There is one sound that heralds a 21st century summer-time more than any other. And no, it’s not the hypnotic sound of buzzing in a bee-loud glade, nor the gentle clack of croquet on a lawn, nor the distant sound of a transient cuckoo — “Shall I call thee ‘Bird’, or but a wandering voice?”

No, it is the following three short sentences, broadcast across our airwaves: “Big Brother House, this is Davina. You are live on Channel Four. Please do not swear!”

Yes, it’s that time of the year again. Davina, the oft’ pregnant presenter who appears to organise her family-planning schedule around Channel Four, is back on our TV screens tonight and for the foreseeable future, in the 10th series of the original and (some say) the best reality show, Big Brother.

And whether we like it or not, it’s now a part of our national culture.

In what has become a tried-and-tested televisual tradition, amidst much hype and hysteria, we will first be shown round the Big Brother house which is modified, redesigned and refurbished each season quite arbitrarily as long as the finished effect is bright, garish, funky, clashing and chaotic.

Like an excited child on Christmas Eve, the 41-year-old is likely to jump on the beds, or sit in the bath, or paddle in the pool, or slip into a sauna, or make herself a nice cuppa whilst being shadowed by a camera crew which beams the live images onto a massive outdoor screen for the rowdy and cacophonous crowd, who are usually — a man-kitted out in bizarre fancy dress and clutching home-made felt-tipped placards.

Next we are given a virtual backstage pass down the criss-crossing network of secret corridors, sneaking a peek through two-way mirrors, zooming in and out of hidden cameras and not-so-hidden ones, then finally panning around the central control room which is fitted wall-to-wall with hundreds of screens, monitors, mikes, buttons and bleepers and almost as chaotic as the house it’s designed to invade.

Then, after one of many lengthy advertising breaks — and a lot more hysterical hype prompted by our rabble-rousing hostess — we are introduced to each character one by one, starting with their audition tape interspersed with a montage of zany interview clips. Last year this began rather ominously with Davina holding up a sign which read ‘UNLEASH THE FREAKS!’

I was tempted to switch off then and there, just to uphold a modicum of personal decency, but voyeurism got the better of me and I sat there gawping with incredulity as another series of borderline sociopaths lined up for their five minutes of fame and a lifetime of ridicule. I know, I know, I’m intelligent and educated and I should know better.

But as much as I hate it, I still can’t help myself from being drawn in to the sheer dross of it all. It’s my grossest of guilty pleasures.

Having seen most episodes of most of the nine past series — and may God have mercy on my soul — I feel more than qualified to predict the line-up of miscreants that will become household names for the summer ahead.

It will, almost certainly, include at least one from the following make-great-telly stereotypes: The Sexually-ambiguous Gender-Bender, The Testosterone/steroid pumped Gym-Bunny, The Nerd, The Cool Black Dude, The Tangoed Wag-Wannabee porn starlet, The Religious Zealot Bible-basher, The W.A.S.P. Posh Bird, The Toffee-Nosed Aristocrat or The Token Fatty.

The only common denominator is that they will all, without exception, be complete and utter odd-balls.