Things we never had and didn't miss part 2

I know I talked about the internet in part 1, but I'd also like to mention a few specific websites as we go along with this series. And if you think that's cheating – it's my blog, so there.

1 Kids TV channels

 

I will take you through the current listings labelled 'kids' on my Sky Plus box, right now, at 6.00pm -

Some Dreamworks shite

'Johnny Test'

Scooby Doo and the cyber chase

Sam and Cat (I know about this – it's two shrieking teenage girls having wacky japes)

iCarly (same)

NEW – Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Peppa Pig

Ultimate Spiderman

Hulk and the agents of SMASH (not the mashed potato brand)

Liv And Maddie

Gravity Falls

The Hive

Sofia The First

Jedward's Big Adventure

In The Night Garden

Peppa Pig

Sally Bollywood

Franklin And Friends

Scooby Doo and the cyber chase (+1)

Fireman Sam (new version)

Ben and Holly's Little Kingdom

Ultimate Spiderman

Family fun time and rhymes

In The Night Garden

Harry and his bucketful of dinosaurs

Sabrina the teenage witch (the cartoon series)

Yu-Gi-Oh! GX

The hive

The mysterious cities of gold

Peppa Pig

Jessie

Sam & Cat

Jedward's big adventure

Dreamworks shite

I think I can stop there, because I've come to the end of the kids' channels. My god.

Our equivalent – Saturday morning tv -

Oh, it's Saturday, there's no school, yay! So do we lie in bed, scrolling through our iPads and scratching ourselves? No! Of course we don't, because it's 1990 and iPads haven't been invented yet.

We spring out of bed like an eager young lamb, and immediately head downstairs to commandeer the tv before our older sisters/parents can get to it. Because, dammit, this is the only day of the week where we get to watch shows aimed at us – viewers who haven't learned to use a knife and fork properly yet.

It's only for a couple of hours, so everyone else in the family can just shut up and find something else to do. Me, I have to dedicate these precious hours to Phillip Schofield, Roland Rat or similar, as they 'gunge' people and introduce American merchandise spin-offs that will fill my brain with colours and sounds.

BIG SHOPS -

Nowadays you can get everything everywhere. Want a battery operated spoon? Primark have some. Want some leggings? PC World has a sale on, what are you waiting for?

I must admit, as a person rapidly skidding towards middle age, it's a relief to be able to get everything I need in one converted warehouse, rather than having to trudge round so many shops that I need a 'coffee break' in between.

Ok, I guess I've never been a big fan of shopping. But even I never dreamed that one day you'd be able to go to one building and get all the things on the following shopping list -

onions

knickers

WD40

vaccuum cleaner

prescription glasses

box set of Steven Seagal movies

Korean noodles

wellies

pile cream

6” screws

You can get all this from my local TESCO EXTRA BIG FUCK OFF HYPER SUPER FUN HAPPY STORE. What you can't get is someone to come and assist you when you have an 'unexpected item in the bagging area' yet again.

Our equivalent – shopping

“Oh, I just need to pop to the butchers, then Farmfoods, then the opticians, then Topshop and Miss Selfridge and H&M and New Look and then I need to go to the chemist...”

I was not a fan of being dragged round all these shops. Even now, when everything I buy is for me, I like to have it in one handy package. Ok, maybe my life would have been improved had we had these SUPER FUN MEGA HAPPY STORES in our lives. I give up.

Blame and claim culture

 

Did you chip a fingernail at work? Or did you sit down on the loo at work and momentarily experience discomfort because the loo seat was a bit cold? Even worse, did someone wilfully injure your feelings by calling you a 'div' at work? Sue those bastards! Phone our hotline now, and we'll get you millions of pounds!

Disclaimer – we will not get you millions of pounds. We will get you up to and including five hundred new pounds, of which we will take up to a hundred percent.

Everyone everywhere is scared of everything. Even I have days where I don't want to leave the house in case a meteor falls on my head, or in case a terrorist comes up and tries to do terror at me.

