Monday, 24 December 2012

'Twas the night before the Sun needed a new columnist


A dream and a nightmare

I flicked through The Sun yesterday. Twisted, I know, but two headlines made me laugh. The first was 22 STONE SCISSOR WEILDING MANIAC NIGHTMARE, with the sub-headline Why was she given a job in a hairdressers? I didn't read the article, but I predict a short novel and west end musical based on the true story. The second was about Jordan and her new bloke spending his nights accessing gay chatrooms.

Then there was Clarkson's page, guess what his take was about the RSPCA spending £300,000 prosecuting the Prime Minister's hunt? Whatever Clarkson's abilities and attractions are (and I'm jiggered if I can identify them), the ability to express an unexpected opinion isn't among them.

I think the questions should be to the filth and the CPS rather than to the RSPCA: 'either you're in the pocket of the rich and the hunts, or...' can't think of an 'or'. The question should be: 'you refused, repeatedly, to prosecute on similar grounds and with similar evidence. The very first time the RSPCA bypassed you and went it alone they succeeded in the courts. Does this not at least suggest and possibly prove that you are the lackeys of the rich and powerful that ride out hunting?'

Then the images started:

A knock at the door. A 'policeman's knock'. Loud, confident, persistent. A knock that, clearly, wasn't going away. Jeremy opened the door, dressed in pyjamas, a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth.

“Uh. Yes. What do you want? It's three in the morning...”

“Mr Clarkson?”

“Yes”

“Mr Jeremy Clarkson?”

“Yes”

“I'm from the ministry.”

“The ministry”

“We're undertaking the cull”

“Cull”

“Cull. You know. You wrote about the foxes making it difficult to run your farm and the need to keep numbers down...”

“...so?”

“That's a cull”

“I know what a cull is...”

“Right Mr Clarkson. Well. You see. The country's overrun with aggressive, middle-aged, middle class,  opinions...much of it in the House of Commons, but there you go...”

“You what?”

“We are, Mr Clarkson, in common terms, clichéd up to our eyeballs. We're one or two hackneyed banalities away from drowning in our own triteness...”

“And?”

“And. Well. I'm sorry Mr Clarkson. This is more humane than it may appear, so I'm told. You may want to run away...”

“Run away?”

“Not much point, but most of them do...”

The pack of huge, genetically modified foxes (yes foxes, I'm not immune to cliché myself, okay, you could even put it down to satire or something clever if you were feeling kind) marshalled by eco-warriors driving 2CVs, and riding bicycles (look, there's Swampy) came racing around the corner. They immediately picked up the scent: stale cigarette smoke, BO, halitosis, and...

“Oh dear, Mr Clarkson. You appear to have let yourself down...”

Top Gear fans should look away now. A lifetime of distain for any sport that does not require an internal combustion engine had not prepared Jeremy for evading his perusers, and in no time at all he was torn to shreds.

“Right” said the man from the ministry to his deputy “where does Littlejohn live again?”

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