Read My Peas

It has always been my wife’s biggest fear that success of any kind would go to my head. This explains the look of disgust that Judy gave me as she closed the newspaper and looked up at all the mashed potato balanced above my immaculate and crease-free brow.

‘Don’t you think it’s a bit much?’ she asked.

I moved myself a slightly more casual angle, hoping to soften the effect of the potato which I’d sculpted into the shape of a hat with the words ‘top blogger’ inscribed in peas. Only Judy wasn’t quite seeing the point of my new mash sombrero.

‘You have an ego bigger than Herefordshire,’ she said, heading over to the fridge where she recovered a bottle of plonk. ‘I’d have thought you’d have been satisfied with being one of the sexiest men on TV, a veritable living god among presenters, without taking this kind of praise to heart.’

‘Ah,’ I said, wiping aside some errant punctuation that had slid to my eyebrow, ‘this is success independent of my work with you, Jude. I might have become a publishing sensation with my book, “Fathers & Sons”, but that’s now so heavily discounted that they’re giving them away with every bottle of Ambre Solaire. But this is my blog. This is my life’s work! This is my attempt to prove to the world that Richard Algernon Madeley is a cut above the normal TV fare. This is a demonstration that my talent is more than skin deep and that those of us lucky enough to call ourselves “celebrity” are really something quite special.’

Judy wiped the neck of the bottle before she sank a mouthful.

‘So you’re still plan to go ahead with your little exhibition?’ she asked but the look had softened in her eyes. I knew it was the closest she would come to giving me her blessing.

It was enough for me. I stood up and grabbed the walking cane that Stephen Fry had presented to me on my thirty seventh birthday last year and I walked to the door where I gave my evening suit a final brush down, my tails a flick, before I headed out.

‘Have fun!’ said Judy, mildly scolding but proud, nevertheless.

For a Monday morning, the road in this undisclosed part of North London was surprisingly busy. I’d forgotten that it’s the school holidays so, when I began to walk up the street, a line of children were soon trailing behind me. Some were only there to pick up the odd pea. Others clearly had high hopes of getting a taste of some Smash. But a few cheered me along, applauding me as I strolled with my head held high.

‘Ah!’ said Michael Palin as I found him unloading exotic foodstuffs from his car. ‘Lovely day, isn’t it Dick?’

I pointed to my hat, careful not to tip it.

‘The Sunday Times? Jolly well done!’

I smiled as I passed along.

I had almost walked past Jeremy Paxman’s house before I noticed him. He was up a ladder and cleaning out his gutters.

‘See my show last night?’ he cried. ‘I explored Victorian sewers.’

I couldn’t look up. ‘Very good,’ I replied and then pointed to my hat.

Jeremy’s getting on a bit and his eyesight isn’t what it was. ‘Oh,’ he snarled. ‘Top dogger! Well I suppose congratulations are in order.’

I hadn’t time to waste explaining. My mash was beginning to run and I had only a few minutes to achieve my intended goal.

At the Dickinson residence, I could tell that people were home by the glow of a slightly irradiated light coming from the upper bedroom window.

‘Oy! Dickinson!’ I cried.

There was a movement of curtains and then the naked torso of TV’s top antique appeared, black goggles sitting in the recessed pits of his eyes.

‘Get a load of this, Duck,’ I cried.

‘Pah! Bloody hell, Madeley,’ replied David ‘The Duck’ Dickinson. ‘You’ve got nothing better do with your bloody time?’

I pointed to the peas.

Even in his tanning goggles, David’s eyesight is still as sharp as it was when he was a seventy year old. He nodded. ‘That bloody sums you up, Madeley,’ he said. ‘A “loo logger”.’ And with that, he shut the window.

I was crestfallen. I gazed at my reflection in the windscreen of Dickinson’s bright orange Bentley and I could see that I was far too late. Peas had slipped and the effect of my mash coronet was ruined. ‘Top blogger’ had become ‘loo logger’ and was already on its way to ‘lo goer’. Judy was right. Pride does come before a fall. Humiliation is but a slipped pea away.

The Great Natasha Kaplinsky Hunt

I thought it odd when I turned on the computer this morning and discovered that my blog had been overwhelmed, not by people seeking Stephen Fry's encounter with shrivelled reindeer glands, but by new visitors looking for pictures of 'Natasha Kaplinsky without makeup'. It set me to thinking.

'Have you ever heard of such a thing?' I asked Judy who was kneeling before the fireplace, chiselling off dried mortar from the new hearth she'd fitted a day earlier. 'Judging from this interest in pale, un-rouged skin, I would think that we could make a fortune if we could get a picture of Natasha Kaplinsky with a little less colour in her cheeks.'

