Can you spot the cat?

Last week's Question Time, BBC1.


Fast forward to 45:30, Julia Goldsworthy MP yakking her disapproval of banker's pay packets. Lovely ginger tom wanders along the back of the set...

That's Cornwall for you.

Before the psoriasis kicked in, obviously...

I like this website.

Second best Adam in the world*

My friend Adam Curtis has entered the "blog" "o" "sphere".

He's mostly writing about It Felt Like A Kiss, the thing he's doing for the Manchester Festival next month, which sounds utterly brilliant. I spent my last birthday getting drunk with him and discussing Phil Spector, proper ghost trains, secret passages and Carnival of Souls. Frankly, the whole thing sounded even better than it did a year ago, when it was going to be about a singing gorilla.

Here's a trailer. It looks like the gorilla (or a close friend) is still in there somewhere.


* after Ant, obviously.

I'm alright Jack

The BBC are trawling through them there expenses claims with licence-payer's help.

CRISPIN BLUNT
The Conservative MP for Reigate has had an expense claim for £88.14 for a flag pole queried by Bradley from Redhill. He wonders whether this is the best use of taxpayers' money. In a statement, Mr Blunt has said the claim is justified as "I choose to display the Union Flag in my Commons office".

Truly, the man is his own rhyming slang...

Your Friday treat

Vintage health and safety posters from the Library of Congress. "Hat" "Tip" - Jane in the office upstairs.

(Actually I've met John, and he really is dull. Nice glasses though.)

Today's top headlines...

Nationwide Shortage of Black Ink as Newspapers All Have Same Idea for Front Pages...

The Daily Mail asks: Are fashion ads going too far?

I'm just not sure. Show me another one. No, still can't decide. Another. Another. Now the first one again...

Did I mention my scholarship to Sandhurst?

Rachel Royce wrote a piece for the Daily Mail today. Apparently her marriage broke up five years ago. I know! I was flabbergasted. Thing like that, you thought she'd have mentioned it before now...

Now that's targeted marketing...

Hello,

I represent a company called Star Position, a company that does what's known as advanced search engine placement. We reach a Network of over
35 million people who are predominantly US based. Our Network is entirely opt-in, and the users on our Network allow us to present them with a preferred choice whenever they are looking for anything on the top sixteen search engines. (GOOGLE, YAHOO, MSN and thirteen others.)

I seek one source to send the users on our Network, from the major search engines, for private investigators.

Please contact me at your earliest convenience. I will be in the office daily from 9:00 AM to 6:00 PM Pacific time.

I wonder if lots of cobblers got it too, and are sending back replies that say "no, it actually is literally a gumshoe"...

A good week for very bad news

I've got a shedload of stuff* in this fortnight's Private Eye.

Why not go out and buy a copy? £1.50 in all good newsagents. And some crap ones where the crisps are past the sell-by-date and they sell fags to kids, too.



(*I'm not telling you what. The rule is, if you like a story, it's mine. If you don't, it must be Francis Wheen's).

Tell us, Adam, what else did you watch this weekend?

The first minute of this clip features quite literally the best thing that has ever happened in any film ever.



Buy it! Buy it! Buy it! I promise you will not be disappointed. It's got a clockwork orchestra in it and everything...

So, farewell then...

Personally, I think British telly would be immeasurably improved if EVERY SINGLE PROGRAMME - soaps, period drama, documentaries, the news - featured Nick and Margaret hovering somewhere in the background, looking unimpressed.

"I believe in never walking away from people in difficult times..."

"... even if they get the political equivalent of a restraining order against me."

He's going to be scratching at the door of Downing Street the morning after the general election while Dave and Samantha are putting up the new curtains , insisting that the country faces difficult times and it would be wrong for him to walk away from his duty, isn't he?

It's probably just Anneka Rice...

There was a helicopter hovering overhead as I walked in to the Eye offices in central London this morning.

It says something about the events of the past few days that I wondered if it was the Skycopter ready to follow Gordon Brown's car on its way to Buckingham Palace.

Or if it was coming in to lift him off the roof of Downing Street, Saigon-style...

Spin-doctoring. Literally.

So, having watched this:



a piece of footage at which it is impossible, whatever your political leanings, not to laugh - the only possible way Gordon Brown can revive any popularity becomes clear.

More pratfalls.

Take that "Stalin to Mr Bean" image and run with it. He's got the awkward body language and crazy smiles already. Strapping on a pair of roller-skates and doing this down Downing Street and across Westminster Bridge would buy him at least, ooh, three days more in Number 10...

Five-times-a-Daily Male

Over in your one-stop-shop for online filth today:

Fitness Fiend Jessica Biel shows off her incredible figure in a thigh-high mini skirt

Harry Potter Star Emma Watson shows off her figure in a daring net dress

Natalie Imbruglia shows off her toned body as she strips off her wetsuit

Yeah, sod making an effort. It's not like anyone's actually looking at the text, is it...

This man, meanwhile, takes you straight to the smut with no danger of Melanie Phillips popping up to spoil your, er, concentration...