But if there is one thing more tiring and dull than going for a walk yourself then it might be watching Janet Street Porter

But if there is one thing more tiring and dull than going for a walk yourself, then it might be watching Janet Street Porter going for a walk.In the opening episode, she promises to deliver “glimpses of post-election Britain” as she tramps across the countryside Unfortunately, these glimpses never really come about Instead, it’s Janet traipsing though rape Janet in a poncho in the rain Janet discussing routes with other sad anoraks. Janet being joined by Chris Smith somewhere in mid-Wales, slipping in mud, and getting a dirty bottom Chris doesn’t bother to help her up. She owns a second home in Yorkshire, goes up most weekends, and walks and walks I am not a great walker myself. I mean, if God had wanted us to walk, why did he invent cars and roads and McDonald’s drive-ins? I am still having trouble breathing from that staircase.

Janet, even at 51, remains a very happening, slipper-scorning sort of person. Her energy and stamina are known to be quite something.After various incarnations – presenter, producer, BBC executive, managing director of the cable station L!ve TV – she has gone back to presenting with Coast To Coast, a seven-part series which begins on 27 February on BBC2 and essentially follows Janet as she walks across the south coast of England, from Dungeness to Weston-Super-Mare, then through Wales, from Cardiff to Conwy, a trip of more than 500 miles She has always been a keen walker, yes She’s a former president of the Ramblers’ Association. See how complex it is? You’ll just have to imagine it.
Physically, Janet Street-Porter is immensely impressive. It’s not just the height or that spectacularly crowded mouth, it’s also her figure. No waist to speak of, she goes straight up and down, and most of it’s made up of the fabulously long legs which, today, end in these fluffy, slip-on trainer things No, they are not slippers, she explains They are part of Nike’s new “post-exertion footwear” range. Then she has to go to Channel 4 to take part in some discussion programme. Plus, she’s awaiting an important call to do with a new show for ITV “You can’t stay long,” she says “I’ve got work to do.” Her glottals stop all over the shop But I can’t work out how to best write this down No “T” is ever pronounced.

Got becomes “go,” but it isn’t “go”, as in “ready, steady, go” because it’s sounded to rhyme with “got”, only without the “t”. But even if she were 3ft she’d somehow make you feel stupid and small. Inside, the house is all magically upside-down, with the kitchen in the roof, even the garden in the roof in the form of a concrete wedge jutting out. “Gosh Janet,” I say somewhat breathlessly, having climbed the long, external spiral staircase, “this is fantastic Is it Wimpey or Barratt?” She looks at me stonily “Neither It’s architect-designed.” Janet Street-Porter is 6ft tall. Eager, naturally, to claw my way back from that initial faux pas, I tell her that, as everything on telly these days seems to be about vets or interior design, she should think about building a series around, say, neutering toms on that purple table while talking us through the colour-washing of the walls

She laughs I am redeemed, but I suspect only marginally She says she’s got a piece to write for the Sunday Times. There are purple, triangular tables, pink benches, peach, colour-washed walls and, downstairs in the bedroom, an old British Rail parcel trolley magnificently converted into a bed.

But it’ll be a long time before our life expectancies approach our potential lifespans.- Charles Arthur,Science Editor. JANET STREET-PORTER lives in this amazing house in the London district of Clerkenwell It’s stunning Steel spiral staircases Diagonal windows Doors of fat, dark wood with thick bits of rope for handles. But this stretches their limited resources (such as food, clothing and often health care), which increases the risk that a child will be unhealthy.In countries which charge for health care, it also increases the chance that they won’t get proper treatment. For instance, in the US, the life expectancy for someone born in the 1990s is 74.4 years.But US citizens now aged 65 can expect to live another 17 years – to 82 And of course there are plenty of centenarians around.

Contraceptive availability usually breaks this loop because it means that having a child becomes a matter of choice, not chance.Once infant mortality rates drop, life expectancy shoots up In most Western countries, it is now well over 70. Paradoxically, this often leads to a vicious circle: because children die young, families try to have many children, hoping that one or two will survive to adulthood. How have they survived? Because the “life expectancy” considers the age at death of everyone in the country – and if you average the the death of an infant before its first birthday and that of a 70-year-old, you get a life expectancy of just 35 years. It’s slightly more than 120 years (the oldest confirmed person in modern times, Jeanne Calmant, died last year, aged 122).So what does life expectancy actually mean? It’s how long, on average, a child born alive in that year can expect to live. Lack of medical care and malnutrition often conspire to cause many young deaths in developing countries.