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From the moment you open your 注目する，もくろむs, it starts. Even before that, 現実に. Stuff that gets the day off 不正に. This morning, for example, I spent half an hour trying to ignore a beeping sound that 脅すd to 運動 me to distraction.
I tried to を取り引きする it in the same way I’ve learned to live with the joys of tinnitus, but short of smothering myself with a pillow (which I considered), I was doomed.
Could it be the alarm clock? No, I stopped setting that years ago when I 結局 中止するd having a proper 職業 and began what is laughingly known as ‘working from home’.
Maybe it’s the microwave telling my wife that her morning coffee has reheated? No, it’s more 緊急の than that. Is it the 辞退する collectors manoeuvring their dustcart outside my window? No, because it isn’t …を伴ってd by the strident 発言する／表明する of a robotic sergeant-major bellowing the blindingly obvious fact that ‘this 乗り物 is 逆転するing!’
In the grouch club: Stuart Prebble
It can’t be the dishwasher or the washing machine 発表するing that they’ve finished their cycle, because both of those woke me in the middle of the night. The smoke detector telling me its 殴打／砲列 is running 負かす／撃墜する? What the hell?
結局, I つまずく to the bathroom and even I ? 常習的な as I am to the never-ending 行列 of new irritations ? am shocked. It turns out that my toothbrush is telling me off because it needs to be recharged.
I’ve hesitated to use electric to othbrushes because they make my brain vibrate, but my dentist (who 会談 to me as though I’m a six-year-old) 勝つ／広く一帯に広がるd and now my day is off to a bad start.
It’s 21 years since I had the idea for the first 一連の Grumpy Old Men for BBC2. At that time, a motley 禁止（する）d of entertaining grumpies got together to lament the seemingly inexhaustible 名簿（に載せる）／表（にあげる） of 誘発s that 疫病／悩ますd our middle age. Drawn from a coterie of 35- to 54-year-olds, our cast happily embraced the 集団の／共同の description, and entertained the 残り／休憩（する） of the world with their 不平（をいう）ing.
Everything from absurdly tight spaces in multistorey car parks to ‘your call is important to us’. From preposterous and facile スローガンs like ‘Fanatical about Film’ to the greengrocer’s apostrophe. From the congestion 告発（する），告訴（する）／料金 to the insistent bass にわか景気 of ‘music’ 漏れるing out of the headphones of fellow 乗客s on the train.
Our line-up 含むd Arthur Smith, （頭が）ひょいと動く Geldof, 法案 Nighy, Tim Rice, Don Warrington, Rick Wakeman and a dozen others, and the first series 結局 turned into 73 programmes (含むing Grumpy Old Women), seven 調書をとる／予約するs and a West End and 小旅行するing 行う／開催する／段階 show.
We had discovered a very rich seam.
Like many good TV 文書のs, this one was based on a watertight 科学の fact, which was that the 35- to 54-year-old age group was the grumpiest of any in history. Grumpier than their parents, who had grown up during the Second World War and felt lucky to be alive.
Grumpier than their children, a 広大な／多数の／重要な many of whom had been raised under Mrs Thatcher and were celebrating getting on the 住宅 ladder and ‘loadsamoney’.
Ours was the group least likely to believe that the NHS was getting better or that our political leaders know more than we do. It was the 世代 brought up during flower 力／強力にする, with the idea that we were 長，率いるing に向かって a world of peace and love.
A world in which robots would do all the hard work and we’d be 解放する／自由な to 熟視する／熟考する higher things. Or even lower things. But that’s not how it had all turned out, and we were grumpy.
You’d think the passing years would have 絶縁するd us from overreacting to unwelcome surprises but, two １０年間s on, the world has continued to 配達する a perpetual 供給（する） of 乱暴／暴力を加えるs. Indeed, if anything they’re coming along 厚い and faster than ever. Where to begin?
We could continue with the vexations of 存在 bossed about and patronised by 科学（工学）技術. The illuminated smiley 直面する 認可するing the fact that I’m 運動ing at the 速度(を上げる） of a salted slug ? as if the 負わせる of traffic hadn’t made スピード違反 impossible. いわゆる ‘smart’ motorways reminding me not to 減少（する） litter or to ‘take a break’.
The 理解できない 告示s by the train guard, repeated endlessly after every ‘駅／配置する stop’. And if I hear a 警告 to ‘See it. Say it. Sorted’ one more time I’ll put myself at 危険 of 逮捕（する） for civil disobedience.
At one time I foolishly 許すd BBC News to 警報 me when there was an important story we all needed to know about, and was 想像するing something along the lines of ‘take cover, the world is about to end’.
Instead of which, it beeps to let me know that the idiot 以前は known as Prin ce Harry has spoken to his brother, or hasn’t spoken to his brother, or might speak to his brother, or has passed 勝利，勝つd in public. Like I could かもしれない care.
Other burgeoning irritations 自然に 含む every 面 of social マスコミ, which 砲撃するs me with blandishments to review my 年金, 乗る，着手する on a 高級な sea-巡航する と一緒に 5,000 other people 船内に a liner with 22 床に打ち倒すs, and the attractions of ever more ingenious stair 解除するs.
When the 減ずるd agility of my 老年の aunt 原因（となる）d me to google mobility scooters, I was 扱う／治療するd to 昇進／宣伝s for everything from incontinence pads to surgical 器具s. Guys, when I need a springy 洗面所 seat to give me a 解除する, I’ll ask!
Everything, I mean everything, is getting worse. Five years ago, my 減刑する／通勤する 伴う／関わるd a pleasant 運動 across Richmond Park, then across Hammersmith 橋（渡しをする）, and I would park in the street outside my office.
Today, 木造の planters 封鎖する the 大勝する around the park, Hammersmith 橋（渡しをする） has been の近くにd for four years and parking outside the office is 限られた／立憲的な to two hours. All designed to make it harder for me to go to work, to earn money, to 支払う／賃金 税金s, which 基金 the 給料 of the hatchet-直面するd 公式の／役人s whose 単独の 目的 in life is to make 地雷 more difficult.
It’s all gone to hell and we’re grumpy. Grumpy Old Men grew up singing ‘hope I die before I get old’, but now it’s too late to die young. We’ve lived to find ourselves patronised by the lovely girl behind the pharmacy 反対する who kindly pretends to be surprised when I tell her my date of birth. I smile in the moment, but 内密に I’m 熟視する／熟考するing 殺人.
My prescription is 解放する／自由な, and I should be happy about it, but somehow I’m not. Or about anything very much.
Except still 存在 alive. Mostly.