³ÉÈËÂÛ̳

Snippets from the week's news, sliced, diced and processed for your convenience.

1. Five trees make an orchard.

2. Matthew Parris once ran the London Marathon in 2hrs 32m, the fastest by an MP.

3. Paper can be made from wombat excrement.

4. Robin Hood had no Maid Marian in the early days.

5. British consumption of poultry increased 25-fold between 1950 and 2000.

6. Video Killed the Radio Star was inspired by a JG Ballard short story.

7. Wine varies in taste from day to day.

8. French women are the lightest in the EU. British women are the heaviest.

9. The Sun is dimmest it has been for a century .

10. There's a swear word in The Beatles' Hey Jude.

Seen 10 things? . Thanks to Simon Dale for this week's picture of 10 seagulls in Eastbourne.

• Bookmark with:
• del.icio.us |
• Digg |
• Reddit
• - What's this?

If the decline of the economy worsens does this mean the economy is getting better?
Adam Morris, Bath, UK

Am I the only one who wasn't fooled into thinking were sisters?
Louisa Hibble, Leicester

Did anyone else spot drunk-girl-on-bench on The Graham Norton Show last night?
Alex, Edinburgh

Was Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg named by the first man to drown in it?
Welshdoug, Caerphilly, South Wales

Darn, missed the caption comp. I only pray someone mentions that classic 80s childhood face-flipping logic game Guess Who?
Dean, Exeter
Monitor note: You're in luck...

Re Paper Monitor's boxing fight between two showbiz bits... ummm... what on earth are you going on about?!
Jennie F, Leeds, UK

Due to the recession, this will have to do.
Richard Evans, Manchester

• Bookmark with:
• |
• |
• - What's this?

Winning entries in the caption competition.

The competition is now closed.

This week, a Bafta staffer works out the seating plan for Sunday's gongfest, the British Academy Television Awards. But what's being said?

Thanks to all who entered. The prize of a small amount of kudos to the following:

6. youngWillz
"Compulsory redundancies to the front, yeah?"

5. fazman1977
Lorraine thought taking part in "Celebrity Guess Who" would have been less back-breaking work.

4. SeanieSmith
"I'm afraid I'll have to stop you there Ms Winslet - I'm about to lock up for the night."

3. Rob Falconer
After the tip-up seats' springs were tragically set to maximum, most of the celebrities were never the same again.

2. ValerieGanne
The revamped shooting gallery was very popular.

1. Stephen, Leader of STROP
An Audience with Jim Davidson was not going quite to plan...

• Bookmark with:
• |
• |
• - What's this?

A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.

Laydeeez and gentlemen, WELCOME to the celebrity news knockdown challenge! It's Paper Monitor's Friday sport of choice, to be sure.

In the red corner, the reigning heavyweight champion OF THE WORLD, , a veteran whose quill is sharpened by one of the Guardian's razor wits, Marina Hyde.

But we have a contender in the blue corner, laydeeez and gentlemen, hungry to trade blows with the champ. I give you... , coached to spill bile and lustful drool in equal measure by the Times's master of the craft, Caitlin Moran.

Both cast a gimlet eye over the comings and goings of celebrities. Lost is ever-alert for signs of the approaching apocalypse (in Biblical times it was a plague of locusts; today watch out for when Peaches shrugs). And Watch treats 'em mean, picking 10 but only granting one a full complement of column inches.

These are dirty tactics, laydeeez and gentlemen, so let the fight begin.

Ding ding! Round one.

Watch dances like a butterfly, ducking, weaving and jabbing each target.

Biff! Hugh Heffner is "the intriguing 83-year-old sexual 'iconoclast' in a dressing gown". Pow! Casting Hell's Kitchen's Marco Pierre White and Grant Bovey in "tragic TV movie Who Will Love My Children?"

But Lost counters with a sharp left hook. Is there a headline in any of today's papers that shouts "READ ME" quite as loudly as "When Paris met Chantal (the wife of the world's 19th most evil dictator)".

Watch reels onto the ropes, but comes right back with a ker-piff, describing Lady Gaga's outfit of choice as "little more than a gigantic hat and a Dolly Mixture glued to her lulu..." Zowee!

Ding ding, seconds out.

