Secret Life Of Dogs – ITV1

“THAT dog,” said Allen (CRRCT), “saved my life, my marriage, and brought me back to my children.” Even in her 80s, Lassie’s a truly amazing animal.

Actually, it was a Labrador, Endal, which transformed Allen’s life. A head injury in the Gulf War had left the former naval officer unable to recognise his wife or children. But, after a chance meeting with the bow-wow, the pair became best buddies. I’m not saying they shared bones, but it was close.

Although it was when they were both hit by a car in the dead of night that the magnificent mutt showed his true devotion. “He got up,”said Allen, “pulled me into the recovery position, retrieved his blanket from under my wheelchair, and covered me with it.” He’s since replaced the AA as the fourth emergency service.

But Endal hadn’t finished. “In the dark,” revealed Allen,“he found my mobile phone.” Don’t get carried away - he didn’t dial the ambulance.

“He brought it to my face,” continued Allen, “and then he made the brave decision to limp off to a nearby hotel to raise the alarm.” He was discovered three hours later in a foam bath in the honeymoon suite.

Endal was awarded the Victoria Cross For Animal Bravery, blotting his copybook slightly by cocking his leg on Princess Anne at the medal ceremony.

But he’s not alone in such heroics. Max saved the life of 79-year-old Margaret after she got lost in woodland for several days while trying to find a short cut home after missing her stop on the bus, a scenario which adds fire to my campaign to have satellite tracking fitted to every senior citizen over 70.

Margaret survived lying under a tree for three days and two nights in freezing conditions. When they found out, the government stopped her winter fuel allowance.

“I kept getting tied up with the brambles,” she explained. “Then it got cold and dark so I lay under a big tree.” The BBC has since commissioned her to replace Ray Mears.

All the time Margaret was just 500m from her house. In fact at one stage she nipped back for a hot water bottle.

Police and volunteers combed the area trying to find her, before Max was called in. “I was relieved when I was licked all over by a dog,”said Margaret. Every now and then she covers herself in Pedigree Chum to relive the experience.

“Dogs are very efficient,” said Max’s handler. “They’re probably equal to about 10 people searching.”

It’s worth getting one just to find your glasses.

Timeshift: Eyes Down! The Story of Bingo – BBC4

“IT’S the early 1960s,” noted Timeshift, “and thousands are gripped by a new obsession.” Not the eye-level grill. Bingo.

“You get a fantastic adrenalin rush,” explained one old bird. “When you get near a line you’re nervous, you’re shaking.” Just watch your dentures don’t fall out.

Even now more people play bingo than watch football. Attendances are higher than church. You’d think they could adapt and combine it with calling out the hymn numbers.

Back in the day, bingo was the centrepiece of entire holidays. “If you’re idea of a good break is bingo from 10.30 in the morning to 10.30 at night,” said a Pathé announcer, “then Clacton is a dream come true.”If it isn’t then it’s your worst nightmare.

Blackpool too has a great bingo tradition. “What have you won?” an elderly lady emerging from a seafront game was asked. “I've got a cupcake money box,” she said, “and a frying pan.” And to think some people chuck money away on the lottery.

However, not everyone was a fan. “The most mindless ritual achieved in half a million years of human evolution,” thundered one newspaper (this was before Sudoku had come along).

Bingo’s popularity came from the fact that it allowed people to win prizes beyond their imagination. “We had cruises to Monte Carlo or Biarritz,” said one club operator. “These were things only the jet-set had at that time.” At that time? They still are.

And it gave women independence. “Women,” we heard, “were beginning to say ‘why can't I go out and have a bit of time on my own?’” Blimey, they’ll be wanting the ironing board putting away next.

“The husband was happy to give her a couple of quid to go with,” said one expert, “because he knew she was in a totally safe environment- there was no-one getting drunk and chatting her up.” No, a shout of ‘two fat ladies’ is rarely misconstrued as a sexual invite.

Talking of which, “it would be impossible to grow up in Britain,” claimed one fan, “without knowing a bingo call,”. Like ‘legs 11’ ‘two little ducks’, and the recently updated ’21 – key of the dole office’.