Judy dropped her lump hammer and turned to me. 'Richard, are you sure that this is the most profitable way of spending your Tuesday?' she asked. 'I thought you could help me come up with some questions to ask tonight's guest, Kerry Katona, who will be joining us in the studio to talk about her new reality show, “Kerry Katona: Crazy In Love”, in which Kerry and her husband, Mark Croft, offer an insight into their extraordinary lives.'

I gazed at my poor darling wife. It never ceases to amaze me how easily she drops into autocue mode.

'Sorry,' she blushed. 'I did it again, didn't I?'

'You certain did, Jude. Perhaps we should continue this conversation after the break?'

She touched a hand to brow and shook her head sadly. 'I don't know what happens. I suppose it's just instinct after all these years. I can't wait for the Channel 4 contract to end so I can get down to Cornwall and start writing my novels.' A sigh and she looked up at me. 'But what about you, Richard? You've still not answered my question. Are you going to help me write some questions for Kerry?'

'Not if she were the last guest on earth,' I replied and vengefully dug a paper knife into the day's mail. 'You know how I feel about her. I don't at all see what's so extraordinary about her life? Has she ever had a great thought or written a line of prose or poetry enough to make a nation weep? Does she have any skills other than those of self-promotion and overindulgence? I've said it before, Jude, but we should be promoting people who deserve our help. Not these examples of British trailer trash who hardly know what it's like to go out and earn money through the hard graft of their own labours. No, no, Judy. You'll have to write the questions yourself. I'm going to spend my day trying to earn an honest wage. I'm going to sneak into Channel Five and snap a covert picture of Natasha Kaplinsky before they've heat sealed her inside a mixture of pancake and wax.'

Judy waved her chisel in the air. 'If you think it's worthwhile, go for it, Richard. But don't expect me to help.'

'There's no need for you to help,' I said. 'I have plenty of friends who will be more than willing to track down Natasha Kaplinsky. There are men out there cast from the same mould as your husband. Men who consider hunting newsreaders as the noblest of the sports left to us since we've been banned from shooting elephants, white rhino, and tiger.'

'So it's a surveillance operation?' said Clarkson half an hour later when I rang him. 'If it is, then count me in. It'll give me chance to try out the new night vision goggles I bought off eBay.'

'No need for night vision,' I told him. 'This will be a daylight raid into the heart of the Five News operation. I'm going to see if Bill Oddie will let us borrow his camera with the lens specially designed for taking surveillance pictures of sparrows at close range.'

'Why not bring him along?' asked Jeremy. 'We might need a man whose beard has been specially trained by the SAS to sneak through undergrowth.'

I explained how Bill and his beard were still suffering from their wounding by an errant heron. 'He's back with his family but he still claims to feel discomfort whenever he gets near an estuary,' I said.

Jeremy rang off having agreed to meet me at twelve, and, sure enough, a few seconds before noon, I heard the distant bang as the sound barrier was breached by a land-based rocket car. Jeremy arrive a second later, the shrill whine of his jet engine fading as he climbed out. He was dressed in combat trousers and a safari jacket, a fact which caused me no end of amusement as we began to pile equipment into the back of the Range Rover and then set off into central London and the promise of big game.

Being two 'A' list celebrities, we can get access to places that are restricted to you normal untalented folk, no doubt stuck out there in your humdrum existence of commuting into Manchester or Glasgow, and working a long day full of office routine. You won't know the thrill of breeching a nerve centre of the nation's communications. One such place is the studio for Five News. It's run by the people at Sky News from their headquarters in Osterley, Central London. We parked out front and decided to try the direct approach by blagging our way past the guard at the front desk. He was the typical guard, proud of his job. His jacket was emblazoned with the insignia of News International and the the Bob Friend Memorial tie pin gleamed near his throat.

'We're here to do an interview about our new show,' I told him.

'Oh,' said the guard. 'And what's that all about?'

Jeremy, quick on his feet as ever, replied: 'the Welsh.' When pressed and nervous, he usually mentions the Welsh. I suppose that, psychologically, the Welsh are Jeremy's comfort blanket, though I don't know why...

'The Welsh?' replied the guard.

Jeremy just smiled. I could tell it would be left to a man of real imagination to fill in the detail.

'Jeremy and I have been travelling Britain together, filing a new series in which we wryly comment on the nation's musical tastes. We began with the Welsh and their unhealthy obsession with male choral groups.'

