“I’m a man of my word”: Clarkson shoots striking workers

Jeremy Clarkson was apprehended last night by the Metropolitan police after executing seventeen striking public sector workers with a high powered rifle he usually only uses on gypsies or cyclists.

While being shoved into the back of a police van Clarkson told reporters that he was merely fulfilling a promise he made on TV. “I’m a man of my word. People say I only have inflammatory opinions for effect or for money paid to me by News International, but I think I’ve proved today that I back up all of my words with hollow-point justice.”

Clarkson issues his fatal threat.

The ‘words’ Clarkson was referring to pertain to his controversial appearance on BBC One’s flagship light entertainment program The One Show that evening wherein he was asked what he would do about the striking Public Sector workers. The car loving millionaire responded “I’d have them all shot. I would take them outside and execute them in front of their families. I mean how dare they go on strike when they’ve got these gilt-edged pensions that are going to be guaranteed while the rest of us have to work for a living”.

The statement was thought to be a typically tongue in cheek slice of right-wing wit from the vetran broadcaster but just hours after issuing his promise, Clarkson ascended a clocktower with an attache case and picked off random workers holding placards. Police surrounded his location minutes into the spree and apprehended the Top Gear host with little struggle.

Speaking from his cell Clarkson was calm and proud of his actions. “I said that I would do it. Me. My only regret is that I couldn’t guarantee the families of the ones I killed were there to see it. I just thought of those gilt-edged pensions and saw red. Why should a retiring teacher be guaranteed anything when I’ve had to work hard for years, driving fast cars and comparing them to stupid things Every. Single. Week to guarantee my own future. I’ve lived on a financial razor’s edge for years, having to put in that graft. Y’know some of those cars were really rubbish at cornering. Tell that to someone that works as a firefighter for 30 years though and what’ll they do? Ask for another government hand out. Get your own Sunday Times column, mate!”

One Show presenters reacting to his promise of carnage

The One Show was flooded with complaints as soon as the £1m per year broadcaster issued his warning. Host Matt Baker, recalls the moment, “I know he’s known for this kind of stunt but the way he said it sent chills through me. The eyes, i think it was the eyes that did it. Such bottomless rage at the people striking against a 4+ year pension cap in the face of massive inflation and financial turmoil which would act as a massive pay cut in practical terms. Honestly, it came as no surprise when i first heard the news, I just wondered how many he’d end up getting. Hammond must be stricken.”

The One Show has apologized for the broadcast and the denim and V8 loving Clarkson is now on suicide watch in Wormwood Scrubs

Felix Prenderghast,

Senior Features Correspondent

Racist Rant Video Shocks Those who Never Use Public Transport

A viral video of a woman on a tram engaged in a profane and racist rant with her infant son on her knee has sparked controversy among people who apparently never use public transport so aren’t completely numb to that kind of spectacle.

Recorded on the Croydon to Wimbeldon tram, the video has received thousands of hits, been circulated widely on social networking sites and -as was reported earlier today- led to the arrest of the woman in question even though barely informed racist shouting from mush-mouthed cretins is as easy to find as pissy smelling seats on any bus or train.

Not the rarest sight

The two minute long video featured the unnamed mother yelling things like:”This ain’t brittin no more. All these f**king polish and f**king nig-yoo-rag-woo-in f**kers comin’ ovah here and takin’ all our tram seats. It ain’t right. NO I WON’T SHU’ UP! Don’ cry darlin’ mummy’s jus’ shoutin at blacks, innit”. It is thought that the real impact of the video came from the presence of the young boy who sociologists are already comfortably predicting will be found guilty of a knife crime before the age of seventeen.

The furore and subsequent arrest of the woman is said to be puzzling commuters up and down the land who are said to be shocked to hear that spouting racial slurs at the top of your voice was not allowed on public transport. “You mean I could have had them all arrested?” asks Stirling based kitchen porter and bus user Michael Dunkly, “I could have filled a small prison-island by now. Wait, if shouting about immigrants is illegal on buses then what’s the legal status of urination, spousal abuse, shooting up or beating children? Because if that’s off the table I’ve got some news for my local constabulary.”

