alexist

He is lovely and cute and laughed with me at Desperate Housewives. And he did the dinner dishes (I only said it was his turn to deal with the roasting tin). I did say he could leave me a pan or 2 (they were left from steaming/boiling veg, so will be easy) but didn't say so till he was halfway through. So he started with the intention of doing them all. :-)

Zoe is also being cute today. Right now she's perched on the arm of the sofa, watching me type.

Absolutely APPALLING column by Janet Street-Porter in today's Independent. Comment is "premium" for the Indy so I can't provide a link, but here's a typical quote: "The idea of living in America appalls me, if I was condemned to watch their television, endure their level of conversation, operate in an irony-free zone." And a reference to "the stultifying set of values that sum up suburban America".

Now I won't defend all of American popular culture. I think Desperate Housewives (the starting point for the rant) is a well done, funny soap, no more, no less. But I think Ms Street-Porter gives the British too much credit and the Americans not enough. There is a hell of a lot of shite on British television, and you can bet the BBC wouldn't be doing all those worthy documentaries if they weren't made to. They'd be doing things that get ratings, same as the US networks. She also attacks "American television" when she would be more accurate attacking "American network television": PBS and cable do a far greater variety of programs. A fairer criticism would be that the British are more willing to mix types of programs, rather than strictly segregating them as Americans do, so you rarely encounter different sorts of programs.

As for the rest of it... it's the sort of crass generalization that only an ignorant newspaper columnist can get away with.