In the meantime, Adrian continues to be scandalised by his irresponsible parents who are conducting a matrimonial square-dance with the Braithwaites - the parents of the beautiful but unobtainable Pandora, who is ruthlessly pursuing her ambition to be New Labour's first woman PM - and to confide in his diary.

His current worries include: indestructible head-lice; his raging jealousy when his accomplished half-brother Brett arrives on his doorstep; moral decline in The Archers; his desperate attachment to two therapists; his mild addiction to Starburst (formerly Opal Fruits); a small earthquake in Leicester; and, perhaps most significantly, the dawn of a new millennium.