Talk To Rex

I just popped over to the Co-op to buy some toilet paper and found myself physically unable to purhase the cheapest brand because it bore the slogan “love your bum”.

Maybe I’m just’s not in touch with my body in the way other people are, but I don’t want to think about my bottom in that way, least of all when I’m wiping it. I certainly don’t want the Co-op thinking about my bottom in that way, either. Neither do I want my housemate to think that I think about his bottom in that way, and the fact that other people may at one time or another have voiced approval of my backside does not alter my objections one bit. They are not the people who buy my toilet paper, after all.

To: david.howarth@cambridgelibdems.org.uk
Sent: 06 May 2005 17:37
Subject: Parliamentary query

Dear David,

Many congratulations on your victory in the Parliamentary election yesterday.

Anne Campbell, whose shoes you are (figuratively of course) stepping into, was a member of the Parliamentary choir. Although she had many facets which I shall not particularly miss, I did find it somehow reassuring to know that my MP was throwing herself into the arts on a regular basis – albeit surrounded by a pot-pourri of Lords and Westminster high-flyers. I wondered if you had any plans to continue this fine choral tradition set by your predecessor?

I believe that Mrs Campbell sang in the alto section. I would suggest that you would be unwise to do this yourself unless you have been especially trained for such things.

All the very best of luck,

James Lark

From : David Howarth
Sent : 06 May 2005 22:55:14

Many thanks – but I fear that my voice would not be up to standard in any register!

Regards,

David Howarth

Every election has its winners and its losers: the new MPs, fresh-faced and keen to take up their representative duties; and those who have heard the division called for the last time. I remember watching a Spitting Image special after the 1992 general election, where they carted away the latex puppets of the old characters we’d see no more, to melt them down and make more Norman Lamonts.

This year, we had our fair share of spills and thrills – Trimble out, Galloway taking Oona King’s seat, and Stephen Twigg disappearing back to wherever he came from. However I honestly didn’t expect Michael Howard to do anything other than battle on to the next general election, no matter what happened on the night. But no – he is standing down, probably by the end of the year, and with him goes a small piece of political history.

The Michael Howard Song.

My enduring memory of Fringe 2003 was – despite my best efforts – the pervasive strains of the “Standing on a Podium” song, murdered every day on the Royal Mile by a group we have all sworn never to mention by name. For Fringe 2004, I’m afraid to say it was probably James’ song about Michael Howard. I’ve been looking forward to Howard’s departure from frontline politics ever since.

So farewell then, the Michael Howard Song. And Michael – if you’re listening, please don’t change your mind.

Congratulations to David Howarth, the new MP for Cambridge.

As I stumbled out of a vaguely disreputable establishment in the early hours of this morning, I was greeted by a group of Liberal Democrats trying to win the student vote by handing out balloons.

In a way, this sad, pathetic balloon kind of sums up the Lib Dems.

In 1988 when Daleks accidentally ended up with human emotions they just got confused, spun around and evaporated. They didn’t blub about it, they didn’t have tinkly piano soundtracks. They went “pouf”.

In 1988 when politicians were forced to shamefully resign from cabinet they were never ever seen again.

The Sunday Telegraph reveals that Tony Blair is planning, upon his re-election, to re-incorporate David Blunkett in the Cabinet in “some kind of enforcing role”.

WHAT??? You mean after all our excitement that the fascist git got his come-uppance, he’s going to be back in Cabinet after mere months??? As “The Enforcer”, the kind of police-state uber-dictatorial position he’s always longed for??????

Has Tony Blair gone totally MAD???? Didn’t he learn his lesson from Doctor Who last night ? (The Daleks were described has having had “all human emotions removed except hate…” – replace the lethal armoured outer casing with a guide dog and who have you got?)

This can’t happen. It can’t it can’t it can’t it can’t…

(Note to self: delete this entry when Blair is re-elected, less it is found by The Enforcer and recriminations are incurred.)

The Doctor lands in a wonderful huge mysterious museum and in one of the cases is a Cyberman head – GREAT!

Then he discovers a Dalek has been caged up – and the Dalek looks GREAT!

Christopher Eccleston gets his top off – erm…*

The Dalek goes on the rampage and exterminates load of people – GREAT!

This appears to be mainly to make up for the general lack of storyline. Ah. (Clearly a running theme in this series of Doctor Who.)

The Dalek climbs stairs – GREAT!

Whenever the Dalek elevates it looks like a CGI effect. Crap.**

The Dalek slaughters more people using a sprinkler system – GREAT!

The Dalek goes all emotional and turns out to be a nice person after all. AWFUL.

* at least this never happened with William Hartnell.

** when they climbed stairs in 1987 the Daleks wobbled a lot, but they did at least look solid and decidedly scary

Such is the hectic life I am leading at the moment, my brain seems to be getting everso slightly unhinged. I have noticed this worrying trend from my increasingly erratic movements on the London Underground – having made the same perfectly simple journey for the last two weeks, all of a sudden I have been finding myself on completely unfamiliar escalators going towards the Jubilee line, or standing looking blankly at a Northern line train and wondering how on earth I thought it was going to take me to Notting Hill Gate, or – as was the case today – travelling in completely the wrong direction on the Picadilly line. It was two stops before I realised that I didn’t normally pass Covent Garden, and as a result I missed my train and spent nearly half an hour pacing furiously up and down a platform on King’s Cross and buying a Cadbury’s Boost for the frankly exorbitant price of 59p.

Does this happen to other people, or am I actually going mad?

Is he hiding junior ministers behind them?

Sorry. Just watching the Newsnight debate, with Jeremy Paxman being unwarrantedly funny and sharp (isn’t this supposed to be, you know, a serious election?), and – strangely – the three party representatives not actually arguing vociferously about police and crime, at least until some members of the voting public had stuck their oar in and got everyone upset. Which is interesting, because on previous issues they’d been at each others’ throats.

Which makes me wonder if perhaps all the parties know that crime is far too sticky to get into at this stage. They’ve learned they can’t rely on trotting out figures, because the figures never tell you anything useful (although, in despair, I realise that the majority of people still don’t know why statistics are so rarely helpful to them) – so they seem to have chosen to say nothing, desperately hoping that way that no one will point out that they’re making it all up. (Sorry, nearly typed “… that they’re wankers” there – slight touch of the Campbells.)

Currently having fun with the BBC’s election website, particularly the Peter Snow bits. Fabulous – this is what elections are all about. Peter Snow and sausages (we used to eat sausages on election night when I was a child, as a way of staying awake). Roll on May 5th!