To find Claudia Winkelman the most irritating woman on TV?

We enjoy Only Connect apart from Victoria Coren, who gets swiftly muted and fast-forwarded when she talks and gets in the way of the competition. We find her contributions annoying and irrelevant. I quite liked Alan Coren, but thought he was irritating at times, as well...

I really like Victoria Coren because I enjoy Only Connect so much. Oh the elation in our house if we manage to make a connection before the teams!!On the other hand I'm frequently yelling at the contestants on Eggheads. When they have gone through four rounds with nobody able to answer questions on any of the subjects you have to wonder why they thought entering was a good idea? And why are they always so appalled if they have to answer questions on Arts & Books?

I don't care in the least what they look like as long as they are clean and decent - actually, no, I really don't care. What I object to is the puffing up into 'experts' of presenters who can read the auto cue. Most of the time. And the ones who are everlasting on talk shows giving their ill- informed opinions on everything under the sun.

Now I read it again, I think it means DM met Robert Webb at Cambridge. Silly me.

Mail on Sunday goes overboard and gets in a tangle about when they met - first of all says at Cambridge and then says 2007 - some poor editing there!

I was in a sort of romantic fantasy land there, absent !

Yes, that's the one. I wonder what conversation is like in their household - probably disappointingly mundane! What a fortunate evening it was when I discovered Only Connect!

crimson The days of handing in articles are long gone.

Is that David Mitchell who writes for the Observer [as does Victoria Coren]? Perhaps they met whilst handing in their articles? How sweet. I think she's the latest 'thinking mans crumpet'; she is certainly incredibly clever. Mind you, she doesn't fall into the category of 'women presenters that I make a point of watching when they're on the telly'. They are Sue Perkins, Lauren Laverne and Lucy Worsley. A mixed bunch, that lot.

Sometimes we don't like people and just don't know why - perhaps they touch some unhappy memory of our own earlier years.

I like Fiona Bruce. She really does seem to take an intelligent interest in the subjects she presents. I also like Sophie Raworth and Kate Silverton. When I read adverse criticisms of younger women in the media, I often have the thought: what if their mums are members of G'net and read these posts? They must surely be really proud of their daughters. I would be.

Sook - I honestly cannot see anything in the least nauseating about Fiona Bruce. She has a tendency to speak with Estuary glottal stops, but that is merely irritating.

Learnergran - I saw The One Show once - it made me so glad I have SKY, as I can always find something to watch that isn't The One Show...

My reaction to Victoria Coren veers from irritation to finding her quite endearing! She's not a patch on her late father, of course. He was in a class of his own. She has married David Mitchell (one half of Mitchell and Webb) who is a genuinely funny comedian and an interesting columnist - not to be confused with his namesake, author of Cloud Atlas and other novels.

I like Victoria Coren! I think she's funny...

I don't know who Claudia Winkelman is, but I see she was a bridesmaid yesterday to my candidate for the most irritating woman on TV, Victoria Coren (who has married someone else I have never heard of).

ella46 Miss Piggy lives up the road from you?

oh yes deeda - I am with you there 100%. Hard to be charitable when watching TV or in real life. A kind of reverse-sexism? Instead of feeling critical of women who do not conform to conventional ideas of femininity - we feel critical of women who seem to over-conform.

She lives up the road from me!

You too can have a fan poster.
Pigga Lisa

Nanadog It wasn't Mozart? Was it Chopin, then? The Mona Lisa is a fine looking chap and doesn't really look as if he is moaning at all.

That's exactly it ana. I was trying to answer greatnan's question honestly. And then saying that I too can judge perhaps unjustly, as these dim quizzes have me shouting 'why have you entered a quiz show when you think that Mozart painted the Mona Lisa!'

But it isn't really judging them, is it Nanadog? We find their TV persona irritating, that's all. Perhaps if we met them in real life we'd feel differently about them, maybe not, but I think we all realise that what we see on TV is not the whole person.

I do find some women extremely irritating greatnan but not some of the ones which seem to have irritated other posters.
I think that as I don't really know these people personally then I'm not really in a position to judge them simply from their TV persona.

But I don't suffer fools well, though I'm trying to be less of a intellectual snob. Still I find myself getting annoyed at contestants on quiz programmes who haven't a clue and end up shouting abuse at the TV.

The thing that really irritates me is the whole "I'm just a silly little woman so I'll giggle a lot and perhaps you'll all like me" attitude. For heaven's sake it's the twenty first century!!!Why don't people want to appear reasonably intelligent? And it isn't only the women either - most of the current so-called comedians hardly seem to have a brain cell between them.

I wouldn't find anyone irritating for any of your reasons, Jess - not what I term irritating, anyway. It tends to be mannerisms, a particular affectation or vocal pattern that make my hackles rise - and it's just as likely to be a man as a woman. I can't watch Paddy in Emmerdale without absolutely bristling with irritation!