Hugging The Bedtaker

Chelsea footballer Antonio Rüdiger recently took part in a photo shoot for Nike and, as you’d expect of a professional athlete, his rider requested an extremely detailed, precision-engineered selection of nutritionally balanced, health-giving snacks.

Just kidding.

He asked for Haribo Starmix, six cans of coke, some Terry’s Chocolate Orange minis and a packet of Crunchie Rocks.

Ted Baker boss Ray Kelvin has taken a voluntary leave of absence while accusations of workplace sexual harassment against him are investigated.

It’s unlikely that he’ll be responding to many emails during this leave of absence – but if he’s smart, he’ll probably close his email account down completely.

For though the username ‘bedtaker’ might be a tremendously funny play on words, it probably isn’t going to help convince the investigators that those ‘forced hugs’ of yours were all strictly legit.

Which radio personality has been known to make female producers this unusual ultimatum during live broadcasts: “Get your tits out, or I won’t play the next record – so you’ll be responsible for the station getting taken off the air”?

Poor Joe Lycett. He was supposed to be headlining a recent benefit for MS at the Comedy Store but had to insist on a last minute change of line-up when he was struck down with a pesky case of the shits.

Joe was still determined to lend his help to the good cause though – so, rather than cancel completely, he asked if he could go on first instead.

Obviously diarrhoea is an embarrassing thing to have to bring up with an audience, but it’s a good job he mentioned it because there were multiple points throughout the set where his sentences sort of drifted away as he visibly switched focus to concentrate on keeping his bumhole closed.

Still, he bravely battled on and finished without visible incident. What a trooper!

It sounds like the relationship between Prince Naseem Hamed and his local branch of Blockbuster ran much deeper than we first thought.

A regular customer between ’99 and ’03, Nas insisted that staff at the Berkeley Precinct branch kept a supply of pre-signed photographs of him behind the counter because he didn’t like to be bothered while he was browsing for movies. As he spent a fortune there most weeks, they obliged.

Sadly, nobody ever asked for one. The photos were all still there, untouched, the day that the shop closed down in 2013.

Back in the ’90s when Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman were filming Eyes Wide Shut they were living in Kingston-on-Thames. Tom popped into the local branch of Blockbusters to open an account but couldn’t because didn’t have any ID.

To try to spare himself a trip home, he picked one of his films up off the shelf and showed staff his face on the cover to see if they’d accept that as valid ID. They wouldn’t. So Tom had to pop back home to pick up his ID, before returning to the store to open a new account by the book.

(Apparently, he handled it all very well.)

A former employee at the Blockbuster branch in Cheshunt got in touch to tell us of the time in the early 90s that a young woman came in asking for a Corey Haim film.

It struck him as quite a weird request, as Haim was already pretty washed up by then, but the girl went on to explain that it was for Corey Haim himself. She told him Haim was parked outside in her dad’s car, but he was too scared to come in and rent his own film in case he got recognised.

Thinking this was a load of old rubbish, he nevertheless offered her the choice of Lost Boys, Lucas and Licence To Drive. She picked Licence To Drive and left.

A few years later, he noticed in the tabloids there was a kiss’n’tell story about Corey Haim and a famous celeb that Haim had met at a London recording studio. The weird customer. Victoria Adams.

Or as she’s better known now, Victoria Beckham.

Since we accidentally cockblocked Jimmy Bullard earlier this summer, revealing that he was trying to fob off a corporate booking in order to head out to Marbella and hang out with some young students he’d been texting, we were a little worried that we might have put him off his stride.

Luckily, the Governor of Banter is made of stern stuff and hasn’t let such a minor set-back get to him. Instead, he’s been bantering up a storm with a selection of flight attendants on Instagram – apparently unaware that air crews talk between themselves.

And to others…

Why are so many of the Mail’s columnists having their heads turned by the Times? Well, the level of attention they appear to be getting from the top brass there is pretty inviting.

New Sunday Times columnist Rachel Johnson was a guest on TalkSport recently and accidentally left her iPad behind at the studio. When she realised what she’d done, she called them and said she’d pop by shortly to pick it up.

Only she didn’t turn up to collect it. John Witherow’s personal chauffeur did instead.

Want to experience a record-breaking urban downhill BMX attempt from a GoPro perspective?
[Watch on YouTube]

Sci-fi podcast To The Manor Borne By Robots returns with Ep.10: a billionaire wants to feed the world edible bugs! What could go wrong?
[Listen here]

Noel Gallagher’s house is for sale
[See on Zoopla]

Lauren Harries is trying to buy a bus
[Help on GoFundMe]

Why are there no new Christmas songs?
[Read on Prospect]

Before Tumblr gets rid of all its smut, here’s a Tumblr dedicated solely to Gene Kelly’s arse
[See Gene Kelly’s arse]

The last four years’ worth of Popbitch annuals are here for you, for free
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Although if you did want to chuck us a few quid for them to buy a Christmas pint, please do
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Still Bored?
The wonderful Miranda Sawyer talks to Media Masters podcast. Everything from Madchester to Madonna, how to write a hatchet job and a guide to a mid-life crisis.
[Listen at Media Masters]