'Very good,' whispered Jeremy.

'Welsh choral groups?' repeated the guard.

That's when Jeremy piped up. 'The show is called, “Good Vibrations With Richard&Jeremy”,' he said.

I made a point of jotting this idea down. Jeremy might not see much potential in it but I certainly do.

The guard, however, was somewhat suspicious. I could tell this by the way he picked up the phone and began to mutter something to his superiors. However, a few minutes later, a call came through and he reluctantly gave us to visitor cards.

We'd reached the first floor when Jeremy dragged me to one side and behind a large cardboard cut out of Kirsty Young marked for recycling. He nodded towards a set of doors marked 'Staff Only' at the end of the corridor.

'We go through there,' he said. 'I've been here before to plug my Christmas DVD. That way leads to the dressing rooms.'

'But we don't even know if Natasha is in the building,' I said. 'We should make some casual enquiries first.'

Jeremy placed his big hand on my shoulder. 'What kind of man comes on a hunt and doesn't know the habits of his quarry? You don't think I didn't come prepared. Before I left the house I rang Jeremy Paxman who told me everything we need to know about Kaplinsky, such as the fact that she rarely leaves her dressing room. She'll be in there now, resting before tonight's show.' He nodded again at the doors. 'Come on, follow me.'

I trailed after him as he crept down long dark corridors. Finally, he stopped outside a door marked 'Talent'.

'This is it,' he said. 'This is where they keep her.'

'Keep her?' I was very cynical, as would you should you know that your actions are being governed by information gleaned from a man called Paxman. 'You make her sound like she's an exhibit...'

Before I could finish, Jeremy threw open the door and I began to realise how little I know about the world of TV beyond Channel 4.

The oxygen tent filling the room was glowing a vibrant pink. Soft furnishings filled it like a sack of cotton candy and giant marshmallows. The fur from creatures whose natural camouflage was pink was spread across the mattress while lying amid the flowers, feathers, and throw cushions, was a figure of sublime beauty, her thin features cleansed of artificial colour.

'Is that her?' I whispered.

'If it's not,' replied Jeremy, 'we should watch out for seven malicious dwarves coming back from diamond mining duties.'

'But won't she wake up?'

'Not during daylight hours,' said Jeremy, who for some reason was opening his satchel. I was a little surprised when he pulled out a foot long stick sharpened at one end and a wooden mallet.

'What's that for?'

'It's just something that Paxman asked me to do,' he smiled the nation's favourite Jeremy.

I was in no mood to question the agreements made between BBC men. I pushed the lens through an opening in the oxygen tent and fired off a few snaps.

'We should get out of here,' I said.

Jeremy lingered, weighing the stake and mallet in his hands.

'Come on,' I said, grabbing him by a curl, 'we need to get out of here before we're discovered and they force us to make them a show. You don't want to be on Fifth Gear do you?'

That seemed to do the trick. His shoulders sagged and he followed me as we retraced our steps out of the building. Five minutes later, we were sitting in the Range Rover. I was checking the pictures on the digital camera while Jeremy kicked the gears into four wheel drive and ploughed us through a hedge and out onto the open road.

'These photographs will make us a small fortune,' I promised him.

Jeremy just looked vaguely out at the road ahead. 'I though I could do it,' he muttered. 'I thought I could do it... And I've missed my chance.'

'Don't worry,' I said, looking at the stake and mallet sitting on the back seat. 'If you're still in the mood for adventure, come along to the show this afternoon. I could do with a man who knows how to wield a mallet.' I looked again at the wood steak. 'I do think we should stop off and find you a bigger big of wood. It's one thing hunting a woman like Natasha Kaplinsky but I'm now talking about an evil that roams the Earth by day...'

The Shirt Off My Back

On most mornings, I wake up fearing criminal prosecution. On what charge, I’m really not sure. But I do know the source of these cold sweats. It’s the same thing that causes my heart to murmur and my intestines to sing baritone. The worry comes from my statistics. I’ve noticed that lawyers are now keeping an eye on this blog.

Why Stephen Fry might have hired lawyers in St. Louis, Missouri, I have reason to wonder. Perhaps it’s Oddie. More likely Paxman, despite his having a 200 hundred line mock heroic epistle dedicated to him. How many journalists can say the same?

Then again, my homeless friends have not posted in a while. Has The Homeless Chicken taken offence and decided to have the shirt off my back? Perhaps it’s J.W.H. Madeley, the famous herring magnate. He too has been out of contact for a while, despite my authoring his official biography. Has he set his lawyers the task of reclaiming the Madeley fortune in order to fund another plundering of the Icelandic herring stock?

