Welcome to my heaven. I am in the men's locker room at the sports centre.

I should point out while the smell of deep heat, me cowering in the corner and the sight of sweaty old men with saggy boobs walking around half naked reminds me of my halcyon days at school, this in itself isn't heaven. You see, "The Secret Man Code" dictates that a hushed silence must fall over the changing rooms - or any place where other men are likely to have their tackle on display. That is unless you're changing to play football, in which case 'banter' is allowed. You should not engage in chitter-chatter or gossip, only banter.

Today, there are people bantering. This is my heaven. I get to listen other people's conversations. I enjoy doing it here because in the changing rooms I do not have to invest in any sophisticated listening devices, which are illegal in most of Europe. I can break through "The Fourth Wall". I suppose this is kind of like those sad people who read Internet Web Logs so that they can get confirmation that everyone else's life is better than theirs is.

"It should complete next week and then as soon as we've sold our house we'll be moving to Spain." says player #1. I often wonder where people get the money to do things like this. He cannot have won the lottery because he is still playing football in a local authority gymnasium.

"Well," said player #2 "you must be really looking forward to that. At least you no longer have to put up with Dave. You'll never believe what he did today...." and then he begins a long winded rant about how everyone at work is an incompetent idiot and how he is the only sane person there.

"Damn!" I think, I can't believe that he is wasting valuable bantering time on moaning about work. If I'd have wanted to know about this sort of thing, I'd read one of those moaning bastard anonymous work bloggers. "... but I think Jane's figured him out and now that Frank seems to be doing pretty much the same job as him, I reckon they're trying to force him out."

Another player enters. "Hi all," I assume he is including me in that "Jeff's gonna be late. Natalie was keeping him behind talking about their project. But it wasn't all bad, she had a short skirt and those knee high boots on!"

"Yeah, she could keep me behind any time!" says player #1.

All three of them smile, stare into the distance and drift off into a "happy place" while I scribble notes down studiously.