Fred believes he's found his perfect niche in what he calls the 'Sunshine Garden Centre Institute For Those With Minor Cases Of Not-Quite Off Their Rockers'. It's far from the Madding Crowd, but close enough to a couple of decent pubs in which to enjoy a quiet pint or two. He also gets three square meals a day plus all the newspapers he can read just for occasionally pretending to be mad.

Safe from the wiles of women and the woes of the world, he's not going to rock the boat. Oh, no.

No, he's just going to sit and observe, and note and comment quietly on the insanity of life outside. For example:

"The French air traffic controllers are on strike again. Won't be long before their farmers are blockading the ports."

"The London Underground are threatening to strike. Correction, London Underground are on strike."

"Tension between North and South Korea."

"The Middle East is a powder keg, with reports of suicide bombers."

"In the UK a right-wing government is threatening to further erode personal liberties. This time in the name of the 'war against international terrorism'."

"Increase in number of grades achieved by school pupils show exams have been dumbed down, claim critics. Concern raised over how girls are out-performing boys."

"Another great capitalism scandal, with a major international finance company passing its audit just before going bankrupt. Suggestions have been made that important documents were 'accidentally' shredded as part of a new housekeeping regime implemented the day after the bankruptcy was discovered."

"The cost of living is increasing, wages are static. Apart from executive pay, which has gone up 17%."

"White police in a major city in the United States have been videoed beating up a black prisoner."

"House prices in London increasing beyond the means of ordinary people to buy them."

Yes, 2002 was proving to be quite a year. It was the year the cross-channel ferry Norsea caught fire and threatened to sink; all vessels in the area altered course and speeded up to come to the passengers' assistance. It had a happy ending: it limped home over 21 hours later, followed by its would-be rescuers.

It was the year Leina, a three-year-old German girl, miraculously escaped death when she fell from her parents' car as it was moving at seventy miles an hour on a motorway in France. A French lorry driver behind the parents' car noticed what had happened and managed to bring his vehicle to a stop just metres away from the child. Then he and a fellow trucker used their vehicles to block the motorway, until the paramedics could arrive. Young Leina survived with only burns and bruises.

It was the year a man in Norway was arrested for barking in public.

It was the year in which a slight improvement in the economy was described as a 'dead cat bounce'.

It was also the time Tony Blair and New Labour were trying to foist mayors on every city or town which didn't duck fast enough.

Fred notes his suspicions that these are just jobs for the boys. The ones who couldn't get a job as Member of Parliament, or something on the EU gravy train. To his delight he discovers that the good burgers of Hartlepool elected a monkey as mayor. Not, sadly, a real monkey, but a man who dressed up as a mascot monkey for the local football team.

When he discovers that the town they are situated in is to get its own mayor he makes a rather rash claim that he could campaign and win, if only someone would lend him the £5,000 deposit needed. In this he is quite safe because none of the residents are that mad.

Had Fred left it at that he would have never have got into the trouble he is about to. Firstly he drops hints to a local reporter that one of the doctors might have a good story to tell – nudge, nudge, wink, wink. The wrong doctor gets interviewed, and the story reported is that the clinic is actually a centre for sexual research. That leads ultimately to a night-time attack by drunken yobs from the local estate, which are repelled by the residents under the involuntary leadership of Fred himself.

The next thing he knows is that his ex-doctor has found an EU fund which will pay the £5,000 deposit. And the other residents now take him at his word. They're fired up with the enthusiasm people can get for a cause in which they know, if everything goes belly-up, it won't be them in the firing line. But they'll be quite happy to watch the fallout from a distance.

In a very short time he's running for mayor on a ticket of doing nothing – especially not increasing local taxes to fund the mayoralty. The majority of the voters didn't want a mayor, and he'll give them the sort of mayor they didn't want.

This approach delights a group of anonymous business people who contact him through their lawyer to offer financial support. He gratefully agrees. But during an interview on local radio he is asked about the moral aspect of accepting the large salary a mayor would be paid in exchange for doing nothing. To which he replies that he could always write a weekly newsletter on goings-on in the local council. After all, that's pretty much doing nothing.

Suddenly he no longer has the support of the local businessmen. In fact they begin to issue veiled threats. But the campaign is picking up pace and stopping is not an option. Not even for the man wearing an Easter Bunny costume who appears to be following his every move.

On the bright side, he does manage to fall in love before the end comes.