Life's a Riot with Kim Jong-un

It's National Blow Up Your Neighbour's Tank Day in North Korea, and the celebrations are going along like a house tank on fire.

But what's this? Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un has fallen for the old Superglue-on-the-binocular-eyepieces gag AGAIN. He'll never learn.

And the Superglue-on-the-binocular-eyepieces joker gets his just reward for - what is, after all - the funniest joke in the world short of blowing somebody up.

Oh, how we laughed.

Ha. Ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha ha haaaaaargh, I'm dead.

Bad news for fans of Martin Clunes

Click for mahoosive full-size version

The giant statue of local celebrity Martin Clunes has broken free of its moorings off the Dorset Coast amid fears for the safety of its 27 crew.

Built to celebrate the actor's continuing success as miserable bastard Doc Martin, the 300-foot sea-going monument was moored off Portland Bill, until recent storms made it drag its anchor.

Last seen heading toward France, the Royal Navy are preparing to sink the Clunes in deep water to prevent contamination from its nuclear-powered engines.

I am not mad.

The Clunes in happier days

Unblocked by Chegwin

I have been unblocked by Keith Chegwin on Twitter. This disappoints me.

In fact, the well-known joke recycler has unblocked loads of people of Twitter, to the point that #UnblockedByChegwin has become an actual hashtag.

The reason why he blocked me and – seemingly – thousands of others is a mystery. Some think that it was a response to complaints that he had "recycled" one of their jokes without attribution, others because he has an itchy blocking finger.

I know why I was blocked. And that's why I'm disappointed that he has unblocked me.

You see, on 9 October 1988, I and four others were trapped in a Sunday evening traffic jam on the southbound M1. We were on the way back from a pointless 2-1 victory at Villa Park, and the road was jammed up like an Imodium overdose victim.

 

And there, in the car next to us, was Keith Chegwin.

We knew it was Keith Chegwin, because he was driving a car with "Keith Chegwin, sponsored by [Newbury-based garage]".

We mooned him, dear reader. We mooned him.

For about 30 miles. It was an act of youthful bravado that almost certainly tipped poor Cheggers over the edge.

And back to 2012-ish, and like some damn fool I shared this memory with Keith Chegwin on Twitter.

Down came the block hammer.

And yet, he has seen fit to unblock me. Cheggers, I am disappoint.

Review: Ghosthunting with The Only Way is Essex

So, it appears that the Alan Partridge school of pitching TV programmes has struck again ("Youth Hostelling with Chris Eubank", "Monkey Tennis") and this is actually a thing.

Not only that, but there's also Ghosthunting with The Saturdays, Girls Aloud and McFly, which goes to show that paranormal inquiry in the hands of minor celebrities appears to be a genuine discipline.

However, one is suspicious of the scientific rigour involved in this production when one notices that they cannot even spell "Arg" correctly on the DVD case. If they insist on calling him "Arge" with an e, what other cut corners will we find inside? This being the case, I haggled the charity shop down from £1.50 to 50p, and they seemed well pleased with the deal.

Mercifully short at 51 minutes, Ghosthunting with The Only Way is Essex left me with only just enough brain cells to write this review, but the sum of human knowledge is clearly worse off with its existence. To quote one review of this production: "DVD arrived in good time and undamaged", and you can't get fairer than that.

And so it begins:

"We're taking six people to a place that they will never forget for the rest of their lives," says host Yvette Fielding. Alas, she doesn't take them to do a day of work, so instead we get six pillocks with orange skin screaming and talking bollocks around Coalhouse Fort in the Thames Estuary.

Within five minutes, with all the TOWIE regulars (Arg, Joey, Spiggy, Spudulika, Rectum and the other one) talking and screaming at once in a language only vaguely related to English, I feel my brains oozing out of my ears.

Now, I spent my early years holidaying in Essex and am pretty up to speed on Estuary English, innit, but even I draw the line at using the word "reem" in public, and somehow they have shoehorned in the word "reem" in among the screeching.

