I AM writing this week’s column in the dark.

This is not due to some bonkers social experiment I have signed up to, or because I am too lazy to get up and switch the light on now the sun has set – it is far more ridiculous than that.

If truth be told, I am sitting at my desk in total darkness thanks to my husband’s latest gadget.

Well that, and a healthy dose of stubbornness on my part.

He swanned home early from work today.

It was a far cry from his normal entrance after a hard day’s graft, when he has usually cycled home and is ranting about the wet weather or an idiotic driver who nearly took him out in Church Road etc.

Oh no. Today he floated in, fresh off the train with two square, ominous looking carrier bags and a dopey smile on his face like he had just been asked to the roller disco by the girl he has fancied all term.

He was home early to install his latest tech toy and boy was he excited.

Regular readers will know my other half is tech-obsessed – it is his job, it is his passion, it is his raison d’être.

You will also know this does not always sit well with me as I struggle to scurry along and keep up with it all.

I had a moan about the technical advancements around my home a few months ago and was accused of being a luddite.

Fine. I will take that on the chin.

My beef with certain technologies is they seem to make some everyday jobs more time consuming and laborious.

And, I fear, the events unfolding in my home as I type will only prove to make my life more difficult, no matter how fancy they may appear in theory.

We are now the proud (for proud, read slightly annoyed) owners of internal lights that can be controlled by our phones and our voices. Sigh.

What is wrong with a blooming light switch, huh?

They have been perfectly effective at turning on lights in our homes since John Henry Holmes invented them in 1884 (thanks Google), so why this nonsense now?

For the past two hours, my husband has been changing every bulb in the house to magic ones that connect to bluetooth.

He now expects me to either open an app on my phone, select the room I am in and turn on the light that way, or say out loud: “Hey Siri, turn on the main lounge lights.”

The first option takes about 20 times longer than flicking on the light switch and the other option – well it makes me sounds like a wally, quite frankly. Yes I did say wally, which I guess just proves I have not yet moved on from the Eighties.

I still cannot quite bring myself to pay for stuff using my smart watch either, because that makes me look like I am pretending to be a secret agent or something equally daft.

Anyway, there is much excitement happening all around me right now as our seven-year-old son is equally thrilled about this development and lights are pinging off and on in every room as he runs around trying out the new system.

It is like being at in a rubbish nightclub, but without the sticky floors.

So here I sit, in the dark, waiting for the carnage to die down so I can flick the light back on in the office, using the switch of course, just to annoy my husband.

I have even had a moan about the fact I was not consulted on the installation of voice-activated lights as it is my house too.

That argument failed to stand up as my other half was quick to point out my house plant obsession is threatening to take over our entire home.

I kept quiet but he is not far off the mark. In a matter of months I have gone from owning one manky looking spider plant that was clinging on for dear life on our bathroom windowsill, to creating a mini Eden Project in every room.

I am not quite sure where this new -found hobby has sprung from, but I can barely drive past Mayberry Garden Centre these days without swinging in for a quick maidenhair fern.

Maybe it is an age thing, or maybe houseplants are just a bit fashionable right now and I cannot resist jumping on the bandwagon.

Either way I am becoming more than a little obsessed with keeping them in tip top condition and feel like a genuine failure if one dies in my care.

One of my favourites is currently struggling and I have spent hours reading up on how to make it thrive again.

I have even been known to take Prince Charles’s advice and talk to them a bit, just in case it helps.

At least they do not answer back.

Mind you, I suppose I can talk to my living room lights now as well. Every cloud.