Sometimes I wonder if I'm getting old. I suppose the facts are undeniable. Writing on the day England go through to round two of the World Cup, I even have dim recollections of the last time we won it. You don't live in two consecutive centuries without picking up memories. It's been a full life, Sven.
As somebody once said to the doctor who warned him that he couldn't make him any younger: I don't really mind, so long as I keep on growing older. Ronald Reagan said to a voter who implied he was too old to be President of the USA: 'How old would you think you were, if you didn't know how old you were?' We're all 25, fit and good-looking on the internet.
For much of the month I have been twiddling TV knobs looking for something to amuse me while recovering from the attentions of an enthusiastic anaesthetist during a recent routine (and highly-reassuring) examination. I was alarmed to hear myself like an elderly 'Disgruntled of Slough', grumbling petulantly about the quantity of dross that seems to be around the airwaves right now. They're even running a third series of Big Brother, which indicates how bad things have got.
