Desperate Housewives mania

Bing! The popcorn is ready. Click! The lights are extinguished. Buzz! The telly is turned on. Squish! The leather sofa heaves under the mesh of bodies. Desperate Housewives is on in five minutes.

Invitations to parties are met with, “Ya mad? Desperate Housewives is on tonight sure!” Even during College Week it will be watched before the parties. Perhaps in ten years pubs and clubs will no longer even open on Tuesdays and when some NUIG scholars research it for their Masters in human behaviour or nightclubs or some other highly interesting subject, they will discover the lack of business was due to it being Desperate Housewives night.
The buzzing of the TV extends to the gathered friends: “Who d’ya think strangled Julie?” “I say it was that new guy.” “What about Catherine? She’s going mad.” Then the Bailey’s ad announces the beginning and, we’ve all seen it happen, silence spreads over the room like butter on a warm roll. The couch seems to open up and everyone relaxes into its many folds. The X Factor is over and it is now Desperate Housewives chance to fill our tongues with the moisture and taste of their worlds.
Mary Alice’s familiar voice fills the room like hot chocolate in a mug. She whispers secret gossip of suburban life into the audience’s ear. “Previously on Desperate Housewives Lynette discovered she was pregnant...”. The mesmerized viewers gaze at the telly from the couch and soak up this knowledge. A leprechaun may have joined them, a tiger may have walked to the fridge and no-one would notice.
Many deem Desperate Housewives a girl’s show. This is untrue, and all the girls know it too, so ye can stop pretending lads! Many men watch it: those forced by girlfriends or house-mates (but before long they become just as addicted) and those who find the woman attractive (unaware apparently that they are all in their late-thirties or forties).
When it comes to the end of an episode us girls have cried our way through a box of tissues, bitten our finger-nails away, eaten our body-weight in popcorn and chocolate, or laughed ourselves onto the floor. Disappointment lines our stomachs like milk before a session as we realise we have to get through another whole week of problems before we can re-visit the street.
When conversation dies down and people begin to flitter off to their beds, downstairs the TV remains on stand-by and popcorn litters the couch, with no Bree to clean it up. It can wait there forgotten until morning when Wisteria Lane is but a distant fragment of the night’s dream which fades with the darkness. Then our lives can take precedence again.

By Shauna Cunniffe