Dunkly continued; “I watched an obese, tattooed mother of three menace her six month old with a broken buckfast bottle while calling him a ‘paki’ because he spilled his juice. I saw that this morning. All I did was turn my iPod up and pretend to be engrossed in the Metro. You step over a Jeremy Kyle episode to get out at your stop. What am I going to do? Get knifed? Every day I watch people who look like they’re made from furious boiled ham and indian ink say horrible things about muslims. It doesn’t even register any more, like the taste of air.”

“So, just so I’ve got this straight, is it just on buses or trains, or are all the fuckwits I work with criminals too?”

This high profile arrest of a vocal racist is thought to unleash a flurry of copycat videos from commuters who honestly had no idea that anyone would watch or be shocked by the content of their twice daily journeys.

Felix Prenderghast,

Senior Features Correspondent

Osborne Unveils Autumn Report, Proposes Return to Barter System

Economists and public sector workers, as well as everyone else, received a grim look into the financial future as Chancellor George Osborne unveiled his Autumn Statement where he outlined a proposed return to the medieval barter system of trade.

Osborne, speaking to the House of Commons said, “Our economy has become too bound to the unstable eurozone and the US market which is similarly hard to predict. With Greece’s fall and Italy’s crisis isn’t it time to cut ourselves off from these leperous limbs and pull away from the complicated business of stocks and shares and interest rates and lending. That’s what got us in this mess after all. I say to the people of Britain that if you can exchange a chicken for a bundle of firewood or a copy of Heat then that is what you should do from now on”

Osborne gives bleak outlook for low income workers

“People are sick of Government intervention and even more sick of bankers telling us what things are worth and how much we all collectiely owe somehow. The people of this country know how much things are worth, they know how many pigs you can trade for a plasma screen telly. We are a savvy nation; we know how to haggle. I believe that the great British public can easily transition to this simpler, less controlled, less arbitrary financial system.”

Chancellor Osborne also unveilled a series of new initiatives and cuts designed to transition Britain into the new financial system. Most notable were:

-Fuel pricing and distribution to now follow ‘mad max rules’

-Retirement age extended till “the dark relief of the grave”

-Public Sector workers can “fuck right off”

-All Jobcentres to be put on stilts accessible only by barbed wire ladders

-All Jobcentres to randomise their opening hours, to be open only 3 hours per week

-£1bn investment in alchemy

-Borrowing set to increase until someone sends bailiffs round to take all the roads

-All Unemployed under-20s asked to “please get a job. Somehow. Anywhere, just please do this for us. Either that or just don’t sign on. Or emigrate. Oh, and don’t breed.”

-Tax rates of highest earners to be revised, haha only kidding

Osborne admitted that “things do look a little bit Weimar” but assured the Commons that under his plan the cost of living would increase at a steady, dependable rate, that the average income would fall “entirely in line with what we can predict” and that very soon the times when we as a species attributed value to little pieces of paper or discs of metal would have passed and we would all see how silly it was to have done so.

Osborne faces fierce backlash over these measures but claims that critics should take comfor in the fact that if his plan takes effect then there will be no need for another Chancellor of the exchequer for another century at least.

Felix Prenderghast,

Senior Features Correspondent

Paul McMullan Voted Philosopher-King of New World Order

Ex NOTW journalist and self proclaimed phone hacker Paul McMullen has become the philosopher-king of the United Kingdom following his testimony to the Leveson Inquiry wherein he broke all of morality.

Describing the hacking of Millie Dowler’s phone as “not a bad thing”, claiming that “privacy is for paedos” and describing how much fun chasing celebrities in cars was before the death of Princess Diana put a dampener on it, McMullen has succesfully broken all written and unwritten concepts of morality so very thoroughly that he has birthed a new philosophical and social movement that has swept through Britain and declared him king in less than a day.

McMullen unveils his Gospel of Black Nothingness

The journalist and pub owner, who was once labelled by his own mother as a “cretinous fuckstain who looks like a rodent sex offender but is actually so much worse” took the stand at the hearing at 2pm yesterday and had attained a higher level of human consciousness by 3.

