A Lot Of Spunk

Had you asked Popbitch to select an MP to head up a new committee to investigate and uphold parliamentary standards, then we probably would have settled on John Whittingdale: the former Culture Secretary who once got caught taking a dominatrix on a freebie trip to the MTV Awards in Amsterdam, which he then failed to declare.

Who better to examine the details of MPs’ contentious lobbying efforts than the man who also failed to declare the free hospitality he accepted from a London lapdancing club at the same time he was chairing an inquiry into the licensing process for London lapdancing clubs?

He’d have been the Popbitch pick for sure – and it seems the only difference between us and Her Majesty’s Government is that, critically, we’d have been joking…

The front-page beef between Anne Robinson and Rachel Riley on the set of Countdown won’t come as a surprise to anyone who was reading Popbitch at the start of the year, when we had to start actively rationing Anne Robinson horror stories from the set of The Weakest Link, in case it looked like we had some sort of personal vendetta.

A challenger for Cilla’s crown, Anne’s history of being difficult to work with stretches back long before she started hosting quiz shows. Directors on Watchdog used to have to carry around swatches of tasteful material to drape over the backs of interviewees’ couches because Robinson was notorious for rejecting films if she didn’t like the décor in scam victims’ houses.

Which famously volatile band have found a novel way of keeping their tempers in check – by working to a weekly drug rota (coke one week, ket the next, etc) to stop things getting too hairy?

Laurence Fox was tweeting this weekend that Ladbrokes has him at 500/1 to be the next Prime Minister. He even took a screenshot of him staking a pound on himself, showing the potential return of £501 if the bet ever came good.

Interestingly, he only screen-grabbed a proposed stake though. Even for the sake of the joke, it seems he wasn’t prepared to hit ‘Confirm’ and actually waste a quid on it.

As far as we can tell, there wasn’t a single penny placed on Lozza all weekend. Nor has one been placed on him all year. The Next Prime Minister book has been open longer than he realises – and the last time anyone put any money on Foxy to take No.10 was back in November 2020.

If Paul Dacre does end up getting the job at Ofcom, you can be sure that one of his first orders of business will be downgrading the C-word from ‘Most Offensive’ to ‘Punctuation’.

Dacre’s potty mouth is legendary on Fleet Street, but there’s a particularly good anecdote about it in the Mail Men biography which sees Dacre picking up the phone to talk to one of his journalists, Jimmy Grylls, but actually ending up on the line with Tory MP Michael Grylls.

Immediately, Dacre launches into one of his famous tirades, barking orders liberally peppered with Fs and Cs – until a colleague, horrified, points out that he isn’t speaking to one of his lackeys, but a member of Parliament.

Dacre realises an apology will be in order. So, barely missing a beat, the next words out of his mouth? “Oh, I’m a cunt! I really am a fucking cunt! What a stupid fucking cunt I am!”

As charges of fraud finally catch up with ex-FIFA boss Sepp Blatter, a quick reminder of one of the greatest stories of the last decade.

In 2010, Sepp was awarded a prestigious South African award for his work in bringing the World Cup to their country. The announcement appeared on an official government website, where they had clearly copied and pasted Sepp’s details from Wikipedia.

Which is why they referred to him rather formally as “Joseph Sepp Bellend Blatter”.

Word has apparently reached Ben Shephard about the rumour we mentioned last week: that he once owned three dogs named “Ben”, “Shep” and “Herd”.

His response (at least as it was relayed to us) was that, if the dog story were true, they would have been called “Ben”, “Shep” and “Hard”.

Which is true. But we couldn’t help but notice isn’t exactly a denial…

We hear a lot about how streaming has ruined the Xmas charts, now the same half dozen songs elbow their way back in to the Top 20 every year. Well, it looks like the same thing is going to start happening with Halloween too.

All due to enter the UK Top 40 this week after a weekend of spooky party playlists:

* Monster Mash – Bobby Boris Pickett (last in the UK Top 40 in 1973)
* Ghostbusters – Ray Parker Jr (1985)
* Thriller – Michael Jackson (2017)
* Somebody’s Watching Me – Rockwell (1984)
* Time Warp – Richard O’Brien & Patricia Quinn (this version’s first time in the Top 40)

“I did a day’s work shadowing on Wolf Blitzer’s programme at CNN in Washington DC about 15 years ago, preposterously entitled ‘The Situation Room’. At the end of it, standing behind the cameras in the studio just after he came off air, I asked Wolf if I could have a photo with him.

“He nodded and said, with great seriousness: ‘Come into The Situation Room.'”

No otter left behind
[See on Twitter]

Jurassic Park, but with a cat
[Watch on YouTube]

Danish politician Janus Boye’s campaign has been targeted by poster vandals. Enough have been turned into ‘Anus Boy’ that he’s made the national news…
[Read on Ekstrabladet]

Succession, but as a Greg’n’Tom romcom trailer
[See on YouTube]

Memories of Cool Britannia from some of its famous faces
[Read on Vice]

Metallica x Leo Sayer
[Listen on YouTube]

Propmaster (and daughter of Martin) Cathy Scorsese gives her thoughts on the Rust shooting
[Read on Business Insider]

Onesies for otters
[Cute]

Still Bored?
Could the Queen identify Super Mario?
[Thoughts and theories on Gawker]