Japanese gadgets

Are the coolest gadgets in the world. Now for those of you who live, or have lived, in Japan, this may not be news for you. But for everyone else.

Japanese people love their toilets. Now I realise that people all over the world love their toilets as well, but I think the Japanese really love their toilets. Most households in Japan now have electronic toilet seats that look like more technologically advanced versions of Captain Kirk's seat in Star Trek. They have warming functions so you don't get a cold bottom in winter. They have have buttons that do things like shoot water upwards, waft warm air to dry everything off, and probably start world war three if you press them in the right combination. Personally I avoid anything that tries top shoot water up my arse, but the Japanese seem to love them.

But wait! What is this on the horizon? Has the perfect toilet seat been improved? What could they have done? Well, a company by the name of INAX - very big in the lavatory world - has now invented a seat that you don't have to lift up. It has a built in infrared sensor that senses when someone approaches and a small motor to automatically raise the toilet lid. All you have to do is walk up, drop your trousers and then sit down, none of this bending down to lift lid. And of course, when the business is finished, all you do is stand up, flush and walk away, no messing about with putting the lid down afterwards.

Great stuff and a much needed development to the work begun by Thomas Crapper all those years ago. Whatever will they think of next....?