I went downstairs aflame with the light of discovery and wonder to tell my husband this and he just looked at me for a while and then turned back to his computer shaking his head and muttering something about paying in the coin of fathomless ignorance or congenital idiocy. Whatever.)

Not only are Bitcoins impossible to get my head around, their presence also gives a terrifying glimpse into the ordinary world I know nothing about. Like, say, how ordinary money works. Central banks control the supply? how? What? You can make money? they have been? that’s what QE is? Then why don’t they do more of it until we’re all rich? Ask the goblins? As soon as I catch one, I shall.

And from there of course it’s a few short steps to standing around all day wondering how aeroplanes stay up, why electricity doesn’t leak out of sockets, why we don’t see more of Cate Blanchett and how exactly tables stay together. What ARE nails? What IS glue, exactly?

The fact is, the future is here and I am adrift. Clearly I have to decide – whether to start making active, determined efforts to keep up with the world and its lightning pace of change, or whether to start slipping quietly into desuetude, tartan slippers and possibly a bath chair and let it all get on perfectly well without me.

A deal – if I can understand what Spotify is and why Spotify is by the end of the day, I’ll go on. Otherwise I shall set my back to the future. That’s a play on the title of an old film, by the way. Google it, dear children, while I set this rug more firmly about my knees. my joints ache, and my heart… my heart…”

Lucy Mangan: I blame Bitcoins for making me feel old