Last night a gremlin hid my remote control and while I was trying to find it, I remembered a joke I pulled on my mother a fair few moons ago.

She'd just purchased a new television for her bedroom and to our joy, amazement and delight, it came with a very new and fabulous extra, being a remote control!
Now, anybody under the age of about thirty will probably not remember the days of olde, when a person had to get up from the bed or sofa in order to change channels or lower the volume, but those who can recall such times will also have memories of when remote controls entered our lives.
And what joyous memories too, as no longer did one have to haul one's arse off the comfy sofa and then walk all of six or seven paces to the telly and then have to press buttons in the hope that one of the three* channels might have something worth watching on them.
And remote controls put an end to all that nonsense, hurrah!

So anyway. One evening my mum and I were in her bedroom watching something, and as the something wasn't very interesting, my mother decided to use the remote to see what else was on. I'd just decided to get a drink from downstairs, and was walking past the television just at the same time as my mum aimed the remote at it and pressed a button.
I couldn't resist.
I screamed, clutched at my stomach, and fell to the floor groaning.
My mother also screamed, and threw the remote into a far corner of the room before dashing over to see if I was alright.
Of course, I was alright as I was only messing about, and once my mother's heart rate returned to normal she (very luckily for me) saw the funny side of it.
No wonder my parents decided to not have any more children once I turned up really. They could have been even worse than me.

*Yes, just three.