Then there was the other friend who threw his television remote at the wall after it had repeatedly failed to function. He was suffering from bourbon overdose at the time and discovered the next morning that he had been trying to change channels with his mobile phone. The revelation also explained why he had encountered difficulty in phoning people the night before.

Remote-wise, it has not been a good week, the problems beginning when a cool change swept through Toowong. This was a localised climatic change, confined to my apartment when the air-conditioner began blowing frigid blasts throughout its confines.

"Strange," I thought as I stood shivering in a pair of shorts, pondering the latest tomato sauce stain to mysteriously appear on the carpet. The sauce stains, while another matter entirely, are the subject of ongoing intrigue and I have begun to wonder if I am witnessing a miracle in the manner of those religious statues that spontaneously bleed. Perhaps a saint lived here before I moved in, leaving behind miraculous carpet that haemorrhages while I sleep. I can think of no other explanation.

As ice began to form on the walls, I found the two remotes for the air-conditioners and turned them off. Ten minutes later they both started again. I turned off the timers and within five minutes, they were running again. Nothing I have done has made any difference and I now live in a two-bedroom microcosm of Melbourne, in which the temperature gyrates between 15 and 30 degrees every hour as an unseen hand manipulates the remotes.

The other remote, which controls the garage door, remains obedient to my commands, but I wonder if it is but a matter of days before the revolt spreads. This will be unfortunate, as I enjoy the sport of maintaining my speed as I approach the garage gates and relying on them to open before me. I misjudged this once when I lived in a house with a wooden garage and knocked down half the back wall. The steel gates on my present garage will, I suspect, be less forgiving.

And there is the remote a friend lent me so I could access her garage in her absence. She wants it back and I have yet to break the news that it has disappeared into the black hole in which reside the myriad sets of house keys, car keys and sunglasses I have lost, along with all those tradesmen who promised on their mothers' graves to arrive first thing the next morning and never did.

I have one of those multi-purpose remotes at my place, the origins of which are lost in time and I have thought of driving to my friend's place, standing in her street, pointing it at the garage door and hoping for the best. I dreamt the other night that I did this and every garage door in her street began flying up and down while television sets throughout the suburb flashed on and off like malfunctioning traffic lights.