I like spam. No, really, I do. I know junk mail in your inbox is supposed to be one of the great nuisances of modern life, but I am quite fond of it.

It beats getting no mail at all, for one thing, and not once has an item of spam snippily informed me that I am over deadline, or that I can expect legal action if my apology isn't printed within twenty-four hours, or that it is an old friend from school who is coming to town and needs a place to stay for a few days.

Once I learnt to stop taking personally the injunctions to improve the dimensions and general appearance of my penis, or to start giving my wife the orgasms she truly deserves, I started to regard spam as my window on the world. How else, for instance, would I know that for the knock-it-down-and-drag-it-away price of $29.95, I could become an ordained minister of the church?

Oh yes, my brethren, a certain Rev Charles Simpson, of no fixed parish, assures me that in the time it takes to cross myself and enter my credit card details, I can have all the qualifications necessary to start my own congregation.

Spam is really our own fault anyway

"Marry your brother, your sister, even your best friend!" exhorts Rev Charles, which makes me suspect he may just be one of those charismatic new free-love ministers who end up taking their flock to a compound in Texas with several vats of Kool-Aid.

Like most of the things we complain about, spam is really our own fault anyway. Spam, on some level, must actually work. Presumably spam merchants are in it to make money, not just because they are freelance agents of the devil who ride jetskis on the weekend and spend their working hours devising fresh ways of tormenting the godly. Spam is like infomercials: if we keep getting them, it must be because there are enough of us who actually buy the things they offer.

That means - extraordinary thought - there are ordinary citizens who have snapped up the "Stars and Stripes Bikinis, now at low, low, patriotic prices". According to my most recent mail, these items of swimwear are "small, sexy and full of patriotism". The accompanying image, indeed, certainly affirms that they are small and arguably sexy and full of something that would cause the armed services to stand to attention.

Like infomercials, there are some items of spam that could tempt even the most reluctant consumer. You would have to be made of stone not to be intrigued by the software product that enables the purchaser to "find out secrets about your relatives, friends, enemies, even your spouse!" Now there's something to make Ben Travato edgy.

Alas, it probably only uses American data-bases, but how useful to know that should I ever be a resident of Baton Rouge, say, I could "discover the dirty secrets your in-laws don't want you to know!" I can hardly begin to imagine the dreariness of life in Baton Rouge if its residents are occupying their free hours voluntarily learning the sexual history of their in-laws.

But best of all was the offer from an American college I received some time ago. "Obtain a PhD based on your present life experience!" the e-mail begged. "No required tests, classes or books!" My present life experience? Someone is prepared to give me a PhD for drinking too much, failing to invest my money and occasionally crashing my car?

Someone is ready to make me a Doctor of Making Bad Decisions? Now that sounds like a pretty sweet deal to me.