Sadly, the smoking ban put paid to a lot of halls. “Smoking’s a very big thing to bingo players,” said one ex-club owner. “It’s a nervous reaction when you’re playing.” Without fags, many were ejected for biting the table.

For some, bingo goes right to the heart. “I don’t want people crying at my funeral,” said one lady. “What I want is for mourners to be handed a strip of bingo tickets and the priest to call the numbers.”

The winner gets her gold teeth.

Benidorm ER – Five

BENIDORM is one of Spain’s most popular resorts. In Europe, only London and Paris have more hotel rooms. Not for nothing is it known as the Filey of the Costa Blanca.

Most visitors come here to catch the sun. Yes, they occasionally catch something else, but that’s what happens when you get too friendly with a stag party from Gateshead.

Holidays generally pass with nought more than a minor case of sunburn (never lie on your front in a thong). However, a small minority will always require the attentions of the Clinica Benidorm, a bit like Holby City but with elegant and olive-skinned medical staff rather than Nigel from EastEnders.

First in this week was Hannah who had a nasty cut to her scalp.“I rolled over in bed,” she said, “and hit my head right on the corner of the bedside cabinet.” Why there isn’t a Public Information Film about that kind of think I‘ll never know.

For Hannah the incident had put the tin hat on what had clearly, right from the start, been a nightmare holiday. “We arrived,” she said, “and for three hours we were looking for a McDonald’s.” The hardships some people have to suffer. It’s like Touching The Void.

Hannah had to be held down by a pal, possibly a Klondike Kate tribute, while she had the wound stapled. The bad news was she was in a grotesque amount of pain. The good news was it reminded me I needed to go to Ryman’s in the morning.

“My head is on fire,” she caterwauled. “It feels like it’s exploded.” I’m just hoping she never pops up on One Born Every Minute.

Elsewhere, Freda (always nice when parents name their child after the Blue Peter tortoise) was cradling a ‘very painful finger’ after an accident in a nightspot. “I went to the toilet,” she said, “and as I turned to lock the door I trapped my finger.” You’d be right in thinking it’s hardly the first twenty minutes of Saving Private Ryan.

“I think it might be broken,” she added, “because I could hear it crack.” Either that or a big girl had bust the seat in the next door cubicle.

In a scene with all the drama and tension of a peculiarly underwhelming episode of Peppa Pig, Freda was called into the doctor’s room to hear the X-Ray result. “No break,” said the doc, her svelte beauty intensified by the venereal disease poster on the wall, “just soft tissue damage.”

We can all sleep easy tonight.

EastEnders – BBC1

SHARON’S been neglecting little Dennis in EastEnders, a fact brought home when she realised she was missing off all the family drawings he’d brought home from school. Although it could just have been they didn’t have a crayon that colour.

“I see Dennis is drawing weird pictures,” mocked Bianca, a woman who is to compassion what Swarfega is to grease. “My Tiffany went through that.” I remember that storyline - when Tiffany’s teachers asked her to draw a picture of family life, they were somewhat bemused to find she’d sketched Vesuvius.

“My son is nothing like your kids,” snapped Sharon. True. Bianca’s offspring are overseen by the UN. Little Dennis, on the other hand, looks like a bemused Little Lord Fauntleroy. My suspicion is there was a mix-up at the hospital. Somewhere a member of the minor aristocracy is wondering why their son wants to run a car lot and keeps asking for jellied eels.

“He's just feeling a bit jealous of you and Lexi,”soothed Jack. “He just feels a little bit left out.” Poor lad - it’s months since she involved him in a gangland turf war.

Sharon made amends in the pub. In a classic piece of mothering, she asked Dennis to draw a picture of her while she swilled a G&T.“Is that supposed to be me?” she enquired of the result. And, to be honest, I thought it was a Yeti too.

Elsewhere, Ian was trying to woo Minute Mart manager Denise, inviting her round for a meal. “I’ve got a lovely bit of haddock,” he charmed. “It’s on the turn so I could do with getting it ate tonight – you’d be doing me a favour.” The only question is what they’ll be sharing next – a bed or a toilet.

“That has to be the worst invitation I've ever heard in my life,” said Denise, forgetting that time Phil asked her to share his porridge at the Scrubs.

