I’ve never thought that September has many redeeming features as a month.

Autumnal weather, the re-emergence of the Christmas tat in shops and the return to school or Uni with associated routine and drudgery.

Thankfully, Julian Fellows has changed all that for me. Happy days, the Sunday night stomach churn has been usurped by a warm glow from 9pm at least. Downton Abbey with all it’s cliché and period drama is back.

I have always been quite clear that I would definitely be part of the downstairs gang.

Probably somewhere between the shortsighted cook, Mrs Pattmore and dopey Daisy the kitchen maid.

I love Downton’s innocent story lines, the stiff formality and the ironic scripts that never fail to highlight quite how pathetic the life of a country house lady must have been.

Sitting around all day seemingly doing nothing at all, other than waiting for the next three-course extravaganza that they have played no part in creating.

Actually, now I come to think of it, I reckon I have a few friends who may be attempting to continue that tradition. Formal drawing rooms have just been replaced by sweaty gyms and spin classes and Marks and Spencer have taken over the mantle of the army of kitchen staff. Apologies friends, you know who you are and you all have tight abs to be proud of.

I would definitely be down below in the servant’s quarters, raking out fire grates and peeling potatoes until my fingers bled. More fool me.

Society has changed immeasurably since the 1920s; the female workforce is almost as large as the male equivalent and it's pretty safe to say without us women slogging as hard, we’d all be in a much worse place right now, and that doesn’t bear too much thinking about.

Despite this, women have yet to quite come to the realisation that they can’t have it all. Ladies, it’s just not possible. Over the past few years we have had a smattering of highly educated girls, many from a very well respected North Oxford girl’s school, visiting the practice for work experience. I can often recognise myself in them a little bit.

Eager to engage, desperate to say the right thing and quite sure that they will set the world alight. It can be hard having someone watching you all day.

Dentistry isn’t exactly an interesting spectator sport, they do well to last a week. I can often sense their slight derision when I explain just how great it is to have a job that allows you to leave at a sensible time to get home for children. I would have been the same at 16. I too was aspiring to a life of world lecture tours and Nobel peace prizes all gracefully collected in chic pencil skirts and shoulder pads.

Well, fashions change as quickly as attitudes.

Three days a week as a family dentist in Botley delivered in an outfit that bears no resemblance to a catwalk creation of any kind, but I love it.

I’m still holding out for the Nobel prize though.

Thankyou Downton for brightening my Sundays with your simple pleasures. Upstairs or downstairs? Right now I reckon I’m somewhere in the middle.

There’s more to life that knowing which knife to eat with or how to dismount a horse without showing your knickers.

Thank goodness for the 21st century woman and hail to the females. Lady Mary Crawley, deep down you are one of us too. Roll on next Sunday.