I suffer from arthritis. It’s a common complaint in the UK, often blamed on our damp weather. It’s exactly where I placed the blame until I began to learn about it.

Both my knees are in a bad state of repair, but the rain, the cold, the damp, snow and ice are only part of the story. There are a whole catalogue of reasons for them becoming as bad as they are, not least of which was letting myself go between the ages of 45 and 58.

I decided to write it up from an accident in 2006, which jarred my left knee and let the arthritis that had been there for some time take a proper hold on me, up until the back end of 2009.

It was a sad and depressing tale, so I decided to inject a little humour into it. What came out of that decision was a quirky book detailing the problems it causes me, mixed with a more light hearted approach to some of the oddities it produces in my life.

In the humorous excerpt that follows, I look at possible causes of arthritis, with my tongue firmly in my cheek.