But when I was growing up, getting injured was not a career. It was a vocation, at best. We did not expect to have our clumsiness rewarded with money. That's what clowns and Eddie The Eagle were for.

Now, if you're short of money and don't want to ring WONGACASHNOW4U, you can simply claim you were tripped over by a member of Al Qaeda, or that someone looked at you funny, and all your financial problems will disappear!

Our equivalent – looking where you were fucking going

 

You know what used to happen if you fell over in the street? Everyone would laugh at you. Certainly they wouldn't offer you money.

Of course, work accidents did happen, and they were generally quite serious, but back then people tried to avoid getting injured. They didn't like being injured, what with the pain and all. Getting injured was seen as a bad thing, not as an equivalent to winning the lottery.

When I was growing up, if you tripped over in the street you were unlucky, or a div. If you broke a nail or had your 'feelings injured' while at work, then you were a fucking crybaby, and didn't deserve the fucking job in the first place.

By the way, I wrote these last paragraphs on the toilet. Just thought you'd like to know.

Wikipedia/IMDB/Yahoo Answers (especially Yahoo Answers)

Killer of pub conversations about... well, anything really. But especially about “Oh, who's that guy from that thing, you know, he was in Morse that one time...)

Nowadays, one self important fuck in the group will casually tap away on his iPhone, and declare -

“Richard Fucknuts, born 1968, was best known for his work in 1990 drama series Impotence Clinic. He went on to be a spokesman for...”

At which point everyone punches him.

Our equivalent – finding things out

If you're like me, you have a mental list of 'oh, I must Google that when I remember.' These things never get looked up, because we're too busy doing important things like looking at porn or playing Candy Crush when we're on the internet.

Before the days when you could Google anything, you had to put some work into finding things out. You had to read books, visit the library, even (shock horror) talk to other people and ask them. This was a good way to acquire knowledge. Certainly better than just going on Wikipedia, and here's why.

As for Yahoo Answers, I refer you to this.

Things we never had and didn't miss part 1

This is not going to be one of those annoying 'OMG THIS STUFF WILL MAKE YOU FEEL SOOOO OLD!!!!1111' posts. No. This was just a discussion between me and the mister, over things we couldn't live without, but somehow managed perfectly well without when we were growing up. Which makes us feel, like, sooo old!!1

I am basing this on a British childhood really, because my American readers will have had some of these things around since they can remember. Then America decided that they wanted to inflict their crap on other countries, and slowly the rest of the world caught up.

Because I have a list longer than my arm, I'm going to split this post into several parts, because I do need some me-time you know, to sit there drinking red bull and watching Antiques Roadshow.

1. The internet 

This is maybe not such a given, because a lot of you young scallywags assume the internet has been around since 1798. No. I didn't have my first glimpse of online until 1995, with the help of Netscape Navigator -

Ok, hands up if you remember any of the following things – getting 3000 free AOL CDs in the post/whenever you buy anything ever, the dial up music, Geocities, waiting ten minutes for half a picture to load (and not just because of all the advertising), your sister buggering up your conversation with 'manicsfan83' because she selfishly decided to make a phone call. No? Then you lose!

Our equivalent – Teletext

Shut up, this had all the features of your so called internet; we were quite happy with it back in the day. It had endless loading times, celebrity gossip, and fake psychics. Ok, it didn't have porn, but sometimes you could squint and pretend that Bamber Boozler, host of the Channel 4 Sunday Teletext quiz Bamboozle, was a nudey lady. Not that I ever did that, but I'm sure you could if you wanted.

2. Mobile phones

 

My god, the day I got my first mobile phone I felt like such a badass, and an important badass at that. It was a big Motorola brick, but still quite modern because it had texting on it. Much like a word processor of old, you couldn't see the entire text in one go; you had to scroll through each word from left to right. So if you realised you'd made a mistake at the beginning, you generally couldn't be arsed to go back.

