Tweaking The Etch-A-Sketch

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“Gossip is a plague worse than Covid. Worse.” – Pope Francis

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* Footballers playing away from home

* Ghost lawyers of the music biz

* PLUS: Farewell to Sawmills Studios

>> Put a ring on it <<

Vlad serves up a Russian twist

Naomi Campbell has been served with a multi-million pound lawsuit from her Russian billionaire ex, Vladislav Doronin. He says she’s still got £3 million of his property that he wants returning. Seems like an awful lot of stuff to have accidentally let slip, but then Vlad’s never been the best at keeping track of his possessions.
When the pair were dating, someone who worked in a hotel the couple stayed at had to call Mr Doronin after he checked out of their suite so they could find a way to return the rather personal item he’d left behind on the bedside table.
Maybe they shouldn’t have bothered, but it would have been an awful shame to toss out such a finely crafted cock ring.

Kylie’s mega-hit Can’t Get You Out Of My Head turned 19 this week. Acts who turned it down before Kylie? S Club 7 and Sophie Ellis-Bextor.

>> Car tool <<

The prince and the police

It won’t come as a surprise to learn that Prince Andrew isn’t a wildly popular figure among the close protection officers that are required to cover him, but that’s not because he’s become any more difficult to work with since the Epstein scandal flared up. He was already a nightmare before that.
One time Handsy Andy stormed into their office at Windsor, absolutely livid. Someone had moved his sports car, he yelled, and he had come to blame them. Threatening to have everyone fired and calling them every name under the sun, he screamed and shouted until he was blue in the face.
It later transpired that Princess Anne had been the one to move the car. And once Andrew found out, he never apologised to the officers – nor mentioned the incident ever again.

California Governor Gavin Newsom had an otter for a pet when he was a child. It was called Potter.

>> Big Questions <<

Who’s asking what this week?

Which former kids TV host earned himself the nickname ‘Etch-A-Sketch’ on account of his penchant for having his nipples tweaked right at the critical moment?

Oktoberfest may have been cancelled, but you can still enjoy the best of the fest at home. Stepping into the breach, HonestBrew have put together an incredible case of beers that were made exclusively for the festival by some of Bavaria’s most celebrated breweries. For just £20 you’ll get six of them – and there are plenty of others to add if you want the full experience.

[Order your case now!]

>> Home advantage <<

Footballers playing away

Just in time for the start of the new season, there’s been a spate of stories in the press recently about footballers behaving badly.
A quick memo to Phil Foden and Mason Greenwood: next time you want to illicitly invite girls to your hotel room, you’d be better off doing it on home soil.
That way, you can follow the example of the ex-England star who used to sneak Katie Price into his room at the Grove the night before internationals – but managed to persuade a credulous high court judge to injunct her from telling anyone about it.

Had it not imploded in a toxic storm of tabloid shit-slinging, today would have been Katie Price and Peter Andre’s crystal wedding anniversary.

>> Driven to despair <<

With friends like these…

Alexis Sanchez spoke this week about how much he hated his 500K a week existence at Manchester United and how he wanted to be back at Arsenal from day one.
He’s maybe looking at those old days with rose-tinted glasses. Team-mates at Arsenal were so sick of him by the end of his stint there that when news got out that United were interested in him, a group of players convinced one of the club’s most senior stars to go to the management and make them the offer of driving Sanchez to Manchester themselves if it meant getting shot of him.

The surname custom in Spanish-speaking countries means children get both their father and their mother’s surnames. So Alexis’s name is actually Alexis Sanchez Sanchez.

>> Text offender <<

A cruel sense of humour

It takes some doing to get yourself kicked off a charity football gig, but Yaya Touré managed it this week at Soccer Aid. Posting a porn video and suggesting hiring hookers for his team-mates didn’t go down quite as well as he’d hoped it would on the group chat.
Still, the Soccer Aid lot should count themselves lucky as it seems Yaya’s humour has actually got a little less controversial over the last couple of years. Participants on a previous football WhatsApp group say Touré’s big joke thing back then was posting pictures of animal cruelty.

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>> A rum deal <<

It’s the end of an era

The legendary Sawmills Studios in Cornwall – where the Stone Roses recorded Fools Gold, Oasis recorded Definitely Maybe, Supergrass recorded Alright, and loads more – is up for sale.
Although the studio was popular with many artists for its heritage and history, it was also pretty popular because of a nearby pub that used to keep a secret stash of illegal overproof rum under the counter for visiting bands.
The stuff was so potent that one group didn’t even remember the evening of carnage it inspired. Fighting, upturned tables, lost clothes. The only reason they know it happened is because someone took photos.
[£2.25m and it’s yours]

At school, Stewart Lee once wrote a story about Christmas that his teacher, Mr Melhuish, loved so much he made the rest of the class study it.

>> You too? <<

American reckoning comes to Britain

The Russell Simmons documentary that was released this summer has reignited a plan at a renowned UK TV documentary strand to do a similar #MeToo exposé of the UK music industry.
A fair few industry stalwarts are rightly nervous, but surely none more than the senior executive whose label has been protecting him so much they’ve been pretending to the media that their lawyers had gagged Popbitch for some stories over the last year. (They hadn’t; we never heard a peep.)
There’s tales circulating of affairs, female execs being bullied out of the industry, ex-conquests being paid off, relationships with artists and old-skool shagging in the toilets at office parties.
It would make for an interesting investigation. Wonder if that army of ghost lawyers will be summoned again?

DeepMoat writes: “Paul Dacre not being corrected on mispronouncing Beyoncé is just the tip of the iceberg. He also pronounced ‘caesarean’ as ‘Caesar Ian’ for years and no one corrected him.”

>> The Daily Tonic <<

Picking back up again

Let’s not dwell on the upcoming social restrictions, or the recent uptick in corona cases, or the fact that Matt Hancock is somehow proving to be even less useful than Ian Brown at combating the pandemic. Let’s just focus on the positive side of things.
Specifically, that we’re sending out daily Popbitch mini-editions again from Monday-Friday to bring a little bit of levity to your afternoons in these grim times, should you need it.
You can either sign up to get it direct to your inbox, or you can catch up on some of the 120+ mini-issues we’ve done to date on our online archive.
[Sign up/catch up]

Popbitch Popquizzes: Seeing as we’re all going to be socialising on Zoom again before too long, now’s the time to get loaded up on play-at-home Popbitch Popquizzes. All the questions, answers and materials you need to host your own version of our infamous pub quiz.

[Download yours here]

>> Hmmms <<

Statham, Sopranos, shark shagging

Bohemain WAPsody

[Queen x Cardi]
A profile of the American courtroom sketch artist who’s captured everyone from Mark David Chapman, to Martha Stewart, to Harvey Weinstein and more…

[Read on Inside Hook]
Take a tour around Jason Statham’s LA home

[Read on Architectural Digest]
Sam Fox has her own line of Sam Fox-branded facemasks, if that’s your thing…

[Get them here]
Every “Oh!” and “Ho!” in The Sopranos

[Watch on YouTube]
Local News Of The Week: Guernsey barbecue edition

[Read on Guernsey Press]
How do great white sharks shag?

[Read on the Guardian]
Wild photos of the blood red, hellfire skies in America

[See on Digg]

Thanks to: MR, AR, RB, CM, GoP, deep_stoat, J, monstris, RM, Deep Moat, RM, gentlemanthug, PC, CB, JR

Old Jokes Home

Q/ Did you hear about the dyslexic Yorkshireman?

A/ He always wore a cat flap.
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