carol to win BB

Grace Dents Latest.

So Lesley, one of my top housemates of all time, has left BB8.

After several days of Lesley being “more bored than is acceptable!”, Seany and Gerry arrived on Friday. That was the final straw. Or more accurately, Seany was.

Lesley’s mood was grim enough already. She’d spent the last week twittering away in the kitchen like Bagpuss’s Professor Yaffle, imparting life wisdom to people who didn’t care. Or simply standing in the middle of the house chaos watching the screaming and shouting, her eyes flashing furiously behind her specs, resembling an angry Where’s Wally?

And then Seany arrives, who on first examination looks like a hobbit who has covered himself in treacle and scampered through Timmy Mallet’s wardrobe. Seany’s a real party person! He loves a good laugh. Well, he claims to, anyhow. I don’t think Seany’s sunny personality was the reason why he was chosen for the show. I think the BB’s researchers possibly got the same gut instinct about Seany that I did within five minutes of meeting him. That he is a horrid, troublemaking little runt.

Seany’s annoyance at having to share his first-night limelight with other new arrival Gerry was quite clear. By the time the pair had entered the diary room for their first briefing, Seany’s “party central” mask had slipped and his face seemed piggy and irate. “Shall I read the message out?!” said Gerry, clutching the envelope excitedly. “I CAN read,” hissed Seany. Whoa! Hang on, Seany, you’ve only been there five minutes. Can’t the bonhomie last that long?

To be honest, by that point, other alarm bells had already gone off for me about Seany. According to his VT, Seany’s a gay man who “hates camp men”. This is odd as he showed up wearing more YSL Touche Eclat than RuPaul the morning after Mardi Gras. In fact, from a distance, Seany looks like a less butch version of 80s scouse songstress Sonia. If he doesn’t like camp men, then he’s clearly a bit self-loathing.

Before Big Brother (and I have seen the pictorial proof), one of Seany’s last big projects was uprooting to Los Angeles during the Michael Jackson trial to spend weeks lurking outside the court building, sweating in a red leather Thriller suit, grabbing his crotch and shouting “Shamon!” every time the King of Pop showed his melty face.

Seany then converted to Islam, but forgot all about that, then decided he was gay, but a gay person who doesn’t like camp men, then he began working as a mentor for underprivileged children who need guidance to help them fit into society.

The mind boggles, doesn’t it? Seany’s idea of ingratiating himself with a bunch of strangers on the first night in a new environment is to whip the duvet off a 60-year-old woman at 4am when she’s been sound asleep for hours, then run off gurgling at the hilarity of his “prank”. When he’s finally kicked out of the BB house for being a knob he’ll go back to his job teaching kids how to behave and do the right thing. Amazing.

Lesley left the house with a lot of dignity. I loved the way she told Seany and Charley exactly what she thought of them. I’ve found Charley’s behaviour over the last few days since Emilygate rather annoying. Her mood has gone from “genuine shock” that Emily said the “N” word, to “genuine incredulity” then “righteous anger” to “milking it for all it was worth to get attention”. By Friday night, Charley was egging Seany on to frighten Lesley in the middle of the night, then she stood smirking at Lesley’s distress, wearing the sort of ghoulish grin at misfortune you’d see on a happy-slapping video.

I can’t decide where Shabnam fits into all of this. She’s on another planet. Shabnam was there during Duvetgate, but I find it hard to hold her personally responsible for anything she says or does as she’s too bizarre and otherworldly. “I’m not allowed to wear make-up! They’ve taken my make-up bag away!” Shabnam shrieked, clutching Gerry and Seany by the ears on Friday night as they walked through the door. It was the first thing Shabnam said as they walked in, which displays awesome levels of both insecurity and self-absorption.

With Lesley gone, I’d say that Seany’s next target will be Ziggy. Ziggy is everything Seany isn’t. He’s taller, slimmer, richer, more self-assured, better looking with better manners. “He’s too good to be true,” bitched Seany, referring to Ziggy.

I must admit, Ziggy has grown on me a lot. He’s one of my favourites in the house right now. Whatever one might think about Ziggy and Chanelle’s relationship (me, not a lot), I think that Ziggy’s an overall good person. His mother did a fine job of bringing him up. Ziggy’s astute, funny and thoughtful towards women. He knows how to give a compliment. He can charm even a lady of a certain age. He knows when to listen and when to shut up. He loves his mother. He bathes regularly and he dresses well.

Ziggy’s not exactly my cup of tea, but, holy cow, you wouldn’t be ashamed to show up somewhere with him on your arm – weddings, christenings and funerals. He shows up in a suit, looks amazing, dances with the grans, makes small talk with your uncle, flashes his toothy grin, then leaves to a chorus of “What a great guy!”

No wonder Seany’s jealous. I bet the only time Seany ever gets invited anywhere twice is to go back the second time and apologise.

I don’t feel a lot of hope long-term for Ziggy and Chanelle as I don’t think the relationship is built out of much more than boredom and incarceration. Chanelle is a pretty little thing. But I don’t think she’s really his type. Ziggy loves women. If he’d been in there a lot longer with fewer options he’d probably have been sleeping curled up around Carole. Ziggy’s type of woman appears to be sporty, rich, classy and feisty. He’s fallen for Chanelle right now, but I think it would be a different story if they slung in Lady Isabella Hervey and they could chat together about how jolly winter is in Gstaad.

New boy Gerry hasn’t made much of an impression on me yet. All I know is he looks like a thin version of Joey Fatone from NSync (or Joey Thinone, if you will), and when he talks, if you shut your eyes he sounds like a Creature Comforts cheetah discussing how much he likes his cage. His VT included footage of him talking about how he’s gay but wants to be “open-minded” and “fancies a change”, which would have been less eerie if they’d not cut it with footage of Gerry walking alone around a fairground, dressed like Michael Hutchence circa 1992.

The one thing Gerry and Seany are united over is their love of Sam and Amanda. Or Samanda as they will be called from now on, as I seriously can’t tell them apart. And I’ve tried really, really hard. I’ve tried working out which has the thin or squashed face (as Emily helpfully suggested). Or telling which of them is the cleverest or funniest. (Answer: neither.) Their twinny song doesn’t help as I can’t make out a word they say and am too busy biting the side of the sofa in embarrassment all the way through.

I get mails every single day from men telling me not to be so hard on the twins. “They’re adorable! How can you be so horrible! All they do is be happy and cute! Leave them alone!” men always write.

It’s always men. Never, ever women. Men love girls like Samanda. Men in their 50s tend to leave their wives for girls like Samanda, then begin turning up at family barbecues in a red sports car, wearing cowboy boots and Bono-style wraparound yellow shades with Samanda on their arm bragging, “Everyone! This is Samanda! Isn’t she adorable!? Go on, Samanda, do the song! Oh, Samanda makes me so happy! She’s not like my old wife at all, she never gives me loads of earache about council tax and endowment mortgages and her worries about the rise of neo-Conservatism and the environment. You know why? She has no idea what any of them are!”