My Fantasy Girlfriend - Dr Charlotte Uhlenbroek

It has been objected (by certain of my 'friends') that my 'fantasy girlfriends' so far have been mostly fictional characters (or, in the case of Queen Gorgo, arguably real..... but dead for nearly 2,500 years).

This month, then, I nominate an actual flesh-and-blood, living contemporary - the dazzlingly gorgeous Dr Charlotte Uhlenbroek. Dauntingly smart, heart-meltingly pretty, completely unpretentious...... and adept at roughing it in the bush. Tomboyishly tough yet still super-sexy - a sort of real-life Lara Croft. She might not be much recognised outside of the UK, but over the past decade she has become one of the BBC's hottest natural history presenters - although her primates specialism (she began her career working with Jane Goodall) somewhat limits her opportunities, and I get the impression that she really is more concerned with continuing to pursue her academic interests than with courting celebrity; so, she hasn't done very much on TV in the last few years; and there are surprisingly few pictures of her on the Internet - this is the best one I could find.

It tortures me to think that she was at University in Bristol when I was in my first job just down the road in Taunton and visiting Bristol pretty regularly..... I might have met her then if Fate had been kinder......