No one ever phoned me as I had no friends, but it didn't matter. I would still have a fine old time choosing my ringtones just in case I got a wrong number or something. And then I upgraded to this bad boy -

Allow me to play you the song of my people -

Unless, of course, you could work the 'composer' feature, and then the world was your lobster. I got really good at using the composer, and ended up being able to make any tune on request. But my favourite thing to do was to bash the buttons on the composer for ten seconds, then have whatever godawful noise came out as my ringtone.

Our equivalent – The phone -

You know, the phone? The actual phone that households have? That has an area code? Where, if you ring and there's no answer, you just assume they're not in, not that they hate you? That.

Also, BT phone boxes. Great for making prank calls (like when you phone someone's house and just blow a raspberry down the phone), useless for making actual calls as they were all crackly and cost about a pound a go.

3. The Lottery -

It could be you! Tip – it won't be. But when The National Lottery started in 1994, every single person in Britain was convinced it would be them. So we went mad buying tickets, in a frenzy akin to something out of Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory. And all workplace/pub/playground discussions were immediately wiped out and replaced by 'what we'd spend our winnings on'.

We still have the Lottery, but recently the ticket price has doubled to £2, and hardly anyone plays it any more. Sometimes we have a flutter though, because quite often you do get three numbers up, which these days will net you a cool £25 – not to be sniffed at.

Our equivalent – The football pools

Typically run by Vernons or Littlewoods, the idea was to correctly predict the scores of all the upcoming football matches of the week. My childhood was filled with my parents talking mysteriously about something called a 'score draw', or a 'no score draw', and putting ticks in little boxes, which a man in a hat would then come round and collect. I can't remember how much you could win on the pools, but it definitely wasn't millions. It might have been enough to retire on, if you just ate tins of beans and never got your hair cut, I don't know.

4. Netflix, Love Film etc -

Bored of everything on TV? Can't find anything to watch? Then I suggest you stop taking those drugs you're on, since they've clearly turned you into a mental. There is always something good to watch since TV on demand was invented. For a mere fiver a month, a household can watch almost any film or TV show ever made with the touch of a button. Very Jetsons. Especially now that Youtube on your TV has been thrown into the mix. Now it seems inconceivable that you might have to flick through the channels to 'see if there's anything good on', and hope you haven't missed the start of it.

Our equivalent – going to the video shop

This was a big thing, generally undertaken when the family was all together on a Friday or Saturday evening. As our family consisted of my parents, my two teenage sisters, and a fat, whining me, numerous rows over what to rent were guaranteed.

The proceedings would start with my parents casually saying, “Oh, there's nothing on TV tonight, let's get a video.” Magic words to me. Immediately my young mind would be filled with thoughts of the entire Hanna Barbera collection, or perhaps The Little Mermaid. Naturally, the video would be my choice; those peasants I lived with wouldn't be given a say.

It hardly ever turned out like this. I wanted something with no more than two dimensions, my sisters invariably wanted either a horror movie or Road House, my mum wanted anything to do with Coronation Street or Brookside, and my dad wanted something about a war. Any war. Or about Hank Marvin. Because of this inability to agree, the family generally ended up renting something nobody wanted to watch, probably not even the people who starred in it.

Then there were those times where, when I'd been really good, I won a trip to the video shop just for me, where I could pick out a video of my choice. This was where I got silly, and all thoughts of Hanna Barbera went out of the window. I would choose something like The Fly, and my parents would get all pissy and make me choose something like The Happy Unicorn.

Well, that's it for part one. I'll probably write part two over the weekend, just so you know and aren't endlessly pacing up and down crying “But when will she write it? When?” Now you can relax. 

Christmas day sometime in the 80s

Today I want to show you one of my most treasured pieces of memorabilia – a photo taken of a 4 year old me on Christmas day, surrounded by all my loot.

Picture is below, but if you want a bigger version CLICK THIS LINK

1. Batman on TV

Since it has Batgirl in it, it might be the episode where she nearly drowns in a barrel, which would have been her own stupid fault for not realising she could have just stood up in the barrel. That's the only episode I remember anything about as a kid.

