Ever since I was knee high to a grasshopper I’ve been monstrously short-sighted. Of course, when it first happens you are blissfully ignorant of nature’s slight until such time as your mother clocks you barging into furniture or, in my case, not spotting her entering the room when under a chaise longue with a stolen hoard of the stepfather’s Playboys. (Yes, we had a chaise longue. Get over it.) Anyway, shortly afterwards I was given a confidence-busting pair of Elvis Costello’s courtesy of the NHS at the exact same time as things began to drop downstairs. This was obviously unacceptable to a young adult drenched in Hi Karate as it severely compromised my chances with Farrah Fawcett-Majors and made it almost impossible to wear headphones in bed: Something had to give.

Five years later, I was given an appointment with Dr Richards at Guildford Road. And, thanks to the wonders of modern ocular technology, I was eventually able to discard those ridiculous billboards of inadequacy for something far more suitable. Sexy, even. From that moment on no-one would ever know that I couldn’t read the body copy of a cornflakes packet less than a metre from my own face. I had contact lenses, for Christ’s sake! Now I was carnally available. Any time. Anywhere. But sadly, this was not to be. Even Nibs, with whom I shared a bedroom, barely registered acknowledgement and he certainly was not my target market.

Fast forward another thirty years and you discover a man who has not moved on. Those two tiny slivers of translucent plastic are still the vehicle through which I decipher the world, and now they are scratched, world weary and begging for change. So, finally, I have decided to listen. On 2nd March of this the year 2013, some bloke called Mr Patel in Shaftesbury Avenue is going to digitally zap the fuck out of my vile jellies and I shall have my road to Damascus moment at last. Unless he buggers it up, of course, in which case you are reading the fifth last post here. Needless to say, one of my main concerns was how this would compromise my bohemian lifestyle in both the short & long term, but according to the Trevithick Laboratory, it turns out that the sustained intake of New Zealand Marlborough Pinot Noir (2008-2011) appears to protect the mitochondria cells which stop you getting cataracts. Who’d have thunk it?

There is, however, a small bridge between now and then, and we do have the Idle Hour Burns Night ahead of us. Now, I don’t wish to appear presumptuous, but if you do happen to come across someone looking like an outpatient from One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, may I ask you to have a small word with Nibs and convince him I’ll be needing a complimentary tipple for medicinal purposes. And if he balks, maybe mention that I’ll be getting a room of my own soon.