Closer to home, one must wonder about my fellow bloggers. Has Ms. Baroque decided to prosecute for the sake of all true poets? Did Chip Dale come out of his gloom and decided to make his fortune by suing me? Have I upset Nige by revealing to the world that he’s really Bill Oddie? Then again, I went and told you all about Elberry’s troublesome digestion and his need for stool softener. After spilling the beans about his beans (excuse the image), might he have decided to come after me for deformation of character?

Bryan Appleyard is a busy man but is he too busy to sue? Then there’s the mysterious Selena Dreamy. Could she be a Mata Hari, meant to entice me with her peerless wit before revealing herself to be the legal representative of Jordan’s left nipple, about which I have had only bad things to say?

David Dickinson’s groin has become something of a joke in these parts but when you’ve got parts like David Dickinson, you wouldn't think it a joking matter. Lawyers must be informed. But lawyers in St. Louis, Missouri, in the United States? It makes me wonder who I can have offended of such international acclaim. Could it be one of my many wives from my polygamous marriages? Could it be PETA out to get me for promoting the wearing of ocelot hats?

Whatever the reason, the lawyers in St. Louis, Missouri are apparently keeping close tabs on me. I make this appeal directly to them: please don’t sue me! I’m a poor man with only the clothes on my back. Would you really want to leave Judy without a home?

[Update]

What do you mean you’re working for Judy?

The Night I Swapped Stephen Fry For Vanessa Feltz: The Truth Finally Revealed

Because the internet knows no reason when it comes to rumours, lies, and insinuation, the true story of the ongoing animosity between Vanessa Feltz and myself needs to be told. Though only six or so months old, the hostilities feel like they’ve rumbled on for a decade or more. Think Vietnam, Korea, and the Second Franco-Moroccan War in order to get a sense of the scale of this conflict. It’s only by the grace of God that the whole thing hasn’t gone nuclear.

It was February when the producers of Celebrity Wife Swap got in contact with the people at Cactus TV and asked if Judy and I would like to ‘swing it’ for the cameras. Judy had said yes before I had chance to object. I’ve never been into the swinging scene. The whole idea appalls me in the same way that I don’t buy things from flea markets. Having somebody’s cast-offs is not the Madeley way. Jeremy Clarkson once told me an anecdote about a Top Gear producer who bought an ‘unused’ second-hand electronic toothbrush from a car boot sale, only to find a pubic hair in the bristles.

So, before I could object, the producers had twinned me with Vanessa Feltz and, one Friday night in March, earlier this year, Judy moved out and in came the woman who was to be Mrs. Madeley for the next seven days. Only, the way things worked out, I think I became the new Mr. Feltz.

Things went well until the camera crew disappeared for the evening, leaving the two of us alone.

‘I hope you don’t mind,’ I said to Vanessa as I cleared away the plates from the dinner table, ‘but Stephen Fry is popping over a bit later. We always get together every Friday night to play Scrabble. I have a pretty good two letter word involving a “J” that I can’t wait to try out on him.’

‘Scrabble!’ cried Vanessa. ‘I’m not allowing any husband of mine to play Scrabble.’

The outburst stunned me, as I believe it also stunned a squadron of migratory geese as they flew overhead. They came down in a neighbouring village and Defra immediately formed a twenty mile quarantine zone until they’d worked out the cause of their deaths. Only now can the truth be told and the people of Snipschurch, Surrey, released from their private hell.

‘Look,’ I said, ‘you’re not actually my wife so I’ll do as a damn well please in my own house.’ I went to pick up Vanessa’s napkin but she grabbed my arm. If they made my life into a film, this part should be made my James Cameron and Vanessa would be an animatronic.

‘Listen, squirt,’ she hissed. ‘I came on this show to demonstrate to the world that I can be a caring wife. I’m not going to let you ruin this by bringing Stephen Fry into the house. Got it, buster?’

For the sake of my wrist, I had to agree. ‘I’ll ring him at once,’ I whispered.

‘’Tis I, Fry, speaking on my newly imported iPhone,’ said Fry when I rang him later.

‘What’s an iPhone,’ I asked, that being the first time I’d ever heard the item that was to behome his own new spouse.

‘It is a technologically marvellous thing from the Americas,’ he said. ‘It has a touchy screen on which I can now see your face as I speak to you.’

I looked at my own handset to see if I could see Fry peering through.

