WHAT’S the purpose of new technology? That’s right, it’s to make another item of new technology which you thought was cutting edge barely a couple of years ago now look like something from 1936. “Ha ha, look at you, still using the iphone 4, you medieval dunce,” guffawed a colleague as they gazed sneeringly at the diarist’s device which may as well be perched in the same old-fangled corner of the museum that houses the mangle, the horse drawn plough and some of the SFA’s board members.

If your dwelling place is anything like mine, then it will have a variety of neglected drawers and fusty storage units that are crammed with obsolete chargers, archaic adapters and lumpen gadgets which used to serve a valuable purpose but now lie redundant and useless like the remnants strewn on the floor of an abandoned Rumbelows shop.

But wait. Don’t be too hasty in flinging your technical antiquities down the garbage chute. Organisers of the 2020 Olympics and Paralympics in Tokyo have declared that all the medals dished out to the athletes at the Games will be fashioned fro m recycled electronic waste, including discarded smartphones, digital cameras, laptops and other hand held gizmos. Officials said that they expect to collect enough defunct devices by the end of March to extract the amount of gold, silver and bronze that will be required to manufacture around 2500 medals that will be awarded next year.

This environmentally friendly approach has gone down a storm in Japan with 1594 municipal authorities – effectively 90 per cent of the nation – taking part in a collection that has already reached nearly 50,000 tonnes Here in Glasgow, meanwhile, dumping dimwits can’t even differentiate between the blue and broon wheelie bins.

Apparently, the IOC high heid yins had contacted Rangers about recycling the medals won in the EBT years . . . but found they were all contaminated.

*THERE has been much guffawing with the news – truthful or not – that Spurs have abandoned plans for a VIP cheese room in the eye-wateringly expensive White Hart Lane redevelopment. Suffering supporters of St Mirren meanwhile, don’t need to be a VIP to be served cheese every week. You’ve guessed it, the team’s leaky defence has been displaying more holes than a block of emmental. And, yes, there’s mould on that cornball gag too . . .

*A group of caddies in India have created Slum Golf, an informal, off the cuff version of the Royal & Ancient game played in the back streets of Mumbai. The terrain and hazards of this urban course include houses, walls, drains, parked vehicles, sleeping dogs, dumps, stray cows and potholes. It sounds just like the things the wild, wayward diarist encounters during another futile medal.

*STAYING with gowf, and R&A chiefs have decided to shift August’s Girls’ Amateur Championship from Montrose to Panmure due to a series of music concerts taking place nearby at the same time. Apparently, it’s the first recorded instance of such a conflict since ye olde minstrel, Terrawin Pendragon, disrupted the R&A’s Autumn Meeting with his lute strumming in 1783.

TENNIS super brat John McEnroe hits the milestone of 60 today. Apparently, he’s going to angrily question the judgment of his own birth certificate. “60? You cannot be serious!” Hot heid McEnroe fell out with all and sundry over the years, including softly spoken British commentator, Gerald Williams. Talking of Williams, the diarist has the excuse of recalling his slip of the tongue when Pam Shriver was stung by a wasp inside her dress during a doubles match. As she was peering down her cleavage to attend said sting, Williams said, apropos Shriver and her partner, “they are a fine pair, aren’t they?”

*RATHER like leafing through an eviction notice, poring over a letter of complaint from a brassed-off reader can be a fairly downbeat exercise. “How long do you intend to persevere with your so called ‘sports diary’ as it is one of the most banal pieces of writing that I have ever come across,” wrote the grumbling reader. He’s obviously never read Barry Ferguson’s autobiography. “The content is neither informative nor balanced and certainly not in the least bit humorous,” the complaint continued. The diarist was slightly taken aback to see said letter concluded with the sign off, ‘yours sincerely, the sports editor . . .