One of the benefits of roaming the city streets is the lack of babies lying about the place. I have enough trouble traipsing through the detritus of humanity as it is without overgrown foetuses clinging to my ankles. Invariably, when these goblins do emerge grimacing into the sunlight they are surrounded by an oestrogenic gurgle of illiteracy. The babbling crowd increases, sucking in all-comers like an old Coney Island freak show until each visitor has paid their two-cents worth of 'Ohhh isn't he adorable!'

It seems incumbent on me to point out that in no way are babies aesthetically pleasing. They are podgy bundles of lopsided, under-developed, ill-fitting limbs. They are adorable to the masses only because they are helpless, utterly dependent and incapable of expressing their simplest desires by means of language. They weep more pathetically than any Hollywood starlet could manage in the arms of Cary Grant. Their only obvious output apart from noise is a tidal wave of filth that reminds me chiefly of the Thames under Battersea Bridge, replete with supermarket trolleys, rotting corpses and discarded boots. I could almost admire them for this last quality, if it were not for the fact they have absolutely no idea what they are doing.

And so it was that an acquaintance of mine approached me with news that his loins had finally sired offspring. He immediately began reaching for his mobile phone, and asked if I wished to see a photograph of the little fiend.

'Nahh,' I replied, recoiling in disgust. It took great effort on my part not to add: 'I'd rather see a picture of your last shit.'