Elsewhere, Cora was doing all she could to stop daughter Tanya inviting serial philanderer Max back into her life. “You can chuck all his stuff out on the street,” she told him, “cufflinks, dodgy CDs, odd socks, but unless you get him out of your head you’re never going to be free.” No, but getting rid of his socks has got to be a start. To stop bluebottles coming in if nothing else.

Cora’s certainly not to be messed with. She’s like Big Mo with bells on. “Take one more step and it'll be your last,” she told Max as he advanced on Tanya’s door.

Why she wasn’t Greco-Roman wrestling at London 2012 I’m unsure.

Wonders Of Life – BBC2

“What,” ponders professor Brian Cox, “is the difference between the living and the dead?” I’m no scientist but I’d say not much in the case of the Bruce Forsyth.

“What is life?” added the smilesome academic. “What is it that animates living things? What is the difference between a piece of rock carved into a gravestone and me?” The answer being you don’t need an A-level refresher course to understand a piece of rock carved into a gravestone.

To be fair, Cox is trying, in terms most of us can understand, to explain the origins of life. “The question ‘what is life?’,” he opined, “is surely one of the grandest of all.” Right up there with ‘can you pass the ketchup?’ and ‘who’s that at the door?’.

“How is it this magnificent complexity that we call life could have assembled itself on a planet that itself formed from nothing more than a collapsing cloud of gas and dust?” It’s a question rarely used as an ice-breaker at a swingers’ party.

Where some believe life to have been created by a higher being – how else can you explain Bradley Wiggins? – Cox sees it in more black and white terms. “Living things can be explained by the laws of physics,” he says, “the very same laws that explain the falling of the rain or the shining of the stars.” Although even physicians are baffled by the existence of John McCririck.

Cox accepts though, that some things that don’t quite appear to add up. For instance, while dead stuff decomposes, “how can it be that a living organism avoids decay?” Clearly he hasn’t clapped eyes on Princess Anne for a while.

To get his ideas across, Cox tries to incorporate objects familiar to us all. At one stage, for example, he tried to explain changes in energy by showing thermal images of a chicken. “The chicken,” he said, “is radiating disorder out into the wider universe.” I’ve no idea what he meant but, if that’s their game, I don’t feel quite so bad about eating them.

Later Cox performed a neat trick where he isolated his DNA with washing-up liquid, salt, and vodka. “In that cloudy innocuous looking solid,” he revealed, “are all the instructions to build a human being.” For Loose Women presenters, double the vodka.

“We're connected,” he stated, “not only to every animal alive today, but to every single thing that has ever lived.” Surely not the dung beetle.

“Life,” he concluded, “is not a thing, it’s a collection of chemical processes.” So there you have it. Our precious existence. Nought more than de-scaling the kettle.

Fighter Wives: The World Of MMA – Five

“THERE are men in Britain,” revealed Channel 5’s documentary, “who make their living by fighting in a cage.” Is this the depths to which those laid off by the civil service have fallen?

MMA is a no-holds barred contact sport which combines boxing, wrestling and martial arts. It’s practised predominantly by women in city centres after chucking out time on a Saturday.

It’s taken the sporting public by storm, upwards of 50 people routinely packing out a back room in Watford.

“It’s brutal, bloody, and,” claimed the programme, “very big business indeed.” In many ways it’s similar to pensioners’ night at the bingo.

For partners it’s not easy seeing a loved-one beaten and mauled in the ring. It’s one of the reasons I gave up lion taming. But for Maria it had at least stopped her beloved Colin getting up to no good elsewhere. Their marriage had seen him “transform from local thug to professional fighter”. The change had been immediate – he went 10 rounds with his mother-in-law at the reception.

“When I first met him,” said Maria, “he did used to fight with people, not for money or in a ring.” It was more something to do on the way home from Sainsburys.

“I’d see him,” she continued, “and there’d be blood where a lad had tried to bite his nose. I said ‘if you’re with me you won’t be able to do that anymore’.” No, if you’re going to be a cage fighter, you’re going to have to give up primary school teaching.

