RICHARD ORD: If aged mattresses could talk, what stories they'd tell

Prime Minister Boris Johnson says Build Back Better ... if only, laments Mr Ord.

That opening sentence, I have to be honest, as about as good as it gets.

While I know your filthy mind conjured up a wobbling mess of hairy limbs and the occasional glimpse of stocking (and maybe a catapult), the truth is far more mundane.

I put my back out disposing of the aforementioned mattress at the local tip.

Much like what had previously gone on atop that mattress, it was a pretty unedifying sight. We had to book our slot at the tip to dispose of the now unwanted bedroom fixture, but getting it out of the back of our car and through the garbage opening was no easy task.

And social distancing rules didn’t help.

As we battled this highly-sprung beast from the car people kept a sensible distance. We were going to have to do it on our own. There is no specific mattress skip at the tip. You have areas for cardboard, wood and electrical disposal, but not pre-loved bedroom equipment.

Which is a pity. Of all your household items, the mattress is really one to dispose of discreetly. Mattresses, after a couple of decades, are not a pretty sight. I’ve seen prettier field hospitals.

“Aye, if it could talk, I bet that mattress would have a few tales,” a pal of mine commented. If that mattress could make any utterance, I suspect a scream would be the most likely. Or perhaps a long and mournful wail. Interspersed with sobbing.

For that reason, a more discrete disposal area is required for the mattress.

Ideally, an easy-access fire pit, rather than an access point several feet off the ground and through a portal distinctly non-mattress shaped, like the one we had to grapple with.

And it was while wrestling the soiled mattress that my back popped.

A handle ripped on the mattress and my back gave out.

It’s not the first time, so I won’t go into the details, needless to say my breakfast, eaten standing up, consists of Frosties and a liberal sprinkling of painkillers.

Fortunately, thanks to Boris and his lockdowns, I’ve got nowhere to go. In fact (he says, dusting down a classic Dad joke) my back really is out more than I am.