‘Listen,’ I said, realising the stupidity of my actions, ‘tonight’s Scrabble is cancelled.’

‘My vim is nil,’ sighed Fry, showing off the supply of three letter words that serves him so well around the board.

‘It’s not your vim I’m worried about,’ I said. ‘It’s this Vanessa woman who has taken over the house. I think she expects to sleep in the same bed as me.’

I heard Fry give a shudder. ‘Shudder,’ he said.

‘Indeed. What should I do?’

‘Alas, Richard, I have not a yen for knowing and it would make me wan to even eke out an answer. Now, ’tis I, Fry, on my iPhone, signing off.’

Michael Palin and Bill Oddie were no better when I rang them and I didn’t expect much in the way of helpful suggestions when I rang Paxman. He just spent five minutes chuckling into the phone.

Vanessa finally found me in the airing cupboard, still clutching the phone thirty minutes later, as I tried to get through to Ronnie Corbett.

‘What you doing in there?’ she asked, as she grabbed me by my collar and dragged me across the hall. ‘You don’t think Channel 4 have installed all those cameras in the bedroom for you to go sleeping in the cupboard? Come on, Dicky. Be a man! Come get in bed with your cuddly Vanessa.’

My own sweet T-101 had spoken. I got changed in the bathroom, that night, sliding the lock on the door for the first time in the ten years I’ve been living in the house. I also dressed myself in fleecy pyjamas for the first time in my life. Beneath them I still wore my outdoor clothes. I feared that might need to make an escape during the night.

‘Okay?’ asked Vanessa as I walked into the bathroom.

‘Fine,’ I said, moving quickly to my side of the bed so she might not notice the extra bulk beneath my PJs.

Vanessa smiled and walked to the bedroom door. I didn’t realise what she was doing until I heard something go click.

‘See,’ she said, ‘holding up a key. Judy said that you might try to escape during the night so I brought my own padlock.’ With that she slid the key into the deep canyon of her cleavage. ‘You’re not getting out of here until dawn.’

Dawn. Has ever a single word so utterly misrepresented an eternity?

I climbed into bed and turned off my bedside lamp before I felt the springs give as Vanessa climbed in beside me.

‘Goodnight dear,’ she said as she threw her arm over me.

‘Goodnight Vanessa,’ I replied. I didn’t know if I’d be able to sleep. It wasn’t so much the arm as the fact that Judy normally plays the trombone for half an hour before she puts her head down. Slumber wouldn’t be the same without the sweet melody of a Strauss waltz played on brass.

I was still awake around three o’clock when Vanessa released me from her grip. She rolled over and began to snore in the other direction. Slowly, hearing began to return to my right ear and as feeling returned to my body, I slipped out of the bed and into my shoes.

The bedroom window opened without a sound and I had soon edged myself out onto the trellis.

‘Richard?’ said a voice behind me.

I made an instinctive choice and jumped. Twenty feet later, I was limping to the car. I thought I’d be a mile or two away before Vanessa found the key to the padlock in her cleavage.

Two days later, I rang Judy from a small bed and breakfast on the Fylde Coast. Apparently, Vanessa had taken great offence at my deserting her in the middle of the night. She had also lost the key to the padlock and because there was no telephone in the bedroom (Judy fears them more than she fears anything), Vanessa had been trapped in the bedroom until the camera crew discovered her on Monday morning. Apparently, the video footage of her captivity is now a cult classic. Arab businessmen have distributed it around the Middle East where it now fetches a high price.

The outcome of all this is that the show’s producers sacked me and replaced me with Paul Daniels. Vanessa lived with him for a while the following April and the whole thing made for, as we say in the business, ‘good TV’.

Since then, Vanessa has been quite outspoken about me in private, though she remains the consummate professional publicly. However, there has been a long simmering Cold War between us, with much of the British entertainment industry secretly siding with either Vanessa or me. I may have the slightly smaller army of supporters but I can count all the big animals: Fry, Oddie, Clarkson, and even Paxman, in his fashion. Now I’ve made the feud public, I hope you’ll also choose a side. If I can get enough troops, we might be able to end this futile war once and forever. We might be able to liberate my reputation forever.

I can smell a storm coming in.

Or it might be Judy making beef and onions for her tea... I’ll leave it for you to decide.

The Lads' Night Out

Epistle to Jeremy Paxman On the State of His Sock Drawer

Preface

My feud with Jeremy Paxman is now history and never again will I resort to making crude remarks about either him or his toenail collection. Such is my admiration for the man, I have been working hard to write him something special. After my widely applauded poem to Stephen Fry comes my latest flight with my muse. It is my longest poem yet and, as you can see, deals with an issue that has barely been discussed by the British media.

