The Curmudgeon

If this sounds like so much gobbledygook, I apologise. But I am not surprised because, this week, my brain has been addled by computer-speak and I wish I could go back to the days when a 19th predecessor of mine in Beggarsdale used to send in his despatches to the Herald by carrier pigeon. All he had to do, presumably, was toss the bird a few handfuls of corn and keep its loft clean and cosy. Even I could do that.

But when it comes to bluetooth, I'm about a much use as a dolphin trying to operate a fax machine, that bit of junk lying in the corner of my little study used, it seems these days, solely for the receipt of junk mail offering services which I do not need at prices I cannot afford.

The internet, you see, has killed off the fax in just over a decade and, in that short spell of time, hi-tech has turned the cosy little world of Beggarsdale upside down. When I was a lad, the village correspondent sent in his jottings by bus, in special envelopes marked "News - Urgent".

Today, of course, buses don't have conductors and don't deliver parcels to my knowledge. Which is somewhat irrelevant, anyway, as the last bus left the Dale 15 years ago after the quarry closed.

And then t'Editor got all this new computer gear and I had to follow suit by the then latest thing in office technology, the aforesaid fax. And, three or four years ago, came e-mail.

I have, by force of circumstance, just about mastered that but now I have felt obliged to get a mobile phone. And, following the advice of Jetset, our world-trotting entrepreneur, I have got one of the best on the market.

Because, you see, it has bluetooth ....

It also has an instruction book about a foot thick, written by a dyslexic Russian in Cyrillic script, or so it appears to me. What I need is an instruction book to explain how to use the instruction book.

However, back to bluetooth. This, as far as I can grasp, allows me to connect to other hi-tech gadgets using infrared rays.

Now, if I had an infrared fly rod which would improve my casting on the beck, or an infrared spade which would dig over my allotment on its own, that would be very useful indeed.

As it is, I suppose I will have to get one of those laptop computers so I can send in my scribblings via infra red whilst sitting on a rock on the top of Tup Fell. The problem there is that I go to the top of Tup Fell to forget about work!

This phone also has WAP - don't ask cos I don't know what that means either.

As far as I can work it out, that means that I can pick up my emails whilst sitting on my rock.

But what would I do with cheap viagra or a scheme to earn a billion dollars in thirty minutes by selling skis to Arabian nomads - the sort of junk emails I get every day - on the summit of the fell? Dear Ed. can I please have the pigeon back?

* The Curmudgeon is a satirical column based on a fictitious character in a mythical village.