they're grrrreat when you're bonced

Rather like the built-in failsafe of erroneously buying a 24-inch dildo facemask, I love the way intoxicants have inbuilt cut-offs.

With alcohol, the more drunk you become the less capable you are of walking to the bar or speaking coherently enough to ask for more.

Ecstasy gives erectile dysfunction for up to 24 hours, by which time your judgement is no longer overwhelmed by tactile enthusiasm and you can pre-check if you actually do want to be fucking the old mate/random person you’ve been tongue wrestling all night.

And then cannabis. As Welsh band - and really, you're in a 70s rock band, imagine having the gall to call yourselves this - Man said in one of their many very very long tracks, 'I like marijuana because it gets me stoned'.

You can't fault the explanation and reasoning with that one, can you?

The intrinsic failsafe with cannabis is that the stronger your urge to eat absolutely everything ever, the harder it is to actually get off the sofa and do anything about it.

This effect – cannabinoids fucking about with your body’s mechanisms of appetite – is a scientifically proven fact. Although this is hardly news to those who have used cannabis, nor to the people who’ve made the new adverts for Kellogg's Frosties aimed at adults who find even elementary items like instant noodles too long-winded and fiddly to make.

I’m sure I’m not the only person who’s independently arrived at the conclusion that cornflakes provide the stoner with the ideal balance of tasting like real food, being around in whatever quantity desired without needing a special expedition to the shop, and being swift and uncomplicated to prepare.

Indeed, I can be certain. Twenty-odd years ago there was a Not The Nine O’Clock News sketch featuring someone single-mindedly troughing cornflakes non-stop for 30 seconds followed by a voiceover, ‘…that was a party political broadcast on behalf of the Legalise Cannabis Campaign’

So it’s no surprise that, as Angus Watson observed in a hilarious and elegantly constructed piece in the Guardian, Frosties aren’t just advertised on Saturday mornings by showing kids eating them, but now there’s the post-watershed ad aimed at adults:

Ever been unemployed, or a student? If so, you'll be familiar with the flood of guilt when the break in the middle of the afternoon film announces that it's sponsored by E-Z Hobble arthritis cream, and all the ads are for incontinence pants or fibre drinks to make you regular (in which a sharp-suited but uncomfortable-looking woman sips something orange at home. Later she sashays through the office, smiling proudly).

The point is, adverts are aimed at the group that should be watching TV at that time. So it used to be that Frosties would advertise their cereal during children's TV. After mentioning that Frosties were grrrrreat, Tony the tiger would do something pertinently impressive, like skateboarding.

But things have changed. There's a new, Tonyless Frosties advert that shows only after 9pm: a young man arrives home, track-suited and muddy. He announces that he's starving and sets about cooking instant noodles. Frustrated by the long preparation time, he eats the television. His flatmate, nonchalantly looking on with a bowl of Frosties in hand, says: "Grab Kellogg's Frosties instead - ready when you are."

In an associated move, Kellogg's Crunchy Nut Cornflakes, usually associated with surreptitious bowlfuls in business hotels, are currently sponsoring The Frank Skinner Show.

Sam Fulton, Kellogg's UK PR manager, says research has shown that people, particularly young men, often eat Frosties in the evening "due to a combination of taste, satisfaction and convenience". Hence the new ads.

Coincidentally, scientists have found that after inhalation of marijuana smoke, molecules called cannabinoids interfere with the operation of the appetite-regulating hormone leptin. That is to say, when you get stoned, it's now scientifically proven that you get "the munchies".

You can cook instant noodles in five minutes, or more quickly by adding boiling water. The munchies is about the only situation when five minutes is too long to wait for food. I have seen stoned people enjoy the "taste, satisfaction and convenience" of half-frozen chips smothered with rancid mayonnaise.

So good on Frosties for pointing out to potheads that Frosties, as well as tasting grrrreat, can be ready pretty much immediately. Compared with what they might otherwise eat, Frosties are a healthy option - one that may stop them needing the uncomfortable-looking woman's drink for a few years yet.