Old Dogg, New Tricks

Seeing as experimentation and heavy drinking appear to be the two breakout activities of lockdown, here’s a cocktail recipe you might like to try this weekend – courtesy of Sugababe Mutya Buena.

The base of the cocktail is effectively a Long Island Iced Tea: with equal measures of vodka, gin, tequila, rum and triple sec, and a generous helping of lime juice. But when you’d ordinarily go to top the drink up with cola, Mutya’s twist is to use prosecco instead.

Since appearing in a recent ad for Just Eat, everyone’s been accusing Snoop Dogg of being a massive sell-out – but the Doggfather hasn’t turned full suit quite yet.

Last summer, Snoop was invited to headline a big corporate gig in Huntington Beach, California. As executives had been treated to music earlier in the day from the distinctly un-edgy Beach Boys and Dean (of Jan & Dean) promoters were keen to make sure Snoop didn’t cause any trouble. Ahead of his slot he was warned in no uncertain manner “No swearing. No drugs.”

As darkness fell, Snoop bounded on stage – a nine inch spliff in one hand, shouting into his mic “…FUCK’S HAPPENIN’?”

Who at the BBC has forgotten how to use the toilet properly? Instead of flushing, they’re just piling lots of loo roll on top of their droppings and leaving it for the next person to deal with.

(The most likely suspect has been treated pretty shittily by the Beeb recently – so maybe it’s a dirty protest?)

Back when this whole lockdown situation started, we thought it might be fun to write a 14-day course of Popbitch mini-issues to help people through self-isolation. Then there was talk of 21 days being the key quarantine duration, so we extended it. This week saw us publish our second full month of daily mini-issues – and still there’s no real end in sight to the lockdown.

Ordinarily, we’d be annoyed about getting duped into doing so much work, but the daily issue has been so much fun to compile we can’t really stay mad. If you want to catch up with the issues so far, or sign up to get them direct to your inbox then you can do so here.

In the meantime, here are some stories that we saved back for the weekly.

Last Friday we asked people to tell us about the strangest ways they’ve seen celebrities make a grand entrance or exit. We couldn’t not share this one with the whole class…

DG writes:
“A few years ago, on the set of a Tom Cruise movie, one of his co-stars was relaxing in their trailer with their family when Tom’s assistant comes to the trailer and asks if Tom could pop in and say hi?

“Cruise comes in charismatically and has some iPads to give away to the co-star and his family. They all love it and are amazed by his generosity.

“An hour later, the same assistant turns up, saying that Tom loved giving the iPads to everyone and wanted to do it again. The co-star is confused but they agree to give back the iPads and Tom comes back into the trailer to do it all again, completely straight-faced.”

Tuesday’s issue was filled with tales of celebrity lost property, but we wanted to hold this story back about Harrison Ford and his time in London filming The Force Awakens.

RLJ writes:
“While escaping work for half an hour, I walked into the Elephant and Castle just off Kensington High Street and who else but Harrison Ford is in there, full lycra running gear on, having a half pint on his own.

“I go to the bar, get my drink and nervously say hi and briefly tell him what a hero of mine he is. He was very polite and I left him to his half. He then left the bar five minutes later but left his wallet on the table. (Who knows where he would have put it in all the lycra he was wearing anyway.)

“I grab the wallet and run up the road shouting ‘Harrsion!’ He turns back and I hand him his wallet and he says ‘I guess you’re my hero now.'”

S writes:
“I used to work at Paul Smith on Floral Street and once Jack Nicholson came in. After a bit of chat he asked to try on a shirt. Into the fitting rooms he goes and a few minutes later he comes out saying the button has popped off his trousers and asks if we can we fix it.

“We say we will, he goes back into the fitting room and we expect to see an arm pop out holding the trousers. Instead, the door is opened and out he strides wandering around the suit department in his pants.

“He bought £400 worth of stuff, roughly the same as his mate but his mate’s card wouldn’t go through. Rather than pay for him, Jack told him he’d have to keep the bag out the back and come back the next day to get it.”

We’ve always known that Liam Gallagher inspires the sweet language of love (who could forget the poetry of the moment when he and ex-wife Nicole Appleton first met*?) – but we didn’t know he was fluent himself.

When Liam once saw an ad poster for a magazine that featured Kate Moss on its cover, Our Kid turned to the person he was with and informed them “I’ve had her on the end of my finger.”

We’ve mentioned in Popbitches gone by how Jean Claude Van Damme refuses to use public toilets as he’s terrified that people will try to take photos of his knob. An unenviable situation to be in, for sure, but it’s not without its upsides.

Years ago, Van Damme attended a boxing match at the Manchester Arena. He had a ringside seat but couldn’t get access to the VIP toilets. When he explained to staff that he needed to visit the gents, but didn’t want a queue of people all trying to snap a dick pic, staff sympathetically led him to a nearby suite and explained the situation to its inhabitant.

Chris Eubank not only gladly welcomed Van Damme in to use the facilities, the two of them ended up becoming close buddies as a result.

As we aren’t going to be able to host our IRL pub quiz for a while, we’ve decided to make them available as downloadable packages for you to play at home instead.

Each quiz package contains everything you need to host your own version for friends/family, and they’re just £5 each – or available in value bundles too.

The most recent quiz (the Teal Edition; our sixth) features Brother Or Lover?, K-Pop or KKK-Pop?, an exclusive audio round, a celebrity alias wordsearch, pop music mathematics and much more.

[Check out the whole range here]

David Lynch is giving lockdown weather reports
[Watch on YouTube]

Facing permanent closure because of Covid?
[The Vagina Museum]

Notorious BIG x Gilbert and Sullivan
[Deepfake rap of the week]

An oral history of Sisqo’s The Thong Song
[Read on Def Jam]

Jennifer Garner is a fan of Iceland’s Eurovision entry
[Her poor cat]

Animal news of the week: Hamsters in masks spread far less Covid-19 than hamsters without masks
[Read on SCMP]

French tax authorities have a website for people who made a mistake when submitting their details
[www.oups.gouv.fr]

COMPETITION TIME
We’ve got some copies of the official Eurovision 2020 album to give away to Popbitch readers. Send your best stupid joke to quiz@popbitch.com to enter and we’ll select winners at random.
[Or you can order one here]

Still Board?
The Popbitch Messageboard is back for lockdown
[Here it is]