TV Dinners: Eastenders

You are legally prevented from buying a washing machine

Eastenderssmall>To be enjoyed with a nice strong mug of tea. Photograph: BBC

1. First put on Radio 1 - Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now is on rotation.

2. Now prepare a luvverly full English breakfast washed down by a nice strong mug of builder's tea (six sugars).

3. Pause when there is a knock at the kitchen door. There stands a long-lost relative you have never mentioned. Shout: "Would you Adam'n'Eve it!" before telling long-lost relative to sling their hook. Shag long-lost relative's partner and enjoy some nice toad in the 'ole.

4. Toss in a mention of Uncle Arthur's bench and the Good Old Days when you could leave your back door open and the Krays kept crime off the street, only reluctantly breaking your kneecaps because they loved their muvvers.

5. Pop out to the launderette. (You are legally prevented from buying a washing machine.) Offer Dot a monkey to buy it and a pony for her trouble. Shake head when she says she'll only take money.

6. Mix in a bent copper, some dodgy motors, and several skinheads who've had more affairs than Warren Beatty even though they look like Jimmy Somerville's dad. Keep irritating children from stage school to a minimum - three or four dozen should do.

7. Wash down some chips from the chippie with a swift livener from the cocktail bar installed in your living room.

8. Whip up a quick screaming match with the nearest family member, then impregnate a neighbour and cook up some hare-brained scheme involving something illegal.

9. Give up cooking and eat every meal in the caff.

· Jim Shelley is the TV critic of the Mirror.