SO MOST of us are country folk at heart. In a recent Gallup poll, more than 70 per cent of people questioned said they would rather live in the country than the city.

See - that's what listening to The Archers does for you. And that new Pauline Quirke/Warren Clarke series is only going to make it worse.

My bet is that most of those would-be country dwellers have a rosy view of rural life that owes more to the picture books they had as children than the current realities of no shops, no schools, no work, plummeting prices and a soaring suicide rate among farmers.

Not to mention the mud. And all that driving. Everything in the country - schools, shops, dentist, doctor - is always miles away in opposite directions. Ironically, it's only in the city where it makes sense to walk everywhere.

As a sideline to the survey, Gallup asked people if they'd ever seen a number of creatures in the wild - hedgehog, fox, owl, bat and badger, etc. A large chunk of people didn't even know if they'd seen a skylark or not, which seems a bit sad. Even sadder, come to think of it, is that the last three badgers I've seen have all been squashed at the side of the road.

I have lived in big cities - largely when I was young and single and earning a lot of money (oh, those were the days) - but I'm not too smug. For even though I'm safely stuck in the sticks with more than my share of bats, badgers and the soaring song of the skylark, there are still one or two things that can make me think, with a pang, of city life.

l variety - of stores, wine bars, restaurants, theatres and cinemas

l 24-hour delis, 24-hour anything really

l lunchtime concerts

l buses that come in twos rather than every two hours

l two postal deliveries in a day

l cafes with 50 sorts of coffee

l cafes with 50 sorts of sandwich

l cheap petrol

l takeaway delivery service

l foreign newspapers

l foreign faces

l museums and galleries ( especially free ones)

l the sheer busy-ness of life.

Are they worth sacrificing for fresh air, a muddy lane and the chance to be kept awake by hooting owls?

Probably. But not everyone thinks so - otherwise that 70 per cent would be actually living here, instead of just telling Gallup polls that they'd like to be, wouldn't they?

HOLD the front page of The Lancet! I have discovered a new ailment.

After reading the new Rosamunde Pilcher (600 pages), the new Colleen McCullough (also 600 pages) and the new Maeve Binchy (500 pages), I have had great difficulties in trying to hold massive hardbacks in one hand while turning pages/drinking tea/coffee/wine with the other.

As a result, I'm in agony. After Tennis Elbow and Housemaid's Knee, let me give you the first public mention of Blockbuster Wrist.

MOST cheering snippet of news last week was a survey on how we spend our money. Not the facts themselves, particularly, but that the researchers mention the 'middle-aged' as being aged 55-65.

Good to know that, according to that, some of us are still technically in the first flush of youth.

Still, I wonder how old that researcher was - probably 54.

IN the war of Jeremy Bowen's moustache, let's hope the moustache wins.

Jeremy Bowen is a much respected BBC reporter with a long and distinguished record - and a bushy moustache. The BBC apparently, is dropping hints that the moustache should go. It is a trifle untidy and definitely much too individual. Ideally, they went all their newsreaders to have style makeovers.

Presumably so they'll all look the same. Boring.

They've just had a poll to find the sexiest news reader (that wasn't thunder, that was Lord Reith revolving). ITV's Kirsty Young topped the poll.

Fair enough. But can you really tell the difference between her and Julia Somerville? Or Katie Derham (pictured above) or Kirsty Lang?

They all have, not just similar looks, but similar hair styles, and identical clothes. Unless there's a cupboard out the back full of pastel suits and little tops.

Well yes, we all have our work uniform, but doesn't it make you yearn for a little individuality? Newspaper reporters and radio reporters come in all shapes, sizes, hairdos and outfits. But once they get on television they have to fit in a mould - all looking and sounding and dressed the same.

Before long they won't need real people but will make do with computer generated images, which will be much more perfect than mere human beings.

Just watch out for the one with the moustache.

WORKING mothers have done it again - now apparently, we're to blame for the boys' bad GCSE results, according to the secretary of the Secondary Heads' Association, who claims we should be at home encouraging our boys to do better.

It all makes you wonder where the fathers are in all this, of course. But purely anecdotal evidence from last week shows me that the sons of working mothers did brilliantly, while the worst results were from the lads whose mums are mostly at home.

Not that it will make a blind bit of difference. Working mothers are a useful scapegoat. As well as those results, we've also been held responsible for the rise in crime, too many fat children, too many sick children, clogging roads and the rising price of Christmas presents.

They haven't yet pinned the blame for the hole in the ozone layer on us. But, believe me, it's probably only a matter of time.

PLANS for impromptu spelling tests in secondary schools have been dismissed by a teaching union.

Relax. It's only the PUPILS who are going to be tested