No, it’s not a sardonic comment on the quite unseasonable ’spring’ weather we’ve been having - even though I woke this morning and, bleary eyed, stood at the window and marvelled at the snow being hurled horizontally from the north and sticking to the side of everything in its path that was vaguely vertical. Sun? Ha! No, we haven’t seen our friendly local exploding ball of gas for quite a few days now, sadly.

What I’m talking about is the collection of mashed paper and impermanent ink which goes by the name of ‘newspaper’ in this country.

We don’t actually have a newspaper delivered anymore. We used to have the Daily Mail, but dear old Dad was right, once they go tabloid, the slide downhill into magazine-dom is inevitable, and so we cancelled and couldn’t find a decent alternative.

So imagine my surprise when I was passing the front door and this thing came hurtling through the letterbox. Damn near dropped my morning cuppa, I can tell you, and then I’d have been doubly pissed.

As it is, I guess I’ll have to hide it in a bag and take it back to the Post Office, because I guess someone, somewhere, might actually want it.

Now, here’s a question: do I tag this with ‘The Home Front? Or Junk Mail?

Ah, let’s go for both.

Through my letterbox this morning came three pieces of junk mail. The first was addressed to ‘the occupier and over fifty’ which was not an encouraging start. Who the hell wants to be addressed like that? Is that going to sell me something? I think not. I was tempted to bin it unopened, but in the interests of education (and blog material) I succumbed to temptation and took the bait. It turned out to be a suggestion from SAGA that I might benefit from joining and taking advantage of their ‘over fifties’ car insurance offers. Ok, so the binning was delayed by five minutes. You had your chance, SAGA, and you blew it.

The second piece of junk mail was more interesting. Oh, it was just a routine charity begging letter - you know the sort: this is what we do, and it’s very worthy, now hand over your cash. This one was for Cancer Research UK, which is indeed a very worthy charity and from time to time they do in fact get their hands on a small wad of my cash, but I never respond to unsolicited charity mailshots on principle. Once you respond, you’re on their ’sucker’ list and they Won’t Stop Mailing You. But here’s the interesting thing. You know how they often include a cheapo biro so you have no excuse not to sit down there and then to fill in the direct debit form? Well, this one was no exception, but instead of providing you with a cheap and environmentally unfriendly plastic biro containing very little ink, they gave me this rather wonderful cut-down and rather greener version.

It’s a simple biro refill, sealed inside a piece of stiff paper. The paper is almost certainaly degradable, unlike a standard biro sleeve, and it’s perfectly usable - at least for long enough to write a cheque. It also fulfils the other avowed intention of the free biro being quite capable of spreading the word, because the advertising is there too.

Cancer Research UK, I applaud you.

The third piece of junk mail informed me that my local John Lewis department store is running a promotion for the next two weeks whereby I buy a couple of Clinique products and they give me a free goodie bag full of trial sized samples. Let me tell you that I’ve had these sample bags before and they are seriously good! If you travel, as I do, they’re the perfect size for packing for a week or so, and a good way to try out lines you might not normally buy. In fact, in order get my hands on this new goodie bag, I am going to buy full size versions of the samples I was given in the last one. I use Clinique products as part of my normal skincare routine (such as it is), so a piece of ‘junk mail’ telling me that my local store is running an offer is just the sort of junk mail I like.

You can order direct from the Clinique website too, by the way - and they also give away free trial-sized samples.

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.