Maria didn’t like fight time. “I’m not going to freak him out,” she said, “but he knows I’m on the verge of vomiting.” Keep your coat on if you’re in the seat in front of her.

She didn’t let their two children attend, but instead hoped to capture it on film. “It’ll be nice to pass down the DVDs to their children,”she said, “so they can see what their granddad did.” They’re just awaiting the age ruling from the British Board of Film Classification.

Elsewhere, Poppy had found a career as a ring girl, one of those women who parade round in their skimpies, much admired by Germaine Greer. “For me it was a bit scary,” she admitted of her debut. “You’re going to be there in a cage half naked and everyone’s looking at you.” It reminded me of a nightmare I once had about Debbie McGee.

Pal Lexi was a little more confident. “Being out in front of all these people half naked,” she said, “there’s nothing better.” I’ll hand it to her - she’d have made a great Olympic Games Maker.

Timeshift: The Joy Of (Train) Sets – BBC4

“IT’S essentially a pointless pursuit,” admitted a model railway enthusiast, with an honesty the crochet community could learn a lot from. “It’s not going to put a meal on someone’s table or save someone’s life, but it might save someone’s sanity.” Essentially he was advocating that people with mental health issues be shored up in lofts with 15 miniature signal boxes and a representation of Bognor Regis Central circa 1930. It’s one of the lesser known changes the Coalition want to make to the National Health Service.

As Timeshift noted, “for more than a century many of us have been captured by this land of tiny detailed wagons and scaled down stations.” I myself had a penchant for model railways. Not so much the engines. More tying my sister’s dolls to the track.

The suggestion seemed to be that train sets were something dads bought themselves under the pretence of being a gift for their son. I did the same last Christmas when I gave my eldest a briar pipe and three tobacco pouches.

For many men, it’s a hobby that’s remained throughout their life. Pete Waterman was one such, although he admitted “you may go off it a bit when you find your wife”. Research shows few women enjoy gluing fake lichen on a platform on their wedding night.

Many were drawn to model steam trains by the shockingly exciting sight of the real thing. “It had steam issuing out from underneath,” recalled one chap. “You'd put your hand on it – it’d be quivering like a horse.” Whether he was talking about a steam train or Clare Balding was unclear.

The leader in the market was Frank Hornby. His catchphrase was “British toys for British boys”, a bit sexist but his range of cast iron ponies never caught on.

“He was very jolly and jovial,” noted a historian. “At Christmas parties everyone would have to rush upstairs to see his latest invention.” When they’d seen the replica cattle truck they shuffled back down again.

But tastes change and Hornby’s success wasn’t to last. “Children became more sophisticated,” we heard. “Model railways became the preserve of adults.” Even now they often give you Hornby vouchers when you buy a duffel coat.

Then, just as it seemed children would never touch a train set again, in 1985 a saviour arrived – Thomas. Not Cruise, that irritating kids’ series narrated by Ringo Starr in what was, I’m sure, in no way a comedown from The Beatles.

“Thomas has brought very small children into it with his little face and his loveable looks,” claimed an enthusiast.

Forget that. Just tell me one thing. What’s his scrap value?

Wild Things – C4

“NATURE,” says horticulturalist Chris Myers, “is on the move.”And he doesn’t mean Triffids.

“Wild plants, bushes, and trees have disappeared,” he continues, “and strange new plants have become familiar.” If he means that mildew on our shower curtain, that’s been there for years.

Wild Things tries to explain our country’s changing flora. Myers, for example, is concerned for the good old British bluebell. “It’s under threat from an invader,” he revealed, “the Spanish bluebell.” Whether the BNP’s aware of this influx is unclear.

“It looks the same,” explained Myers, “but with one key difference - the Spanish bluebell doesn't smell.” On the other hand it can more than hold its own with a pair of maracas.

Mirroring a Club 18-30 to Benidorm, the British and Spanish have started to breed. “The new hybrid bluebells have already started to infiltrate our woodland,” revealed Myers. “We stand to lose that unique scent forever.” It’s coming to something when you have to take a can of Glade on a walk.

Myers is an interesting new presence on our screens. He’s like Ray Mears only without the desire to create a shelter from moss.