Ladies, gentlemen, fellow poets, after many promises and many more false starts, I finally give you my one hundred and seventy line 'Epistle to Jeremy Paxman On the State of His Sock Drawer'. Monumental and epic in its scope, it stands as a worthy tribute to our favourite 'Newsnight' presenter and, in my humble opinion, it is one of this century’s finest poems written in English. And it even made Judy cry.

My dear old Paxo, you inspired my muse to soar
On the trouble that lately grew from your sock drawer.
How did you get them into such a pitiful state?
Did your socks rebel? What left them so irate?
Could it be that you have no love for your noble socks
That stop your feet from turning into twin icy blocks,
As cold as the frost sitting on Kirsty Wark’s smile
Which is as pleasing as a night in a Glasgow jail?
Ah, now I see how this condition came to pass,
You are such a foolish and somewhat foppish old ass!
You mixed coloured silks with your hoses made of cotton
And holes you let grow in every poor sock’s bottom.
Your big toes poke out of your official BBC pair
And look how the heel is worn through right there!
So let us, Paxo, mucker, mate, and jesty pal of mine,
Embark on a worthy tale that’s so sure to entertain.
On the nature of sockdom, drawers, and blessed Newsnight,
This note will answer, better than any show put on late,
And without all the signing, that so annoys my muse,
Who really prefers it when Huw Edwards reads the news.


