means? Will you ever travel to China, Japan or India, and are you prepared for people to point at your tattoo and laugh?

(in the case of name tattoos) How long have you been together? When did you last fight? What was it about? Do you have the names of past lovers tattooed on your body? And how did those relationships work out, huh?

If the prospective tattoo recipient can answer these questions in such a way to suggest they don't often do impulsive and regrettable things to their body, and can moreover prove that they are with their lover for life / have a strong tribal affiliation / are fluent speakers of the language in which they are to be tattooed, then they will be required to submit a digital photo of themselves, highlighting the body part they want to be tattooed. The image will have the tattoo added, and the resulting picture will be distorted to demonstrate how the tattoo will look as the recipient grows older or fatter.

If people still want a tattoo after all that, then good luck to them. They won't be able to say I didn't warn them.

No. 006: Healthy Eating

2005-04-22T18:30:00.000Z

When I rule the world: we will make healthy food choices.

From what I gather, the Western world is getting fatter and fatter. Blame working mothers, blame busy lifestyles, blame too many hours spent watching TV - the upshot is our bottoms are getting bigger, our arteries are clogging up, and we're eating too much crap.

And our governments get all in our face about it every now and then, and issue guidelines about how we should eat five servings of fruit and vegetables every day, and not cut out carbs to lose weight, but most of us ignore them and keep eating stupid things and then complaining when we can't fit our jeans. So we stop eating carbs for a year, only poo once a week, and then wonder why we end up with bowel cancer forty years from now.

Who knows what a 'serving' is, anyway? I do, but who else? And why is it that healthy food is always more expensive than KFC? Where's the incentive to buy a basket-full of vegetables and laboriously make a nice soup when you could just buy a pizza instead? And why does organic food cost so much? We're told that our fruit and vegetables are covered in pesticides, our eggs and dairy products are probably full of dodgy antibiotics, our meat may have been raised on a carnivorous diet, and our fish could give us mercury poisoning. We're told what we should do to be healthy, but we don't get any help. I'd change that with my D.E.L.A.P. (Don't Eat Like A Pig) policy.

For one thing, farmers will have to feed cows and sheep grass, and chickens will only eat grain, so we won't be eating weird Frankenstein foods. I'm not yet sure what I'll do about the fish. I don't eat fish, so I can't pretend it's top priority for me, but I'll find a Fish Expert to iron out the details. And meat will be sold with the fat trimmed away. None of us really need to eat crackling. It's bad and wrong.

Fruit and vegetables will be sold pre-washed and pre-prepared. It will be as easy to buy carrot sticks as it is to buy chocolate. England's supermarkets are already pretty good about presuming complete laziness in their customers, and it's brilliant. It's so much easier to eat stuff you don't have to peel or wash yourself. Fruit and vegetables will become convenience foods.

This will be paid for by taxing unhealthy foods, thus further incentivising us to make healthy choices. So we'll still be able to scoff a bucket of KFC if we just can't resist it, but by doing so we'll be helping subsidise healthy food for somebody else. This would reverse the current trend of lower-income people eating the least healthy (and cheapest) food. Healthy food will no longer be a luxury item. And increasing the cost of a Mars bar to $5 might make us a little more likely to reach for a 25c banana when we get the munchies.

There will be a zero tolerance policy of any 'cut carbs' / 'cut protein' / 'never eat fat' / [insert fad diet of choice] eating plans. And the people who have peddled the Atkins Diet and its ilk to us over the years will have to hand over 50% of their profits to help subsidise sensible diet groups, like Weightwatchers - these will all be free. Kids will learn about nutrition at school. Food won't be used as a reward, and giving children too much sugar or artificially-coloured food will be akin to peddling them crack.

And Nigella Lawson and Jamie Oliver will go door-to-door, teaching us how to cook. Nigella promises to tie her hair back first. Jamie promises he won’t talk in that fake Cockney accent.

No. 005: Chain Emails

2005-04-21T19:18:00.000Z

When I rule the world: people who send chain emails will be punished.

We all have friends who think that forwarding an email is the same as staying in touch. Whenever I receive one I have to take a moment to remind myself that I do love the person concerned, and that I shouldn't think less of them because of their emailing habits - but sometimes it's difficult. There is a wonderful website designed to separate the rubbish emails from those which are true. If you have ever sent a chain email without first checking it I urge you to change your ways, because soon there will be consequences.

The level of punishment the sender receives will depend on the severity of their crime, and in many emails your victim (the poor friends you send these emails to) will benefit from your misbehaviour.