“I like to mooch about in the countryside,” he says, “to see nature in the wild.” Which made his next statement even more bizarre. “This week we're in Birmingham,” he said. Surely the only wildlife to be found round there is flea infestations.

Myers was fascinated by the M6. “It may seem an unlikely starting point,” he said, “but in the last 50 years the roads have become Britain’s latest nature reserve.” Forget Martin Mere, take the family for an educational day out on the hard shoulder.

Charmingly named miniature flowering plant Danish scurvy grass – get your wife a bunch for Valentine’s Day - was what grabbed Myers. It’s found all along our motorways, its seeds transported by car wheels, and the presenter got straight in there. “It's not every day that you get to walk down the central reservation of the M6,” he said. No, makes you wonder why you waste so much time trailing round Dovedale and the Lake District.

Down on his hands and knees, he was much taken with the plant. It was just a shame about the lead poisoning.

“I came to Birmingham with a mind full of concrete and tarmac,” he admitted. “Not much room for animals and plants.” But he needn’t reproach himself. It’s understandable that people go to Birmingham harbouring negative thoughts. That way what you find there can only be a bonus.

Next week: The microscopic life of a D-road puddle.

World Without End – C4

IT’S a story of bawdiness, brutality, and promiscuity. A sort of 1300s What Happens In Kavos.

Ken Follett’s World Without End is wall to wall grunting. Although admittedly some of it’s ploughing.

Kingsbridge Cathedral is the scene of much groaning. If it’s not illicit couples making love in church confessionals, it’s the wounded from medieval bridge collapses. “The dead in the south transept,” ordered young medical student Caris, “the injured in the north.” Basically it’s Casualty without anaesthetic.

Caris took a pragmatic view on the accident, seeing it as a simple structural fault. Narcissistic monk

Godwyn, though, believed it the Lord’s work. “The punishment,”he opined, “is on Kingsbridge for becoming a haven for witches, whores, and filth.”If he’s right, I’d suggest the structural engineers of Wolverhampton check all bridges immediately.

Caris saw the collapse as proof the town needed a designated hospital. “We can't just leave people strewn across the cathedral floor,” she said. Certainly it’s not what you’d want if you’d got a wedding booked there.

“We need somewhere to put the injured,” she added. I can see the first 14^th century hospital soap coming on.

With building on a new bridge underway, Queen Isabella stormed into town with her chest on show. War chest that is – she’s about the only female character not to flash her other one.

The coffers were empty, and she didn’t want money wasted on vital improvements. Whether Follett’s an advisor to the Coalition I’m unsure.

“Kingsbridge can wither and die for all I care,” she told town tax collector, dishevelled knight Roland, a man who doesn’t so much look like he’s been dragged through a bush as spent the past 15 years living in one,“but I will have my taxes.” They say George Osborne’s got a poster of her on his bedroom wall.

Roland sent Ralph, evil Lord of Wigleigh, to tell the bridge builders to stop, although there was no small amount of anger at the news. “****the Queen,” said one. It’s fair to assume he wasn’t a collector of Jubilee tea towels.

Ralph rewarded this outburst by removing his arm with a sword. It sounds tough but I can’t help feeling it’d work better than the anti-social behaviour order.

Blood-spattered, he returned to Roland to tell him the work had stopped. “Now there's a man who knows how to take an order,” noted Roland. And certainly having him round would speed up productivity in most offices.

Roland’s upbeat mood was stymied, however, when he found his wife had been one of the Kingsbridge groaners – and he wasn’t the cause.

That’s what you get for letting yourself go. What Roland needs is a medieval Gok Wan.

Great Northern Cookbook – Five

“NORTHERN grub is my passion,” claims former Coronation Street actor Sean Wilson. Although since he isn’t morbidly obese, I’m not entirely sure I believe him.

“I like to think I know everything there is to know about it,” he adds. Again, I’d question this statement. At no point of this lard-laden series have I seen anyone mop up their excess gravy with a slice of white bread.

Northern dishes, claims Wilson, “is proper food for proper people.” When he says ‘proper people’, he means those with blocked arteries.

This week, he started by cooking up a pork loin dinner for a group of civic dignitaries travelling from Crewe to North Yorkshire on steam train the Scarborough Flyer.