*

It is a misty morning, in London South West Four,
When Paxo hears knocking from inside his sock drawer.
He says ‘Hello, by wonder! What makes this lively din?’
And up he gets, gown on tight, and he dives right on in,
To investigate the nuisance, coming from across the room,
He shuffles over, ear on wood, hears a mighty boom.
The drawer he opens slowly, and what a sight he sees,
A battlefield of underwear, of fighting lingerie.
Wave on wave of socks, advancing in their finery,
Chasing packs of garters, and warring demon hosiery.
‘Stop that at once,’ cried our confused man of Pax,
But socks heeded not his call; oh woe and, indeed, alas!
He grabbed a toe, he thought he’d won, but it was his mistake.
It pulled him in, just like that! He could not believe he was awake.
‘Get back!’ came the cry. ‘I assure you this is quite real’,
Said a battle-scarred comrade sock with well worn heel.
‘Do you come to aid us now, in our hour of need?
Or are you here to scoff, while good socks bleed?
Look at yon mighty thermal pair, see how they fight,
Do you care to mock such spirit with your typical spite?’
Paxo looked on, never believing what he saw,
A epic warzone, it certainly was, in his own sock drawer!
‘Grab a sword, choose a spear, fight at my side!’
The voice it was of a martial sock and on a glove it did ride.
‘You are the man who made us thus, hardened by your feet
And now this war, of your own design, battle we must meet.’
‘This is not mine,’ said Paxo sure, he did not plan this fight.
‘I’m a man of peace, for goodness sake! And I present Newsnight!’
‘Then that’s your sin,’ said a sock, with a well-sewn frown,
‘You never cared for all the good socks you have cruelly trod down.’
Alas, this sock never finished his worthy little speech,
The defensive line across the drawer, the foes they did breech.
Paxman watched as the field was filled with new attackers
And cowered as towards him ran a fierce pair of undercrackers!
‘Retreat,’ came the cry, ‘to the shoebox, we all must flee!’
And Paxman fled, like many socks as far as his eye could see.
A last stand was stood in the box that was quite spacious
Where Paxo kept all the things he considered the most precious.
It was there he saw, for the first time, the man most ready,
The chief of socks, the Caesar of his age: Grand Marshall Oddie.
He was the oldest of all of Paxman’s old odd socks,
Years had passed since its pair had been somewhere, somehow lost.
He stood nearly half a foot, greying at the muzzle,
With a slack elasticated rim, and a larger, slacker middle.
‘Come gather you brave socks, this field can still be ours,
We will make these walls a fortress, these knickknacks our towers.’
‘Hang on,’ said Paxo, ‘what on earth do you mean by “knickknacks”,
These things are awards for journalism and aren’t given to hacks!’
There was widespread laughter, which broke the dreadful mood,
As socks mocked Paxman, who thought it all quite rude.
‘I say,’ he said, ‘mock not my place in this nation’s heart.’
To which an old garter snapped, as if answering with a fart.
‘Listen friend,’ said Oddie, ‘you are now in a sock-run world.
We care not for Newsnight and all the abuse that you hurled.
This is a time for spirit, for socks with a steadfast seam.
Are you with us, man, or do you choose bat for the other team?’
‘I’m with you, ay,’ said Paxman sure, ‘I’m always with my socks,
But respect I want from every garter snapping in this box.’
A roar went up, as all the socks made ‘Paxman!’ their cheer,
Before Oddie with careful voice, issued orders loud and clear.
‘We attack at once, lest the underwear get wind of our few numbers
Paxman will lead the charge, but beware of his unwashed chunders!’
‘I beg your pardon,’ cried the Pax who was feeling quite abused,
‘Everything here is very clean, I wouldn’t return a pair I’d used.’
‘Steady there, good fellow,’ said Oddie, now with calm,
‘Save your complaint for the battle, I meant you no harm.’
So out they rushed, in hectic flight, with Paxo screaming louder,
Charging the lines of Y-fronts swelled with antifungal powder.
If you never thought it in him, you should have seen him fly there,
Paxo the warrior! Paxman the mighty! Pax the long john slayer!
With his bare hands he choked the life out of an old string vest,
And tore asunder a pair of boxers long past their best.
Oh, how he grappled with nylon and how he wrestled with briefs,
Till, he came at a pair of undies made in the old Far East.
‘You cannot win,’ said the large white pair, ‘I’m sure I’ll best ya!
Can’t you see that I’ll defy your strength since I’m 10% polyester!’
Paxo stood tall, to the height of nearly six inches,
‘I never wore you! Don’t you know that artificial fibre itches?’
‘You lie,’ roared the Y-fronts, and swung a mighty kind of blow
Which Paxman avoided like all journos do, by ducking very low.
He responded with a fist, right into the fiend’s gusset,
‘Take that,’ he cried, as if with one blow he hoped he had bust it.
But the pants were strong, they hardly felt his tiny mortal hand
And Paxman fled knowing that a deadly blow he couldn’t land.
‘That beast may yet win the day,’ said Oddie looming nearer,
‘We need a weapon to defeat it, but I know of nothing keener
Than the old mystical tie pin you used to keep at the other end
Of this drawer, but of that journey, I wouldn’t know who to send…’
With not a word, Paxman bent his back and walked away
To march to Drawer’s End and to reach it by the end of day.
He roamed for a while, across the drawer’s landscape out laid,
Until the sound of battle dimmed and he began to feel afraid.
He travelled long, he travelled fast, until he came to a little nook,
And there with welcome eyes he spied his old notebook.
And from it’s end, he could see an old pencil with sharpened tip
He took it and then on he went with it hanging from his hip.
At last he reached the darkened end of his sock drawer,
Where what little jewellery he owned lay spread across the floor.
‘Where is the tie pin I need,’ cried Paxman, now quite scared,
‘It is the weapon to defeat that beast in Hong Kong manufactured.’
He fell and cried, bewailed his luck, and why things never happen
To that other bloke, who reads the news… the one who’s not called Paxman.
‘Is this what you seek?’ said a simple voice, whispering with a waver
From an old discarded metal case, containing his spare electric shaver.
Out came a glove in fine silk dress, from an interview long forgotten,
With Meryl Streep who had playfully touched Paxo on his bottom.
The glove advanced and in its fingers, nestled rather tightly,
Was the old tie pin, the finest steel, still shining very brightly.
‘You may take this lance, Paxo dear, if you cross my palm with silver,
Or failing that, if you would do me just a very simple favour.’
‘Whatever you wish,’ said Paxman, now even more determined
To have the weapon that once ensured his ties were well pinned.
‘Beyond this nook there lies a shade in which you hid a Christmas tie
You rightly saw it, learned to hate, and left it to fester here and die.
It is a thing of ugliness, orange with a picture of a baboon,
You destroy it now and this pin I promise will be your boon.
‘I won’t be long,’ said Paxman fair, ‘I’ll kill that funky gibbon!’
‘Oy! Watch it!’ shouted Oddie’s voice, though the reason remains well hidden.
So Paxman went to kill the tie using his short pencil sword,
The tie fought valiantly but Paxo dispatched it without a word.
Christmas ties are wicked, the kind of present we should rue,
So fret you not that Paxman ran this monkey tie through.
‘You’ve done a great deed in this,’ said Meryl Streep’s glove,
‘You may take this tie pin back, and have it with my love.’
Paxman took the sword and raised it to the light,
This was the weapon, he knew to win an underwear fight.
So back he raced, not sparing heel, to the sock battlefront,
Where the underpants stood cruel and tall, and so very arrogant.
Up he ran and to the sockish hoards raised the sword and shouted
‘This is for every hose and heel I have so cruelly mistreated!’
And to the pants did Paxman plunge the fierce blade in deep,
Until the gussets did wail and the elasticated waist did weep.
‘Hurrah!’ cried the all socks to see their enemy outfoxed,
By Jeremy the Paxman, standing proud on the vanquished crotch.

