The postal strike threatened for next week will probably have little effect on me if it does take place. It is rare that the postman passes our house without delivering something, but most of the post seems to be junk mail. I have had only two letters this week: one was a note telling me how much I owed for using French toll roads last month and the other I will have to pass on to another Lion. The rest of the post has been either begging letters, letters trying to sell me something, or catalogues from mail-order companies. Glancing through one of the latter, I wondered how many people really want a set of nodding meerkats to decorate their gardens or an electronic gizmo that winds up a watch. And how many people have to wind a watch nowadays? I bought a watch by mail order a couple of years ago. I think it was probably advertised in our daily paper as a reader offer, so I thought I was reasonably safe to part with my hard earned. The watch was described as radio controlled as it connected to a radio clock to ensure that it both kept accurate time and changed to different time zones when travelling. Just what I wanted, as this would save me having to alter my watch whenever I went to France. How convenient it would be to have the hands whizz round an hour as I left the ferry at Calais, then round 23 hours on my return, all done as if by magic. I suppose I was just a little naive and a few moments thought would have made me realise that the European radio clocks are situated in Rugby, England, and Dusseldorf, Germany. How would the watch know that I had got off the ferry and it should switch its connection from Rugby to Dusseldorf, especially as Rugby was still closer and presumably the signal from there would be the stronger? Anyway, that didn't occur to me until after the watch had arrived. It was then that I discovered the connection to the nearest radio clock was made only twice a day - 4 am and 4pm - so the watch would still be wrong much of the first day after arriving in a different time zone. Then I discovered another problem. There was no way that the watch could receive a signal in our house. There was no signal in the garden either, and in fact the only place I could make a connection was a hundred yards up the road. Go a hundred and two yards and the signal was lost again. But I did get my money back.