Daughter received a parcel from the States the other day containing a Christmas present from some old friends of ours.

They had posted it ages ago on December 4 and, as it hadn't arrived in time for Christmas, we had decided it must have got lost somewhere along the way.

It must have turned up or reappeared somehow and we finally received it on January 16. No explanation or apology of course, and no prizes for guessing which country's post office had left it languishing in a sorting office for the last six weeks.

Anyway, it was one of those little chrome micro-scooters which are so much the fashion over here, so of course daughter was delighted. After a lot of pestering she allowed me to have first go on it.

Scooters have of course changed a bit since I was little. Then they only came in red and were made of tin.

They also didn't go very fast in those days. My attempts on the ultra-narrow footboard of this one, with it's superfast blue wheels, was more in keeping with Mr Bean.

I decided to leave scooting to the younger set in the future and to remain on two legs myself, especially as one of mine is still dodgy.

Daughter, being both as physically flexible and mentally judgmental as the average 11-year-old, likes to watch me do my exercises. This is so she can laugh at me and say things like "Why does that hurt, look, I can do it easily" and "Why can't you lift your leg up any higher, I can lift mine much higher than that".

I am half hoping she'll fall off her scooter and then perhaps she'll understand.