LOVE is in the air... Actually no. It's really lust that's all around at the moment, and indiscriminate lust at that. True, there are plenty of hearts and flowers on display - but they're fighting a losing battle against the forces of tat. Instead, shop windows are full of chocolate boobs, jelly willies, briefs and boxers with suggestive messages, and cards that are just downright unpleasant.

Whatever happened to romance?

Well, it might just have been reborn and saved for the nation in the hearts, minds - and loins - of the middle-aged.

Valentine's Day is wasted on the young. They've turned it into one big joke, sometimes funny, but too often sleazy. Maybe they're just embarrassed by the whole thing and have just, quite literally, got their knickers in a twist.

So let's leave them giggling childishly at their silly toys and concentrate on the important things in life.

Because the good news is that love is for grown-ups too. Not just those of us who got lucky many years ago and have stayed lucky ever since. But second, or even third time, arounders are having another chance at love and making the most of it.

Life may or may not begin at 40 - but love often can. Not to mention the flirty fifties and maybe even the sexy sixties.

Middle-aged men have always traded in their old wives for new models. But now some of those discarded wives are getting nice new lives too, thank you. Or even doing the discarding... In the last week alone I have heard of three women - one in her late forties, two in their fifties - embarking on exciting new relationships. The new swagger in their hips and that wicked gleam in their eyes proves that love, and a good healthy dollop of lust, is not just for the young.

Even Hollywood agrees. At 58 years old Diane Keaton plays the romantic lead in Something's Gotta Give. True, she's playing opposite Jack Nicholson who recently told us more than we need to know about his need for Viagra. But we won't let that spoil the story.

So while the young waste their money on rubbish, us grown-ups will just smile - smugly and knowingly.

And I'll tell you the most romantic story I ever heard. A few years ago an 80-year-old widow told me she was emigrating to Australia. I was suitably impressed at her courage and sparkiness. But then she told me why she was going to start a new life on the other side of the world - because she was getting married again.

It really is never too late. Now there's a cheering note for Valentine's Day.

NOW A level results are proving to be increasingly meaningless, universities say they want to use interviews and tailor made tests to select candidates. Back in the 60s when I was applying for university, everyone offered me an interview and made me sit an hour long test. If you wanted to go to Oxbridge, you went back for a third year in the sixth form and prepared for another proper entrance exam.

And I bet that's another old idea that will be resurrected any day now.

AJUDGE in Miami has found a wonderful way to deal with offenders who play their car stereos too loudly - he sentences them to a night at the opera. "They either get to appreciate some culture or it drives them up the wall. It's a win win situation," he says. But what if it's actually opera with which the thoughtless driver has been blasting passers by? The judge doesn't say, but maybe a night of non-stop Cliff Richard would fit the bill nicely.