There was conjecture among the passengers as to whether he was up to the task. “Can he cook?” pondered one. “A lot of people spend 20 or 30 years getting to this standard of cooking.” But enough of Bernard Matthews.

Certainly conditions weren’t ideal. “I’m starting to realise that preparing a full roast dinner at high speed in a tiny kitchen is a massively ambitious plan.” My wife said something similar when I asked her to cook something while travelling down the M5 ready for when we arrived at the caravan site.

He was having particular trouble with his cheesecake. It hadn’t quite set and had sheets of gelatine in it. On the plus-side there was no horsemeat.

“This is every chef’s worst nightmare,” said Wilson, “turning out a meal that people refuse to eat.” And you’d have to say if this is the stuff Gail was serving up on a daily basis, no wonder he left Coronation Street.

Crewe Mayor Margaret Martin did her best to be diplomatic but couldn’t help mention the cheesecake’s presentation woes. I’m not saying it was a mess, but it looked like the Vienetta factory had exploded.

Wilson tried to defend himself. “The presentation was difficult,” he explained, “because we were doing 75mph at the time.” They’re doing 570 in a jumbo jet, mate, and they seem to manage.

In fact it wasn’t a great journey all round for Wilson. After Scarborough he headed for Blackpool to revive interest in an old northern favourite. Not Stan Boardman, black pudding.

“A mix of pigs’ blood, fat, herbs and spices,” he said, “it’s been made to recipes that have changed very little since medieval times.” Sorry, mate, you’re just not selling it to me.

He reintroduced it to the breakfast table of a B&B, but the guests sent it back. Great Northern Cookbook was possibly the least successful celebrity chef tie-up since the Galloping Gourmet got involved with Tesco.

The Food Inspectors – BBC1 Jan 17

“EVERY year,” says Chris Hollins, “more than a million people get ill because of the food they eat.” It’s all that’s stemming the obesity epidemic.

The problem’s predominantly down to hygiene. “You can't have a rabbit where you’re preparing food,” health inspector Mandy Cartwright told the owner of one Chinese takeaway. And certainly not sitting on your shoulder.

Mandy is known in the trade as “clean up or close down Cartwright”. When she’s finished with food inspecting she’s moving on to post-watershed Channel 4.

Her job is to prevent issues affecting restaurants. “Some of the symptoms are horrifying,” reported Hollins, “amnesia, paralysis, diarrohea.”And that’s just from sitting next to someone you don’t like very much.

Sadly there are those in the trade who will always take risks. “Food business is big business,” said Hollins, “and can attract people who cut corners.” On the plus-side, if the dead rat’s under the sink then at least it’s not in your meal.

“Dinner can be dangerous,” he added. “Ten germs can multiply to a thousand in just six hours.” And all at no extra charge.

Hollins is a strange choice for a programme like this. He used to present the sports news on BBC Breakfast and then won Strictly. How that makes him perfect for The Food Inspectors I’m not sure. It’s like asking Louis Smith to present How Clean Is Your House?.

Nevertheless, he ploughed on, visiting Linda, a woman who enjoyed her animals. “She’s got a horse, a pony, and a cat,” we heard, “and she treats them like family.” I’m hoping they don’t share a hot-tub.

“Mucking out,” Hollins enquired, “do you enjoy that?” “Oh yes,” enthused Linda. Give her a call if there’s some manure needs shifting.

While the stables were spotless, the same couldn’t be said for Linda’s kitchen. “You can see there’s a complete jungle of different flies,” noted an inspector. “Dead daddy-longlegs, fruit flies, shield bugs.” The good news is that a fruit fly counts as one of your five a day.

No wonder then that Linda’s daughter Faye had refused to let her little girl eat there. “If I go,” she revealed, “I’ll take a packed lunch because her kitchen’s not clean.” It’s a ploy worth thinking about if you hate cooking for visitors.

Linda was made to see the light, and Faye now happily eats at her mum’s house. That she wears a boiler suit and a gas mask is just a coincidence.

But it’s worth remembering the programme’s central message - “where there’s pets there's poo”. Don’t keep your stick insect in the bread bin.