I need to send off the registration form for my new TV, otherwise I don't get the 12-month guarantee. This requires the serial number and the exact model number, which are printed on the back of the thing. Unfortunately, I didn't think to read them off the back panel before Colin and I laboriously pushed the TV into position in the corner of my living room, and it was really heavy, and I definitely didn't fancy pulling it back out into the middle of the room on my own just to read two numbers off the back.

So I sat and thought, and wondered about tilted mirrors on sticks with which I could read the serial number in situ, and suddenly realised the perfect solution: fetch the digicam I bought from Christi recently, lean over the telly and hold the camera behind it, press the button. Bing. One pin-sharp JPEG of the back panel, all numbers clearly legible, no heavy lifting, and not even the squinting that would have been required with the mirror approach.

At the start of this month I mentioned that the real reason I'd wanted a digicam was because of the occasional unexpected situation in which it would have come in handy, and also mentioned that I couldn't actually think of any such situations but I was sure I remembered them existing. Well, this was exactly such a situation. I feel vindicated. :-)