“Dawn Needs Pee-Pee”

“Please! Ask me about the theory of relativity!” – Paul S Club

Dominic Cummings told reporters on his doorstep this week that they should get out of London and start speaking to people who aren’t “rich Remainers”.

If any reporters are considering taking a trip up north at his suggestion, maybe they could stop by the Cummings’ family farm just south of Durham. It’s easy enough to find. It’s just off the A167 at a junction known locally as “Cock O’ The North”.

It took its name from a pub that used to stand there, but that’s long since been demolished. So it’s nice to see Dom doing everything in his power to make sure the name will be remembered for generations to come.

Back in 2007, a 17-year-old Aussie signed for a village cricket team in Cheshire: Grappenhall CC.

He arrived on a Tuesday but by the Friday, before a training session had even been held, he was already on his way home. The teenage cricketer had been so appalled by the boorish, drunken antics of his would-be teammates in their local, the Mulberry Tree, that he left.

It’s a shame because, as the son of a UK passport holder, if things had worked out there he could have gone on to play for England.

As it was, Steve Smith opted for Australia.

Which former MP used to use the chat-up line “Have you ever kissed an MP before?” while sloshing around the club in the wee small hours? Sadly, he had to retire it in 2015 after he lost his seat…

Taylor Swift’s latest album contains a song called “The Man” about how she gets it in the neck for doing things that she’d be celebrated for if she was a male star.

Today she announced she was going to play this year’s Melbourne Cup. Within minutes she was being harangued on social media by people complaining that a supposedly woke animal lover shouldn’t be getting paid to do two songs at a horse race with a questionable safety record. Her publicist has been fielding irate messages and calls about it all day.

Last year, when Sam Smith did the same gig? Not a peep.

Last week we told you that legendary Wall of Sound supremo Mark Jones got the boot from Soho House for nabbing food off other people’s plates. Happily, it seems he’s been faring a little better at some of Soho’s other clubs.

Earlier this summer, Ian Holloway was in the Groucho doing some TV interviews about the football. Mark Jones was in there too and came up to greet Holloway like an old friend. The two men had a five-minute conversation which ended with Holloway agreeing to buy Jones a burger.

As Jones disappeared into another room, one of the football journalists asked Holloway who his friend was. Holloway’s reply? “I’ve never met him before in my life!”

Roy Keane drew a fair bit of flak after an appearance in Dublin last week where he savaged everyone from his former boss, Sir Alex Ferguson, to new Man Utd star, Harry Maguire. Many column inches and social posts were written up about what a sad, bitter man Keane must be – but some of his old teammates would beg to differ.

Former United striker Andrew Cole developed some kidney problems a few years ago and, in 2017, underwent a transplant. While he was recovering in hospital, Cole came round one day to find Roy Keane sitting by his bed. The pair had been teammates back in the 90s, but Keane and Cole hadn’t exactly been close in the years since – so Cole was a little surprised to see him.

Asked why he was there, Keane simply said that he was concerned about his old friend and wanted to make sure he was OK, impressing on him that if there was anything he needed – anything at all – he only had to ask.

Carnage was narrowly avoided in Hackney on Sunday afternoon when a black BMW nearly crunched a cyclist outside a deli near Victoria Park. The driver had been trying to sneakily park his car in a loading bay but botched it so badly that he somehow managed to almost wipe out the same cyclist twice.

A crowd of other cyclists stopped by to chastise the driver for his careless manoeuvring, surrounding his car to shout at him through all available windows. Eventually, things calmed down and the cyclists left.

At which point, with the coast now clear, Christopher Biggins popped out and dashed into the deli to buy three cans of blood orange San Pellegrino.

All of his celebrity friends were astonished – just ASTONISHED – to hear about the types of things that Jeffrey Epstein got up to in his private life, but it’s not as if Epstein was particularly discreet about any of it.

There’s an anecdote passed around the New York hairdressing scene that Epstein used to bring very young-looking girls to a fancy celebrity NYC hairstylist to treat them to a cut-and-colour.

It takes a while for hair dye to fully develop and Epstein (ever impatient when it comes to development) would often find himself getting bored with all the waiting. So the salon owner would grant him use of a private backroom whenever he went – sending the girls back there with a reminder not to mess up their hair too much.

If you caught the Harvey Weinstein documentary on BBC2 the other week, you’ll no doubt have heard the “Fuckin’ Sheriff Of This Shit-Ass Town” story.

Strangely enough, that same incident plays a very significant role in the four-part story we’ve been telling you over the last few weeks (the one about Harvey Weinstein and Jeffrey Epstein both being early investors in what is now the National Enquirer’s sister site, Radar).

As well as explaining the Sheriff story, Part Three is also about Weinstein and Epstein’s earliest investment collaboration. The time they teamed up to try to buy New York Magazine.

[Read Part Three: The Coalition]

If you need to catch up on the previous parts of this story, they’re here:
[INTRO: Back On The Radar]
[PART ONE: Talk Of The Town]
[PART TWO: A Social Animal]

Last weekend’s Sunday Times Magazine was centred around a 14-page deep-dive into the world of social media stars, including an extensive ‘Top 100 Influencers’ chart.

Not the sort of fodder you’d usually expect the Sunday Times’ largely retirement-aged Home Counties readership to care much about. So was this a noble attempt at connecting News UK’s legacy media audience with the cutting edge of #content creation?

Or a 14-page advertorial to big up The Fifth, News UK’s social media influencer agency?

Is Madonna still keeping up with Popbitch? She’s just been making jokes on Facebook about how she needs to “go wee-wee” too…
[Coincidence?]

Local News Of The Week: Pooing On A Roof Edition
[Read on Lincolnshire Live]

Local News Of The Week: Pooing On A Car Edition
[Read on Devon Live]

This property listing starts out OK – and then…
[Flick through the photos]

Who wants Beryl Reid’s Aston Martin?
[Buy it here]

A Robin S/Crystal Waters/CeCe Peniston live medley
[La da dee, la da dah]

Film of the year? Killer Sofa: a movie about a murderous armchair
[Watch on YouTube]

Is that supposed to be… a wine rack?
[Plastic – but still NSFW]

Squeaky bat!
[See on Twitter]

Still Bored?
Our vote goes to the sea otter at this year’s Comedy Wildlife Photo Awards
[See the finalists]