`Speed Ramps" opined one friend solemnly, "that's what you should write about this week, speed ramps and how they're killing this city." Now that I've been writing this column for a few weeks, I find I've become a scaled-down version of the Chris Barry phone show. Everyone, it seems has a grudge, hobby horse or irritation that they feel should become the latest Winging It rant.
Of course, this is partly my own fault as, in a fit of nerves brought on by calculating the amount of opinions needed to fill a year's columns, I let slip that I was willing to have a look at any opinions people didn't want any more. But I had underestimated the breadth, diversity and obscurity of other people's obsessions.
Somebody actually wanted me to look into the thorny issue of why it's so difficult to get mobile phone coverage in so many of the city's pubs, which just goes to show you how little some people have to worry about these days.
Still, as a kind of disorganised vox pop, it did prove rather interesting. I found myself bombarded with a fairly good cross-section of what was getting people of my age hot under the collar. To my surprise, the gripe that cropped up with the most regularity was neither trendy ("Isn't sushi boring?") nor trivial ("Don't this season's sandals give you fat ankles?"), but something altogether more traditional. "The pressure to get married, write about that," said one female friend darkly and was immediately swamped by a chorus of approval from the other girls present.
It's obviously something that was really getting to my friends. Several different girlfriends with boyfriends said the same thing: "If one more person asks me when we're going to name the day, I'll scream." One besieged girl who is perfectly happy in a long-term relationship recently went to a very civilised hen night with her five close friends, all of whom, bar the bride-to-be and herself, are now married.
She took bets with her boyfriend about how long it would take before somebody started making coy references to her own prospects. Apparently, she won the wager with an estimate of "before the starters arrive" but was deducted some penalty points with the use of the word "coy", as the others mounted a four-prong attack that started with the subtle lead-in "So when are you two going to name the day?"
My first reaction was to give myself a little pat on the back. Here was yet another torture that, like sharing the remote control and my deodorant, I was avoiding by being single. Right now the marriage problem is about as relevant to me as, say, the problem of what to do with the Nobel Laureate medal once I get it home from Stockholm. Until it occurred to me that my last long-term relationship had been placed in the "where are they now?" files for much the same reasons.
Indeed, my lovely ex got into the habit of using a kind of shorthand when asked why we had split up: "Three weddings in a row." After a whole rake of glowing post-nuptial couples asked if we'd be next, I felt I had to make a rather extreme statement to the effect that we wouldn't.
Isn't this terrible? Even the snootiest of shop assistants knows that, if you're trying on a horrifically expensive dress, the last thing that they should do is pressurise you into buying it: "When are you going to get your cheque book out then?"
Yet, when it comes to making a decision that will affect every aspect of their lives, women are having their arms twisted as if they're Ballerina Barbies in the hands of the kindergarten bully.
It's also the kind of pressure which a lot of people kid themselves was phased out with the arrival of Germaine Greer and the concept of living together without getting married. And it probably was for a while - talking to a certain generation of thirtysomethings, I get the distinct impression that, for a while, getting married was something quite shameful. It implied that you served coffee in cups and saucers rather than pottery mugs and were terribly worried about what the neighbours thought.
But now, for a multitude of reasons ranging from a reaction on some of my generation's part to their own uneven backgrounds to the eternal affection girls hold for buying big dresses, weddings seem to be back in fashion. Dear ol' Prince Edward, who we never thought we'd see trotting up the aisle, has signed up and, even if Ross's marriage in Friends didn't work out, the zeitgeist-wise producers obviously felt it was time for a big day out.
Whether this is a good thing or not is a whole different kettle of fish, but what is definitely not a good thing is this rise in strong-arm tactics aimed at making people think of marriage as soon as they've clashed teeth with someone three times.
The irony of it is that the worst culprits seem to be married female friends.
The charitable way to look at this would be to reason that newly-marrieds were so blissfully happy that they wished the same for all their friends. I sometimes think, as I listen to a couple of friends who are in the final stages of planning weddings, that it's because they're so overcome with battle fatigue they want others with whom to swap remedies for post-traumatic stress disorder.
However, at heart I fear it's because of a lemming-like conservatism in us all - once we make a major change in our lives we want everybody to do the same. It makes us feel better about ourselves and the choices we've made.
But, if you've got any "attached-but-not-surgically" friends this wedding season, please keep in mind that these questions don't make them feel better about themselves and the choices they've yet to make. It makes them talk to journalists instead and the next time they might use names.