The scale will be as follows:

Level 1: sending an 'aren't friends great! I love you guys!' email (without an accompanying story - see Level 9). Touching, but meaningless. If you love a friend that much, send them something original and don't copy it to ten other friends at the same time. Punishment: do your friend's laundry for a week.

Level 2: sending an email about how a big corporation is going to give away free stuff if you forward their email enough times. Never true. Corporations didn't get big by giving stuff away that easily. Plus, you can't track forwarded emails in that manner. No, it's not 'worth a try!!!' as so many people who forward this kind of email seem to think. It's just stupid. Punishment: buy your friend the thing the corporation was supposedly giving away.

Level 3: sending an email that urges the reader to add their name to a long list of recipients, with the eventual view of forwarding the email to another country's government and thus ending dog-eating/bear farming/whatever else. While the dreadful behaviour might be true, emailing the governments concerned won't make a blind bit of difference. And fooling yourself into thinking that you're somehow striking a blow for the dogs and bears by merely adding your name to an email is just silly. Punishment: donate a week's salary to a charity that actually helps the cause concerned, in your friend's name.

Level 4: sending an email about a poor sick child who will somehow be helped or cured if you keep forwarding the email. Punishment: a week's unpaid labour at the local kindergarten of your friend's choosing.

Level 5: sending a scary email about some essential personal hygiene product causing cancer. Punishment: buy your friend a year's supply of their favourite personal hygiene product.

Level 6: sending a scary email about strangers hiding in parked cars or parking buildings, waiting to rape and murder helpless women. Punishment: wash your friend's car for a year.

Level 7: sending false virus warnings. Punishment: no internet access for a month.

Level 8: sending completely improbable and stupid emails about impossible things like Bonsai Kittens. Punishment: no chance of a Bonsai Kitten for you, ever.

Level 9: sending a 'my friends rock!!!' or 'love thy neighbour!!!' email, accompanied by a tooth-rottingly sweet story of a suicide avoided/car crash regrets/drug regrets. Punishment: a year's therapy for your hapless friend. Punishment to be doubled if your email contained a poem. Punishment to be tripled if your email suggested bad fortune faced people who didn't keep forwarding the email.

Level 10: sending the 'Instructions for Life' email supposed to be written by the Dalai Lama. Punishment: I can't actually think of anything bad enough. You've defamed the Dalai Lama! How do you sleep at night?

No. 004: Inky Hands

2005-04-20T17:49:00.000Z

When I rule the world: all newspapers will be printed with non-transferable ink.

I hate inky hands. I hate dirty hands in general, actually. I don't like being dirty at all. I'm not phobic about it and I don't wash my hands twenty times in boiling water, accidentally touch the rubbish bin as I throw away my paper towel, and then start the whole sorry process over again, but I don't like being mucky. I spent my formative years knee-deep in mud and horse poo, so it's strange that I am so averse to dirt, but hey! That's what makes me complicated and mysterious.

Of all the dirt that may end up on my hands during the course of an average day, newspaper ink is, in my mind, the most annoying. It's particularly bad in the summer, when I'm wearing light-coloured clothes and risk ruining a favourite item by thoughtlessly trying to retrieve a slipping bra strap or something.

In my experience newspapers have to be fairly old before they stop transferring ink, but if I leave them to reach that stage before reading them the quality of the news tends to be diluted. It's all very well reading about imminent snow storms three days late, but that won't be much help when I'm the fool on the train in my summer dress, and the blizzards are blowing around my carriage, and I've got a ten-minute walk to my office when I get to London.

Until newspaper ink technology can definitively solve the transfer problem I will continue to read my news from sterile online sources.

No. 003: Flying Cars

2005-04-19T14:14:00.000Z

When I rule the world: the best technological minds on the planet will concentrate on developing flying cars for general release.

I'm obsessed with flying cars. When Monkey urged me to having driving lessons recently I argued that it was a waste of time, as I'd just have to sit a different flying car test in a few years' time. He was undeterred, and suggested I might benefit from being able to drive terrestrial cars in the meantime (and it turns out he was right).

Interestingly, I watched Richard and Judy whilst visiting the in-laws last week, and they interviewed some science magazine boffin who touched on the whole flying cars issue. He said current research is focusing on the ways swarms of insects and flocks of birds move together, to make sure flying car technology would avoid collisions.

Life will be brilliant when we all have flying cars. I imagine there are several logistical problems to be ironed out - the need for flying car freeways and floating refueling depots, that kind of thing - but one of these days we'll think nothing of buckling up in our own private flying machine and zipping off to the supermarket. After all, Back to the Future Part II was set in 2015, and flying cars featured heavily. They're just around the corner, I tell you!

