I had a piece of junk mail land on my doormat this morning. It was a roughly A4 sheet of paper, glossily printed, folded into three and sealed with a sticky strip.

On the outside, in the top left hand corner was printed this ‘important notice’ -

“This envelope contains an offer of an erotic nature. If you are offended by eroticism or are under 18 years of age kindly discard this envelope unopened”

Naturally, I opened it. Not only am I way past eighteen years old, sadly, but I am entirely unoffended by eroticism. Or erotica, come to that.

I AM, however, offended. I was promised an offer of an erotic nature! What did I get? Pictures of lithe young women in tacky lingerie! Call me picky, but I don’t find bland and pouty young ladies in a variety of tasteless underwear composed of lace, gauze, bows – and in one particularly horrible example, what appears to be the Macgregor tartan painted by a creatively minded ten year old – in the slightest bit erotic. What’s more, having checked with my Other Half, neither does he. Or so he says.

Also on the page is an ‘enticing’ offer which suggests that if I order something from the catalogue (which they will be overjoyed to send me on request) I will get two free gifts. One is a thong made from black see-through nylon with a bright red fabric rose holding it together. I may be a ‘moody old broad’ as one of my dear American Depp buddies called me recently (and I’ll get you later for that, Darlene), and I may be overweight, but that garment, if I may be permitted to stretch the description thus far, does nothing for me but make me irritable and inclined to snap – as I’m sure those insubstantial looking threads of fabric holding it together would, should I be so foolish as to attempt to wear said garment. I’m guessing they’d probably give way round about the time I tried to ease them over my backside.

And I’m also guessing that if I did, by some enormous stroke of luck, actually fit into the thing, I would 1) find it extremely uncomfortable, and 2) be sporting tramlines across my hips for a week. No visible panty-line? Ha! I think I’d need liposuction to get rid of that one.

The other free offer is a game which is based, probably rather loosely, on the Kama Sutra. The illustration on the lid is the only thing I could possible find in the slightest bit erotic on the whole damn leaflet, but is rather spoiled by the fact that the young lady straddling the poor guy has legs of such disproportionate length that even though she is kneeling with her legs at an acute angle, her crotch is nearly at the level of his jaw. Hmm. Well, maybe that is a little bit erotic … although I think he’d break his neck if he tried anything.

But passing hastily over that one, come on – seriously now, Leaflet People! Do you really think that in this day and age ANYONE, whether under the age of eighteen or not, is going to be the slightest bit interested in ogling lingerie-clad teenaged girls who are not
displaying so much as the merest hint of a nipple? You can see more just walking down the local High Street on a good day. Or even a bad day.

On the one hand, this not-very-literary effort does promise me a catalogue bursting with seduction and fun accessories, but on the other it says no-one will ever know about me exploring my passions, which suggests I’ll be flying solo.

I think I’m probably supposed to be intrigued, but sadly I just feel old, crabby and jaded. And just a little bit annoyed about the waste of a perfectly good bit of paper.