For some weeks The Archers was exercised by the break-up of Brenda - she of the aggressive glottal stop - Tucker’s relationship with the insensitive and perennially self- centred Tom Archer. Unfortunately, rather than thanking her lucky stars for having escaped his clutches she was heart-broken. Eventually he came to his senses when saving her from a physical assault by Matt Crawford’s former business associate Steve ‘Chalky’ Chalkman. Realising that he was lucky to have anyone who would put up with his perpetual whining he asked her to marry him and - you’ll regret this Brenda - was accepted. Meanwhile Brenda’s Dad, Milkman Mike, has taken up with the brash, attention-seeking, considerably younger, and, very probably, gold-digging Vickoi. In a fit of senile lust - he’s almost as old as me! - he’s proposed to her and been accepted.
MEANWHILE ... on Sky Italia the current series of Desperate Housewives has just ended on a cliff-hanger: Mike Delfino is seen getting remarried - but whether to his ex-wife, Susan, or to his fiancée, Catherine, remains a mystery. Either way it’s a disaster: as he’s still in love with Susan, marrying Catherine’s a bad idea. On the other hand,
Susan is such a pain in the arse that this viewer won’t
rejoice if that’s the outcome.
THEN ... yesterday, whilst sitting outside Luisa’s bar with Irish Paul, enjoying a coffee and a smoke, I had a ‘phone call from Adam asking for Sophy’s hand in marriage. She’d told him that although I rejected new-fangled American imports such as ‘Father’s Day’ I’d be tickled pink by his reviving - even if in a postmodernist way - the archaic custom of asking the putative father-in-law’s consent. Having been assured by Adam that there’d be no hunnish practices, and that he would waive the dowry of two camels, I was happy to agree. For unlike Tom and Brenda, Mike Tucker and Vickoi, Mike Delfino and Susan or Catherine they’re not only both lovely people but are ideally-suited to each other. So, to adapt the cliché, for once life doesn’t imitate art but improves on it a thousandfold.
THEN ... yesterday, whilst sitting outside Luisa’s bar with Irish Paul, enjoying a coffee and a smoke, I had a ‘phone call from Adam asking for Sophy’s hand in marriage. She’d told him that although I rejected new-fangled American imports such as ‘Father’s Day’ I’d be tickled pink by his reviving - even if in a postmodernist way - the archaic custom of asking the putative father-in-law’s consent. Having been assured by Adam that there’d be no hunnish practices, and that he would waive the dowry of two camels, I was happy to agree. For unlike Tom and Brenda, Mike Tucker and Vickoi, Mike Delfino and Susan or Catherine they’re not only both lovely people but are ideally-suited to each other. So, to adapt the cliché, for once life doesn’t imitate art but improves on it a thousandfold.
