We all talk about people who don’t have, or need to get, a “clue”. This gets us nowhere. By their very nature, clueless people aren’t likely to be able to hunt down clues on their own.

As a public service, please print out the list of clues below and give it to the clueless person in your life.

NB: If you are the clueless person in your life, it probably isn’t a good idea to read all of these in one sitting.

1. Troubleshooting: Plug it in. Turn it on. Turn it off. Turn it on again. Hit it. Buy a new one. At no stage during this process is it necessary to bother anyone else.

2. Persons wishing to leave a supermarket with merchandise are usually expected to hand over money in return. Emitting a little “Oh!” of surprise when the cashier demands the same does not endear you to the queue of people whose time you are wasting by being disorganized.

3. Large retailers will not change their company policy because you spent five minutes shouting at a deputy store manager.

4. If your computer is running slower than usual, installing software recommended by a popup window is unlikely to remedy the situation.

5. Telephoning random strangers to inform them that they have won a valuable prize is not a viable business model. If this happens to you, it’s just possible that the caller isn’t entirely honest.

6. The new improved formula is cheaper to make than the original.

7. Plans hatched after more than four units of alcohol should be reviewed the following morning before implementation.

8. Maybe you really can forge a new career whereby you double your income by working part-time from home. The odds are, however, that this will not involve calling the number on the little plastic sign tied to the traffic light.

9. The weather tomorrow is going to be wrong.

10. Nobody who works in an airport has a sense of humour. If your travel plans today do not include killing large numbers of people, lose no opportunity to make this clear.

11. If you buy a cleaning product after seeing a demonstration of it’s amazing properties, you won’t use it more than twice.

12. The waiter will see you when he wants to.

13. Companies having anything to do with telephone lines do not provide good customer service.

14. Softer is the opposite of Stronger. This applies to toilet roll as much as to steel girders.

15. Your new computer will not be faster than your old one.

16. Warren Buffet does not make bulk purchases of lottery tickets. What can you learn from this?

17. God does not want you to give up all your possessions, live in an isolated compound in the desert and provide sexual favours to an unwashed hippie with a straggly beard.

18. The QWERTY keyboard, analogue watches, the lever corkscrew, and the missionary position do not need improving.

19. The fares advertised by budget airlines do not apply to you.

20. The simplest and most likely explanation for the "Push" label on a door is that pulling won’t work.

21. If you have to pay for it every month, it’s not free. I don’t care what your mobile phone operator says about 2,700,000 “free” minutes per month.

22. Things are sold on eBay because the current owner doesn’t want them. 

23. The vast and expensively constructed casino you are standing in is a monument to the absolute certainty that your “system” does not work.

24. Americans do not genuinely give a crap what kind of day you have.

25. For all we know, there might be a secret password that lets you beat a call centre. However, “I want to speak to a supervisor” isn’t it.

26. You are genetically programmed to put up with your children. Everyone else isn’t. You are outnumbered six billion to two.

27. If someone mentions a soap opera while giving you relationship advice, don’t take it.

28. The graveyards are full of people who knew for certain that they would beat cancer.

29. Quizzes in lifestyle magazines are made up by journalists with third-rate liberal arts degrees and tight deadlines. You aren’t necessarily an emotionally repressed, technophobic, unfashionable bad lover who watches the wrong films. Unless you want to be.

30. Wine waiters, teenagers and salesmen in expensive hi-fi shops are going to sneer at you no matter what.

31. The most effective way to lose weight fast is glandular fever.

32. Scientists talking about foods causing cancer, climate change and forthcoming ‘flu epidemics are guessing.

33. If violence, obscene language, a virgin sacrifice, threats of legal action against the manufacturer, lateral thinking, and rendering up your soul unto the powers of darkness have all failed, it’s time to read the instructions.

34. Product designers don’t stop when they run out of useful new features.

35. Home insurance policies don’t pay out in real life. If someone steals your laptop, you’re on your own. If someone lands a light aircraft on your patio furniture, help is only a phone call away.

36. Buying the product will not result in you meeting the girl in the advert.

37. Drugs that make you feel good now will make you feel bad later. This applies equally to adrenaline, caffeine and crack cocaine.

38. Road signs warning of lane closures, floods and traffic jams are usually lying.

39. Road signs warning of bends which cannot possibly be negotiated at more than 20 mph are always lying.

40. Regular horoscope readers get run down by buses as often as everyone else.

If you still haven't got a clue, visit blinman.com