Kath and Kim

I seem to have written a lot about wildlife. My defence is that it's quite a preoccupation here as there is so much of it and it's so undaunted by human beings. However, I thought a cultural interlude might be welcome so it's time to meet Kath and Kim....




They are the main characters in a long-running television comedy show that will soon be coming to the screens of the BBC. It's inspired in me (if that's the word) the same terrible combination of disbelief and familiarity that the The Office achieved. So it's well worth watching.

It's set in the Melbourne suburbs, the sort of place where you have to move the Pajero to get at the Holden to move the Toyota with the supermarket shopping near the door. I hope you're keeping up. Kath Day spent a long time bringing up daughter Kim as a single mum after her first husband, a swimming pool salesman, went off to Hong Kong to strike a deal and never came back. She's now married to Kel Knight and, always one to keep up with the times and something of a closet feminist, now bears the name Kath Day-Knight, and sees absolutely nothing odd in that.

Kim is a spoilt monster, recently married to Brett, who works in an electrical goods store, and has just given birth to little Ebboney Rae (can't help you there, I'm afraid). One of her recent career moves was to try to become a trophy wife. She has boundless self-confidence. Being pregnant, in her words "really got up my goat."

The final character is Sharon, hapless, love-lorn, massively over-weight and Kim's "second-best friend."

Expect lines like:

Kath: "...and then I met you Kel, and I've been living high with the hog ever since."

Kim: "...it's hard being a horn-bag when you've got a small baby."

Kath, after her new joint exercise regime has left Kel too tired for sex: "...never mind, I'm hardly Mrs Carmen Sutra myself tonight."

And you thought this was a cultural desert.....