Hey man, 143!

KlaxonsI’m officially old. I know 35 isn’t exactly prehistoric, but a couple of things recently have confirmed this for me.

Firstly, I was mildly horrified to realise I’ve never heard any of the music from this year’s Mercury Music Prize winners The Klaxons. Of course, if it had been Amy Winehouse, Maps or Arctic Monkeys I’d have been OK.

The second shock was that there’s some cool new slang going around wiv the kids, namely 143. I didn’t know what it meant either, you see. It’s short for ‘I love you’ and kids are now texting other friends, to let them know how they feel.

What I want to know is why no-one’s invented a virtual rose to send, rather than three digits. After all, nothing says it like a bunch of flowers, real or not!

Britain’s gone potty

Am I alone in finding Paul Potts-mania completely baffling?

For those of you who have been living in a vacuum for the past couple of months, the aforementioned appeared on and won Britain’s Got Talent on ITV, as a mobile phone-selling opera singer.

Since winning, he has released an album which has, predictably, shot to the top of the chart, outselling everything else comprehensively.

What I don’t understand is who buys this stuff? And, more pertinently, why? If people truly want to listen to opera, why not go for the real thing and buy some Enrico Caruso?

At least Enrico was never forced to sing an operatic version of REM’s Everybody Hurts!