Open Writing

"Going out'' - ie: tearing oneself away from a warm television when it’s 30deg outside – is a grossly overrated pastime after 8pm.

I know other women share this aversion. ‘I couldn’t move,’ a yoga absentee explained when I queried her nights off. Was she sick, a broken ankle perhaps? No. ‘I love my fireside too much these cold nights.’

I haven’t noticed the bad weather affecting our male element yet. In fact pressing appointments at a certain bowling club appear to increase during wintry spells.

My socialising can be handled from my armchair. I pop into the Rovers Return. I’ve been switched on to Coronation Street ever since Mrs Dale closed her diary, and can never understand why there hasn’t been a special award created for the superior acting and script-writing throughout this long-running series.

Naturally, like most figures one becomes familiar with, some possess aggravating habits. I try not to notice the way Elsie Tanner pouts her bottom lip in an effort to look coy and only succeeds in looking more middle-aged. I make excuses when Stan Ogden talks like a ventriloquist. Ena Sharples has eventually mastered those teeth – bless her hairnet. There was a time when her ‘Osmond’ smile looked ready to spring out and attack her nearest victim. Annie Walker must be a scriptwriter’s dream.

One of her supercilious sniffs can register more emotion than half a dozen Noele Gordon’s splutterings.

Some members of our team are still at Crossroads Motel, in spite of the lifeless tariff. My husband protects himself with his ‘Examiner’ throughout this and Little House on the Prairie, which floods our living room with un-checked tears each Thursday teatime.

But I love to curl up with a good television serial especially on Fridays. The rest of the family is out. The bathroom, the best corner seat by the fire and television are all mine. When I have wallowed in unoccupied bathroom, soaked up the silence of the cassette-less atmosphere, I turn on the Flambards and tuck into an hour’s adventure with William and Christina.

At first the ear-shattering background music threatened to drown the characters. It sounded like two horses playing a duet on a piano, while a girl called for her mom and someone else carried on whistling. But the cast is so refreshingly natural, the camera work excellent, I’m learning to live with the noise. Like eating fish and chips with custard, it’s different.

I wonder if other serial freaks have noticed that Sarah in Thomas and Sarah wears Christina’s tweedy cardigan.

Yes, I love my languid little rut, at least I did until I read about Mrs Florence Sephton, aged 80, of North Wales. She has just graduated in History with the Open University. Sophie Tucker was wrong. Life begins at 80 – if you’re willing to make the switch.