Not to be trifled with

I had sleepless nights over trifles. It just wasn't right that the law should not concern itself with trifles. It seemed so arbitrary and unfair that, of all the desserts available for consumption, some high-minded judge somewhere decided, for no obvious reason, to home in on one of my favourites. Why couldn't the law adopt the same attitude to lumpy custard or spotted dick (which has far more menacing connotations)?

And it means, for all time, that if anyone were to choke on a trifle, or assault or '“ worse '“ murder another man with a trifle, there would be no remedy because the court would undoubtedly strike out the case, as it would if an unpaid trifle manufacturer wanted to sue for the price that in good faith he had charged for a container load of trifles.

Each one of these unfortunates would be met with the same response. You know how judges are: once they get a bee in their bonnet (or wig) you cannot budge them. They sit there with their elbows on the bench, their lips pursed and ready to say: 'We cannot hear you because we do not concern ourselves with trifles.'

Over the years several brave litigants have no doubt tried to circumvent the decisions. There must be stacks of unreported cases on doughnuts, fruit tarts and blancmanges.

All the small things

It could be that judges in their wisdom were trying to say that the law did not concern itself with little things; but if they had meant that I am sure they would have said so rather than make our mouths water from thoughts of the more tasty desserts.

But the law (and lawyers) most definitely do concern themselves with little things '“ the ones that always intervene when you are in a hurry, under pressure and facing a deadline. Like:

• The stapler. You would have thought that after many decades those who occupy stapler design centres would have devised a way of telling you when your stapler has nearly run out of staples. Microchip technology should be able to send a petulant squeak when you are down to the last ten. That squeak should also induce a little echo underneath the piles of detritus that fill the average office desk drawer '“ the squeak of staples in a box waiting to serve you. The corollary to a staple-less stapler is not being able to find a refill, or if you do '“ one that does the job. Hands up those of you who have found a strip of staples at the back of the drawer (making love to a paperclip that has to be prised away from its amorous activities) only to insert it (we have stopped discussing love making by the way) and have the stapler mash three staples together and seize up. The resulting injury to your hand, caused by the pair of scissors you use to unjam the stapler, does not lighten your mood '“ especially when your blood drips onto the will you are about to send for probate. And you know that in a few weeks' time you will have to explain the bloodstains in an affidavit of plight and condition.
• The hole punch. A helpful beep would also be useful just before the little plastic tray at the bottom is on the point of spraying the floor with dull confetti.