My father's was bigger than Wham! in the 1980s. It was so large he would literally have to lug it around in a suitcase. He would show it off proudly when friends popped by to investigate what all the fuss was about, irrespective of the fact that it rarely showed signs of life and was very unpleasing aesthetically.

A few years passed before I followed suit and procured a mobile phone. As a late teenie, in the badlands of Hastings, and with a market stall that sold poor quality Oriental goods, it was a must-have accessory for the upwardly mobile young entrepreneur about town. Sadly, I had to liquidate the market stall after a few months, and I apportion the blame on the Motorola brick phone.

At the formation of my short-lived business empire, I also acquired a faux leather jacket to complete the look. Mistakenly I believed Faux to be an exotic breed of Friesian. Its only USP was that it had a very deep internal pocket large enough for a house brick. The weight of the phone, when placed in said pocket, would cause the jacket to sag around my knees. Each time a prospective punter wandered in to peruse my fine array of joss stick holders and pirate bandanas, they would be met with me physically struggling with a hand in my pocket around the groin, as I struggled to stop the phone from kneecapping me. Punters were scared off and market stall became defunct, along with the Motorola brick.

Fast forward a quarter of a century and such technology is laughable. It is now the odd bods who possess phones which only call, text and, at a push, have the slithery snake dot matrix game with which to while away the hours. Times they are a changing, and mobile phones are now viewed as a need, not a want, which saddens me greatly. As a nation, we are obsessed. It kills sociability and the family. Thankfully my daughters are still too young to have their own phones but I envision a time soon when the pester power will commence, only ending once I give in to their demands. At home, work and in the pub, we stare hypnotised at screens like ketamine-injected droids. We cut short conversations and become irritable when screen time is disturbed, all in the name of keeping ‘connected’ with people whom we may not have clapped eyes on for decades, often with good reason.

The issue is fomo (fear of missing out). One in three adults admit to waking up at night to check their messages. With 37 million smartphone users in the UK, that’s a whopping 12 million, give or take, so obsessed with staying connected that they forego sleep to check what Britney off Towie has misspelt on Twitter or look at pictures of others' seemingly perfect nuclear families. Even joshing with family about their mobile usage results in verbal abuse bordering on the aggressive and confrontational. The truth smarts and we are all hurting. Thankfully there is a sliver of light at the end of the tunnel.

Smartphone sales grew six per cent in the last 12 months compared to nine per cent the year before. As with all ‘new’ technology, the fad will wear off eventually as we move onto something new, much as video killed the radio star or DVD did for the VHS. Our mini computers can do anything we want despite what we really want, to love and be loved, yet we still mistakenly cling to vague connections that are neither fulfilling nor offer longevity. The constant stress as to how many minutes the battery will last will continue for a while, as will paranoia over delayed social media responses.

As well as sleep deprivation, studies have concluded that there is a clear link between compulsive phone use and depression. Depressed people spend, on average, four times longer on their smartphones. With the phone glued to us, callers can become irate if calls go unanswered, creating further psychological issues. The internet has turned us into monsters and Sir Tim Berners-Lee should receive life imprisonment. Privacy is invaded and peace of mind is besieged.

Anyhow, must dash. I’ve just received an urgent message alert from Sky news informing me of some random who is bidding to build a seafaring vessel from plastic bottles. I think I may join him but only if I can download the snake game and source a faux waterproof rain mac.