Of course they were going to see ghosts. Dense people plus frequent suggestion of paranormal activity plus darkened room full of loads of people equals mass screaming panic, and that's exactly what you get with Ghosthunting with TOWIE.

And NOT, I should point out, members of the production team pranking the TOWIE idiots something rotten, because that would be the kind of fakery that gives Blue Peter presenters a bad name.

"I don't know if there's scientific explanation to this," says Yvette strapping Arg to a seat in the laundry room like some low-IQ offering to the dead, "But people run out of here screaming."

In fact, the scientific explanation is this: There aren't any ghosts. Just idiots. And production crew shoving things around in the dark and flinging things at easily-excited alleged celebrities.

Yvette, now our nation's leading paranormal expert: "Poltergeist activity only happens when you turn your back."

How very handy, as furniture is flung around off camera, like a no-budget episode of Beadle's About.

And so it finished with a crescendo of shrieking and a blind sprint back to the limo, like an episode of Most Haunted without the laughs and populated entirely by twats. Marks out of ten: No ghosts out of ten ghosts.

Arg is still strapped to a seat in the laundry room. His tan is starting to fade.

Something something "oxygen of publicity" something

 Taking the concept one step further, one is pretty sure that a "…with The Only Way Is Essex" series could go far deeper than the important subject of the paranormal. This band of experts could lend their knowledge and diplomatic skills to such important productions as:

• Solving the Arab/Israeli conflict with The Only Way Is Essex
• Defeating ISIS with The Only Way Is Essex
• Solving Fermat's Last Theorem with The Only Way Is Essex
• Turning the NHS into a fully-patient oriented public service with The Only Way Is Essex
• Monkey Tennis with The Only Way Is Essex

Alternatively, we could all set fire to our televisions, and never speak of this thing again.

For sale: One DVD copy of Ghosthunting With The Only Way Is Essex

North Korea Lube Factory: This changes EVERYTHING

You may probably be aware that this picture of Kim Jong-un getting over-excited by lube is one of my favourite things in the world.

What I didn't know until yesterday is that there is a promotional video for the North Korea Lube Factory. MIND. BLOWN.



As well as seeing (possibly) the back of Unexcited Lube Man's head, this film brings one pressing question to the table.

WHY DOES THE NORTH KOREA LUBE FACTORY HAVE A ZOO?

On second thoughts, best not answer that.

Sixteen Films About Reading

Local girl Kate Winslet has said that she'd like to make a film in her home town of Reading (presumably to raze to the ground the hideous block of flats named in her honour opposite a Pizza Hut).

This being the case, here's a list of films about Reading. Some local knowledge required.

1. Poo Island of Doctor Moreau
2. Butch and Sundance: The Earley Days
3. Whitley Men Can't Jump
4. Burnham after Reading (A film set on a commuter train to London)
5. Hexagon with the Wind
6. Beavis and Butts Centre
7. Smelly Alley G: The Movie
8. What Happens in Heelas
9. Emmer Green Berets
10. Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Southcote
11. Sonning's Gotta Give
12. Ed Woodley
13. Journey to the Savacenter of the Earth
14. Action Jackson's
15. School of Reading Rock
16. Caversham Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels

The eagle-eyed among you will note a lack of Ricky Gervais vehicle "Cemetery Junction", which while named after the Reading distrct twinned with Gomorrah, wasn't actually filmed there. Essentially because the entire truckload of film equipment would have been stolen during the first lunchbreak.

So, good luck Kate. Sorry about that time I accidentally touched your bosom and all that.

Keeping it real with Ian Beale: Episode One

Due to huge demand, I've written the first episode of the shit-larious Phil Mitchell / Ian Beale odd-couple sitcom. This has got 'hit' written all over it. (As in "For mercy's sake Phil, please stop hitting me")

"And now on BBC1, a new series from the makers of EastEnders. Keeping It Real With Ian Beale

"Viewers are advised that this programme contains scenes of a bathroom nature which some might find distressing"

[Opening titles. Theme song]

"Ian and Phil! Ian and Phil!
They live together cos no-one else will
Ian's a loser
And Phil's quite bitter
When Beale makes Phil cross
His head goes down the shitter"

EPISODE ONE: Shark Sandwich

[Ian and Phil's kitchen. Day. Phil is making his packed lunch]

Phil: There. This is going to be the best packed lunch that Walford's ever seen.