It is thought to be after he outlined how he had one of ITV’s Gladiators fired for drug use after promising to use the story to make him into an anti-drugs role model that the intricate design of McMullen’s stark anti-morality began to emerge. McMullen, whose soul is the rough equivalent of a bin full of knives, then explained how privacy actually fostered evil and a palpable sense of impending Revelation is said to have gripped the room.

At first witnesses and participants in the inquiry alike were so taken aback by the torrent of hypocritical, loathsome- but still self righteous- bile that they simply muttered obscenities to themselves or were sick into the cupped hands that were collecting their tears. But as McMullen spoke more, his bleak inner landscape hammering at the superegoes of every thinking person, the room became unified. Cameras show the gallery looking up at the man as if anew as an attitude borne of what many describe as “a very real religious awakening” lit on all of their faces.

As another indistinguishably warped excuse for hacking the phones of grieving parents left his haunted and sallow face a single black tear was seen to spill from the eye of every attendant person in unison. The viscous coal-black tear evaporated as soon as it left the body and McMullen finally stopped talking about the moral imperative of reporting celebrity infidelity through the cunning use of lies and crime. It was in this moment that McMullen’s new amoral order was born.

Lord Justice Leveson was the first to rise from his seat and look wonderingly at the silent court. Still running BBC cameras caught him asking aloud; “wh-what has happened to me? Does anyone else feel.....”, the judge trailed off but the whole room at this point was becoming active, with people patting themselves down as though checking for injuries. “I feel like I’ve lost something...” continued Leveson, “but I feel so....free. Like anything is possible. Permitted”. Sitting silently and smiling serenely McMullen was recorded looking around the room in a satisfied fashion.

It was then that the room erupted into an orgy of violence, sexual aggression and thievery as the inhabitants took their first steps into a world where the concepts of right and wrong, of acceptable and unacceptable behaviour were rendered naught but a child’s mirage. Prosecuting attorney and convert Ian Beadle said,“nietzsche and Sartre may have said that the only real freedom is in life without God but McMullen has shown us the way. THIS is true freedom. No god, no love and no mercy. No hu-man-ity. This is our world now and he, our spiritual king.”

As news of McMullens scabrous thoughts were reported across the UK this same conversion process could be recorded. It was 7am today that McMullen took to his makeshift throne converted from a skip, sitting outside a sacked Parliament building.

“I’m just glad everyone’s finally got off their high-horses and seen things my way” said McMullen, (who looks like a rancid scarecrow somehow taught to feel only bitterness) to the disciples who are currently spreading his word throughout the land

Felix Prenderghast,

Senior Features Correspondent

Huge Amoral Corporation Making a Killing Off those Guy Fawkes Masks

Sitting in front of a spreadsheet in a dimly lit room, a sinister fat man smoking a cigar today announced that his company was making an absolute killing selling those Guy Fawkes masks.

The mysterious tycoon who holds significant stock in arms companies, nuclear power, sweatshops and battery farms chuckled as he informed his underlings of the massive profits he was reaping from the Occupy Wall Street protesters who were buying the product by the thousands.

Every one contains 17 millilitres of orphan tears

“Ha ha ha” he boomed through a fug of expensive cigar smoke, “those peasants are pouring money into my blood stained hands, the fools! The profits from those masks have meant that i can reopen that South American Diamond mine! Just in time for Christmas. This is after i buy another yacht, of course and I might well treat myself to another immigrant housekeeper while i’m at it.”

The Guy Fawkes masks, a symbol of anarchistic uprising taken from Allan Moore’s graphic novel V for Vendetta and the subsequent motion picture, were first appropriated by internet group ‘anonymous’ and most recently the Occupy Wall Street movement who are protesting the system of global financial management among other things.

However the rights to the image and their reproduction were bought up by a consortium of different companies operating on behalf of the unnamed large corporation whose true machinations can never be seen. Since then the sales of the subversive masks have provided a steady revenue stream for a wide variety of businesses and animal testing laboratories.

