I have such a box of copulating cables. Long ones, short ones. Every kind of one. It seems that each time you buy an electronic something these days it comes with enough cardboard packaging to make Al Gore break into a disorienting fever, and three too many cables. It’s always three. You plug your new gadget together and there, leering up at you from the bottom of the ripped and shredded plastic container, are the extra wires.  When they arrive they come with those tiny wire cable ties holding them tight and snug, but beware: the moment you untie the tempting little twisted thing you will never get that cable to look as neat again. But there’s actually no reason to untie them anyway, they serve no purpose. They’re just there, to taunt you.  And to be put into the box.

So over the years you do that. You feed the box-beast.  My box is on the top of my clothes cupboard. It’s the box that my first VCR came in a decade or so ago, and it has lasted longer than the machine. Go figure. But it serves a purpose –as den of iniquity for my extra wires.
Sometimes, late at night, I think that the cables have a party. They get the thinnest wire (that would be the digital audio cable from my new CD ROM drive) to stretch itself over the open end of the box. Much like a guitar string. All the other cables, led by the sinister RCAs who think there is safety in numbers and that, therefore, they own the place, use their end bits to strum the improvised guitar. This creates a low hum, not dissimilar to an LSD-induced experimental album from the 70s.

OK, they obviously don’t really do that, but they are having sex. I know this because the number of cables in the box is no longer divisible by three. And I haven’t taken any out, so they must have been up to something. Tonight I’m going to set my alarm for 3am, get out of bed, tiptoe over to the box and watch them. Like the sick cable pervert that I am. I might even wear a grey raincoat so that I really look the part.
I don’t care if anyone laughs, but I don’t want this to go on. Not under my roof.

What if these shenanigans went on unchecked? Before I know it my house would be awash with extra cables. They would worm their way into my sock drawer, around my loo roll and gently squeeze the life out of every living creature within their grasp. That’s how bad it could get.

Then they would begin organising. They would link arms and sing songs, demanding a bigger box. Some of the cables, probably the younger and thicker ones, would begin agitating for a new leader and swear that they would die for it. The older cables would roll their eyes and long for the days when everyone knew their place. And the paler cables….don’t even get me started on those. They think they’re so damn special.
It’s all true.

Now if you’ll excuse me I need to go and check on my cutlery. I think the spoons are dealing drugs.