London - (In M'Lady's Chamber Mess): Waves of nausea sweeping the UK this week have been sourced to a BBC festive potboiler.
NHS sources initially blamed it on Swine Flu - a highly infectious virus created by the Tories when Mrs Thatcher last had her snout in the public trough.
But beleaguered TV licence payers may know better - and say they have been left groaning under the onslaught of 'period drama' platitudes by the nauseating' BBC festive three-parter.
Billed as a sympathetic reworking of the ITV's 1970s classic 'Upstairs, Downstairs' the sequel credits the original, highly successful series to past-it also-ran actresses Eileen Atkins and Jean Marsh.
"That's a whopper on the JK Rowling scale of plagiarism and story theft," one disgusted National Viewers' and Listeners' Association member complained today.
"Marsh and Atkins are two puffed-up non-entities desperate for one last gasp of stardom," a Licence Payers Association lawyer concurred.
"They've just jumped up on the copyright bandwagon - hoping to make a megabux killing just when the Nation is felled to its knees by festive bollox like the Queen's Speech."
Tonight's concluding episode strains at viewer credulity with all the finesse of a boa constrictor blowjob from Opus Dei apologist and BBC chairman Mark Thompson.
A personal oubliette has been reserved for him for the New Year at HMP Belmarsh.
