It's scandalous the money that is spent – especially if you have a daughter to send to the ball.

And being the devious divas that they are, girls are demanding the works – even having trial runs at the hairdresser's – £200 gowns, pricey accessories and stretch limos to take them to the bash.

"They know what they want and how they want it and how they will get it," confided one friend who is still recovering financially and emotionally from her 16-year-old daughter's prom night.

My pal was all for restraint.

No chance. The dress had to be bought for £220, with no hire available. That was just the start – £65 on shoes, £40-worth of beauty treatment, £25 for jewellery – total: £350. Plus the £40 ticket for fruit cocktail, fruit platter, chicken in mushroom sauce with veg and an apple tart at a local venue.

She did her own hair. But at the salon her pals had to be seen to be believed. They changed their minds as fast their nail varnish dried. They wanted another colour and once their hair was up they wanted it down.

"They were all excited having their nails repainted, hair all over the place looking like birds' nests. We didn't get a limo, her dad took her," said my friend.

She was even more shocked when she saw some of the frocks – one girl arrived with a piece of leopard print clinging to her body and barely covering her modesty with a long pink train and golden crown on her head.

This American import is now a commercial bandwagon that is totally over the top and some mothers are dafter than their daughters and get totally carried away. Very definitely a case of more money than sense.
Like one girl's family who paid for a horse and carriage to take her to her Sunderland school which had tried to keep costs down by hiring a coach for the prom.

No one can wait for anything any more – and that includes growing up.
There's no surprise or thrill in anything with this "I want it now," mentality – whatever the cost.


Smoking ban – snuffing it out

FOR stub it out, read "snuff" is back.

Thanks to the Government's smoking ban, the powdered baccy – popular in the 18th century – is making a comeback in pubs with drinkers wanting to sidestep the new law.

The ban's certainly having a dramatic effect: "It was like sitting in our own front room," said a friend after lunching out in a near-deserted city centre pub which is usually busy.

And since the yellow lepers' line went down outside the Echo House staff entrance – us smokers on one side; fresh air fiends, the other – friends have been standing in the torrential rain having their ciggies under brollies in the designated spot.

One told me how her 85-year-old uncle, who lost his wife in January and then his dog, would really miss his treat of the week in the club, having a couple of pints with a fag on a Friday night and Sunday dinner time.

He's too old to change.

But not the eight-month pregnant Sunderland lass, pictured on telly puffing outside a city pub. Not a pretty sight.