2. Shitty Christmas card I made sellotaped to the wall

Maybe this was before they invented BluTack, I don't know. Maybe my parents were just idiots in the 80s.

3. Rude balloons

Obvious now, but I guess we never spotted it. That is to say I never spotted it – maybe it caused hours of hilarity for my mum and dad, and possibly for my sniggering older sisters too.

4. My Child doll

A few years after I got her, I got into trouble for drawing red spots all over her in felt tip pen and claiming she had a life threatening illness.

5. Musical Christmas bear

When you pressed his paw, his heart lit up and he played Christmas carols. My god, I loved that bear to the point of insanity. I still have him somewhere, but his batteries have long since died. I don't know if his batteries are replaceable, or if I just couldn't be arsed to do it last time I looked.

6. Random bride doll

 

I don't think this was a Barbie or a Sindy, judging by the packaging it was a knock off, probably called Sharon or something.

7. Keyper

Princess the swan no less. I used to keep all my secret things in my Keyper until one day I noticed it had some weird brown stuff spilled inside it. Probably chocolate, but it could have been toxic waste for all I know.

8. Selection box

Nothing much to say here, except that I probably nommed the whole thing that day.

9. Bluebird market stall

One of my best presents ever, I'm just sorry my stupid 4 year old self is in the way of it in this picture. Never mind, here is another picture of it I nicked off Google -

The side you see was a burger stall, and the other side was a traditional fruit and veg stall. I think there was a squeaky phone on it somewhere. My god. The hours I spent shouting at my family to come and pay me money for plastic carrots and burgers. Happy times.

10. Mullet

Blame my mother.

11. Magnetic blackboard

I used to love playing schools with this, lining my toys up and barking the alphabet at them, which was pretty much all I ever remember my teachers doing.

Maybe I'll post a photo of the 30 year old me on Christmas day - if you want to see me sat round scratching myself and eating Matchmakers.

Lucozade, Kilroy and tutting – having a day off school

I kind of pride myself on never pulling a sickie at work. Even if I had the plague I'd still feel honour bound to turn up, then spend the whole of my shift crawling round on the floor. Not so when I was a kid – I was forever employing weird and wonderful tactics to wangle a day off school; inventing bizarre tropical diseases to achieve my nefarious ends.

Most of the time this didn't work. My parents, being older than ten, saw through my flimsy facade straight away, and bundled me off to St. Joseph's to sit there in a jumper and knitted kilt, learning my seven times table.

It wasn't that I didn't like primary school, I did. I had a laugh with my friends and, barring P.E., did pretty well in most of my subjects. However, the heady pull of a bona fide day off was often too strong for me. The slightest sniffle and I was in seventh heaven, my mind filled with dreams of sofas, Lucozade and crap daytime TV.

So how did a sick day pan out? It normally started with my mum (or 'Her Magnificence' as I referred to her when she kept me off school) deciding my queasiness or my slight fever was indeed real, and informing me that I'd 'better stay at home for today, and see how I feel later.' Note that she only really did this when I was genuinely ill, not when I'd drawn felt-tip spots all over myself. That worked in the Beano, but it seldom worked in real life.

In order for a sick day to be fully appreciated, you had to be careful not to be too ill. You had to be well enough to be in the living room without the noise of the TV and the vaccuum cleaner making your head explode. And it was better not to be so ill that you have to go to the doctors – that kind of illness is not fun. Once, I got food poisoning mixed with a bit of sunstroke when I was on holiday in Ingoldmells. My mum took me to the surgery there, and I was sick everywhere, including in my mum's handbag and, bizarrely, up the doctor's sleeves. I spent a week of that holiday holed up in bed watching Tommy Cooper reruns, when I could have been eating blue ice cream and losing at tele bingo.

