CHUFFING GREAT!

Slouching on the sofa, he lifted a chinoed buttock. Brrrrthpffflurrrrup! “More juice, boss?” he asked, without even an innocent smirk.

I feigned distaste but, actually, I couldn’t repress a grin. Farts are just intrinsically funny to blokes. I know it’s pathetic, but it’s true. OK, maybe there are a few balanced, reconstructed men out there who would decline to flick through a discarded Sunday Sport, who wouldn’t dream of putting their foot down on a deserted A-road and who would never snigger at a well-timed parp. But such men are like QPR managers _ they don’t alter the fundamental realities.

It starts early. My nephew is 8 and giggles with inexpressible rapture at every cheek-wobbler he produces. “I blowed off!” he announces happily, though not forgetting to add the magic word, sorry. His cousin, 10, looks at him with an expression of disgust that will one day wither full-grown men. And yet, they’ve both been brought up by non-exist parents who go out of their way to avoid gender stereotyping. Sonali will be a building a Meccano suspension bridge as Rahul rustles up a Play-Doh omellete in his plastic kitchen _ and he’ll be backfiring delightedly, like a New Delhi moped.

All right, it’s possible Rahul and Sonali are receiving from their parents subtle signals that suggest boys let rip and girls don’t _ but where would such a notion originate? How far back do we have to go? Maybe some all-male Neolithic hunting party were sitting round a crackling fire one night when Grog shifted slightly on his rock and launched a snorter that rattled the bleached mammoth bones.

“More goat’s blood, shamen?” he asks. His fellow slapheads clutch their hairy tummies and roll around on the ground in primal glee. Back at the home cave, a chuckling Grog relates this moment of high comedy to his women _ but she merely tuts and carries on plucking the dodo. (Incidentally, the study of linguistics shows that in every single Indo-European language there are a dozen-odd shared words that can be traced back to common prehistoric roots. They represent the fundamental concepts without which human beings can’t run a society. “Bread” is one. “Tree” another. And _ yup, you guessed it _ from Leningrad to Lisbon, from Mysore to Midlothian, the expressible consciousness of every mortal soul has the word “fart” at its centre.)

I once went out with a woman who claimed never to have farted in her life. I was stunned. What _ never? It was like saying you’d never taken a piss outside. “Nope _ never done that either,” she admitted. I fell into the habit of treating her to countless grassy lagers and molten-lava curries. Nothing. Not even in her sleep. Not so much as a deflating-Lilo hissy one. In an attempt to lead the way, I provided her with constant, reassuring examples of the art, selflessly letting fly with frequent and unerring aplomb in every room of her house. I was so determined to be around when she finally broke that I damn nearly married her.

As admirable as any sane person would find it that you can turn the TV from across the room through the controlled application of subsonic vibration, this is not a talent I would recommend showing off on a first date. Indeed, a chap’s first untrammelled fart is a crucial event in any relationship. During the early days, you lie there in post-coital cosiness, clenching your buttocks and hoping to God she’ll go to the bathroom or offer to make tea or something, so that you can let rip in private. When she finally wanders downstairs to phone her therapist, you stretch back, brace your feet against the headboard and _ ohhh, yessss _ release one that balloons the duvet like a pub-lunch pastie. But this kind of private parping can’t go on. When she starts to come round every night, you’re going to wake up one morning bobbing against the ceiling with Goodyear stencilled on your bloated stomach. You decide to test the strength of this new liaison.

So, some quiet dusk, you must submit to the impulse. There’s no point in messing about here _ you’ve got to produce a Spielberg-standard ripper with stereo-effects and orchestral stabs. Clocks should stop ticking and mirrors should darken. And when it’s all over, you must put on a winsome grin, turn towards your partner and, with a boyish shrug, say, “Umm…Oops.”

She’ll grimace at you sidelong and shake her head. “God,” she’ll say. “You are so disgusting.” Pay no attention _ she’s nuts about you.