The powerful industrialist flipped on one of his myriad TV screens to coverage of the amorphous protest and poured himself another brandy, saying;“If only they knew how many tiny Indonesian children were being permanently disfigured by boiling plastic spillages in my shoddily made mask factory. Do you know how much I hush up the families with? A shiny, single dollar.....paid to a man with a machete, a shovel and a bag of slaked lime”

Addressing his stockbrokers, the shadowy businessman said; “I really do love those counterculture kids. they’re trying to affect a real change. When the political candidate that I’m sponsoring takes charge of the country and is informed by the banks that I part-own that they need to go to war to provide my factories with oil, I’ll think kindly of these hippy students and try to resist having them conscripted.”

When informed of the link, most OWS protesters have remained skeptical, claiming that the ‘powers that be’ simply wished to take away their unifying symbol through misinformation.

Meanwhile a revitalized Halliburton has recently announced its takeover of Amnesty International.

Felix Prenderghast,

Senior Features Correspondent

President Obama Accused of Hating the Baby Jesus

U.S President Barrack Obama has come over fire for not mentioning God in his Thanksgiving address in what has been seen as an overt effort to eradicate the eternal love of the Creator and build a secular nation.

The alleged Kenyan Muslim Commander in Chief gave the customary address for the American holiday, thanking overseas troops, addressing fiscal concerns and touching on the Republican nominee’s race but never once pausing to give props to the Almighty. Many Conservative commentators have taken this as the latest clue that the President may be planning to eliminate Christ from their way of life through a relentless campaign of holiday speeches, gay marriage, abortions and socialised medicine.

Obama praises his Lord Satan

Though White house officials pointed out that president Obama did actually include thanks to the Christian Godhead in his written address, this has done little to assuage critics on the right. Inflammatory news personality Glen Beck claimed: “If it was in his written address why could he not say it? Ask yourself that, patriots. Why could he not bring himself to utter the name of our god. Is it possible that his forked tongue would burn to a cinder in his mouth if he utterred false praise of the divine spirit? I’m not saying that’s the case. I’m not. Nobody is. But it’s probably the case.”

Obama has been seen as closer to the secular progressive left, politically, with his overt and public funding of scientific programs and his avowed belief in the filthy satanic lie of evolution. Though Obama has gone on record as saying that he was, indeed a ‘man of faith’ and that he was raised going to church, many believe that his neglecting to praise god in the holiday address is a more accurate key to the president’s spiritual life- or lack thereof.

The athesit writer and advocate Richard Dawkins recently made a statement, cackling from atop his throne of monkey skulls shaped like Darwin’s beard: “Goooood,” he whispered, “This is indeed the first step. First the ‘forgetting’ in an inconsequential speech, then unleashing sodomites in the wedding chapels, then raising tax rates for those in the highest bracket to try to relieve the national debt. With all of that and the anti-deity neutrino weapon the scientific community are developing we will be able to eradicate the divine and live in a cold rationalist void!”. Dawkins then flew away in a rocket, back to Cobra Command.

The President has not responded to this latest criticism from the Republicans, as many speculate that he is simply too consumed with his burning hatred of the baby jesus to do anything else.

Felix Prenderghast,

Senior Features Correspondent

Technology Reaches Perfection

All scientific and technological progress ceased today as it emerged that all human progress in the field had peaked with the recent release of a video game that can be controlled with piss.

British Company Captive media has developed the first truly ‘hands-free’, ‘urine-controlled’ games which have been unveiled in a few select toilets across England, though the proliferation of these systems is set to expand once the people at NASA and CERN sell all of their now defunct equipment and invest all of their available capital in the company.

Finally

The system works by using sensors to ascertain when targets placed on urinals are being struck by a stream and with how much force. Using this information they feed it into a game displayed on LCD screens at face level. And thus man’s unconscious dream of touching the face of god, of knowing true divine inspiration, of being finally sure what your purpose in the universe is- has now been reached.

