WHY should any of us be surprised to learn that, from time to time, participants in daytime chat shows have been fakes?

As an occasional viewer of the "you stole my husband, you bitch"-style programme, I've often found the guests incredulous. No one in their right mind would surely want to broadcast their personal traumas to the nation unless they were seeking publicity for self gain (eg actors) or they were getting paid for it (eg actors).

If they do happen to be genuine people looking for some sympathy and understanding, then they've totally missed the point of these programmes, which is purely and simply to entertain. Television can never be a replacement for professional help.

What does surprise me, however, is how these programmes, often with sexually deviant exhibitionists, found their way on to daytime TV schedules in the first place. Most of the viewing hours between 10am and 4pm are taken up with silly quiz shows with Cheryl Baker and Roy Hudd talking about what happened in Britain 30 years ago, or inane celebrity chefs showing us how not to crack a joke. Not that I'm glued to the TV all day long, you understand. I just happen to catch it whenever the baby accidentally steps on the remote control and I'm too busy rescuing her squeaky Tigger from down the back of the sofa to switch it off.

It's all rubbish anyway, apart from Watercolour Challenge presented by that nice Hannah Gordon. Mind you, I'm now beginning to doubt the validity of this one, too. One of the contestants once pretended that the farmyard scene they'd been asked to paint contained a pig, a horse and several ducks. Presumably he did it to liven up the the show. What's the difference between this and pretending you're squabbling with your sister? About three hours, according to my TV guide.

Our plans for the perfect toast on Valentine's Day went askew last weekend when all three of us (me, husband and baby) came down with strange afflictions.

If you remember, we were looking forward to buying a Dualit toaster. But our trip to Caz Systems was put on hold at the end of last week when Eve contracted a horrible virus that caused her eyes to ooze custard and her nose and mouth to dribble like an alien.

While we were panicking and pumping her full of antibiotics, my husband came down with a thumping bout of sinusitis and I ended up with a stress-related eye inflammation.

The most romantic day of the year passed us by while we raced between the emergency doctor service, the eye hospital and the chemist.

By teatime we'd more or less calmed down, but as we hadn't had a chance to get any shopping, our candlelit supper consisted of fried egg and melted cheese on toast (done under the grill).

It was delicious and made us realise that having a fantastic toaster was much less important than having good health.

Besides, we've now decided that new curtains in the living room would be a better investment.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.