Various

• I do like Mark Kermode. He does terrific film reviews on Simon Mayo's show, he loves Mary Poppins, and he has this to say about culture:

'I think everything is culture except football.'

I couldn't have put it better myself.

• Sometime in the next few weeks, I might try and go up to Manchester to see the exhibition of Mills and Boon romance covers. (HT: Smart Bitches.)

• Watching Britain's Got Talent, I was once again struck by the difference between the UK and the US.  These really were amateurs in every sense of the word.  Some of them were excellent amateurs and some were dire. (Playing the theme from Star Wars on a synthesizer badly does not constitute a talent.)  All of them, almost without exception, wanted more than anything the opportunity to perform in front of Prince Charles at the Royal Variety Performance.  I don't say they'd turn down the £100,000 prize, but it wasn't the major motivating factor for most of the acts.  And very few, I think, saw this as their opportunity for instant fame and fortune.  One or two do have the potential to go onto successful careers (the classical quartet, for instance) but the girl with the dancing dog and the overweight male hula-hooper dressed as Wonder Woman know perfectly well this is a once in a lifetime experience, and that's all they really want.  Hardly anyone had been to stage school, most practiced in their back garden or down at the local bus station.  Charming, eccentric, mad, talented and oh-so-very-British.

• I love, love, love Lucinda's wardrobe on the Apprentice.  Mad, crazy woman but fabulously dressed in amongst all the boring black.