If there's one thing you should love more than your Mom, it's How I Met Your Mother

INVENTIONS have been around since some unsung genius decided that a round disk is perfect for moving things around (if you believe in religion instead of evolution, you can say that the deity of your choice invented the wheel — there, are you happy?). Buttered toast; tight jeans; chocolate; the iPod — inventions like that make it worth getting up from your comfortable mattress for (thank you, whoever invented the mattress).

But there is one invention that has shaped many people in ways that they seldom realise, it's the humble television. Even though it is often decried as an instrument to rot brains (and there is good reason why it earned the sobriquet "idiot box"), there's not a single one of you out there who has not been influenced and awed by this by-product of the late 19th Century.

I have always had it as a constant companion in both my growing years and my current state of existence, though I don't watch as much TV as I used to (which is a good thing, really). Back then, I was not particularly fussy about what I saw (my parents were well aware of what I was watching, in case you're curious). We had so many good shows, and censorship in Malaysia was nowhere near as bizarre then as it is in the present day (insert your own "that-is-SO-true-because-I-remember.." story here).

There was always something new the watch, even though nowadays there are so many new old shows about you would think that they were starting to run out of ideas (Battlestar Galactica, V, The Bionic Woman and Beverly Hills 90210, for the love of ALF. I shudder to think how they would reimagine Automan, The Greatest American Hero, Daktari, Man In The Net or Opah). But there are some pretty good shows that surfaced in the past few years that have lodged themselves in my heart: one of them is How I Met Your Mother (HIMYM).

The plot is fairly simple: Ted Mosbey, an architect, is telling his daughter and son the story of how he met their mother. Of course, it turns out to be a VERY long story involving Ted, his best friend Marshall Eriksen (who has only been with one woman all his life, the kooky Lily Aldrin), their self-appointed, sex-crazy friend Barney Stinson and Ted's gorgeous Canadian once-girlfriend/lover-but-eventual-good-friend Robin Scherbatsky. The gang get up to some pretty far out antics along the path towards finding Mrs Mosbey, involving a goat, a T-Rex-shaped bank, an Indian cab driver and even Canadian sex acts amongst others (really, don't ask).

Frankly, Ted is rather like Ally McBeal, Meredith Grey and Carrie Bradshaw: a whiny lead who really needs a good slap most of the time (although Ted is nowhere near as unsalvageable as those girls, because he's eventually loveable, while they aren't). The others have outrageously funny quirks, but the real star of the show is Barney, hammed up to the hilt by the ridiculously funny and talented Neal Patrick Harris.

The most amazing (and ironic) thing is that Barney, a womaniser so depraved he once pretended to be twins to sleep with the same girl twice, is played so convincingly by a man who is actually gay in real life. This role is strong enough to make sure that Harris will be remembered for more than merely being a prodigiously young and annoying doctor (I know you know what show I'm talking about). As if that were not enough, Harris' real life partner has a recurring role in the show as Lily's ex-boyfriend! Keeping it all in the family, as they say (and in this case, it works).

So HIMYM's first season was kind of slow and iffy in places; what matters is that those who persevered were well-rewarded. And Season 2 saw the plot not only get thicker but richer, even more hilarious and heartwarming. For me, the highlight of this season was the episode called Slap Bet: the gang discover that Robin is hiding a secret, and Marshall and Barney challenge each other to a slap bet (the loser's cheek gets to be friends with the winner's palm) to see who unravels the mystery first. Let's just say that the "revelation" will have you slapping your own back as you cough your lungs out laughing.

The following seasons (it's currently in its fifth, and Season Six has just been announced) build on the show's fine foundations, although it is very irritating that we STILL do not get to see the Mom. Yes, I realise that once she's seen, it's game over for the show, but there's only so much TV that I can watch, and I want to find out who the woman is NOW (there was a throwaway line in one episode which hinted at the Mom's name, so let's hope they writers follow through with it).

And like all great shows, they have a fantastic theme song (I still play the Theme from MacGyver on solo piano, even to this day). In this case, it's a small part of a song, actually: an extract of Hey, Beautiful by The Solids (whose members include the two guys who created the show). It's a a wonderfully catchy and bouncy number that has a music video made up of scenes from the series. Unfortunately, the scenes have the mouths of the characters superimposed with those of the singer (and ONLY the mouth), so it looks kinda freaky. Nonetheless, the song is (to use a popular piece of Barney-speak) awesome, and I am sure there are some of you out there who have it as a ringtone already.

Perhaps someday, you will sit down with your children and tell them how you met your spouse. If that happens, to be the case, HIMYM will be the standard to adhere to. And if you haven't got any antics that compare to the song and dance about suits, you may not want to bother...

Ahmad Azrai can't seem to build sandcastles in the sand...