The alarm bells in my head started clanging the moment I heard about Celebrity Blind Man's Buff: not just because of the specially-made glasses, but because the very word "celebrity" has, for me anyway, become synonymous with those dreadful cooking and DIY programmes that dominate the TV schedules. The final nail in the corny coffin was the news that the three celebs/personalities were aiming to get to The London Eye. I definitely feared the worst and can honestly say that it only took a few minutes of watching the programme before I started feeling thoroughly let down. Incredulity, anger and patronised are three of the emotions I had anticipated experiencing from the outset. I was certainly incredulous: but that was because I was amused and actually found the whole thing quite entertaining! There was one hilarious moment when Gail Porter smashed into a post while being guided by someone who promptly cracked up.

Apart from Gail, who, like Liz Hurley is famous because of who she is rather than for achieving anything noteworthy, the other Blind Man's Buffies were Linda Robson, star of the dated sitcom Birds of a Feather and Sean Hughes whose sharp wit and comic talent elevate him miles above the plain inhabited by shallow celebrities. He and the other two Blind Man's Buffies had cameras following them as they trekked individually (travelling by at least five modes of transport each) from Blackpool, via a series of cafes, clothes shops and hotels, to London. The erstwhile blindies were filmed in situations where their sight deprivation posed problems for them: queuing up for tickets, locating buses and cabs, negotiating a hotel room and eating. I half-expected some cringing moments en route when they nipped to the shops to buy some clothes - how hard it must be to pick clothes when you can't see and how brilliant blind people are for managing to do it - but mercifully I can't recall anything condescending like that at all. I did flinch at one point when Gail began feeling a blind guy's face to see what he looked like. Yuck!

In my experience blind people fall into two distinct camps. There are the diffident ones who walk around at a snail's pace with their canes tapping frantically who get easily flustered in unfamiliar surroundings, and the laid-back ones who rarely get phased by anything and take life in their stride. Ok I could be accused of being crass for that and maybe I'm guilty of making a sweeping generalisation, but I don't care. Anyway, my observation was reflected in the way Sean Hughes as opposed to the other two went about things. Asked how he felt after donning the glasses, Sean replied that he was hungry. From the moment he belatedly left Blackpool Sean came across as calm and in control. Despite taking time out for several café visits and missing the last bus on one leg of his journey, he had enough time to visit the spa in Buxton and fondle the concrete cows in Milton Keynes. In Contrast Linda and Gail confided that they felt "vulnerable" and "rattled" and were tentative and unsure of themselves all the way to London. Queuing for tickets, shuffling along station platforms and attempting to cross roads both Linda and Gail could be heard pleading loudly:

"Hullo?... Hullo?... Is anybody there?... Hullo?"

Hearing that I felt like I was back at school! Then on a train somewhere along the line Gail Porter suddenly piped up:

"... Hullo? … Is there anybody in this carriage?"

I know several fellow blindies who would probably strangle Gail Porter for showing them in such an embarrassing and stereotypical light: in the context of the programme though, I don't think it was any more damaging to the image of a blind person than Sean Hughes knocking back countless cups of tea. I was more discouraged by a guide dog owner in London who told Linda Robson that it would have taken a lot of persuading to tempt her to do the Blackpool to London trip.