[He packs his lunch into an ice cream tub and puts it on the work surface]

[Ian enters carrying an identical plastic tub, which he puts on the work surface next to Phil's packed lunch]

Ian: There. A week's worth of stool samples for the hospital driver to pick up. For God's sake nobody open it, it smells like the end of the world.

Phil: I hope they don't get mixed up and I end up with your poo samples for my lunch, because you know what will happen...

[Think bubble appears above Ian's head showing Ian getting his head flushed down the toilet]

Ian: Please Phil, not again...

[Doorbell]

Ian: Ah-ha! That'll be the hospital driver picking up my stool samples

[Grabs wrong box, goes to front door]

Phil: And that's my cue to head off to The Arches

[Grabs wrong box]

[Ian re-enters, realises what's just happened]

Ian: Uh-oh.

[There follows twenty-five minutes of Ian Beale trying to make an identical packed lunch and sneaking it into Phil's place of work without him noticing, all with the help of Ian's homicidal son Bobby, whose only suggestions revolve around stoving people to death with blunt objects, and Phil's creepy son Ben Mitchell, whose only motive is to stir up as much trouble as possible. This stuff writes itself, to be honest.]

[The Arches, interior, day. Phil is looking for his lunch]

Phil: Where the hell's my lunch? I only left it here a minute ago. I hope Ian's got nothing to do with it, my flushing arm's feeling a bit stiff.

[Ben enters, carrying an ice cream tub]

Ben: Here you go dad, you left it at home. Ian sent it over.

Phil: I did? That's why you shouldn't drink son, rots your brain.

Ben: Enjoy your shite, dad. Lunch. I meant lunch.

Phil: You're the best son, even after all them murders you done. An' don't let anyone take that away from ya

Ben: Whatever you say dad. Just take your time opening that box, eh?

[Ben leaves in a hurry]

[Phil sits down, leisurely tucks a napkin into his collar, sighs happily, and opens the lunchbox. His nose twitches, but he suspects nothing as he grabs a sandwich]

[Cut away to Ben and Bobby outside The Arches]

Bobby: Shit sandwiches?

Ben: Shit sandwiches.

[Cut back to Phil]

Phil: Cheese and chutney, my favourite.

[Phil takes a huge bite]

Phil: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGHHHH!!! BEEEEEEEALE!!!

CAPTION: Later that evening

[Phil and Ian's bathroom, Phil is flushing Ian's head down the toilet]

Ian: Whargarble!

Phil: Lol.

[Fade. END CREDITS]

Keeping it real with Ian Beale

I've had an idea. An idea for the best television programme in the world ever. Here, let me explain, in Twitter form:

They don't even have to film the last scene, either, as there is plenty of archive footage.

Like Terry and June, only with an East End thug and a bloke who runs a chip shop who has survived innumerable assassination attempts. There's even a working title:

Man, I can taste the BAFTA awards dinner already.

On getting a tattoo

Let's all get tattoos!

I've never felt the urge to get a tattoo. It's not the thought that I'll be inked with something I might regret for the rest of my life. No. It's being prodded under my skin with a red-hot needle.

Then I saw this masterpiece.

Now I want a tramp-era Ian Beale inked onto my body.

In fact, everybody should get a tramp-era Ian Beale inked onto their body because tramp-era Ian Beale is best Ian Beale.

"I am the best Ian Beale"

Moustache-era Ian Beale is the worst Ian Beale. Do not get a tattoo of moustache-era Ian Beale.

"I am the worst Ian Beale"

Now we're all agreed, let's meet back here tomorrow and compare inkings. You go first.