ROMANCE is dead. It's official, just ask Mr Darcy. Actor Colin Firth was regarded by many of the female population to be the very epitome of the dashing romantic, when he pulled on his breeches for his 1995 role in Pride and Prejudice.

The Long Suffering Marjorie, for one, had his picture on her bedroom wall, next to a fading picture of Take That and a huge poster of a monkey on the toilet. Girls are hard to fathom.

But now Colin Firth has broken the myth by tolling the death knell of romance.

He has dashed his dashing image with the cutting remarks: "Romantic cliches don't appeal to me," and "Romance can be a bit facile."

You can almost hear the posters being ripped from the walls as his once-adoring fans rebel against such "nonsense". Telling girls romance is dead, is like telling kiddies, there is no such thing as Father Christmas -- you may know the truth, but you go along with it.

Of course it all depends on how you class romance, and boys and girls definitely differ in their opinion.

Valentine's Day to me is an exploitation of the weak and foolish. Why should we buy our loved ones gaudy teddy-bears with amorous messages, and sickly cards on that certain day? It is nothing more than an exercise to line shopkeeper's pockets. Yet girls love it.

In the early days of our six-year-relationship, I made that point quite strongly to the Long Suffering Marjorie.

No point in her thinking I'm a hypocrite, I reasoned, and so on the first Valentine's Day we were together, I abstained from buying anything.

My plan (before you start booing) was to buy her a nice bottle of wine the day after Valentine's Day.

A sort of "no one tells me when to buy love gifts for my girl" kind of thing.

Unfortunately I didn't see her the next day. Or the day after that. In fact the LSM went out of her way to avoid me for some two weeks.

Despite my reasoned argument against Valentine's Day (along with Mother's Day, Father's Day, Next Door Neighbour Who You've Only Said Hello to Once Day), the LSM went spare.

Ever since then I have had to swallow my pride and buy the card with the doe-eyed puppy on the front and the mushy poem inside.

I refuse, however, to buy the teddy-bear dressed as a devil and stick to a box of chocolates.

Romantic gestures in general are usually confined to the rich and invariably stupid. Think of Posh and Becks, whose "fairytale wedding" was verging on the ridiculous.

If I dared to suggest to LSM of having thrones at our wedding (not that I'm getting wed - I don't do marriage) she would throw it back in my face. Or I would like to think she would.

I don't want to paint a picture of an Andy Capp-type figure, because I'm not without my romantic side.

Only last weekend I took the LSM out to her favourite Mexican restaurant, bought her the best meal £20 would buy and generally played the nice-guy act.

Listened to her tales of work, laughed at her anecdotes and let her finish off the Chocolate Mountain For Two.

Then I told her I'm off to Chicago for a week on a work's trip. Fingers crossed she'll be speaking to me again soon.