Specifically, runs of bad luck betokening the interest of some sort of supernatural character out to get one.

However, within the last few weeks, the following have happened.

1. The handle of my Hoover snapped, presumably from plastic fatigue, necessitating buying a new cleaner. The only one of a reasonable price lacks the tool I usually use for cleaning the stairs, and the old one doesn't fit, so I have improvised with a polypipe screw fit connection.

2. I went to see War Horse, and a friend gave me the CD of the songs and music for my birthday. I went to play it and found the CD part of my radio/cassette/CD player wasn't working. I paid £19 for it to be looked at, only to be told the board of that part of the machine couldn't be sourced any more - and it has hardly been over used, either. I could only find one replacement, looking for DAB radio as well as the cassette, much more expensive than I hoped, only available via the Wireless for the Blind charity. It also plays MP3s from SD card and USB sticks, though. But not the recordings from the other radio from the same manufacturer, which are MP2s.

3. My bedroom TV took to constantly falling off the table on which it has been propped on a book stand because its old stand broke some time ago. Had to buy a bigger one (it was a tiny camping one) - still it plays DVDs and can record on USB sticks.

4. Someone threw an egg at my window last week, the day the window cleaner had been. I managed to rinse it off with a spray bottle aimed through a crack. This apparently happens round here occasionally, silently in the night. No sniggers, no footsteps. Odd.

5. I ordered some bookcases from a DIY store sopme miles away which said they had them, turned up, spent ages with a guy who got stuck up on his cherry picker trying to find where they were and had to be got down by someone else, only to find that their computer was wrong and they hadn't any in stock. Went to IKEA instead and got stuck in a major traffic jam on the way back. (I did know about that in advance, but it was predicted to have cleared.)

6. My handheld cordless vacuum cleaner proved incapable any more of picking up the dust from sanding the skim down on the bathroom wall, so I had to buy a new one. (Did get £5 off with an about to expire voucher, though, and it was in the sale.)

7. Found I had been driving around on a slow puncture. Went to get my electric pump to get me to a garage, only to find that the plug on it was broken, (and there were no bits any where near it). Had to get roadside assistance out, as the car was too close to another for me to get the jack under it safely - and when the guy came, I saw I would not have been able to get the wheel off the bolts anyway - he had a problem with it. It had a bolt in it, and it has proved possible to repair it for £15. I should be able to fix the pump - I have one of those plugs somewhere, and it isn't so broken I can't see which wires go where. (The bolt wasn't the sort likely to have been propped under my wheel at the time of the egg incident - got done twice at school by that method.)

8. When I finally got all my books sorted out (see number 5), I realised I have lost my Shakespeare. I think I took it to my living room when I was watching Coriolanus, but if so, I have no idea where it went next.

I do not believe in gremlins, but it is beginning to feel a little as if something is setting me up to quote Kenneth Williams in Carry on Caesar. I expect random negative things to cluster, but this is rather a lot for that. Still, all those new things should last me out, and I can fix the little TV to the wall in the kitchen, though I will have to run a coax cable through from the living room. A good thing my pension is due in in a couple of days, though.

Penny