Apathy Sketchpad

Sometimes, I hate being single. In these times, I lie alone in bed, wishing I had a girlfriend to share it with. Fortunately, I developed a very mature and sophisticated way of dealing with it: watching Loose Women on television. While watching loose women on television is a tactic employed by many single men, mine is subtly different, in that in involves the talk programme on during the day, and can be done in company (even female company). The show is ideal for men who wish that had a woman in their lives, because it rather effectively makes the urge go away.

The show is fronted by a group of women — presumably loose ones — who range from ex-members of girl bands, to ex-hosts of poorly thought out quiz shows. They spend the time discussing topics of little or no interest to the modern woman, such as whether or not bottom-pinching should be illegal. Really. I mean, I understand that I am not the target audience for this programme, but I have never once seen a woman have her bottom pinched. I have never heard of it happening (except on Loose Women). I have never met a woman to whom this has happened. I have, however, know it to happen to men, because on more than one occasion I have been that man. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the only person on the show who mentioned this trend was the guest, who was a man (specifically, I think, a racing driver). After having several minutes of uninformed and irrelevant discussion, they threw the debate open to the nation in a then-new section called “Woman on the Loose”, in which their then-new presented found some people with no opinions and asked them for their thoughts on the matter. For the most part they said it was only a bit of fun, but asked where you draw the line. After this roaring success it was passed to the viewers at home, or at least the ones who felt like calling in, who between them offered just one opinion, which was that the caller was all in favour of bottom-pinching, but nobody seemed to want to pinch her.

But she lived in Scotland, which is more than a bit out of my way.