Assuming you're the right amount of poorly, you lay in bed listening to your mum phoning the school from the hall. At this point you got a bit nervous, as if the school was going to call your mum a liar and demand she bring you in immediately. That never happened, but it was always a worry in the back of my mind.

Next, if your mother deems appropriate, you are invited downstairs to spend the morning on the settee. This is fantastic, since everyone knows that on the settee in front of the fire in the middle of the day is the comfiest place in the whole world. Plus, if you got bored you could always look for loose change down the back, which you mostly got to keep.

A few items were needed to make the morning on the settee go as smoothly as possible. Most important were Lucozade, Calpol and your quilt from upstairs – the holy trinity. In exceptional circumstances you also had to have a sick bowl next to you, but if you had to use it much then you probably weren't going to get the most out of the day.

Once you were suitably comfortable in your settee nest, you were free to take part in activities suitable for a slightly ill child. The main thing to do was to watch daytime TV – getting a rare glimpse of all those mysterious shows you normally missed, and because they were shown while kids were at school, you began to think it was somehow forbidden for kids to see them. This carried all day, apart from lunchtime, when Rainbow and The Riddlers came on.

Possible programme choices included the following -

TV-AM

This morning

Take the high road

Win lose or draw

Young doctors

Flying doctors

Pebble Mill at one

Chain letters

Going for gold

The time the place

Kilroy

Sometimes your mum would make a token effort to get you to watch BBC2 Schools, but you just feigned an attack of diarrhoea to get out of this. Unless they were showing a good story, like Badgergirl or Geordie Racer.

An entire day spent watching these mysterious, forbidden shows was brilliant enough, but what truly reached stratospheric heights of greatness was those days where you accompanied your mum into town, because she had some urgent shopping to do or something.

This was better than watching forbidden TV for two reasons. Firstly, you got to find out what it was that grown ups did during the day, because you were pretty sure they didn't have to go to school. Sometimes, though, this was a bit disappointing. Instead of seeing sword fights and disco dancing competitions, you were treated to the sight of some women stood tutting over the price of pork chops in Safeway. However, this was still more interesting than being sat there sharpening your wax crayons while pretending to do some work.

True excitement

Secondly, because you were ill, and had bravely left your sick bed, there was a good chance your mum would buy you a present. So not only were you allowed to witness a world that was normally more secretive than the Freemasons, you got a new Barbie too! Top that off with your mum buying you a chocolate milkshake and a sausage roll from Baker's Oven, and it was truly a glorious day.

These days, as I said, I'm not the kind of person who can phone in sick without mountains of guilt, and anyway, daytime TV isn't what it used to be. Although I can't hear the theme tune to This Morning without being transported back to my Lucozade and Calpol days, I actually hate that show, and would rather just watch the blank screen of the TV in standby mode than watch that load of tripe. Besides, I work shifts, so I have plenty of free weekdays at my disposal. I no longer feel the need to bunk off on a Tuesday to see women tutting in supermarkets, because now I probably am one of the women tutting in supermarkets.

5 things that gave me nightmares as a kid

Do you want to laugh at me being a wuss? Of course you do. I’m a massive scaredy cat. For example, this morning I came downstairs to find a hooded demon staring at me from across the road –

It’s pretending to be a picnic umbrella, but I am not fooled. Given this, imagine my chicken tendencies transplanted into the body of a 5 year old with terrible hair, and you have an idea of me in the 80s. I was scared of everything as a kid. I was forever hiding behind settees, teddies and my Dad. Yet somehow the things that scared me also kept drawing me to them, like I had some morbid desire to be plunged into a world of evil and then to have nightmares. I was obsessed with the things that disturbed me, and I guess I still am. Some of them, I’ve come to realise, were standard nightmare fuel, but to be honest some of them were just plain odd.

This list will probably be in multiple parts, because if I listed everything I was scared of in one post I might break the internet.

Are you sitting comfortably? Good, then I’ll begin scaring the shit out of you. And by you, I mean me.