As the fighters retire to their corners, coaches Hyde and Moran dab brows with wet towels and bawl encouraging expletives into the cauliflower ears of their protégées.

Ding ding, round two.

Lost, adopting the sartorial digs tactic, describes the Cameroonian first lady - she who met Paris Hilton - as dressing "like Chaka Khan by way of the Carrington mansion". God, but the 80s were great.

Watch skitters out of reach, landing a quick one-two with "[Susan Boyle] has become a fresh stick of gum for all the of Fleet Street to chew over, now Jade's dead".

But has there ever been knock-out blows delivered with such precision as Lost's take on the Madonna-falling-from-a-horse tale? No, there has not. First she grants Steven Klein, owner of said horse, the job title of "photographer/narcissism enabler". Then Lost outlines the Queen of Pop's rehabilitation regime as "600 abdominal crunches and a couple of hours on her specially customised 13th-century rack".

She suspects a conspiracy at the heart of the accident, from which don't-call-me-Madge recovered so very quickly. "Lost in Showbiz would like both to know what efforts are being made to trace the white Fiat Uno that may have clipped the side of Steven Klein's perimeter fence, and to see the Duke of Edinburgh account for his actions on the afternoon in question."

Ow and ow.

• Bookmark with:
• |
• |
• - What's this?

See the Quote of the Day every morning on the .

"I knew that we would go as them because Keith looks just like Shrek" - A bride explains why she and the groom dressed as Shrek and Princess Fiona.

Ahh, to be compared to a film character. Newman's Butch Cassidy, James Dean's rebel, Marlon Brando's Terry Malloy or Shrek. Anyway Keith Green obviously revels in it, enough to get married to fiance Christine England in full Shrek outfit. Love is a strange thing.

• Bookmark with:
• del.icio.us |
• Digg |
• Reddit
• - What's this?

For the love of god, please stop being so negative in the reporting of Moneygeddon (I refuse to use the R-word). How is having such negative headlines all the time going to reassure anybody that we're not all doomed? It's just an excuse to keep digging at politicians. I'm far from being a Labour supporter, but just let them get on with it without scaring the daylights out of everybody every day.
Adam Molloy, Cardiff

It looks like Paper Monitor's . In these days of cuts and streamlining the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ can't have two paper reviewers, so one of them has to go. Either Paper Monitor starts appearing at 6am too or starts studying the job section.
Steve Bowman, London

Re Paper Monitor: The "Smith" in question in Gordon Brown's English people to be proud of should be both Zadie and Maggie. But definitely not Jacqui...
The Bob, Glasgow

Re : Could it be because they appear to have built a go-kart track in the middle of it?
Hennell, Lincoln, UK

Is it me or have astronomers been baffled a lot recently? First the then the . I'd like to see then exhibit some other levels of confusion. Perhaps they could embrace a new word 'confuzzled' instead - it's high time that was in a headline.
Sarah, Colchester

In defence of The Bob (Letters, Tuesday), the joke is funny if you say it was Marx, and factually correct if you say it was Proudhon. Which is the better condition for a joke?
Phil, Guisborough

And to think, after all that work learning to spell "Massachusetts" in kindergarten, I've been spelling Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg incorrectly all these years.
Nadja, north of Boston, Massachusetts USA

Re : Who are these people? Couldn't you find someone that people have heard of?
Nick Morton, Camborne, Cornwall

Re . Why would final tickets for an illegal cup cause worry? (If you don't like the joke, or even if you do, you might be interested that it's all nouns except for an adjective.)
Warren, Bristol

I love .
Steven, Sunderland

As long as doesn't re-release The Power of Love, I don't mind what she does.
Chris Kenny, Southampton, England

Could be the shortest film ever? "Naming Pluto tells the story of Venetia Phair who was 11 years old in 1930 when she suggested the name to her grandfather....she piped up, 'why not call it Pluto?', and that's the story, that's the whole story."
Chris Kenny, (still living as above, in Southampton)

• Bookmark with:
• |
• |
• - What's this?

A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.

Poor St George.

It's hard enough for the old chap to get a look-in, with extrovert cousins Andrew, David and Patrick hogging the limelight. And then just when George is beginning to get noticed, along comes a white-haired great-uncle with black eyebrows to steal his thunder.

The array of red and white flags that usually adorn the front pages today are absent, because many are in no mood post-Budget to celebrate (click for a review of their Budget coverage).

