Oh No - there's doom and gloom everywhere. The economy's only growing at 6 per cent! That's virtually a recession, which can only lead to a depression.

We're all going to lose our jobs. We'll have to leave Oklahoma and move west.

Our entire generation will be blighted by poverty, and an unshakable sense of dispossession and rootlessness.

In preparation for all this, why not brush up your CV and keep it permanently by your side - on your keyring.

You never know when it will come in handy.

The tiny disk-on-key can actually hold up to 32Mb of programs and data - the equivalent of 22 floppy disks. You can even store video clips on it, carry slide-shows for presentations, even keep your favourite songs as MP3s.

You just plug it into the USB port at the back of any relatively new PC or Mac, and the computer immediately treats it like an extra hard drive.

The disk-on-key, costs about £40 (€51) for the 8Mb version, is available at diskonkey.com and in computer stores.

smaccarthaigh@irish-times.ie