1. Max Headroom

My number one biggest irrational fear as a child. Despite what I said in this post, I’ve warmed towards Max Headroom (or ‘Snap Snap’) as I used to call him for some reason) recently. I particularly like his mini backstory movie, 20 minutes into the future. 

25 years ago, it was an entirely different story. I would cower pathetically behind the settee whenever his glitchy, stuttering face appeared on TV. As it was the 80s, this was all the fucking time. To make matters worse, comedy impersonator and all round 80s staple Bobby Davro did a Max Headroom spoof. This was tragic because I actually loved the rest of Bobby Davro’s show. Another thing Max Headroom robbed from me, with his stupid isocahedron face.

2. The TV being interrupted

This still gets me now. A few months ago I was working a night shift, and BBC News 24 got interrupted in the early hours. It was bizarre - for minutes there was just a long shot of the newsreader, not saying anything at all, then it would cut to a live shot of a deserted road in London for ages, then back again, and so on for about ten minutes. Then they just resumed the news like nothing had happened, the giant bastards. By the end of the ten minutes I was convinced that terrorists had taken over BBC headquarters, and were planning to film themselves bombing London. I guess that wasn’t the case, but they never did explain why it happened.

Any time a programme gets interrupted you immediately think something terrible has happened. This is especially true at night, because everything is automatically worse at night. Even when it’s just a ‘technical fault’, I still tend to assume the technical fault is caused by a nuclear explosion, or an alien invasion or something.

If I had my way I’d find some other way to deliver breaking news without interrupting the programme. My nerves just can’t take it. Maybe I’d have a little cartoon cow dancing across the screen, holding a balloon that says “Hey guys, why not have a peek at the news? There’s something rather exciting going on!” Mind you, then I’d just learn to dread the arrival of the cartoon cow. Maybe Spongebob would work better, I don’t know.

3. Policemen

I wasn’t some kind of toddler anarchist wanting to throw my used nappy at the state; I had my own reasons for being terrified of nipple headed law enforcers. When I was three, my dad got me arrested. Well, it was sort of an arrest. I was being a bit noisy in the back of the car one day, so my dad called over a passing policeman and got him to ‘have a word’ with me. The policeman leaned into my window and told me, in a very stern voice, that if I didn’t behave he’d put me in prison. I was so petrified I was actually trying to crawl under the driver’s seat to hide. These kinds of things can affect the way a girl thinks. Even my dad now agrees it was a bit extreme as toddler taming goes. But you know, this was the 80s in North Wales – policemen back then were about as scary as pasta.

4. The ghost train at Bridlington

I never actually rode this, which probably made it all the more scary. It stood just back from the prom, so impressionable children at the kiddies’ fair across the road could view the exterior and imagine what went on inside. While I was waiting to ride the carousel or the Mini Apple roller coaster, I’d gaze over at it, waiting for the one visible part of the ride to make itself known. It was part ghost train and part roller coaster; the roller coaster part involved riding the track along the exterior of the building and down a dip before going back in for some more mortal peril. The dip itself was actually pretty tiny, but to my inexperienced eyes it looked like Kingda Ka.

As I looked, all I’d ever see was a train full of frightened people emerging into daylight for a few seconds before going back in to meet their doom. I was a bit obsessed with what happened inside the building; several times I had dreams about it at night, and in my dreams it was everything from an empty warehouse with a roller coaster in it (which was more frightening somehow) to the fiery pits of hell. Sadly I never did get to ride it for myself since it’s now been removed, but I did manage to find this on ride video –

5. Sonic The Hedgehog

Let me say now that I did love these games and I still do. But back then it was a love tinged with stomach churning, sweaty palmed fear. I’m not exactly sure what disturbed me so much when I played Sonic, but every time I jumped into that weird, floating dystopian world it unsettled me. Maybe it was the feeling that if Sonic died, he really died, which gave me a crippling sense of responsibility. This hasn’t been helped in recent years by the creepypasta about Sonic springing up all over the place. Maybe it was the music – even the supposedly happy music of Green Hill Zone gave me a slight feeling of unease. It still does, and I can never quite put my finger on why.

