I have a bit of a problem with my alarm clock. It doesn’t go off at the right time. It doesn’t seem to understand that in the morning, I want to be woken up ten to fifteen minutes later than when I said I wanted to be woken up the night before.

Interesting stats in the newspaper last week. Apparently of the 70 victims of mass-killings in Australia and New Zealand between 1987 and 1993, 84% of them were killed by lunatics using legally owned guns. Well! That’s a relief, isn’t it! ‘Cos I’d hate to be gunned down by a lunatic who WASN’T allowed to be armed!

Maybe the gun lobby’s saying "Guns don’t kill people, people kill people" needs to be amended. To something like "Guns don’t kill people, people with guns kill people."

The article also said that 95% of people were killed by a familiar person. So here’s a message to all my friends and family: Keep your distance, I’m watching you.

I’m not a particularly mystical person. I’m not really sure what I believe in - God, the afterlife, all that stuff. I don’t know. Uncommitted. But I’ll tell you one thing - there’s something going on out there. Must be.

Without trying to get into anything too deep and meaningful, think about the universe. The scientists say it was the Big Bang that set it off. Okay, I can live with that. Hydrogen, helium whatever it was. Next question is… what set the Big Bang off? And so far the only explanation I can come up with is that without the universe being here, existence would be extremely dull. So maybe God was bored.

The other factor that I take into consideration is my own experience. I have seen into the future. Honest. Not cataclysmic events like wars or great leaders snuffing it or the end of the world, no. Nothing I could write a book about and people could say "gee, he really saw that coming, didn’t he, that’s amazing."

Alas no. But I do, on occasions, see into the future. It happens in dreams. It’s usually just a snippet of conversation. A sentence or two, often spoken by someone I know. I’ll wake, and for a few minutes think "hmmm, interesting dream. X said Y… I’ve never heard him/her say that. Interesting."

Days, weeks, often months will pass. I forget about the dream. It’s cast into the back of my mind. Until one day, X says Y. Just like in the dream. And it comes back to me. Wham… I dreamt that.

I used to stop them and say "have we had this conversation before?" We hadn’t. I don’t say that anymore, I just smile and shake my head, because I know what’s going on. I don’t know how, or why.

How could this happen? Some of you are scientists - explain it! Go on, I dare you!

A couple of weeks ago the saga of the attempted souffle hit the virtual airwaves. Well, I’ve had another go. And although it didn’t rise far enough to look as impressive as in the cook book, the result of this weekend’s culinary experiments did indeed result in what could be described as a souffle. That, combined with Daniel’s World’s Simplest Salad (a.k.a. lettuce and some slices of tomato) made up Saturday’s dinner. What a feast.

You will also be no doubt overjoyed to hear that last week’s "Ants Bros - Rag Mop" conundrum has been solved. Thanks to Fiona Kelleghan and Jarrad Dowd we at Custard Puzzler Central HQ are now fairly certain it was a reference to an old song by the Ames Bros, called "Ragg Mopp" that we’d heard on the radio. Phew, I’m glad we got to the bottom of that. And the mental health authorities will be taking this into consideration when the hearing continues, so it’s good news all round!

Have you ever found a piece of paper, just a scrap, a post-it note, whatever, upon which was written, in your own writing, something you could make absolutely no sense of? I found just such an object while digging through the kitchen the other week. A scrap of paper, upon which was written, in what can only be described as my handwriting, the following:

The Ants Bros - Rag Mop

I have no idea what this means. I’d appreciate any input from anybody who might have a clue. I’d really like to know. I hope that by including the full text of the note here, I’m preserving it and distributing it far and wide, just so that in the slim possibility that it is some piece of knowledge that is of great value to humanity, it isn’t lost in the ravages of the paper recycle bin.