*

The rest of this epic tale, I think you’re well aware,
Of Paxman triumphant and vowing to never again wear
A sock he did not name or treat with utmost care
Or cast aside on the floor or lose down the side of a chair.
To him a sock was a thing revered, that made his eyes go misty,
Like Fiona Bruce, Anna Ford, though never the Kaplinsky.
You know the socks, themselves, lived happily every after,
Treated well, with wounds repaired, and with extra fabric softer.
And once bigger than his sock drawer, Paxo to his room returned,
He went to work that day with martial honours earned,
And told his tale to a man much bemused called Clarkson,
Who later described him ‘a loon’ to the readers of ‘The Sun’.
And how the Dimbleby (the David) listened to this story
Before snootily declaring it must be a toenail allegory.
Oh, my dear Paxman, I think I have reached the end,
Where I declare that you really are the oddest of my friends.

© Richard Madeley, 2007

Jeremy Paxman's Toenails

If you've been reading my blog for a while, you might know about my long standing feud with Jeremy Paxman. It all began when a friend of mine who works in the BBC happened to call at Paxman’s house to pick up some scripts for a new show they were planning about the disappearance of British eels. He claims to have seen Jeremy putting his toe nail clippings on a box he keeps above the fireplace. He also said that the box was almost full of the damn things. Of course, my friend told me this in the strictest confidence, which led to my naturally mentioning on air that Jeremy Paxman collects his old toe nail clippings in a box. I couldn’t see much wrong with it at the time. Lots of famous people have had similar collections. Byron used to collect pubic hair and the late Duke of Wellington had the largest ball of earwax in the British Empire.

Only now it turns out that I might have been mistaken. My friend has finally admitted that it was a hoax. I’m sorely disappointed. I like to think I’m a man who enjoys a good joke but hoaxing is beneath me. I’m sorry but I can’t see the humour in leading gullible people on.

This morning, I nipped around to Paxman’s house to offer him my apologies. It was about nine o’clock and Paxo arrived at the door looking a bit the worse for wear.

‘What the hell do you want?’ he grumbled as he picked up his milk bottles from the step.

‘I’ve come to apologise about your toenails,’ I said.

‘Have you now?’ he looked at me as he gave his testicles their first scratch of the day. ‘Well, I suppose you better come in.’

I followed him into Paxman Towers and found myself entering a different day and age. Modern Gothic doesn’t do the place justice. It was like as thought the Norman Conquest was being run by Homebase.

‘You want some coffee?’ asked my host.

‘Not if it’s any bother,’ I said.

‘Bother? Your existence on this planet is bother but I’m making myself one.’

‘Fair enough,’ I said.

Ten minutes later I’m watching Paxman munching his cornflakes.

‘Well?’ he asked, staring into his bowl.

‘Oh, yes, my apology. I just wanted to say that I’m sorry about mentioning your toenails on TV. I now accept that you don’t collect them in a box above the fireplace.’

He looked up, his long face sagging in all the well known places. ‘How do you know I don’t?’ he asked.

‘Pardon?’

He spooned some more cornflakes and looked rather pleased with himself. ‘I said: how do you know I don’t keep my toenails in a box above the fireplace?’

‘Well, that would be crazy, wouldn’t it?’

He shrugged and gave me one of those smiled he normally reserves for Home Secretaries.

‘Listen sonny,’ he said, dropping his spoon. ‘Unlike you, I’m a trained journalist, so I’d check my sources before I run an exclusive. The next time you want to besmirch my name in public, I’d be grateful if you’d check with me beforehand. Now sling your hook, chum, before I give you some of what I gave Michael Howard.’

I was chagrined. I left the kitchen feeling a smaller man. The smaller man was pleased. He’d only dropped in to pick up some scripts. But as I headed to the front door, I gazed into Paxman’s living room and saw a wooden box above the fireplace. I would have checked its contents but I could sense the great man following me and the little man as we headed for the front door.

And that, my dear friends, is why I have only one Paxman fact for you today. Did you know that he collects his toenail clippings and keeps them on a box above his fireplace. It’s the Gospel truth.