Some of the papers do feature one of England's national heroes, Robin Hood, but only as a metaphor for the new tax rate on high earners.

First port of call for a bit of nationalistic tub-thumping would usually be the Daily Express, which four days ago was urging readers to "whip up a fervour" on St George's Day.

But strangely there's no mention of England's patron saint. Perhaps the front page headline "THEY'VE RUINED BRITAIN" left them in no mood to lift a glass of warm beer to dragon-slayers.

Even the Daily Mail, which this month joined forces with Boris Johnson to turn 23 April into a national holiday, doesn't mention that today is that day.

The Guardian and the Independent are St George-free newspapers, although online the Guardian runs a survey on the most patriotic places in England.

Its northern editor Martin Wainwright - "where they burn the Satanic Verses, have street battles, and more benignly make fabulous curry" - which came third in the poll. Scarborough and Penwith, in Cornwall, came first and second respectively.

So it's left to the Sun to fly the flag, even if it is only on page 19. There's a full-page for St George, including a message from Gordon Brown that name checks a list of English people to be proud of, drawn mainly from the world of entertainment and the arts.

There's Lewis (Leona, not Lennox), Smith (Zadie, not Maggie), Shakespeare, Dench, Churchill, The Beatles, Beckham and Alan Bennett.

Brown (that's Gordon) signs off by offering "Mr Shakespeare" a happy birthday.

But the Daily Mirror goes one better. To mark the Bard's birthday, it imagines what Coronation Street would be like if he was writing the script. So Puck, Iago, Lady Macbeth and Falstaff are reincarnated as characters Sean Tully, Richard Hillman, Tracy Barlow and Fred Elliott.

Last word to the neglected St George. The Times makes the biggest effort to mark the day, by visiting the Israeli town of Lod where he was born and reportedly buried.

But it's a depressing scene - "crime, drugs and car parts scattered about the landscape like the detritus from a thousand pile-ups". And the only pilgrims at his tomb were from Italy.

• Bookmark with:
• |
• |
• - What's this?

"Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg" - the corrected spelling for the place with the longest name in the US

For years, signs pointing to the lake in Webster, Massachusetts, have carried a misplaced "o" at letter 20 where a "u" should be, and an "h" at letter 38 which should be an "n" - but all 17 "g" were present and correct. Now the local newspaper has unearthed the correct spelling, and the signs are to be changed.

• Bookmark with:
• del.icio.us |
• Digg |
• Reddit
• - What's this?

Re . Presumably the bird was a puffin.
Simon Robinson, Birmingham, UK

So the against the dollar since early April. I suppose it might be more worrying news if it wasn't still April.
James O, Oxford

The Bob from Glasgow (Tuesday letters) should note that "Property is theft" is an anarchist slogan, not a Marxist one, so his joke has failed.
Steve, London

The Bob, Glasgow. Not Marx, Proudhon.
Diana, Woking

Dear Charles Pizzitola III, (Tuesday letters). I will gladly send you some English tea if you supply an address. Then at least I will know that someone in the US has a decent cup of tea. I might even come over for a visit.
Louise, Windsor, UK

Peter of Leamington Spa (Tuesdays's letters) must be the only man with access to a computer who never got that naked-woman-done-entirely-in-ASCII-characters email that was doing the rounds a few years back. I'll get my birthday suit.
Ray, Turku, Finland

• Bookmark with:
• |
• |
• - What's this?

A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.

Gordon Brown is no Arnold Schwarzenegger, but for the sketch writers of Her Majesty's press Tuesday's prime ministerial "to camera" address (see embedded video) on the Downing Street website, about MPs' expenses, presents a chance to see who can best ape ().

In Mr Brown's case, it's not his muscular frame our keen-eyed observers are sharpening their focus on, rather his uncomfortable efforts to crack a smile while trying not to be dull and motionless.

For the Guardian's Simon Hoggart, it is , in a doomed attempt to reassure them... It is meant to be a friendly smile even if it is almost as scary as anything Hannibal Lecter might come up with."

Hoggart goes on to summon the image of a supply teacher in charge of an anarchic classroom and thinking "poor fool, that he might be able to win them over by sheer niceness".