But out of all of this, by far the most gut-mangling aspect of the game was the infamous drowning music, particularly during Labyrinth Zone in Sonic 1, and Chemical Plant Zone in Sonic 2. Sega knew the effect this music had on children right from the start, which is why they’ve included variants of it in most of the Sonic games.

Obviously I was never very good at Sonic as a kid. Which is why I always ended up drowning, and always ended up hearing that bloody music. Maybe it was never anything more than the feeling that once that music started playing, I’d have to start the whole level over. Again.

Well, that’s it for now. I’ll write a part two on this subject soon, when I’ve stopped shaking and having to lie in a dark room drinking neat brandy.

Home on the range (and the living room floor) - how to build a den

We all have a nesting instinct. Our homes are our castles, which is why it is legal in some countries to shoot an intruder/Avon lady/Jehovah’s Witness.

Everyone needs a place to call their own, but what do you do when you're too young to earn a living and buy a homestead? You build your own!

The good thing about dens is they're not subject to planning regulations and council tax. They're normally only subject to whether or not your mum needs the dining table that day.

Build a den, and you can claim your own private sanctuary - a place where you can meditate, have some quiet time, and play with your Barbies in peace.

Materials -

You can make a den out of almost anything, although there are a few preferred building materials. These include sheets, boxes, and furniture, or for maximum points, a combination of the three.

Use your imagination – you're ideally going for a roof, two side walls and a back wall. For this purpose, a sheet or two draped over a table/two chairs is perfect. If possible you want a front wall with some kind of opening for a door. But this is extremely difficult and should only be attempted by experienced den architects. However, if you're using the sheet method, there's nothing to stop you using another sheet for the front wall, and just climbing underneath it when you want to get in and out. Do not attempt to cut a door in your mum’s sheet – she will not thank you.

Boxes are a good second choice, but they must be huge boxes – think fridge-freezer delivery boxes. Alternatively you can cut boxes up and tape them together to make one large box, if you have really good scissors/an infinitely patient parent.

It's easier to create a working door with the box method, as you can just cut one in. however, be sure to make the door big enough, as getting stuck in it will just result in the whole thing falling over.

Outdoor dens -

Building a den outdoors becomes more common as you get older, although to some people it is standard practise. Popular locations for outdoor dens include -

- in your shed/garage

- in a hole in a big hedgerow (they always seem to do this in books, but I’ve never seen anyone do it in real life, ever)

- your rich friend's wendy house (inviting your rich friend along is optional)

Decorating your den -

Even if you are a boy, you still have to pay some attention to the inside of your den. This is because if you invite your friends round to sit in what is essentially a cardboard box, they will think you're a bit strange.

If space will allow, add some seating. Unless you already have carpet underneath you, flooring is a must (especially if your den is built on grass, as this is a surefire way to get ants in your pants). If you want your den to be homey, cut out a nice window (do NOT do this with your mum's sheets). Lastly, if your den is really big, add a table, around which you will hold all your important meetings.

Things to do in a den -

Obviously, the main purpose of a den is to hold your club's secret meetings. All members of your club must have a password to enter. This is the law.

The first rule of your den – you do not talk about your den.

In the meetings you will discuss important topics such as how to raise money for your club (ideas like “sell my dad's car” and “hold a bring and buy sale for charity – all proceeds go to the club” - both of which are equally unlikely to work).

Keeping intruders out -

This is by far the most important aspect of a den, and as such must be treated seriously. Guns, cannons and boiling oil are illegal when you're a child, which is a shame. Instead you must rely on the following tactics -

- tape a note to your door that reads “KEEP OUT” No one allowed without the password!!!!”

That's about it.

If you're really lucky, your mum will let you have tea in your den, which means one of two things. Either she will bring you and your friends sandwiches and pop to devour at your leisure, or you must eat whatever you can forage, which is usually Claire's half eaten packet of Polos.

Home sweet home!