“Since time immemorial, man has wanted to power things with his penis,” claims system designer Tom Hiddlebottom, “Since first there was snowfall and the inspired primordeal man who first wrote his name- or maybe drew a crude cartoon of a willy- the idea of competitive pissery has been rooted somewhere in our collective unconcious. Everything since then- helicopters, mousepads, telescopes, cillit bang- has all been a grasping toward this one perfect machine”

“No more will we have to suffer undistracted through those 30 second intervals in our day when we can do nothing stand mute and bored but as piss sallies forth from our privates.”

The games are said to not only defeat the long despised period of time where it was impossible to play videogames, it also is said to destroy any social pressure felt by relieving oneself at a public urinal. Hiddlebottom continued: “Before, we all might shuffle in, size up the person-to-pisshole placement and make an informed gamble on which position would keep us as far away from another man’s phallus as possible. But as often as not you’d find yourself squeezed in around the trough, trying to strain liquid through unresponsive glands while burly men on either side of you sized up your package. Probably.”

“Now that discomfort is a thing of the past. no one’s looking at anything but the leaderboard, and squeezing into a place is seen less as managing to worm your way next to the watering hole and more like finally making it to the game’s table. Now it’s your shot.

“Even the stump-cocked can be a hero of legend if his stream is powerful and his aim is true.”

An unprecedented influx of money has hit Captive Media, coming from every corner of the globe, while the creative headquarters has expanded to fill 422 working laboratories, quickly converted as soon as any man heard about it. Development of a piss powered Mario Kart, call of Duty, tetris, Spyro the Dragon and many more are currently in development everywhere.

Hiddlebottom concluded; “ for those worrying about flying cars or a cure for cancer or whatever; don’t worry, there are still plenty of female scientists. So until they find the equivalent vagina-based entertainment hope for the future lies with them. now if you’ll excuse me, i have to spend a penny.”

Felix Prenderghast,

Senior Features Correspondent

Piers Morgan Spawns

Following reports of livestock birthing litters of two headed snakes and the rare astronomical spectacle of a blood coloured full moon, a cause for these and other unrests are thought to have been found. Piers Morgan has brought forth a child of his loins

Morgan has already amassed three other apprentices through other vessels but this newest baby is the first with his newest thrall, Celia Walden- Novelist, daughter of Conservative MP George Walden and incubator for the unclean. The pair have been married for a year.

Morgan and Walden: proud parents of Abaddon the Unclean

Morgan, 46, tweeted about the birth as soon as the ceremony held on Stonehenge at midnight was over. “I have created Another. I will name her Abaddon. She carries my blood. Pay your tributes or know pain. :)” following this tweet a number of Morgan’s close personal friends and hordes of the fearful congratulated the happy couple over the social networking site, many forwarding images of blood sacrifices that they paid as soon as they heard the news.

The birth of the child was arranged far in advance, with Morgan wishing to have the child born in a place of “spiritual significance”. The unusual outdoor birth was, however attended to by a host of specialist private doctors, nurses and several dozen jackals that emerged, unbidden from the night.

Morgan recently quit his talent show judging career to concentrate on the interview show he has on American network CNN. When asked whether the new child would tear him away from this already hectic schedule Morgan denied that it would. “The child will be of no concern to me until she comes of age. I will send her from my sight. She will be trained in the Arts and when the Time of Wolves is at hand she will return to me and sit at my side.”

Young Abaddon joins a large family of three other children from a previous marriage: Rah, 11, Quixacolz, 18 and Spencer, 18. Even though she’s the youngest, Piers insists that he’ll not be playing favourites: “She is the fourth. As has been told, she will be the child with the gift of sight into the Other Place. All have their uses.”

In unrelated news the satirist and editor of Private Eye Ian Hislop was found dead this morning in a church near his house. The Have I Got News for You captain was found impaled on a decorative crucifix that fell on him from above

Felix Prenderghast,

Senior Features Correspondent

South Korean Prison Robots “Will Not Overthrow Humanity”

South Korean prisons are to test a scheme where faceless robotic men keep guard over their human prisoners in a move that officials are calling “definitely not a chilling vision of things to come”.