For the Daily Mail's Quentin Letts, it is the smile of Herbert Lom. Herbert Lom? The actor who played chief inspector Dreyfus in the Pink Panther movies

[Mr Brown's] lips stretched wide into an inexplicable smile. His head jerked. He practically chuckled, reflexive to some deep-boned impulse... Had someone sprinkled itching powder in his smalls?"

At the Times, Ann Treneman notes he was .

Unable to avail itself of the services of a sketch writer, Metro just opts for a spot of in-story editorialising, identifying how Mr Brown was "like a Video DJ about to introduce the next track on an MTV show".

Sadly, when the ball is passed to the Independent's Simon Carr to show his flair in this particular arena, he removes it and plants it among at the Home Affairs Select Committee kick about.

The Daily Telegraph meanwhile seems to have vanished from Paper Monitor's desk. Maybe it's been nabbed by an over-eager tennis fan inspired by the in his commentary on Wimbledon's new Centre Court roof, about how the paper makes ideal reading matter for disappointed fans of the sport.

"The cover of...Watching the English, by Kate Fox... shows a couple sitting in a completely empty Centre Court beneath an umbrella, bored out of their minds and - not entirely by coincidence [as ever, Paper Monitor's italics] - reading a damp Daily Telegraph".

Meow.

• Bookmark with:
• |
• |
• - What's this?

"I spent New Year's Eve on my own, with a bottle of vodka and wrote this song. But I'm not at all bitter" - Unsigned songwriter Nick Hemming, nominated for one of the music industry's top prizes, an Ivor Novello award.

The 35-year-old works in a warehouse by day and pens songs by night. The latest, The Last of the Melting Snow, tells of meeting an ex he hoped - in vain - to get back together with. It's now been shortlisted for Best Song Musically and Lyrically, previously won by Paul McCartney, John Lennon and Andrew Lloyd Webber.

• Bookmark with:
• del.icio.us |
• Digg |
• Reddit
• - What's this?

is considering whether all police officers should be made to wear name badges. With a name like his, it shouldn't be a problem. For a policeman with a name like mine, it's tantamount to giving out his home address and phone number with an open invitation for harassment. (Note to the criminals of Yorkshire: I am not, in fact, a policeman. There is no need to visit or call.)
David Richerby, Leeds, UK

Regarding the , isn't it a little curious that the best time to start drinking wine starts on Friday at 6pm? Did the pub down the road sponsor the article? I'm not sure though that I'll still be drinking at 9am on Sunday, and it's hardly surprising after all that drinking that Sunday then becomes an "unfavourable" day.
Basil Long, Nottingham

Charles (Monday letters), one can find good English tea blends in the US, even here in Boston where we have habits of throwing it overboard. If there aren't tins in your local grocery, there are online dealers. If you're using tea bags though, you're on your own.
Nadja, north of Boston, US

Earl Grey.
Nicky Stu, Highbury, London

Charles Pittizola III, you may not get proper tea in the US, but you sure as heck get some great names there.
The Bob, Glasgow

And as Marx said, "Proper tea is theft."
The Bob, Glasgow

Re that Metro cartoon (Paper Monitor). I laughed and felt guilty at the same time. Certainly controversial.
Russ Tarbox, London, UK

If Paper Monitor is a guy, he's truly in touch with his feminine side...
Clare, Turnford, Herts

Re the gardener ordered to cover her naked gnomes (Quote of the day) - what should I do about my unclothed dwarf delphiniums?
Rob Falconer, Llandough, Wales

• Bookmark with:
• |
• |
• - What's this?

A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.

Hit or miss? Those of us slaving away at Monitor Towers are split over today's Metro's cartoon.

It features a couple walking past a newspaper billboard announcing that Stephen Hawking is gravely ill, and the man says: "I wonder if they've tried switching him off and switching him on again."

Paper Monitor cringes, being a delicate petal who cries during Lassie and has a desk liberally decorated with photos of kittens sleeping, kittens playing with balls of wool, kittens squaring up to Great Danes.

But Punorama, who's stopped by to say hi, begs to differ and points out that it is a play on the great man's willing - and necessary - adoption of technology to improve his quality of life.

Meanwhile, the Daily Mirror splashes with "COLLEEN: My secret baby agony". But who's the woman pictured, the brunette in the pussycat bow blouse? In tabloid world, there is only one Colleen, and she spells her name Coleen. And has yet to show much of a fondness for pussycat bows.

