The Second Serve // Martin Buttocks

It’s been a weekend heavy with rumours of a snap summer election, and equally stout denials from No.10. But it might be more instructive to look at what MPs are doing rather than saying to get the best gauge of how imminent an election is.

It seems there’s been an uptick in the number of Tory MPs starting up a course of the modish slimming treatment, Wegovy – hoping to look trim and match fit for all the campaigning they plan to do.

Both for a general election and then the inevitable leadership challenge.

Now that Huw Edwards has officially left the BBC, details of their investigation into his conduct are starting to emerge. How candid were their findings?

It’s been reported that the Beeb had cause to speak with Huw about his inappropriate conduct on Instagram in 2021 and 2022. That might well be true, but his habit of sliding into DMs was well-known before that. We first alluded to it back in November 2019 (PB958 “Selena Goatmez“).

You’ll see that that week’s Big Question was about a newsreader who’d been making a name for himself on Instagram for sending some very friendly DMs – sat under the sneakily amended subhead “Huw’s been asking what this week?”

Politico has not only been fervently following every little detail of the New York Times’ fall-out with the Biden administration, they have been shit-stirring immaculately.

While everyone else’s coverage has basically boiled down to the topline “NYT blasts Biden for not doing interviews”, Politico has been getting deep into the weeds of the beef between the two parties.

The finest detail they’ve managed to uncover? That one of the contributors to @NYTPitchbot – a Twitter account that posts nothing but scathing parodies of NYT headlines – is… Biden’s deputy press secretary.

KW writes:
“Further to Thursday’s quote from Carol Decker, I must share a story of the feisty redhead. A few years ago, I was viewing a venue with a promoter friend who is married to a wonderful musician from a very popular band, who was with us for the venue recce.

“We arrived just as T’Pau had loaded in and were wandering about ahead of their soundcheck. As the venue manager took us up the stairs towards a second room being used as their dressing room, Decker shot a death scowl from the sidelines. We stood talking logistics to the venue manager and Decker stormed in and actually stamped her foot like a toddler, screaming ‘I thought this was MY dressing room’ and slammed the door as she went off in a huff.

“Apparently it was one of several little tantrums that day. When she pulled up at the venue, her first question was ‘Why isn’t my face plastered over the front of this building?'”

Once again, we’ve completely forgotten to do what we promised we would: dig out fun stories for each Club Popbitch issue from the corresponding issue of original recipe Popbitch, to show you what we were talking about back then.

We’ll catch you up with a speed run through the last few issues below – but we couldn’t condense this perfect scene that featured in PB117. Overheard in the OXO Tower over lunch, between Les Dennis and his agent.

AGENT: Calm down, Les

LES: I can’t calm down. Why didn’t I get the Lottery?

AGENT: You’ve got ‘Fortunes, Les, just calm down.

LES: But why didn’t I get the bloody Lottery? I mean, where am I going?

AGENT: ‘Fortunes is security, Les. You’ll always have ‘Fortunes.

LES: BUT WHERE AM I GOING? IT’S NOT ENOUGH.

AGENT: Calm down Les. You should be happy with ‘Fortunes.

LES: Sorry.

* Each series of Baywatch used 306lbs of body makeup and one 50-gallon drum of sunscreen.

* Martin Clunes means ‘Martin Buttocks’ in Latin

* Heather Mills and Paul McCartney used to call each other by code names when they began dating. Names for Macca included Lord Jock of Dundee, Vladimir the Russian Masseur and Mr Patel.

* More painful than their high-profile divorce? The thought that Angelina allegedly had the words “Billy Bob Thornton” tattooed on her labia.

* Norman Cook had a reflective toilet bowl in his house (“When I reach forward for the bogroll I can see my balls hanging down. That’s disconcerting.”)

* Fran Cutler sacked a PA after one week because they were supposed to fax Kate Moss at a hotel under the false name “Pixie”. But they misheard and addressed Kate’s fax “Dear Pigsy”.

* Louis Theroux used to write letters to Hip-Hop Connection using the pen name King Lou E.

Last week we had audio rounds on the themes of Diss Tracks, Landfill Indie, Mark Menzies MP, Rough Trade and songs from the compilation album Now That’s What I Call… Unforgettable.

This week, we’ve got five more. Listen to each two-and-a-bit minute mix and see if you can identify all ten songs and all ten artists in it. There are twenty points on offer (one point per piece of info), making a hundred points across the week.

You can then swap those points for a warm feeling a satisfaction and/or smugness.

Today’s Theme: John Hughes

[Play it here]

The Ingram-Moores are selling up
[Sans spa facility]

How many games of Tetris can you play at once?
[Play Neltris]

Wombats are taking to the sea
[Read on ABC]

A fun video from Tim Hunkin of Novelty Automation
[Watch on YouTube]