Learn to drive from the comfort of your armchair. Mrs Patel shows you how.

As part of her million-selling series of self-help books, Mrs Patel now launches three essential volumes; teaching beginners in her own unique style how to drive any type of vehicle, anywhere in the world...all from the comfort of a favourite armchair or sofa.

Think of the time and money saved: forget about tedious on-road driving lessons, endless parking manoeuvres, pointless questions about outdated highway codes.. Mrs Patel's inimitable, step-by-step instruction technique show you how to pass every crucial test without stress.
Book 1 teaches you how to drive any make of car: saloon, shooting-brake, 4X4, van or stretch limousine...simply grasp the pretend "sports style"steering wheel provided, carefully noting the imaginary location of indicator buttons, screen wash, headlights and wipers etc. Next, piece together the pretend gear stick and mount it on your armchair's left or right arm, depending whether right or left hand drive. Finally place the spring loaded clutch and brake set in front of your chair and off you go. Book 2 concentrates on learning to be a complete petrol-head along with guidelines about living (and more likely, dying) in the fast lane. Book 3 provides comprehensive tuition on driving JCB's, Earthmovers, Tanks and MML's (Mobile Missile Launchers). Also, why not consider qualifying as an Ambulance or Fire Truck Driver. Mrs Patel shows you how.
Every book contains comprehensive instructions about using your home seating arrangements to become a safe, confident 21st Century driver, whatever your imagined vehicle. If you have any high-backed chairs, even better as you will learn how to minimise whiplash in the event of shunting into Book 2's tutorial for novice LGV/HGV drivers blocking the middle motorway lanes.

If you introduce a few kitchen chairs along with some side tables and footstools, the whole family can learn to drive with you. You can even practice who's going to become chief irritating back seat driver, and the adult/child most likely to want to see the sea first or be violently sick en route.
It's all in this fascinating series. For more information and to buy the books online go to jollywigs.com

Others in the brilliant Mrs Patel series:

Mrs Patel's Armchair Guide to Flying a Jumbo Jet.
Mrs Patel's Guide to dealing with Welsh Call Centres (Limited Edition)
Mrs Patel's Guide to Christmas

DO YOU HAVE MORE SUGGESTED TITLES FOR MRS PATEL TO CONSIDER PUBLISHING? Please use comments facility below.

Eco-Warriors versus Common Sense. Who's Winning?

I have family up in flood-devastated Gloucestershire. I've rung them of course and been pleased to hear that, except for battered blooms and rather soggy cats, they're all ok and existing on copious amounts of home-made Bredon Hill plum wine.
On dry land everywhere, the prophets of doom gather daily to use the phrase "global warming". "It's all mankind's fault" they chime, waving packs of low energy light bulbs. Please, let's get common sense back into all this. The emphasis is in all the wrong places. My family recycle to cut down on landfill sites, not compete against the world's farting and burping cattle or Co2 released by the oceans. I have signed petitions and sent letters to supermarkets begging less pointless packaging... more for health and safety issues than environment. Try opening any blister pack of batteries without nearly decapitating your thumb and forefinger.

I also believe that a few dedicated vans delivering fresh local, seasonal produce is far more efficient financially (and environmentaly) than people leaping into cars to sample the already turning fruit selections bulging in the supermarket fruit and veg aisles. Again, it makes basic economic common sense. Perhaps because I was once in advertising and marketing, I cringe at new bandwagon campaigns, along with this misleading, so-called moral claptrap from politicians and Government-appointed scientists. "Carbon-footprints". Now there's a marketing phrase if ever I heard one.
"Oooh dear missus...mustn't leave your carbon footprint". Actually, what needs to be said in the current climate is, build proper houses and gardens again, preferably not on flood plains and just maybe these blips can be better contained. Also...dodgy subject this...can we please remember that we are an overcrowded Island. Politicians mumbling about new legislation to control our carbon emissions is a smokescreen for a failed, collapsed immigration policy. So how are we doing on the Common Sense front? Recycling paper, for example...makes perfect sense. Stopping the tide of unwanted mailings and door-drops bundling through your letterbox...suddenly you realise, the whole system is having a laugh at your expense. There's a limit to the paper you can recycle. Most plastic coated papers are unsuitable for recyling. But it all helps to fuel your local council tax bill under the guise of "we're getting greener". There's an old saying that says "where's there's muck, there's brass". And holding the eco-friendly ticket is currently earning big business extra billions.
Continuing on the common sense theme. Just about every processed food or household item you buy contains chemical cocktails designed to promote amazing allergies, rashes, toxic overloads.. yet suddenly, the eco-warriors see the cartons as the enemy. Read the labels:...and before you buy any more Coke...or any fizzy drink, look for a nasty chemical sweetener called Aspartemane, banned just about everywhere except in the UK for its suspected carcogenic properties. Mankind's undoubted contribution to world-wide catastrophe actually has very little to do with global warming. Think about it. In the meantime I think I'll open my own bottle of Bredon Hill Plum Wine.
I more than welcome a flood of comments...

