End of the game

Haven’t we heard it all before from this chancer who is probably about to place a deposit on his next glitzy property thanks to selling out the Royals to the highest bidder, second time around? And what of the Sussexes whom he depicts as a kind of Snow White (Meghan) and Bambi (Harry) pairing? Presumably, they are both complicit in their silence on the matter of who spilled the acidic beans to old Scooby-Doo?

This sensationalistic sequel is a long rant about the inadequacies of the Prince and Princess of Wales and just about everyone else in the Firm. Meanwhile, sainted Meghan and Harry can do no wrong. However, this time, even the US media is rolling its eyes in boredom. Nil points, dear Scooby-Doo.

In fairness, Scobie has a fantastic name that offers endless opportunity for satirical sobriquets but I’m not sure what else he has going for him. He is evidently very vain as he has had various obvious facial tweakments and lied about his age in his book. Not a clever move because if you are willing to lie about yourself publicly and shamelessly, there’s a good chance that you’re likely to lie about the subject matter that you write about.

He made more than a few quid on his first kiss-and-tell but this one doesn’t seem to have hit the mark and has received terrible reviews so far. All the same, does he care? He has cleaned up financially and can gracefully retire a pariah (hopefully to a remote desert island), but perhaps with a long-suffering beautician in hand and a mirror, without having to work another day in his sad little life.

Jungle Capers

Having managed to escape any more news about Strictly, hopefully because someone won the wretched competition, we now have a whole new load of endless and tedious notifications and tripe about the participants of I’m a Celebrity. Oh, spare us.

Politician, Nigel Farage, the endlessly weeping sister of the singer Britney Spears, and a host of others I’ve never ever heard of, are now holed up in a fake jungle in Australia, gaining front page news while two world wars are going on. Tumpty-tumpty-tum. In between boring each other to death, having explosive and divisive arguments with as much intellectual vigour as a cup of milky tea, and making plates of some god-awful rice concoction by night, they play inane games. Yes, when not sitting around a studio camp with plastic critters and carefully trained rodents, they enjoy platters of kangaroo penis and wombat scrotum and other delectable fodder or allow themselves to get covered in insects and goo while gaining gold plastic stars. The infantilisation of adults on this show is shocking enough but the conversations genuinely make one wonder if a number of the contestants have had lobotomies or ever had an education at all.

I’m not sure what new horror will emerge following this show. I’m guessing it will be Britain’s Got Talent (a nice bit of satire in itself) or American Idol or X Factor (or has that finally died the death?), the other so-called talent shows by Simon Cowell. And lest we forget Big Brother. I’m still not sure from which murky swamp they find its scary contestants, but I never want to go there.

The question is why British television today is overloaded with all this rot. My take is that people are so fed up, demoralised, impoverished, and sick to death of the world’s woes, that they just want to watch visual Prozac to take away the pain. It’s a sad old state of affairs and I really can’t blame them although I’d heartily prescribe something more edifying and genuinely humorous such as Miss Buncle’s Book, a tome that always has me crying with laughter.

Favourite Foods

My elderly neighbours were talking about what they liked to eat for lunch and gave me a funny look when I told them what I normally gulped down when not chained to the desk. While they enjoy leisurely, yummy plates of arroz brut, sopas, savoury pastas, and baked fish dishes, I tend to eat a small avocado while standing in the kitchen (terrible habit, I know), a bowl of baby broad beans in lemon juice and olive oil or palm hearts with vinaigrette. If I’ve made beetroot or celeriac salad, I can gorge on that, and the beauty is that I am only gone from the desk for about ten minutes. Very occasionally, I’ll have a working lunch in Palma but that really is a major treat. And there I was thinking that life in rural Mallorca away from my office in London would bring peace and repose. I must have been mad.