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“Nick Grimshaw has a right slinky pair of pins on him” – Sara Cox
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|_| |_| 28.11.13 ISSUE 667
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* First class twits
* Fake Kate Moss
* Charts: Calvin/Theo/Alesso are no 1
>> Spotifspy <<
Watch what you’re listening to
Defenders of government snoopers will often trot out the line that the agency is miles too busy to track civilians, that the only things they’ll be intercepting are terrorist communications.
Well, they might be having more fun than they are prepared to admit. We’re told that the little party trick of one particular agency is sending text messages to their friends – featuring the lyrics to the songs that said friend is listening to on Spotify.
Steve Harris from Iron Maiden’s eight-bedroom mansion (with football pitch and floodlit tennis court) went on sale last November. It’s still on the market.
>> First class twits <<
How politicians make friends
When Chancellor George Osborne was caught sitting in the first class carriage of a train with a standard class ticket, it was front page news. But if gossip leaking out of BA’s Club Class is anything to go on, it seems there’s a worse offender in Whitehall.
A recent flight from the States was delayed by an hour so that a British politician could have his bodyguards fully check the plane. Once they’d finished, they then turfed three business class passengers out of their seats, so that his security team could all sit together – even though most of them only had economy tickets.
Whose team was it that had the brass neck? Why, it was self-styled ‘ex-politician’ Gordon Brown MP!
BG writes: “I used NorthernRailFreeWiFi as my hotspot name when travelling as I hoped it would cause their complaints desk to be bombarded with calls about not connecting.”
>> Big Questions <<
Who wants to know what?
So many rumours are starting to leak out from Matthew Freud’s 50th birthday party, but the one we most want to be true? The one about the model and the annoying rock star having sex in full view of a number of guests…
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>> Fostering appeal <<
Words… don’t come easy
We never thought you could feel sorry for X Factor producers, but we almost do this year. A largely talent and charisma free line-up has gone from being laughed at by viewers and reviewers to ignored.
By this point in the series you can usually see the machinations going on to demote their least favoured (but popular with the public) and push their picks through good production, placement and PR. But last year the weight of the X Factor machine swung behind James Arthur. And despite the single’s sale, look how well that turned out…
So it was interesting to see they can’t quite help themselves trying to engineer things, with all the headlines linking Tamera Foster with X Factor alumnus Niall from 1D, to keep her in the news. (The earlier nonsense attaching her to another X Factor gimp obviously gained no traction).
With Screwbo hot favourite, and a cast of nondescript buskers alongside her, they must know their best chance of getting any media coverage is to make sure the one that keeps forgetting all the words stays on the programme.
FYI: Full TV betting round up to come next week. And remember re IACGMOH, the second favourite often wins and a sports star usually makes the top three.
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Fantastically rude and funny Christmas cards and gifts. Just perfect for those special friends and dreaded Secret Santas. Loads of everyday vulgarity too. Not long now until the big Ho Ho Ho! http://bit.ly/OCjy1
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>> Frank discussion <<
Filipino slaves in the news
Those “eye-watering” allegations against Nigella we’d mentioned finally got an airing in court. The two personal assistants’ didn’t do themselves many favours with the jury, surely, with the complaint they were ‘treated worse than Filipino slaves’ by being asked to contribute to the 60k per month they’d been spending on expenses. Bearing in mind two of the biggest news stories around are the Philippines typhoon disaster and South London “slaves” rescue…
Which reminded us that the late BBC star Frank Muir used to have two Filipinos who lived in a shed at the bottom of his garden. In exchange for that living space they cleaned and looked after him.
Brave social media campaign of the day: @ManUtd imploring Twitterers to sum up Ryan “Superinjunction” Giggs’ career in 140 characters…
>> Cop strop <<
Royalty wranglings
fayekorgazm writes:
“Lewis Collins will be chinwagging with Gordon Jackson now, about what a curmudgeonly old sod Martin Shaw was/still is. For it was Shaw who held up release of The Professionals on video, thus depriving both Collins and Jackson’s widow royalties for many years, despite Jackson’s wife announcing her need for the cash.”
Alan Pardew – on the Beak (St), spotted enjoying a post-match pint in the Coffee House pub, Soho.
>> Arthur’s feat <<
A difficult bloke to like
This week has seen a huge amount of media publicity for a Facebook campaign calling to drop X Factor winner James Arthur from his upcoming appearance on the show. To put it in perspective:
1. Number of “likes” the campaign has amassed – 7,000.
2. Number of people who bought James Arthur’s Impossible. 1,200,000.
3. Number of people who watched last week’s X Factor? 7,700,000.
Rihanna sold her 10 millionth album in the States last week. She’s released seven long players in eight years.
>> Male order <<
Online store proves popular
When companies launch catalogues and online shops they usually expect it to take a year to start making a profit. That was the case with all the Arcadia group online stores apart from Evans, the shop for larger ladies. Demand was massive, ahem, from the outset and the sales were so high that it went in to profit after just a few months. But why? Well, online shopping proved to be a massive boon not just for ladies. But especially for those men who like to dress as ladies.
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“Art on the Street. THE Open-Air Art Fair! Over 100 stands of fine art, ceramics and photography plus live music, workshops & street food!” http://www.artonthestreet.org.uk
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>> Cock up <<
How journalism works pt 352
A few days ago the Mail, Mirror, Sun and Telegraph excitedly ran an agency story on their websites about a housing estate in Hoylake, Wirral, that looks like a cock and balls when seen from above on Google Earth.
Perhaps they shouldn’t have been quite so excited. The Sunday Sport ran the same story five months ago. (With a much better headline, btw “Cul-de-nutsack”.)
And the Sunday Sport themselves spotted it on a local Hoylake blog back in June.
http://bit.ly/1ikrxYE
It’s that shark-jumping moment for little folk – Leicester Square’s Hippodrome are advertising for “Door Dwarves”.
>> Silly mosstake <<
QW – Friend of The Stars
Quentin Wilson, the original Top Gear presenter, needs to brush up on his sleb spots. On Saturday night he tweeted about what a lovely evening he’d had at the Groucho, in the presence of Gary Lineker, Richard Bacon, Boy George and Kate Moss. That is until Boy George replied “Kate Moss? Yeah right!”.
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>> Hmms <<
Pot, pop, pigs
World cup seedings. Play a rubbish friendly = get unseeded?
http://bbc.in/180lEsY
Gross. Especially for the chipmunk in the Sarah Jessica Parker movie:
http://bit.ly/18MFAA2
Local news of the week. It’s about a “sad” fish:
http://bit.ly/1b0grCr
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Christmas cards, art prints and all manner of excellent gift ideas from Lovely Jojo’s (who is every bit as lovely as the name suggests) http://www.lovelyjojos.com/
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Thanks to: Meow, SG, KJ, CMH, Sk, TP, bad_horsey, m, CMH, JT, JD, deepstoat, danceswithmustelids, AM, meow
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Old Jokes Home:
Q/ What is Nigella doing on her new Xmas show?
A/ Cold turkey.