"Are you dead?"

"Are You Dead?"...truly amazing revelations. Send £5 to AfterLife Inc; PO Box 6445 London. Back in the 1980's, during the dying days of extended lunch hours in the advertising industry, B.Bazzley and I used to spend many a liquid hour (or twenty) in a pub near Warren Street thinking of novel ideas to pay off the bar bill. The idea was simple: for this jolly high-yield wheeze, we'd take out a small ad in Prediction Magazine, a specialist journal for those deeply into things mystical, astrological and other strange things going bump in the attic (including trapped roofing contractors). Then with each fiver coming in, we'd send out the following mailed return: On the Front Cover, a repeat of the proposition: "Are You Dead?". Inside......

"NO...but here's a list of people who are..." Julius Caesar, Winston Churchill, Edward VI, Emily Pankhurst, Dr Crippen, George Washington, Karl Marx....and so on.

This idea also led us onto ways you could "put the fun back into funerals". Go faster stripes on the sides of coffins. A revving two-stroke engine mounted on the back. Messages from the dearly departed concealed in a specially mounted CD player on the coffin lid, berating the assembled mourners for not singing "Jerusalem" with sufficient gusto. Either that or issuing a loud digitally-remastered burp during the middle of final prayers.

And attending your own wake.

The Celestial Bank is mentioned elsewhere in this edition. This was one of the introductory offers.

"Make sure you open your account now and when you finally pass over you will be able to "...talk to each invited mourner at your wake, enjoy the buffet, the wine, the endless remember-when stories, even drop mischievous hints about the contents of your will...all through your very own Celestial Bank approved medium. You'll be able to discover first hand what people really thought about you. Will you be deeply missed? Then again,, why has your parting become the subject of such unbridled celebration, joy and happiness? At last, you'll learn the ever-lasting truth about your so-called friends and fawning relatives, and in your next life, by opening a separate "Pay Back Time" flexi-account, you can earmark any of their vile ancestors to receive as much abject misery and plagues of locusts as your Celestial Bank high-yield account can fund over not just one, but several lifetimes..."

Sponsored tombstones: that was another idea. And as a marketing medium, it really stands the test of time (!). On the back of the stone, a simple message "Thanks to Sun Life Assurance, I leave my family's future in safe hands." For real impact, have a neon light display each time someone walks past with their dog. With every laser-controlled trigger, a sprouting plastic daisy display gently pushes up and a recorded message from the deceased recommends X-Y-or Z Life Policy Company. For the true death entrepreneur, there are so many opportunities.

Funerals at sea. Simply stick an outboard motor on the back of the coffin and off it roars.You could actually hold coffin races, helping to offset funeral costs and providing welcome, much needed entertainment for all the families of the bereaved.

Race 1: Uncle Bert versus Mrs Parslow, Uncle Silas and Gerald (Duke) Cadogan.

"And off they go. Much-Loved Uncle Silas in the Frederick Death & Co Ltd coffin is streaking into the lead, closely followed by Merry & Co's Lightweight Beech Coffin containing Mrs Parslow's mortal remains. Once Awesome Uncle Bert seems to be having engine difficulties...oh no...the coffin has developed a leak. It's sinking. Gerald (Duke) Cadogan in the Gently Funeral Company's streamlined mahogany coffin just manages to avoid a collision. Oh dear me, more calamity up front of the field. Much-loved Uncle Silas has ploughed straight into a Buoy. Mrs Parslow's mortal remains are heading unchallenged towards the chequered flag... Mrs Parslow's mortal remains win! Bravo! What an astonishing victory... "

The other great thing about coffin racing, whether on land or sea... there's a limit to how far health & safety can become involved for fairly obvious reasons...

Ever wondered why some people are born "with a silver spoon in their mouth"?

