ANN Maurice is far closer too Witch Doctor than House Doctor (C5, Thursday) for comfort.

There was an open-mouthed moment this week as she trampled over the memory of Pearl's dead husband Harry by calling his over-enthusiastically decorated home in the village of Kirk Merrington, County Durham, as "footballers' wives gone bad".

The programme-makers also recruited a bunch of morons, posing as potential house buyers, to describe Pearl's palace as "a junk shop", "scary" and "awful".

Poor Pearl was reduced to tears and ended up lashing out £2,700 on a bland, green and beige make-over which one of the blinkered, bleating buyers didn't have the ability to conjure up themselves.

"Don't sell it to any of them, none of them deserve it Pearl, they've got no imagination," said my wife as reality TV sank to a new low.

Basically, if the house was worth buying after a splodge of lime green was added to the walls and the gaudy red carpet was replaced by a neutral colour, then it was still a good buy in the first place. If half the country is running around with a bucket of whitewash to cover up their personal taste so that the other half can't make thoughtless remarks, then the world has gone mad.

You're in danger of coming to a similar conclusion about airports. Airline (ITV, Fridays) regularly features easyJet staff being unhelpful and aggressive.

The rudeness seems to fly faster than the planes and must surely put some people off. Passengers for a plane bound to Greece were told to fend for themselves until the following day's flight after a motorway accident delayed their arrival a few minutes beyond check-in time.

Yet others found themselves kicking their heels in departure lounges long after they should have left. Over on Airport (BBC1, Thursday) completely the opposite approach involved a bag lost by Donatella Versace.

Apparently, if you arrive by Concorde and lose one of 13 bags while transferring to your private jet then half of Heathrow's baggage staff are required as a search party. I suppose it couldn't have anything to do with the celebrity status of a wealthy fashion designer?

"Why does anyone need 13 bags? I bet the missing one has her botox and make-up," quipped my wife. Those of us who battle for elbow room to claim our battered luggage from the carousel scrum have absolutely no appreciation of what it's like to be separated from suitcase No 13.

Anything over five that survives is a flipping miracle. Then again people like Terry Wogan admit they "never turn right" on entering aeroplanes, so perhaps easyJet have the right approach after all.

Most youngsters, when not tempted to hit golf balls at David Blane's alleged fasting place, will have tuned into Jump London (C4, Tuesday) which attempted to get us excited about young Frenchmen leaping around London's rooftops.

The recent BBC advert about a businessman athletically beating the traffic jams has assisted the craze, but Dick Van Dyke's chimney sweeps in the film Mary Poppins were stepping in time above London long ago - and with rockets if I remember correctly.

Without anyone to explain the stunts, this was about as exciting as England's exploits against Liechtenstein.