Filth Patrol

The world might be arse over elbow at the minute, but there’s nothing quite like watching mid-tier British celebrities trying to drum up a bit of publicity in the middle of a global health crisis to make you realise that some things will never change.

Refusing to be cowed by the threat of coronavirus, Myleene Klass is still braving the streets of London in defiance of the lockdown in order to make her way into the Global Radio studios to record her Smooth FM show.

Not only that, she’s still bravely tipping off the paps to let them know exactly when she’s due to cross Leicester Square, so the MailOnline still has plenty of shots of her to run on the Sidebar of Shame too.

Hopefully she’s being responsible and reminding photographers to stay at least 2m apart.

In among all the usual items on the rider he submitted to a venue he played recently (water, fruit, snacks etc) Adam Ant also made a request for a pink dressing gown. Knowing that artists will often put a wildcard item on their rider just to make sure that venues have paid attention to every last detail, an employee was duly sent out to pick one up.

They returned with one and laid it out for Mr Ant – but, sure enough, they noticed that throughout his time there he didn’t actually wear the garment once.

But it was later found in the dressing room, soaked in piss.

Which Hollywood beauty has become so addicted to wearing Spanx that even though she’s smaller than the smallest size they make she gives them to wardrobe to take them in for her?

Madonna faced a pretty sharp backlash when she videoed herself in the bath calling coronavirus “The Great Equalizer” – but maybe she was on to something?

Kirstie Allsopp used to enjoy an A-List hometown hero reputation in the village of Broadhembury, Devon. Sadly, her name is now mud among the locals because they all blame her for bringing Covid-19 to their doors when she chose to flee that there London and quarantine herself in their peaceful little idyll instead.

We hear the anger is such that the chances of her opening any fetes again after the lockdown is lifted are practically nil.

With the UK’s Chief Medical Officer self-isolating, you may have noticed Sir Simon Stevens taking a more prominent role in the government’s recent coronavirus briefings. He’s a smart choice to wheel out in a time of crisis, as we hear he has quite the bedside manner.

A few years back, someone who had half an ear on the studio feed in the ITV News studio a few minutes before the 10pm bulletin overheard Julie Etchingham bashfully purring to her producer about how “very charming” she had found him during an interview earlier in the day.

Neighbours of Nick Cave can always tell whenever he’s got new music in the pipeline. How? Because they’ll see him come out of his front door, get into the car parked outside and watch him as he listens to his latest demos loudly through his car stereo.

Not because his car stereo is particularly good, you understand – but because his missus won’t let him play them in the house.

Well, we made it through another week of sending out daily Popbitch mini-issues to those of you who need a little mood-lift each afternoon under quarantine. If you haven’t joined us for these daily shots of smut and silliness, you should sort that out as soon as possible. If you’re working from home (or no longer working) it’s like a little breakroom gossip each day.

We’ve put together an archive of the 14 isolation issues so far if you want to catch up, but you can get it direct to your inbox each day by signing up here.

[Get Popbitch: The Daily Tonic]

On Monday, we asked daily readers for stories about the nicest favours that celebs had ever done them. A couple of our favourites came in a day late though, so we decided to save them back for you.

RD writes:
“Years ago (late 80s) a mate of mine was following Napalm Death around the country on tour… until he sprained his ankle stage-diving, which made hitching from gig to gig difficult. So for the remaining dates of the tour, the band took it in turns for one of them to hitch to gigs, so my mate could have their seat in the van.”

KC writes:
“When I was at uni at Imperial College in the late 90s, a group of us were gleefully downing pints and smoking in the union when someone decided to dance on the table. The inevitable happened, he face-planted into the adjacent table full of empties – so I, being the most sober of the group, offered to take him to Chelsea and Westminster hospital.

“Outside the union no cabs would stop for us (there was a lot of blood). Just when we thought we’d have to walk, a sleek black Range Rover pulled over and a beautiful blonde woman asked if she could help. I explained our predicament and she offered to drive. I spied white leather interiors and started to decline but she insisted she take us to A&E. We sat on my jacket in the back and after the 10 min ride I was grateful to see we hadn’t stained the seats.

“She was lovely throughout the ride and genuinely concerned for my idiot friend. It was only when she dropped us off and I thanked her yet again did I realise we’d been graciously chauffeured by Elle Macpherson.”

On Tuesday, we asked people to tell us about the strangest celebrity friendships they know of. One reader told us that Timmy Mallett and Sir Clive Woodward are neighbours and attend the same church, where Timmy can be seen constantly dicking about during the sermon. We’ve since had some corroboration.

RP writes:
“I know it to be true that he acts up in church as one Xmas Eve a few years back I was dragged along to midnight mass. Just after it all started, I looked over to see Timmy gurning, waving and giving me huge double thumbs up. Very, very strange and a little disturbing.

“After a long minute of this I was about to say something, before the chap behind me gently tapped on my shoulder and whispered ‘Please just ignore him. It’s us he’s looking at.'”

Maurice Gibb from the Bee Gees’ spaceship is up for sale
[See on Facebook Market]

If orangutans can do it, so can you
[WASH YOUR HANDS]

Need a Friday night pop fix? A four hour live-stream Taylor Swift DJ set is raising cash for charity
[Swiftothon 2020: Friday @ 8pm]

Kitten cam from the Los Angeles Sanctuary
[Watch them live]

Koalas to the max!
[Play here]

Can a neural network identify your browser drawings?
[Play Quick Draw]

Making cocktails with your back-of-of-the-cabinet booze
[Ideas on the Guardian]

Need a VPN to protect your browsing in lockdown? CyberGhost is offering Popbitch readers a great deal on their annual package and is donating 10% of sales to coronavirus relief funds
[Take a look]

Still Bored?
Can’t Touch This: The Isolation Mix
[Listen on Mixcloud]