Flying car-related links:

An explanation of how flying cars might work - "After a century of unfulfilled promises, flying cars may fill the skies in the next few decades. There are still some obstacles to overcome, including receiving approval from the FAA, but the cars are close to being finished."

Real live flying cars! Only $995,000!

The BBC know it's just a matter of time.

Photos from Yesterday

2005-04-18T11:07:00.000Z

We interrupt this manifesto: to bring you the photos I took yesterday. They are all stored in Yahoo Photos - a service which can sometimes be a little temperamental. If at first you don't succeed, try, try again. Nobody likes a quitter.

Here is one view from our bedroom window. It may look peaceful out there, but you wouldn't believe the racket passing horses and riders make. It’s like the Pony Club M25, some days.

Another view from our bedroom window. I think I've only been down that road a couple of times in the entire six months we've lived in this cottage. I really need to get out more.

The view from Monkey's study - 'Monkey' being my secret code name for my husband. He's not a real monkey, and he doesn't look at all simian. It's just a nickname. Stop analysing everything.

That garden looks pretty wild, doesn't it? It's like The Day of The Triffids out there. Monkey attacked the front garden with a strimmer and an electric mower, but it didn’t really improve things – he cut grass and trimmed our front hedge, but he didn’t pick up the trimmings. In fact, it looked like a hurricane had hit our garden. Hurricane Monkey.

Here is the view from my study, which is conveniently located next-door to Monkey's study. This photo shows our untamed lawn. We hadn't spent any time there over the winter, so last week we paid it a visit and were dismayed to realise it's enormous. We could be weeding and mowing every weekend and it would still look like the Scottish highlands (but without the hills). Mind you, if we decide to throw a garden party for 50 people we've got plenty of room for the marquee.

This cottage is fabulous. We've very happy here. It has one big bedroom and two small spare rooms, and we love having our own study each. Monkey particularly loves the fact that he doesn't have to share a study with me. My study is packed full of stuff, but his study is very minimalist. One of these days I'll do a photo-tour of the whole place, so you can see. I'll have to vacuum first, or you'll think I'm a slattern.

Just to prove we really are in the countryside, a nice view across our neighbours' garden and over the fields. Our neighbour is a real country man and no doubt thinks we're posh city wankers. He does something to do with hunting - beating pheasants out of the undergrowth, I think. He has a black lab that barks excitedly at me if I go outside. I’m perfecting a very angry voice that seems to work well on it – one shout from me and the barking stops.

Our neighbour is very overweight, and is missing a couple of high-profile front teeth. He’s no Rupert Campbell-Black, that’s for sure. Last weekend we heard a squeaking and banging noise late at night, and concluded he was doing the sex with his Significant Other. It prompted a night of strange, unsettled dreams.

No. 002: Weather

2005-04-17T19:06:00.000Z

When I rule the world: I'll have a word with [insert deity name of choice] regarding the weather.

I don't think weather was adequately planned. Too often we all hope for sunshine and instead get rain, ruining wedding photos and waterlogging my mother-in-law's clay garden. England suffers through soggy winters, followed by hosepipe bans all summer. And places like Perth slowly run out of water altogether. Crops fail, cattle go hungry. It's madness.

Nobody really wants to be out and about when the rain comes. But we all want a little bit of rain every day, to keep our water supplies flowing and ensure our fields look green. So my plan is this: reorganise the weather so it rains every night, from 2 a.m. to 4 a.m. - after all, most of us are tucked up in bed during these hours, so we wouldn't be inconvenienced. A couple of hours of steady rain every night would ensure the rivers continue to flow, but without washing away all the houses built on flood plains. It makes perfect sense.

The weather was beautiful in Hertfordshire today. We drove to the gym with the top down (and the heaters roaring). I even took photos to prove that the sun sometimes shines in England.

No. 001: Blurred Vision

2005-04-16T14:47:00.000Z

When I rule the world: laser eye surgery will be free on the NHS (or your Government-sponsored healthcare plan of choice), and will be completely safe and reliable.

I am sick of wearing contact lenses. Some days my eyes love them, and I can wear them for 18 hours without a complaint. Other days, they get dry and scratchy after twenty minutes. And it's not even like I push my luck and wear lenses that haven't been cleaned properly: I only use daily disposable lenses.

Glasses are even worse. My glasses are always smeared, and it infuriates me. My eyesight was fine until my mid-twenties, and I suppose I should be grateful that I haven't had these issues since childhood, but I just hate not having 20:20 vision. I probably should have eaten more carrots as a young girl.