WE ALL have our selfish little moments. Come on, admit it.

I am as guilty as the rest. I wouldn't own up to it in public, but I'll tell you: I buy new shirts when I don't need them; I eat the glutton's share of a bar of chocolate; I sometimes forget to put down the toilet seat when I've 'been'; I sometimes find an excuse not to do the washing up; and I don't see enough of the grandchildren because (I tell myself) I am far too busy.

I hope it's all petty stuff, certainly compared with the woman doctor who will soon give birth at the age of 63. What an act of utter, contemptible selfishness. I'm sucking Rennies at the moment because she's got my stomach burning with rage.

This irresponsible woman has had IVF treatment to get pregnant to 'seal her love' for her 61-year-old husband. It's not that she's childless. She has two grown-up children already.

But she's a child psychologist who must know better than most of us how this child will be affected by the age of its parents.

By the time she's finished pushing the poor kid - they are expecting a boy - in its buggie, he might just be old enough to start pushing them around in their wheelchairs.

Imagine the poor thing having mum and dad turn up with walking sticks at the school sports and the other children asking: "Is this your gran and gramps?"

Who is going to take off the lad's bike stabilisers and run alongside him until he is safe on two wheels? Who is going to chase him into the waves at the seaside? Who is going to push him on the swings or take him down the slide at the park? You know, all the things a child needs from parents in the natural order of things.

But to me, the worst thing of all is that they will die when the child is relatively young. Okay, people are outliving the Biblical three score years and ten. We are supposedly fitter and more active. But to nurture a boisterous ten-year-old when you are 73 is totally unthinkable. A child is for life, not just for a couple of Christmases to come.

My daughter was nine when we lost her mum. She and I know how agonisingly hard that was for a child. Fortunately, I still had the energy to be mum and dad. I couldn't now - in my fifties - so how is a septuagenarian going to cope?

Ah, nannies. Get someone else to do the energetic bits of bringing up the child. Bring him to me at bedtime.

I'm sorry, but it's not on. This well-off couple have the potential to do good with children already in the world. They could support an orphanage in Africa, care for Aids-ravaged youngsters or adopt a parentless child - but then this couple would surely be considered too old to adopt. It makes me sick.

On a happier note, perhaps, a new survey says we are not as happy as we were in the 1950s, even though we are far better off financially. Trouble is, those born since the 1960s can't possibly know about the Fifties, and those born before that decade have had their memories rose-tinted by time.

I remember the 1950s as far gentler, less-frantic and more carefree than today, and the sun always seemed to be shining. But I was just a boy. And I do recall my parents worrying about money and me going to school in my big brother's frayed hand-me-downs.

Happiness is relative. Buying a new car can give you pleasure, yet fuming in a traffic jam does not. A row with the boss or the wife. Not good. Relaxing in the garden - or the pub - hmmm, good.

I'm not happy at the moment. I'm having trouble with my new conservatory. We've sprung a leak and suffer a deluge every time it rains. The people who built it will not even return our calls. How's that for customer care and after-sales service? I'll have to threaten them with the newspapers. If it goes on I'll have to name and shame.