Ges on the Box; Given a choice, I’d have been born male

IF anyone had bothered to ask, I’d have plumped for being a boy at the moment of conception. Firstly, it would have made my dad’s day, what with him being Welsh and intent on a male heir etc, etc.

And secondly, it would have made this life a whole different ball game.

No way would father have agreed to any son of his having to do “women’s work”. The sole bastion of maleness in an otherwise all-female household (despite going for a hat-trick, he never did get his heir) my old man has some pretty rigid ideas on gender jobs.

So I’d have grown up knowing nothing about the finer points of washing up, vacuuming, dusting or changing sheets. And although I’ve done my best, over the years, to forget all I learned at mother’s knee, it doesn’t quite work when you’re female.

Indeed, it’s frowned upon for any woman to boast you could write your name in the dust on her bedroom windowsill. Or that she doesn’t know where Him Indoors keeps the Hoover. But, hey, who cares?

Men have it pretty good, all things considered. Apart from the sheer utter convenience (pardon the pun) of being able to spend a penny standing up, men don’t have to pluck their eyebrows, either. Even Denis Healey didn’t.

Or shave their legs, wear a bra, cope with (as my mother referred to menstruation) their little monthly visitor, don stilettos, bear babies, shop for toilet paper, carry handbags, decide what’s for dinner, clean the loo or breastfeed.

Indeed, the only downside I can see to being born a male is you have to pay for dinner on the first date. And, frankly, that’s no great hardship as you get to decide which restaurant anyway.

You go grey and it’s distinguished. Get a wrinkle and it’s character; go off the rails and it’s a boy thing; sow your wild oats and you’re an old dog.

Nowhere, no matter how much you sleep around, is anyone going to call you a tramp. Or leave you holding the baby. It’s still a man’s world.

Which is why I went out of my way to catch the first of four episodes of ITV’s new comedy drama “Boy Meets Girl” — basically about a couple of strangers who get struck by lightning and end up in each other’s bodies.

Apart from watching Danny, as Veronica, trying to put on a bra (did we have to learn that, ladies, or does it come with mother’s milk?) and walk in stilettos, it wasn’t that funny.

But the subject matter is, so I’m going to stick with it. And anyway, I’ll have no choice but to watch it because Him Indoors fancies Veronica . . . or is it Danny?