It's now 20 years since I owned my first mobile phone, and I can remember quite clearly the excitement of unpacking it from its cardboard container. I savoured it, because I didn't want it to end. It was a mobile phone, something that had been as unthinkable as time travel in my childhood. I wanted to prolong the experience.

I've owned a lot of mobile phones since then, and I've become an unpacking cynic of the first order. Maybe there's just too much stuff too cleverly packaged in my current life, so what was once a rare treat is now a diurnal ordeal in the archaeology of cellophane and polystyrene. I bought a new iPad recently, and it's a wonderful thing, as ever. But on arriving home my first thought was something like, 'Oh bollocks. I've got to fight my way through all that neurotic Apple wrapping-up before I can play with this thing.'

This is a shame, isn't it? New stuff is only new once, and once revealed, it can never be returned to its state of being unknown to you. It's like a conker, or an oyster. Collectors of things such as old toys and watches are obsessed with having their 'pieces' in the original boxes, but it's all a bit fraudulent, really. Once a thing has been unboxed it will forever be unboxed, and merely returning it to its box does not actually make it boxed again, if you see what I mean. You may as well try to become unborn.

There is, obviously, a delight still taken by many in that first unboxing. Unboxing videos are surprisingly popular. I've watched plenty of them, I'll be honest, but I've never tried making one myself. So here is my first attempt, and it's on an automotive subject.

I hope you enjoy it, and I apologise in advance for rambling on a bit. Feel free to respond with your own vids.