New Year's resolution and my first whinge!

I resolve to blog more often and put my annoyance and irritations into writing rather than sulking and letting them fester. Then perhaps I can see more of the positive side of life than I saw in 2009.

You might think (especially if you are a bloke and more specifically if you are James Martin) that my first post of 2010 is just over-reacting to what was meant to be humorous. Well maybe and maybe not, read on anyway.

Celebrity chef James Martin was interviewed for the January edition of Waitrose supermarket's house magazine. I really like James. His TV presenting style, the kind of food he likes to cook and the fact that he loves fast driving and expensive cars. He's a hunky guy and has a lot of female followers.

According to the article, there is a particular group of his fans who he calls 'The Martinis' who turn up regularly at his events and have done for several years. These ladies are not immune to the ravages of time and their looks may well have declined since they first became his fans, but it is really not gentlemanly or very kind to comment on it.

The article also mentions that James had to pulp the first edition of his autobiography 'Driven' after he was sued by his stepmother so I thought he might have been a little more careful about what he said and his public image.

More generally speaking, it is very irritating when celebrities are dismissive of their fans in various ways. We put them where they are and they should show appreciation by at least not being rude.  Sometimes their demands for privacy are downright unreasonable - not James, but how many stories a year break about some rock, TV or movie star or even footballers, in a scrap with a persistent photographer. Maybe they have now got enough money to go and hide for the rest of their lives and never make another public appearance, but they will get old - oh yes, and maybe they won't have been in the public eye long enough for us to remember them in another 20 years.

They will lose their looks - even the men - very few people are beautiful to the end of a long life without the need for a cosmetic surgeon's life and a lot of makeup.

Enough said. If James ever gets to read this, I think he is a nice enough person really to have at least a moment's regret for upsetting even one loyal fan, even for one moment. Am I one of the maligned Martinis? No. But I would crawl over broken glass to be on Saturday Kitchen with Mr Martin.

(James' book 'James Every Day' features in my Squidoo lens about the current crop of cookbooks)