There are many times I feel sorry for myself. All the way through January, any time I have to leave my sofa, and when I ponder whether I am in fact the only person on this green earth not to like Big Brother. But none more so than when I am sick. So Friday saw me on the sofa, under my blankie, bemoaning the TV gods yet again for the lack of telly. It was daytime telly this time, so it was even worse.

It was yet another time in recent months when I found myself in extravagant praise of 4OD. I found Comedy Live Presents, with Russell Brand, which I watched pretty much because it was on the first page of 4OD and I couldn’t be bothered scrolling down any more. But it was very good, it was. I can’t quite explain the origin of the gag that had Russell Brand fantasising about grabbing the Queen’s boob, but rest assured it was very funny indeed. Comedian Michael McIntyre’s diatribe against that strange six day period between Christmas and New Year where you don’t know what’s happening ("Is the TV still good? Do I have to go back to work? IS THERE POST?!!") was very good too, although sorry to say the only Irish comedian on, David O’Doherty, was in fact very poo. (I did like Russell Brand’s pointing out though that as "an Irish gentleman" O’Doherty seemed to have been placed on a little performance area islanded away from the main stage. Heh.)

But Comedy Live Presents was a one-off, according to the moguls at Channel 4, to which I say boo. More please.

I was feeling somewhat better after this comedy therapy, at least enough to ring a friend and demand he come over with Wotsits and fruit juice and sit on the sofa with me to mop my fevered brow. Once again while watching TV with a male friend I found myself fighting for dominance of the remote control, meaning that while I got to watch Eastenders because quite frankly there was going to be an almighty temper tantrum if I didn’t, I then had to watch Derren Brown on Channel 4, because there were horses in it (yes, my friend, like my dad, is a gambler).

I don’t really like Derren Brown, namely because he’s a bit smug and because he spells his name in a stupid way, but he’s not as annoying as, say, David Blaine, so I settled down to watch this without (too much) moaning, although my friend was sent out to the shop to get more Wotsits as penance.

Anyhoo. This new Derren extravaganza was called "The System", where he claimed he could predict the outcome of horse racing and guarantee winners every time. Naturally every gambling type up and down the land was glued to it with notebook and pen, as was everyone on Betfair.com who no doubt thought all their Christmases had come at once.

"Investigating the psychology behind gambling and using his unique combination of skills to create guaranteed success, Derren proves his skills work every time," boasts the Channel 4 blurb. Er, not so.

The programme featured a young woman from London, who had been getting anonymous tips for the races in the form of a "System", and who won her bets five times in a row. After the fifth time, when she was a grand up, she was taken to meet the man behind the system – our own Mr Brown, who was wearing a particularly horrible camel-coloured coat. You know the system works, he told her – are you prepared to risk all the money you can raise on the sixth race?

Four grand was duly begged and borrowed, and put on a horse at Newbury a few days later. Then Derren explained his "system", which wasn’t a system at all but which had seen him take over 7000 people, split them into six groups, and give each group the name of one horse. Five of the groups lost, and the remaining group was again split into six, and again each group given a horse to bet on (come on, keep up). And so on for the five races, when there was only one person left standing.

Personally if I’d been that one person, and had only been told of this scam after putting my four borrowed grand on a horse where there was only a 1/6 chance of winning, I’d have smacked Derren Brown. The horse duly lost, the woman was suitably devastated, and Derren then predictably produced his trump card - he had actually backed the winner for her after all!

This was really stupid TV, and was completely misrepresented by Channel 4. No, I didn’t expect to be able to learn a system for betting on the gee-gees, but unlike most of Derren Brown’s other stuff, there was nothing interesting behind this at all, only a simple numbers game. It was pretty much a scam. I also think that the self-righteous blurb at the end of the show, saying that all the participants had whatever money they’d lost refunded, was a complete cop-out. Nothing at all to address the fact that most of these unwitting guinea pigs had probably never gambled before, and were now very likely going to do it again.

Now I don’t mind irresponsible TV. I don’t even mind sick TV. But bad TV? Pah.