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to Channel 3. Damn. The end credits were rolling . She’d missed it!
     
    “Why didn’t you call me earlier?”
     
    Her tone reeked with irritation.
     
    “Well, I imagined you must have known about it. And why on earth you didn’t think to tell me is anybody’s guess. I’m always the last person to know about everything. Your sister’s just the same.”
     
    Her sister Jacqui had been living in Hong Kong for the last five years, so it was no surprise her mother knew little going on in her life.
     
    “It was a last minute thing which only happened yesterday. It was a screen test. There was a clue in the title. Why are they even broadcasting it?”
     
    “Oh, well,” said her mother, “I can answer that, actually. It wasn’t just you who they showed doing a nutrition slot, there were two other women and one rather dashing man. It’s the viewers who get to decide who they want to be the new TV Nutritionist. Apparently they can vote on You Tube.”
     
    “Mum,” said Claire, running downstairs to turn on her computer. “I’ll speak to you later. I’ve got to go.”
                                          -----------------
     
    Fifteen minutes later, Claire clicked ‘Play’ for the tenth time on the video of her which was posted on You Tube. It was painful to watch. No, it was tortuous. The actual segment they’d filmed had lasted about eight minutes, but what they’d put online was a quick-cut, edited version of all her worst bits. ‘Out-takes’ she thought they called it in the business. Tomatoes tumbling and splattering to the floor when she’d tried to remove some from the bowl.  The milk she’d heated for the gooseberry fool over-boiling. The food processor exploding when she’d tried to puree the cooked gooseberries. She hadn’t realised how many times she’d said oops but she must have said it at least a hundred and, each time that she had, she’d done some idiotic jazz-hand gesticulation to accompany it. It had been a car crash, just like she’d known, but oh, the public humiliation! It hadn’t been for hundreds to see. So much for gooseberry fool! The only thing looking foolish was her .
     
    She picked up the phone and called Georgia.
     
    “Oh my God, did you know about this?”
     
    Claire hadn’t realised that she was capable of screeching louder than even her mother but it suddenly appeared she’d inherited that gene.
     
    “About what?” Georgia asked.
     
    “Are you at a computer?”
     
    “Yes. Why?”
     
    “Go to You Tube and type in my name together with Morning Cuppa .”
     
    The phone went quiet on the other end as Georgia did what she was told, and then Claire could hear the video playing over the phone line.
     
    “Hideous, isn’t it?” Claire screeched when she could hear it had finished.
     
    It went quiet on the other end again.
     
    “Are you still there George?”
     
    “Yes,” her friend replied. “But hang on a sec, just let me check something out.”
     
    Georgia went quiet again. And then, after a couple of minutes, she gasped loudly.
     
    “This is great,” said Georgia, her voice full of excitement.
     
    “Great?”
     
    Claire had always considered her friend to be intelligent but now she was seriously having doubts. How her looking a fool making gooseberry fool was ‘great’ she had no idea.
     
    “What on earth are you talking about?” Claire said.
     
    “Well,” replied Georgia, “I’ve just seen it’s a competition and you’ve had one and a half million votes so far. The next best contender only has five hundred votes. You’re way ahead. In fact, I’d say that you’re pretty much going viral .”
     
    “Going viral ? I don’t want to go viral. I want that video taken off You Tube. I look like an idiot.”
     
    “The public clearly loves you.”
     
    Claire was getting frustrated.
     
    “No they don’t. I’m getting the pity vote. They feel sorry for me. Get them to take it off.