at the third stroke...

Have you ever noticed the remarkable shift in viewer demographics that the Channel 10 network and its advertisers seem to imagine takes place at midnight? Apparently, when the clock strikes twelve, the relatively normal, healthy, well-adjusted day shift scuttles off to bed with their respective partners and the night-shift bundies on.

So, what sort of creature inhabits the night, according to Channel 10 and its sponsors? Well, to answer that question, you’ll need to look beyond the mere programming and read between the none-too-subtle lines of the various commercials.

If it’s 12:01am and you’re still up watching television, Channel 10 advertisers think you’re almost certainly a single male, most likely a wanker, and not just figuratively speaking either judging by the enormous number of young ladies they have queued up just waiting to chat to you; ladies in underwear/bikinis; writhing around on top of their bedcovers unable to sleep presumably due to the intense mid-April heat?

Why not give them give them a ring, ‘Vaseline Boy’ (‘Call me…call me now…’), since you’re obviously both terrific people, tragically alone and yet, strangely awake at precisely the same time. It’s fate, although even fate has a price; $3-00 per minute…higher from mobile phones.

OK, maybe you’re not a pay-to-play kind of guy but Channel 10’s sponsors still suspect you’re probably a total dork, completely lacking any real-world skills? Well, you’re on the right channel ‘Dweebo’, because whether your pleasure is heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, tri-sexual or even transsexual, they have a matchmaking website tailored to your specific needs. You’ll never need to leave your darkened room to date in person again once you go online with the thousands of other socially awkward people looking for a meaningful relationship, a one-night-stand or a simply a little anonymous cannibalism.

While you’re at it, perhaps you could lose some weight too; not much good meeting your perfect cyber-partner looking like that, is there? Hey it’s your lucky day, ‘Pork Chop’, because they have the ‘Flab-Buster Pro’ to help you shed those unsightly kilograms while you’re sitting there eating doughnuts by the light of the television. Sure it might look like just a large inflatable rubber ball, but check out the army of celebrities already using it to help them tone their fabulously un-single bodies.

And that receding hairline isn’t doing you any favours either, ‘Baldy’. You really should consider a visit to the specialists at ‘I Can’t Believe It’s Not Hair’.

Finally, one of the best-kept late night secrets, ‘Lawnmower Man’; there is a growing legion of self-made billionaires working from home for as little as sixty seconds a week, using the revolutionary new ‘Megabucks Now’ system of wealth creation. This guaranteed path to unimaginable riches is apparently not available to day-shifters, who are condemned forever to their working-class existence.

And you’ll certainly need those billions of dollars shortly, ‘You Stupid Cunt’, especially if you keep spending all night on the chat lines, buying RSVP stamps, ridiculous exercise machines and wonder hair products.

In fact Channel 10 should just come right out with a new viewer classification for that time of the evening; ‘LFBPG35+’ ??

The following programme is suitable for ‘lonely, fat, bald, poor guys over the age of 35’…