KEY POINTS:
Oh goody, a new series of Grumpy Old Women. This is silly stuff, a bunch of moaning old(ish) bags sitting around, well, moaning. It doesn't sound very entertaining but it is.
What I love about it is that it's exactly like sitting around with a bunch of your grumpy old girlfriends moaning, but without actually having to see any of your grumpy old girlfriends. Because, much as I love them, they can't half moan.
The first episode of the new series devoted much time to moaning about the tyranny of new technology, how you never get a minute to yourself these days and so on. But the GOW have worked out that there is some good in all this fevered cellphone talking, texting and message leaving.
You pick times, said one, when you know your grumpy old girlfriend will be putting the kids in the bath, in an extremely important meeting, or whatever.
Then you ring and leave a message. You have been a good friend, you've kept in touch, without having to have a conversation.
This can backfire. Sometimes the GOG might answer. Then you have to talk to them and, gawd, they can't half moan.
But, play it right and you'll never have to talk to anyone again. As Indira Joshi said, "I can't bear to be sociable, especially now nobody smokes, drinks or takes drugs to take the edge off."
I very much liked the woman who moaned about how she doesn't like people parking outside her house. Me neither. Why can't they park outside the house of the person they've come to visit? And that won't be me because I can't bear to be sociable. And don't you dare park on our berm. We'll call the council. We have called the council. It cost the parkers $40. I could be on this show.
Men are good to moan about. Men like meetings; women don't, said a GOW. Men have invented all sorts of idiotic management-speak which they use at meetings which are used to spin out their working day so they don't have to go home and put the kids to bed.
Management-speak is very useful. "It leaves you in no doubt whatsoever," said a GOW, "that the person using it is an absolute prick." I concede that this could apply to women, too.
Right, something else has been making me very grumpy and that's Corrie. It's been making me so grumpy that I haven't watched it for months (except while I was in London and could eat jaffa cakes while watching it which made me slightly less grumpy but fatter).
I should still love it because it has a surfeit of GOW characters who could moan for their country.
But it's not the lovely old bags who have caused me to stop watching. It's the horrid young bags and their silly storylines and binty get-ups who have got me moaning. Call me a GOW but I don't think Corrie should have sex and kissing and skimpy outfits unless they bring mad Karen and her magnificent cleavage back. Or Bet Lynch and hers. Oh. No. They tried that one, didn't they?
But I have been dragged, kicking and moaning, back in. What are they up to now with these communications from beyond the watery grave from Richard the psycho Rat? Surely they're not bringing him back? Didn't we see him dead? And didn't Eastenders try that one with Dirty Den?
I'm sure that this storyline will drag on for months and turn out to be as daft as Tyrone but it's intriguing enough to stop me moaning for a little while. Maybe. I've just remembered it will involve the Platts, and that Gail's whinging and moaning makes everyone on GOW look like an amateur.