(with acknowledgement to the genius and wit of James Sherriffs who's idea it was in the first place). This question has puzzled ordinary people for centuries. Paris Hilton is a prime example. The hideous American air-head-heiress popped out of a gold-plated womb straight into billions of dollars of inheritance. The answer? In 1615, old Jack Hilton, a vagrant and a rather useless pickpocket from the village of Lesser Beeding in Somerset, opened a high-interest savings account with The Celestial Bank. Some 200 years later, Cedric Nathaniel Hilton was born into an extremely successful bed and breakfast business in St Ives, Cornwall. He too carried on the family tradition and also opened an account with the Celestial Bank - The Premium Gold version offering an additional 15% interest over base rate. It is his shrewd investing with the Celestial Bank that has given us the world-wide chain of Hilton Hotels. And Paris Hilton. Who, believe it or not, is old Jack Hilton reincarnated and having a ball in his new female I'm-a-dizzy-blonde-bimbo impersonation. Shame about the drink-driving conviction and the spell in prison. One of his standing orders must have been processed late.
So how does it work? During your life on earth, you contribute as much cash as you can spare into your secure after-life savings account.On the moment of death, account holders are given a number of future surrender options: 70 years: you can return to Earth as the offspring of a moderately wealthy couple living in your choice of suburbia...private education, honours degree, and a guaranteed job with long lunch hours in a major city bank. Wait 150 years and you'll go to Eton or Cheltenham Ladies College...or Harvard...and end up in a future Government in some cushy number with a whole variety of tax-free residences. Discreet extra-marital affairs are also thrown in as part of the package. For an extra few pounds invested a month, you can also enjoy the financial benefits of an automatic publishing contract for your forthcoming Diaries. For 250 years, you can choose to come back as a future Saudi Arabian Prince or one of Sir Paul McCartney's heirs with zillions of dollars having quietly accumulated over centuries. You won't just have a silver spoon in your mouth, you'll have an entire solid silver tea set. So how do you apply for your account? Simply log onto thecelestialbank.com....or get in touch with your local Celestial Bank Authorized Medium. You'll find them in most wacky astrological magazines or wandering round the High Street trying to flog you sprigs of lucky heather.

It's 20th July. Christmas is upon us...

Rain, rain and more rain. More rain. Even heavier rain. In London's Oxford Street, the famous store, Selfridges, have cleverly fast-forwarded the seasons to introduce yet more exciting shopping opportunities. As we're all trying to dry out from this soggy July suddenly there's a Christmas gift room in the West End. Here you can plan ahead, buy sparkly things, get yards of wrapping paper and imagine that the unseasonable hailstones now falling are pretty winter snowflakes. This is globally-warmed marketing on a brilliant scale. No summer means eradicate Autumn and cut straight to inflated Christmas prices. The "ho-ho-ho-" joy of sweltering bell-ringing Santas wandering up and down Bond Street...can't wait. Equally intriguing...on the day the nation's schools break up for their summer vacation, Clinton Cards, W.H Smith and Tesco's already have "Back-To-School" offers. Are they right? Have they read the weather to such a finite degree, kids will be bribing the janitor with cases of Merlot in order to get back into the warm, dry familiar surroundings of the schoolroom?

Thanks Anna. How are your bunions?

I'm deeply grateful to the world's..no galaxy's.. favourite and certainly fittest agony aunt: Anna Sorry-But-With-The-Best-Will-In-The-World-I-can't-fix-your-leaking-taps Raeburn who kindly suggested the title of this blog, "Mike's Pen". Anna is known to millions of radio listeners who tune into her radio show on LBC-97.3 every weekday from 2pm... (Plug over, now when can I expect the cheque...) although personally I've never understood the term "agony aunt". It implies that whilst addressing caller's often complex dilemmas, she's trying to twiddle the knobs with arthritic joints, nursing her bunions or readjusting yards of bandages around the worsening gout infestation. Another strange term used on radio: "Shock Jock". It conjures up visions of kilt-swirling Scotsmen being struck by lightening. Some might say that's a good thing but I couldn't possibly comment. I've never met Anna although I suspect she'd be a superb dinner guest; would fellow guests be enthralled or consider throwing themselves off the balcony? Would I need plentiful supplies of aspirin in case her pain worsens during the pudding course? Or should I transfer her pain over to Kelvin Mackenzie, famed ex-editor of The Sun who seems to feel it daily? Again, Anna, thanks.

Does your neighbourhood contain a badly singing thrush?

Since early Spring I've had to endure the dreadful chirrupings of a thrush that desperately needs singing lessons. Early every morning, it turns the dawn chorus into a maelstrom of distorted crotchets and fractured quavers. Every note is so horribly off-key, even the leaves on the oak trees opposite are crazily hurling themselves off the branches. It's even worse than listening to Duran-Duran's current comeback tour or British Eurovision Song Contest entries. I've rung the Royal Society For The Protection Of Birds (RSPB) and received the reply that its relentless mutilation of soothing birdsong may be due to avian laryngitis. Or more likely, because it's thoroughly tone deaf. It hasn't attracted any mates (sensibly, on hearing the first battererd notes they flew off somewhere else).
I saw it in my garden the other day, bashing a juicy snail to smithereens. It ignored both my ear muffs and the roaring engine of the ground-to-air missile aimed at it. Nothing happened because my attention was diverted to another strange sight. Wood mice attacking Blackbirds? I'm beginning to wonder whether my garden has a hidden crop of magic mushrooms. Unlike house mice, wood mice are sweet-faced and ginger coloured and for their own safety should never be announcing "I'm here" in broad daylight to predators up in the sky, in the bushes or approaching them with a baseball bat. More strange Nature Notes soon.