Downton rapture

Downton! Only one word: DIVINE. No, another word: DELICIOUS. All those plot balls in the air, spinning, sparkling - how does Julian Fellowes do it? One after another, launched aloft. Enchanting. Costumes, set, script, acting - all as good as can be. Even the goddamn dog is perfect. And in the middle, there's my friend and former theatre school classmate Dame Harriet Walter, perfect as Lady Shackleton. Someone I know, sailing through a scene with Dame Maggie Smith. What a thrill.

It's a good thing there are so many cute guys in the show, with all those Dames around. Mmm Branson. Surely you won't end up with the teacher, that Bolshie. Over here, Branson, over here!

Wayson cancelled, but Jean-Marc and Richard came over and Carol came down from her room and we all sat, enthralled. This is why I bought that ridiculous television set - I am the neighbourhood Downton resource. Come one come all, Sundays at 9.

There was a half hour documentary afterwards about Edwardian manners, obviously aimed at explaining the mores of the show and the era to an American audience. I thought about my mother's parents, so very British, and their encounters with my father the American - how my dad, the first time he met my grandparents over tea in their London parlour, perched on the arm of a chair. On the arm of a chair! I don't think Percy and Marion ever recovered. Oh those crazy Americans, so rude.

Superlative television. A great way to see out a cold, dark week.

Before you go, to those of you interested in writing, I highly recommend my friend Shaena Lambert's essay on the left - love her internal tussle with Margaret Atwood, her notion of "letting the paint dry" on a first draft, and then stretching it out in a scrapbook. A very interesting suggestion. Take a look.

And let me know, please, who you think will remind Branson of his humble roots.