Undercover Cameron

The strangely moist and thoroughly unlikeable David Cameron, leader of Her Majesty’s Opposition and potentially the next elected Prime Minister, went undercover in Birmingham last week. Old-Etonian Cameron, who occasionally tries to disguise himself as a member of the lower orders by removing his tie and asking to be called “Dave”, spent a few days living with an “ordinary family”, Abdullah and Shahida Rehman. While he was in Brum Daveyboy also had a crack at being a teaching assistant at a local school.

It’s quite romantic, really, and not unlike the old folk tales where the King puts on a peasant smock, has a quick roll in the dung-heap and sets off to travel amongst his subjects disguised as a beggar. Those stories (at least the ones that get turned into folk songs) tend to follow a predictable pattern.

The undercover king, prince, pope, bishop, colonel, (or whatever), lustily plights his troth with a blushing maiden who steadfastly refuses to Do It with him because she is too pure, and also because he has no money. In Olden Times it seems, a maidenhead was rarely jettisoned without huge lumps of cash changing hands. How unlike the present day, when the phrase “there’s no such thing as an ugly rich man” is never used under any circumstances.

Desperate for a shag, the beggar flings off his smock to reveal his doublet, hose, fine stockings, and, most importantly, a bulging, throbbing purse of gold coins. At which point the maiden suddenly realises that she truly loves him and they rush to the hay-loft where they couple like maddened badgers.

They then either run off together and marry, or he dumps her and heads back to the castle leaving her to bear an illegitimate child, live for twenty years in poverty and then die horribly from smallpox.

And actually we don’t care what happens to them, because by this point the ballad, sung by a middle-aged Aspergic woman with dirty hair in a centre parting and a voice like two asthmatic piglets fighting in a bag, has reached the eighty-second verse and we have broken out in a slight sweat and abandoned all hope.

Not that Dave got up to any of that stuff. He came back having had “an experience which has strengthened my conviction about the right way to build a more cohesive Britain.”

Which is good, probably, but it’s not the kind of thing you’d want to write a song about.

Here's Your Pig's Bladder

Chubby humourist Bll Bryson’s on an anti-litter campaign here in the U.K. at the moment. Seemingly irritated by an American daring to point out to them that they’re a bunch of slobs, a few people on the news opinion forums I frequent have been quite disparaging about Bill.

Some have even called into question whether or not he’s funny. Well, he is. I mean, I’ve never wept with mirth or had to lie down because my sides were aching after reading Bill’s stuff, but he’s an accurate observer and on the basis of an “evening with” he did at a local theatre a few months back, he’s also a genuinely nice bloke. He also manages to be funny without ever being truly unkind, which is harder than it looks.

I also have a soft spot for him because someone once suggested that I could be “the next Bill Bryson.” That’s flattering, but to tell you truth I’d rather be the first Bill Bryson, because then not only would I already be immensely wealthy but I’d also have a pretty good head of hair for a man in his fifties. (Although he should wash it more often, if his last breakfast T.V. appearance was anything to go by.)

On the downside, of course, the first Bill lives in Norfolk, a county which consistently fills me with dread, both because of the eye-watering flatness of the landscape and because for many of the inhabitants the job of village idiot is seen as the pinnacle of an aspirational and challenging career path. “Welcome on board, Jethro. Here's your pig’s bladder.”

A few hundred years ago people from Norfolk enthusiastically colonised many of the parts of North America which now feature in Stephen King novels and teen slasher movies. Many East Anglian traditions, such as folk dancing, incest, murder and cannibalism, often all with the same person and in quick succession, are still carried out by their descendents to this very day.

Bill claims to be happy in Norfolk, but I bet he keeps a gun under the pillow.

May Flash Fiction (1)

The train pulls out of Euston on time, dead on four o’clock.

An hour into the journey and already it seems we’ve run out of things to say. We’ve had a brief discussion about the conference ahead. We’ve asked and answered a few questions about each other’s home life and after a very short while realised we really don’t care much about each other’s partners, children, pets, friends, if the truth were told.

