'It's the end of an era,' bemoaned a Geordie today as Carol Vorderman made her final appearance on words and numbers TV gameshow, Countdown. 'She's been treated so shabbily by C4, I'm sorry, It's so emotional.'
In scenes reminiscent of the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem, Brit daytime TV viewers reached for the Kleenex in record numbers as Vorderman made her tearful farewell.
'It's just not fair,' said Gordon Leech, a 21 year old student at Leeds University. 'They 'offered' our Carol a ninety percent pay cut and gave her forty eight hours to respond. How would anybody respond to an ultimatum like that? I tell you, I'm in bits.'
'I fear that this may be the end of the gorgeous Carol's career,' said pensioner Alice Bogbrush of Brighton. 'I mean, with the credit crunch and all that, she's hardly likely to make a living advertising extortionate bank loans and stuff. It truly is the end of an era.'
'I grew up watching Carol Vorderman,' said student Davey Jones of the University Of Manchester Institute Of Science And Technology. 'It's going to be really difficult getting through a day without her bubbly personality pulling us all through.'
'It's back to the drawing board for Countdown I'm afraid,' said a spokesman for PA Guru Max Clifford. 'They've got some serious reinvention to contemplate, and we think it's doomed to failure, however they go about it.'
Richard Whiteley is said to be turning in his grave so fast that he's melting the snow above him.
More as we get it.