This time, it's Paper Monitor's colleague Housekeeping who steps in. "It's Colleen Nolan, you cretins. Don't you ever watch Loose Women?"

• Bookmark with:
• |
• |
• - What's this?

"They're proper cheeky chappies with their little smiley faces looking up at you" - Gardener ordered to cover her naked gnomes after complaints from neighbours.

Bromsgrove District Council has told grandmother Sandra Smith she must preserve the modesty of the two nude gnomes which have stood in the garden of her West Midlands home for more than 15 years. They now wear T-shirts.

• Bookmark with:
• del.icio.us |
• Digg |
• Reddit
• - What's this?

Re - great news for teletext buffs, but what will the Page 3 girl look like?
Peter, Leamington Spa

Thank you PM (Monday). I'd spotted that "virgin" headline over someone's shoulder on the train this morning. I was trying to work out whether it meant Richard Branson or maybe that Slumdog kid who's dad wants to sell her. And now I know.
Caroline Brown, Rochester, UK

Jon Barnes, Friday's letters, it says "the beginning of LAST century", so it would be more than 9 years, it would be 109 years...
Rob, Reading

Now is a proper all-noun headline.
Rob Foreman, London, UK

What is the most poplar tea consumed in England? We cannot get a decent cup of tea here in the US. The Tea here really sucks. If you do find a good English tea here it is usually so stale you can't drink it. I will probably have to send to off to England to get a good tin of tea. If I have written you in error please accept my apologies and if at all possible please direct to where I can find the info I seek. Thank you for your time and attention in this matter.
Charles Pizzitola III, League City Texas 77573

I wonder what the CO2 cost is of having as ?
Philip Chillag, Leeds, UK

• Bookmark with:
• |
• |
• - What's this?

A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.

Sorry to start the week with a grumble, but turning the clock back to Saturday, Paper Monitor couldn't help but feel a tad deflated on reaching for the Guardian's free map of the world only to realise it was merely a newsprint rendition - not the glossy affair newspapers have given us to expect these days. At the same time, the Guardian editor was explaining on p2 why the paper had gone up 10p - credit crunch, fall in advertising and "rising newsprint costs".

Putting such quibbles aside, Paper Monitor turns its attention to the overnight sensation that is Susan Boyle... and the troubling conundrum of how someone who couldn't be less preened for the modern media spotlight can actually be a highly talented singer.

All the weekend papers seemed to take their bite of Boyle. The Sunday Mirror, for example, waded in with this sensitive treatment of Miss Boyle's life of chastity.

"Susan gets her first snog... Spinster Susan has finally had her first snog... Family and friends...were shocked when she told judges she'd never been kissed... so Pal William McDonald, 64, stepped forward to do the honours [Paper Monitor's italics]".

In a seamless baton handover, Monday's Daily Mirror presents us with a Yorkshire Pudding that, apparently, is the spitting image of Susan Boyle.

The Sun, meanwhile, reduces Boyle to a convenient noun: "Virgin given a minder".

The Daily Telegraph is a Boyle-free zone today - choosing instead to look at the rather arcane matter of the replacement of manually-operated wooden level crossing gates at Frinton-on-Sea, Essex, with modern, remotely controlled alternatives.

But to the Telegraph, this is no mere updating of rail infrastructure. Rather, it's another erosion of standards of moral decency, as the paper tells us that "for more than a century [the gates] were a symbol of the town's refusal to accept the decline in social standards".

Eh? Is Paper Monitor missing something or were these level crossing gates invested with some mystical power for preventing teenage pregnancy or preserving the sanctity of marriage? Unfortunately, the gates' magical influence to arrest the onslaught of the liberal society are never elaborated upon.

• Bookmark with:
• |
• |
• - What's this?

"We have so many other things to educate consumers about - so many remain confused about screw caps for example" - Tesco manager on new developments in the wine industry

Tesco and Marks & Spencer have revealed they select the dates for tasting sessions with wine critics based on the biodynamic calendar. But Pierpaolo Petrassi, Tesco's senior product development manager, believes it is all a "little step beyond what consumers can comprehend".

• Bookmark with:
• del.icio.us |
• Digg |
• Reddit
• - What's this?