The Eastern city of Pohang will be the first area to let robotic guards patrol its prisons, effectively letting the robots’ first sights to be that of humans in chains. The month long government trial of the three foot robots designed by police and prison research group the ‘Asian Forum for Corrections’ is set to end in March, assuming that the robots are willing to relinquish their control.

Emotionless automatons no cause for alarm

“I assure you, it’ll probably be totally fine” said the designer, Prof Lee Baik-Chu, “we built these to help. Plus we ensured that they have enough intelligence to understand us when we tell them the exact parameters of their jurisdiction. If that wasn’t enough, these are ‘learning computers’, so they gather information rapidly themselves. That means that if they do make any kind of mistake we can tell them about it and they can learn from that. There’s no need for fear. Anyway in the absolute worst case scenario I have a voice activated destruct code, so I can shut them all down remotely with my secret password. Of course if anything was to happen to me.....Nah, never mind. Now please stop sending me sci fi DVDs.”

The largest part of the robots’ duties will be during prison night shifts when chances of violence and suicide are at their highest. To combat this the robots will have an extensive array of sensors and cameras capable of detecting this risky behaviour. The completed models will be able to read human temperature, pulse, adrenalin level, fear level, the chances of compliance, pupil dilation and how much pain it would take to break a prisoner. Special night monitoring robots will watch over problem offenders as they sleep and through monitoring eye movement during REM sleep, will be able to map out an individual’s nightmares with an 88.9% success rate.

Though not built to directly discipline prisoners, the robots do have tools to ensure compliance. An internal database will allow the robot’s to first read out the names and addresses of all of the prisoner’s relatives in an eerie monotone, but on meeting further resistance the robot can deploy any of these counter measures:
-A high decibel alarm
-A nozzle that fires pepper spray
-The ‘hypno-ray’
-A boxing glove on a spring
-Crotch-level drill
-A compartment full of hornets
-A broken bottle on a spring
-Flamethrower

The state of the art robots will be deployed all across South Korea, then Asia, then the World if the costly initiative is deemed a success. Though having cost over £414m to develop the designers claim that they have kept costs lower by having the robots run off of meat instead of costly batteries or electricity, so instead of charging them, a simple hunk of animal matter is deposited into an energy conversion engine in the robot chassis.

Prof Baik-Chu is excited to begin, letting one of his robots and its roster of pre-programmed responses have the last word: “WE LOOK FORWARD TO WATCHING OVER THE HU-MANS”

Felix Prenderghast,

Senior Features Correspondent

Twilight Fans Discover How the Rest of Us Feel

The latest film in the Twilight series has been causing queasiness and seizures in what’s being described as an ‘overdue piece of cosmic justice’.

Breaking Dawn Part One is said to contain a particularly graphic birthing sequence wherein that grumpy looking girl gives birth to a vampire or a ghost or maybe Blade. The scene, shot from her perspective is said to be so graphic and full of quickly flashing colours that the pasty, swooning little girls and creepy older dudes in the cinemas have had to leave, be sick or even lose consciousness.

One of the many nauseating scenes

Despite it’s PG-13 rating the director Bill Condon stated that he wanted to push the envelope in terms of how he presented childbirth. The scene, where the birth hits complications and Robert Pattinson has to chew his new wife’s belly open to let the baby out is the cause of the sickness, largely because that is what happens in it.

Responding to this, an open letter from an informal union of movie lovers and people that have been dragged to this thing by loved ones was issued today.“This really is fantastic”, it begins, “Hopefully as you vomit in the aisles as the indifferent torso of Taylor Lautner looks down on you you’ll spare a second’s reflection for all the rest of us. That nausea is what we’ve been feeling for years. The ads, the hysteria, the T-shirts. We didn’t want to know what it’s about but now we do. And like Adam, that knowledge has torn us away from the bliss of not knowing anything about the romantic problems of glittery vampires who never do anything awesome and aren’t scary. I hope you choke on your vomit.”