For the last five minutes she’s been gazing out of the carriage window as the backs of houses fly past. Her jaw-line is tautened by the turn of her head. In the pallid spring sunlight I notice for the first time that her cheek is covered with the finest golden down. For a moment, unexpectedly, I wonder how it would feel against my lips.

Suddenly she turns to look at me. “I’m looking forward to this conference,” she says, “it’s been a long time coming.”

The phrase hangs in the air, and for a second our eyes lock, and then, coward that I am, mine skid away. When I find the courage to look back she’s smiling. “I’m a bit like that myself, sometimes.” she says, and turns her face to look out of the window once more.

The houses turn to woodland, then to fields and distant hills dappled with shadow and glowing in the westering sun. I pick up my newspaper, pretend to read, and dare to wonder what the next few days might bring.

Have Your Say

I occasionally try to have my comments published on the BBC News "Have Your Say" website. I am rarely successful...


DEBATE:
Elections 2007: Will you be voting?
COMMENT:
We have many burning local issues in this part of Surrey, but I'll willingly vote for whichever candidate can guarantee that I will never again be doorstepped by Edwina Currie. Terrifying.
COMMENT STATUS:Awaiting moderation


DEBATE:
Has the government the right green policies?
COMMENT:
Interesting that those who believe global warming to be a fantasy created by Blair, "Greens" and "Lefties" seem also to be unable to spell, punctuate or construct a coherent sentence. It could be argued that this strongly suggests them to be morons, but I've heard there's some evidence to the contrary. So that's all right then.
COMMENT STATUS:Unpublished


DEBATE:
How should society tackle gun crime?
COMMENT:
Call me old-fashioned, but surely we could give these disaffected youths a few guns and their own island where they could savage each other to their hearts' content. It could be filmed as a "reality" T.V. show and the profits given to their victims.
COMMENT STATUS:Unpublished


DEBATE:
Are young people too hung up on body image?
COMMENT:
"Are young people too hung up on body image?" Yes, probably, but then young people tend to be hung up just about everything that doesn't matter, and most of them will grow out of it. Let's stop pretending this is important.
RECOMMENDED BY:2 people
COMMENT STATUS:Published


DEBATE:
Is the Anglican Church right to issue gay ultimatum?
COMMENT:
The sight of this bunch of delusional bigots slapping feebly at each other is not totally without entertainment value, but I fear it will soon become tiresome. As a suggestion for those torturing themselves on points of dogma, I would paraphrase Kurt Vonnegut's simple creed. "Believe whatever harmless lies you like, as long as they make you happy, healthy, brave and kind." Works for me...
COMMENT STATUS:Unpublished


DEBATE:
Should all UK imports and exports of poultry be halted?
COMMENT:
Yet another piece of misdirection - what will this ideologically and morally discredited government try to slide by unnoticed while this nonsense holds our attention? Incidentally, on the radio this morning someone referred to the national poultry "herd". Thank God we at least avoided a stampede. Yeehah.
RECOMMENDED BY:2 people
COMMENT STATUS:Published


DEBATE:
Why is the north fatter than the south?
COMMENT:
Surely the simplest way round this problem is to adopt the approach used so many times before in areas as wide-ranging as education, measuring inflation, unemployment and so on. If we were to move the goal-posts redefine obesity as "over forty stone" then most people in the U.K., North and South would comfortably fall into the "normal" category again. Problem solved.
COMMENT STATUS:Unpublished


DEBATE:
How can we tackle childhood obesity?
COMMENT:
Surely we could solve the problem by providing fat children with an exercise wheel like those used by hamsters. Connected to the National Grid these devices could go a long way towards solving Britain's energy problems without resorting to nuclear power or unsightly wind turbines.
COMMENT STATUS:Unpublished


DEBATE:
How should Britain prepare for Bird Flu?
COMMENT:
I'm greatly encouraged by the news that the 'flu has been contracted by a domestic cat - perhaps I can now look forward to H5N1 wiping out the bands of marauding squirrels which spend each summer enthusiastically violating my wife's hanging baskets. Come to think of it I won't shed any tears over next door's Jack Russell either. Bring it on.
COMMENT STATUS:Unpublished