[Chris O'Carroll]

Not sure why the latest New Statesman arrived in my inbox a day earlier than usual, but there it is.

Again this week, Nicholas Holbrook (a close personal associate of Brian Allgar's) leads the field. Brian also gets an hon mensh in his own name. Me too.

No 4227 Set by Leonora Casement
An online poll has discovered that around 11 per cent of single men would rather have the new iPad 3 than a love interest in their life. And about 3 per cent claimed they would actually leave their current partner if offered a new iPad 3 tablet. The women polled preferred the opposite, with 84 per cent choosing a new male partner over the new iPad tablet from Apple. According to www.freeipad3s.com: “For a lot of people, [the new iPad 3] is the ultimate tablet. This new Apple product tablet has come with a wide variety of multiple functions,” the website continues. We want letters/emails from a man from this 11 per cent explaining to a woman why he is not/no longer interested in her.
Max 150 words by 17 May comp@newstatesman.co.uk

[Lance Levens]

Your limbs cavort all night; your fragrant kisses lead me down a country road in spring; you're brilliant; you're compassionate; you're Argentian passionate. But your wiring is so humano-neuro. Your eyes--que font-ils? They only "see!" So Cromagnon--like hunters on the veldt scanning the horizon for horns. What's beyond the veldt, beyond the mountains, Hell, beyond Orion. Your busybody optic nerve, my sweet-ti-kins attaches to two miserable viscous cell balls. El computadora hurls info feelers farther afield than your wildest shopping impulses have ever flown. And your poor conflicted heart, my marrow-filled amusement, how it pounds when I mis-inflect a vowel to your dismay. My Pad feels nothing, fears nothing, fouls nothing. Farewell.

[Brian Allgar]

There is no app that offers ‘Oral sex’,
Then asks me “Was that how you like it, dear?”
It cannot phone for takeaway Tex-Mex,
Nor darn my socks, nor bring an ice-cold beer.

Despite all this, it swallows up my time;
I’m far too busy even to embrace you.
I know that infidelity’s a crime,
And yet my iPad’s starting to replace you.

I yearn to touch it with my fingertips
And see it glisten like a loving wife,
Or brush its surface gently with my lips
And feel it quiver into android life.

I’ve no complaints; we’ve had a lot of fun;
You’ve acted perfectly your wifely role.
But now I find, when all is said and done,
That iPads are the Windows of the soul.

[Roger Slater]

Like you, she lights up when I push her button.
Like you, she is elegant, sleek and slim.
But unlike you, she asks me for nothin'
and she doesn't mind that I quit the gym.

Like you, she is smooth and a multi-tasker.
Like you, to be with her delights and empowers.
Like you, she'll do anything that I ask her,
but I don't need to thank her with jewelry or flowers.

[basil ransome-davies]

So this only affects heterosexuals, is that the idea?

[John Whitworth]

Do a gay one, Bazza. PC-ness will probably mean you'll get the prize. But then you would probably et it anyway.

[Roger Slater]

There's only two entries posted so far.

[John Whitworth]

I have no idea what an Ipad is. And I don't think I really want to know. And what's an Ap? No, don't tell me. I don't want to know that, either.

[Brian Allgar]

John, an iPad is - oh, very well. And an app is - oh, very well.

[Brian Allgar]

Originally Posted by basil ransome-davies

So this only affects heterosexuals, is that the idea?

Not necessarily, Basil. After all, the competition says "We want letters/emails from a man from this 11 per cent explaining to a woman why he is not/no longer interested in her".

Quite apart from the iPad, being gay could certainly explain this.