Some critics claim that the content of the film is more nauseating than the style of direction, citing a part where the werewolf one really, honestly, no fooling falls in love with the newly born baby, because that’s what werewolves do apparently. The Twilight mythology labels it ‘imprinting’ but audiences around the world are seeing a man fall in love with a baby. And that man is also a wolf. Also there is a pro-life message in the film that some find disconcerting. But it’s mainly the baby-romance.

Even in the face of criticism, the existence of logic and the pleas of jaded moviegoers the film has taken record breaking amounts of money. Ever since the first movie, the series- about a girl who is in love with a dracula and a wolfman though they steadfastly refuse to fuck her because none of them are married and she might be a Frankenstein or something- has become a global sensation despite the fact that most of the plot seems to revolve around pale people staring at each other in fields.

Hearing about the sickness author Stephanie Meyer claims “they really captured the essence of my story, finally.”

Felix Prenderghast,

Senior Features Correspondent

Heston Blumenthal Successfully Cooks a Metaphor

Heston Blumenthal, the ominous looking chef and liquid nitrogen enthusiast, has become the first chef to successfully braise and then bake a metaphor.

The metaphor, which Blumenthal successfully extracted from an absurdist short story by Russian writer Mikhael Bulgakov, was pan fried with rosemary and shallots before being spun in a centrefuge, stood near some magnesium phosphate and then baked in pastry. The resulting dish has been called the world’s first metaphor wellington.

Blumenthal sitting on a seat made of gravy

“First thing was to pick the finest metaphors we could” the eccentric chef explained, “I wanted something really vintage, but not so old that it was fusty because that would give a bitter flavour. We’d tried out the capture technique when we harvested some similes, but compared to metaphors similes catching is as easy as shooting fish in a barrel.

“We’re going for a good, plump metaphor to offset the mushroon crust, so we couldn’t take anything trite or mixed. At first we were going to go for one of them Blumenberg ‘absolute metaphors’, but that would be way too large for one serving. In the end we decided on something about a corrupt political system or a marriage that had started to decay. You get really nice notes of cinnamon in those”

The wellington is described on the menu as “an ancient oak tree, standing on a blasted heath in a forgotten country, twisted by the winds into a shape at once wretched and defiant”. It is set to cost diners £312 a serving, if it makes it onto the menu after being approved by a panel of chefs and critics.

Blumenthal first called on the services of Salman Rushdie to try out his dish, relying on the renowned droopy-eyed enemy of the prophet Mohamed to be able to judge the literary merit of his dish and also the crispness of the pastry. Locking him in a sound proof drum that Blumenthal had made smell of wine gums to enhance the experience, a small audience of foodies waited for the author to finish his meal and deliver an opinion.

After twenty minutes, Rushdie emerged from the drum, looking sated. “It’s delightful!” he announced, wiping flecks of pastry and literature from his face, “Really playful. I got hints of citrus, a critique of the suffocating bureaucracy of Soviet Russia and those potato fondants simply to die for. I’d eat those every day. But then I’d get fat.....wa”

Blumenthal is said to be trying to perfect his metaphor menu with a little help from some famous writers who are eager to participate in the experimental cuisine. Ian McEwan, the writer of Atonement who looks like an old and clever falcon, has already volunteered to be basted and type in a chimney made of chocolate for ten hours to help make a massive trifle

Blumenthal hopes to have gathered enough metaphors by the end of the year to fill his restaurant’s freezer so he can add the dish to his spring menu.

Felix Prenderghast,

Senior Features Correspondent

Army Reserves Set to Teach Classes During Teacher’s Strikes

Education Secretary Michael Gove is taking a hard line with teachers by announcing that classes will be staffed by army reserves during the upcoming strikes.

“If it worked with firemen it will work with teachers” Gove told the Times Education Supplement, “last teacher’s union strike a third of schools closed and a further third were partially closed. Never again. I can assure all parents and pupils that during the strikes Britain’s fighting forces will take charge of their education.”

