Wednesday, February 12, 2003

Banana drama

On Friday the Daily Mail ran a headline on their front page that read, “What became of the couples who went on Channel 4’s Wife Swop”.

I’m no expert, but my publishing chums reliably inform me that the front page headline of a national daily is not where you want to put a typographical error. Not that your average Daily Mail reader would notice this of course, they’re too busy seething about the immigrants and the paedophiles and the EU and pretending that the Daily Mail is a small Daily Telegraph, and not The Sun with a fancy typeface.

Not so long ago the EU put out a press release saying that they were planning to conform the bendiness of bananas throughout Europe. In fact they would become, to all intent and purpose, straight. The Daylee Mayul readers were incensed. I found out today the whole campaign was in fact somewhat of a smokescreen.

Britain’s favourite fruit is the banana, and so voracious is our appetite for them that should demand increase exponentially over the next 10 years as it has done over the last decade, supply will run out, and they’ll be not no nanas never. So the EU is funding research into the production of genetically modified bananas to ensure demand can be met. To avoid any hysteria resulting from the no ‘nanas threat, they’ve been peddling this straight bananas story to hide the truth of their evil experimentation.

My work puts me in regular contact with people who are on the inside of these things. They are people who are immensely clever, but if left to their own devises would get dressed by putting their socks on their hands. I’m one of those people who ensure they put their socks on their feet, figuratively speaking.

Last night for reasons too long and dull to go into here I was utterly comatosed at a seminar listening to the Chief Group Economist of an extremely large UK bank.

He too was a spectacularly clever man who went on and on about fiscal policy and exchange rates and blah blah blah snore. He had the dusty grey lumbering gait of a man who relaxes by visiting hookers specialising in adult baby sessions. Once a week, somewhere in a respectable suburb, you can probably find him wearing a nappy, eating rusks and being covered in talcum powder after bath time.

The speech went on for forty minutes, of which four of those minutes I was interested. When he ended I shifted in my seat preparing to make for the door. When asked if there were any questions everyone in the room seemed to put their hand up. Questions about consumer confidence and the Euro and German Fiscal policy went on for over an hour.

Even the bloke I was with asked a question, so not to be outdone I mustered all my A’ Level Economics knowledge, put my hand in the air, and waited for the roving mic. When it reached me I stood up, cleared my throat, and asked…

“Do you remember when you could buy a packet of Snaps and a Curly Wurly and still get change from 20p?”

I didn’t of course, but I wish I had.

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