Kate isn't a saint

I was amused to see one of the harpies (ie a woman columnist for one of the nationals) last week claiming that actress Kate Winslet fulfils all the criteria to be an icon to men and women. Yet today Kate is castigated by the boilers for blubbing when she won two awards at the Golden Globes on Monday.

True, she was embarrassingly snivelly and incomprehensible, and yes, it did bear comparison with the hideous performances of Gwyneth Paltrow and Halle Berry. Yes, these ladies should try to get some perspective. But it's not a crime, and the harpies should cut Kate some slack.

They've put her on a pedestal for some reason and still labour under the misapprehension that Kate is a normal Reading lass who had sausage and mash at her wedding and has somehow struck it lucky in Los Angeles with her glittering film career.

They don't seem to realise that Kate has moved on!

Sausage and mash was at her first wedding reception - and the marriage ended. Her second wedding, to Sam Mendes, was a different affair. She's a much more toned, glossy and groomed Kate than she was back in Titantic days. She maintains her figure with a harsh regime of diet and exercise. She might love her food but these days she knows she won't get work unless she is a US size 6 at the max.

The fact that she appears in big budget blockbusters and has Oscar nominations cascading down on her bears witness to how hard she has worked and how she understands the system over in LA.

So if she acts like a "lovey" and starts blubbing at the Oscars next month - assuming that her Golden Globes are precursors to The Big One - don't criticise her. It's what superstars do!

ps. I don't have a lot of respect for the tabloid lady writers - Jan Moir, Amanda Platell, Liz Jones and their predecessors, Lynda Lee Potter, Jean Rook. They're generally a disgrace to women and far worse even than some of the Neanderthal male writers like Clarkson and the ridiculous Rod Liddle.

Strictly Come Yawning

Strictly Come Dancing preview

I'm disappointed. I love SCD and am usually in a fever of excitement every Saturday after eagerly watching It Takes Two during the week. But this year, I'm missing some of those programmes and not bothering to watch the recording. It seems as if SCD has become a little boring.

I think it's this year's celebrities. Goodness they're all so earnest. So dedicated! So self-effacing. Andrew, when dinged over a bad performance, agreed with the judges! Where's the spark? All of them are on wretched "journeys" and there doesn't seem to be any of the usual tension or rivalry. At the start the show tried to manufacture rivalry between Austin Healey and Tom Chambers. But both are too affable. So we don't even have the usual "must-do-well-at-all-costs" aggressive competing from the athletes. Healey seems to do it effortlessly and Mark Foster was as gentle as a lamb.

Zzzzzz.

Even the business of John Sergeant being kept in by the public has been remarkably benign. He hasn't yet put the judges in the position of having to get rid of a good dancer, which really made things hot up last year. And he isn't as screamingly bad as Kate Garraway or Fiona Phillips. Sometimes hie scores are faintly respectable.

This week they're all doing a different dance so I can't remember who's doing what except that Tom is doing a paso doble, Cherie is doing a samba and Christine an American Smooth.

I predict that John and Heather will be at the bottom of the table and the dance-off will be between Heather and Andrew.

How could I get it so wrong?

(Slaps hand across forehead).
OK ok, so I fell for Kelly's "I'm rubbish at the Viennese Waltz" nonsense, and should have known better. It was a set up to make us feel sorry for her. She always was really good at it.
I'm talking Strictly Come Dancing of course. Another cliff hanger thanks to the public vote. I never would have expected to see Matt in the dance off: I thought the teenage girl vote was his (well, shared between him and Gethin).
So quite a shock to see him and Penny competing to stay. I knew it was a no-brainer that Penny would go. Her salsa was too frantic and needy. And she has less potential than Matt. I don't think he's had one bad dance, except arguably his first one.
Very disappointed to see Ian Waite go out at this stage. He's my favourite (so there, Brucie).
I did get one thing right, which was that John Barnes delivered a great salsa. I knew he would! I was disappointed by Letitia's (and her dress wasn't great again - the one she wore in the group dance was much better). But I think the best salsa of all was Alesha's.
I find the Viennese Waltz a real "zzzzzz" but my favourite couple, if I have to have one, was Camilla and Gethin's. He's coming on leaps and bounds each week and you can see him gaining in confidence. I thought theirs was very romantic, unlike Brendan and Kelly's which was posey and self centred as per usual.
What can I say about Kate? I really did think she would go this week, having shown a slight improvement last week (and therefore a dip in the public's need to drag her back for further humiliation). But her salsa was just the worst dance I think she's ever done. Freed from Anton's iron fists, as he normally drags her round the dancefloor, she went freestyle with laughable results. Next to her, Letitia looked like.....(insert your favourite lady dancer here).
When Bruce talks about "the public" I always immediately think of Kate's demographic: the staunch, fiercely loyal GMTV viewer. Who is this person? Whoever it is, she's in danger of dancing into the final at this rate!
Finally, a word as usual on "Dancing with the Stars." Jane Seymour went out this week. She didn't dance badly, in fact she scored three eights for her first dance and eights and nines for the second. But what she did do, shamelessly, was talk about how special the dance was for her special friendship with Johnny Cash and his wife. Cue video of JC with one of Jane's children. I'm afraid to say it was all too vomitworthy even for the Americans, and they gave Jane the boot.