A former friend once bought me the book “Grumpy Old Men”. Why, I don’t know as I’m the epitome of sweetness-and-light and go through life like a child skipping through a field of daisies.

Apart from when they start discussing things like MPs expenses in the media and nobody comes up with a simple solution that’d stop any shenanigans. It’s not that difficult. Within Oldfields, if any of us need to pay for something that is for the job, and necessary for the job only, we pay for it ourselves, usually with a credit card, get a receipt and claim it back at the end of the month. It doesn’t cover things such as lunch just for yourself (you have to pay for that whether you’re at work or not), clothes (if you weren’t at work you still have to wear clothes) or houses for ducks. Publicly paid employees expenses are enough to get any reasonable calm sole spluttering.

Then they go and start confusing the issue of expenses with an MP’s salary. What on Earth have they got to do with each other? Apart from the fact they both involve the movement of money into the employees bank account, there’s absolutely no relation. One is out of pocket expenses that the employer should pay for, the other is pay for the job. Any confusion between the two is dishonest. Of course, anyone should be honoured to serve their constituency and country. If only the rest of us were a little more discerning in our choices.

But apart from things like that, I grump very infrequently. Unless, of course, pushed by the news that it’s these same people preaching about how we should live our lives, source our diet, pay our taxes. This from an organisation that can’t even manage itself.

No, as you can see, very little gets my blood pressure up. Apart, that is, from those stupid little bits of paper that are stuck onto apples to satisfy the whim of some meddling bureaucrat who’s never grown, picked, packed, shopped for or cooked in his - and it will be a “his” - life.

I was eating an apple while driving the other day, which is of course nowadays a crime, when one of these things got stuck to my teeth. Throwing the apple out of the window was another crime, as was spitting repeatedly after it trying to unstick the glue, as well as veering from one side of the road to the other, so nearly contributing to the rising cost of insurance premiums.

Of course none of this would have happened if I hadn’t eaten the apple while driving. But I was trying to take the government’s advice and get my five fruit and veg a day while rushing to generate enough money to pay our staff to raise those extra taxes to pay for the government’s mistakes and eating while in the car seemed the only chance that I’d get. And all would have been fine if it hadn’t been for that helpfully-placed label.

And why do we have to label apples anyway? My meat doesn’t come with the animal’s name on it, I can drink a pint of beer without it being labelled. Surely a sign at the point of sale is all that we simpletons need?

The doctor says I have to calm down. Who’s wound up? Not me. I sleep like a baby – with wind and a wet nappy. I’m never grumpy. Never, that is, until I read that, in the UK, we waste £10 billion worth of food each year. £10 billion! In a time of world food shortages and other disasters where millions are dying needlessly, that’s the real crime. And interestingly, it equates to over £150 each man, woman and child; not all of whom are tax payers. Enough to go a long way to compensating for our government’s mistakes, as well as feed millions who desperately need it.

We’ve obviously lost the plot. Now why on earth should I be grumpy?