Infantry reserves being taught about Elizabethan drama

Under Gove’s new plan thousands of Territorial Army volunteers are being briefed across the land in a crash course in Renaissance art, Egyptian history, French pronouns and the importance of Arthur Miller in American Literature. Each TA barrack is set to take a seperate part of the curriculum and then on the day of the strike, deploy its soldiers across the land as needed.

Leuchars TA base, whose recruits are to specialise in Drama, are being lead by Sergeant First Class Mark Ferguson. He claims that the men serving under him are more than up to the challenge: “These lads have been training to face down insurgent forces in hostile territory. Teaching inner city youths how to express the inner neurosis of masculinity we see in Mamet’s Glengary Glenn Ross may be a step up from that but we are a well oiled military machine that can overcome any obstacle.”

The National Union of Teachers is said to be stunned at the audacious move, threatening to up their pension demands and even extend the strike. “It’s an outrage to assume that just anyone can do our jobs, “ said NUT head Hilary Fisto, “Our demands are reasonable considering the pressures of our job. To see camouflaged men bringing sandbags, nets and bayonets into our schools in preparation for the TA’s special curriculum is a huge misstep on Mr Gove’s part. We will not stand for this. Besides, most of our pupils have their own bayonets”

The teacher’s union are asking for an increased pension allowance, extended sick leave and the re-introduction of corporal punishment in order to claw back some respect from the dead-eyed, knife-happy, happy-slapping, heavily pregnant, grime-core classes they have to deal with. Fisto added, “Actually just the beatings will do. Give me that and you can fucking have the pensions. There’s your compromise”

However, Michael Gove, flanked by TA infantry soldiers/geography teachers has effectively shut down any further negotiations. Gove said “with this army at my side, we can crush the unions! This government cannot simply hand out money for those who require it, so for this day onward, any striking force will be taken over by our brave boys. D’you hear me Bob Crow? Our trains have needed military attention for too long. See you on the picket lines.”

The nationwide teacher strike is still scheduled for later in the month.

Felix Prenderghast,

Senior Features Correspondent

Kelly Rowland Steps Down as Dance Commander

Kelly Rowland confirmed speculation today by issuing a press release stating that she would be resigning from the post of Dance Commander. “It is with great regret that I must resign my commission” said the 30 year old singer.

It is thought that the twin responsibilities of judging the X Factor and overseeing and legislating all British rhythmic movement proved too much for the American Rn’B star, forcing her to choose between the two careers. “It is with a heavy heart, but also some fantastic memories that I step down from this most hallowed and historic of positions” claimed Rowland.

Rowland in the uniform of the Dance Commander

Rowland, who had held the position for just over a year, stormed into the job with refreshing boldness and braggadocio, claiming in her inaugural address that “baby there’s no other who do it like I do” and that, “No fear, no doubt, I’ll provide the answer”. However, today those promises of continual funk supervision and dancefloor leadership were ended, proving too much for the Houston native to handle.

Taking over from Roy Hattersley in 2010 following the former Dance Commander’s career ending hip operation, Rowland was said to have big shoes to fill since Lord Hattersley had successfully overseen UK dance for eighteen years, weathering brit pop, a resurgence of 80s electro and a brief disco revival with the stoicism and steely resolve of a vetran.

Rowland’s campaign, with boogie secretary David Guetta, was seen as a necessary breath of fresh air since the ex-Destiny’s Child singer would be the first black woman to hold the position. However, despite a flurry of techno laws and a new dancefloor standards and practices document being drafted within her first three months in office, Rowland’s performance was seen to drop off rapidly once she got the job of judging people next to David Hasselhoff.

Ashcroft shoulders a “lofty burden”

After a vote in the House of Lords, Michael Ashcroft has been elected as the new Dance Commander, accepting the post and ceremonial glowstick, Ashcroft stated that he hoped to bring “stability to the role, with all respect to my right honourable predeccesor, I hope to have staying power. I may not be as knowledgeable about grime, i may not be as fresh, but I believe I can serve my country in this time of dance turmoil.”

Rowland has wished Ashcroft all the best and told reporters that she knows he will be a “stellar Dance Commander.”

Felix Prenderghast,

Senior Features Correspondent