October 3rd – They felt they had to rehearse, Although we know they are masters, They get a real groovy sound, And you will have to admit it.

Cleaned myself: 0
Monkey see, monkey do: minus figure
Tics: –
Believe in God? Never! never! never!
YTLH: moderate to good.

Have you noticed the way that everyone in the meeja starts every paragraph with “so” ? So much so in fact that it’s started to leach its way into the way that common people speak too. So, I have been to see Tenet again, and must stick with my original opinion, that I still can’t hear anything. Perhaps that is the point? The new realism has identified that we speak but don’t listen.

So, the purpose of course was to watch my replacement advert, and it was with relief that I saw the Celebrity Squares version running. They are all me of course, and I can sort of see that when you get past the excruciating shame of it all, that it’s a bit odd, in a good way. It promises to put Cressington Park Motors on the map in this commutable part of the country, from where people seem determined never to commute again. Let us hope they take up motoring as their means to travel into the suburbs to witness the fall of the citadel.

So, Big Tooth is coming round too.

So, to sure up the ground, I have let her have her way in shaping the pageant. Her point is that although the general theme of Old Testament disasters linked to modern day calamities is good, to hold our audience we need still to deliver a recognisable Christmas scene at the end. I was reluctant to start with, but she makes the point that not only does Malachi pave the way for the big New Testament Opening, it also allows us to link catastrophises ancient and modern.

So, her idea is this: a starving child looks through the legs of merry makers in Downing Street, where the Prime Minister is standing on the steps of No.10 banging a saucepan with a wooden spoon, in celebration of the NHS. The child makes the internationally recognised symbol for begging for food to indifferent passers-by. The light refrain of a tinny sounding Christmas song drifts through the air. The Prime Minister bangs his pan too vigorously and it breaks, so he loses interest, drops his pan on the floor and goes back inside. The little urchin crawls between the legs of the revellers and picks up the pan and takes it to the edge of the stage. Everyone leaves the scene, and we see the starving child is at home, wrapping his ‘gift’ with scraps of newspaper he finds lying about the place. It’s his Christmas present to his mum.  Christmas morning dawns, and the child, starving and ragged, is proud to have a present to give to his mum, but she is nowhere to be seen. She’s a cleaner at the hospital. All the time the refrain can be heard, and slowly it grows in volume. He follows the sound to the A&E department of the local hospital, where the cleaners, nurses and support staff, are playing in an impromptu steel band comprised of pots and pans, and they are playing the tinny Christmassy tune that we’ve been hearing. As the volume grows, we hear that one of the pans strikes a discordant sound, and is spoiling the rendition; it’s the one being banged by the urchin’s mum. We can hear clearly now that the song being played is a high tempo version of Twelve Days of Christmas, which is familiar from an advert from last year. The urchin runs up to his mum and delivers the gift, which she unwraps, and as she strikes it, we hear that she’s no longer out of tune. In return he’s given an apple and an orange from an orderly’s trolley, with which he’s delighted.

So, to this scene, from stage left, the Prime Minister appears, seeking a PR moment with the hospital staff, who are now playing at full tilt and a loud volume. He goes to the front and middle of the steel band and turns to face the audience, as if taking credit for what’s going on. The urchin’s mum comes behind him and bangs her new pan down on his head, where it sticks. He is disorientated, as first the mother, then others bang the pan on his head, until eventually he’s sent spinning off the stage. The band finishes off their song with a great crescendo, and brings the house down (there will be stooges in the audience).

So, what do you think?

So …
Look over there
Prime Minister
Stupid blond hair
He doesn’t care …

Repeat for ages