Skeletor, Captain Hook, the Great Train Robbers, The Child Catcher, Fagin, Margaret Thatcher.
Of all the villains that marked my childhood, there are two more sinister than all of these.
Mr Neat and Mr Tidy.
Do you remember them?
I'll just run their story by you.
It's a bit over 40 years since Gil Scott-Heron penned the piece that would earn him monikers like ''the godfather of rap'' and ''founder of the spoken word movement'' for the rest of his days.
I was brought up on traditional Christmas stories, the sort that saw me going to midnight Mass and arranging holy plaster figures in a home-made wooden crib.
The news that our terrorism alert levels have gone from very low to low in the past few weeks has brought to mind those swingometer rural fire warning rainbow charts.
When I lived in Japan for a year, I saw many marvellous things. A photo booth in Osaka that could merge two faces to show you what your offspring might look like.A vending machine selling hot coffee on the top of Mt Fuji. Shops that sold sock glue. Students that wore thick white ruched socks held halfway up their legs with sock glue.
Let's face it. There's a lot wrong with the world these days. But two things make me really mad. Stainless steel pineapple slicers and planned obsolescence. Let me explain.
Last week a friend opined that if there was a pill you could take three times daily to give you all the food nutrition you need, she'd never cook another meal.