Levitations Caused By ‘Super Moon’ Strangely Fewer Than Anticipated

Britain’s emergency services reported with relief that the number of cases of spontaneous levitation reported during last night’s ‘super moon’ event turned out to be rather lower than predicted.

“In fact, there weren’t any,” said a spokesman. “Neither did the moon’s slightly closer proximity result in enhanced strength, X-ray vision, ESP, involuntary carnivorous transformations or supermenstruation. Somehow, it seems we have all managed to come through this deeply mysterious event without supernatural enhancement.”

There's no rational explanation for this

The moon’s orbit has a slight eccentricity, which brings it 0.3% closer to our planet roughly every 20 years. People with more than a slight eccentricity cite the fact that nobody was there to see what started this prehistoric wobble as clear evidence of benevolent non-human intervention. They also state that, since the mass of the moon is nearly enough to suck the oceans of the earth into space, its abnormal nearness must therefore generate super-abilities in particularly wet specimens of the self-propelled bags of water known as the human race.

“I dropped science for pottery at the age of 14, because education is a state conspiracy to program unquestioning obedience into children,” said Starchild Moonflower, a windchime tuner from Aveton Gifford. “After entering a state of spiritual receptivity with the aid of twelve pints of spingo, my spirit guide Tigger told me that the earth mother has drawn her moon lover to her breast so her children will receive the secret wisdom of the universe, i.e. the American, French and British governments absolutely caused the Japanese earthquake with all their H-bomb tests fifty years ago, the bastards.”

Ms Moonflower also claims to have had a sublime out-of-body experience during her astral travels, having woken up outside her yurt at 4am with her pants filled with what she angrily insists is ectoplasm.

Continuing Onslaught Due To Faulty Brakes, Insists Gaddafi

Tragically, the whole of Libya is on a 1 in 12 gradient

The well-known man of peace, Colonel Gaddafi, wrung his hands today on Libyan state TV as he explained that his forces were continuing to advance into rebel-held towns only because their tanks had been deliberately fitted with defective brakes by evil foreign governments seeking to overthrow his caring, democratic regime.
 
“Please spare a thought for my poor, terrified tank crews trapped in these roaring engines of doom,” he begged his people. “When, solely out of love for my misguided opponents, I decided to end their kindly chastisement, my loyal soldiers joyfully pulled the brake levers - but nothing happened. Of course, all the buttons are labelled in the godless script of the evil oppressors, so in their desperation to engage some sort of emergency engine cutoff they may inadvertently have engaged the turret’s auto-loader and accidentally fired off the odd round or two.”

“I urge the rebel forces to set aside their issues with some minor aspects of my humble leadership style for the time being, and lie down en masse in front of these runaway vehicles,” he urged. “I’ve read the owner’s manuals written by the foreign merchants of death, and they state quite categorically that this is the only way to stop them.”

‘Yes, We’ll Deploy An Aircraft Carrier As Soon As We Can Launch It,’ Declares Britain

In the wake of last night’s UN resolution to set up a Libyan no-fly zone, British prime minister David Cameron today promised to deploy an aircraft carrier to the Mediterranean straight after it leaves the slipway on which it is currently being built.

Not playing

“It’s bloody typical of the Libyan people to rebel against their barmy leader, Colonel Gaddafi, just as we decommissioned our last toytown carrier, HMS Ark Royal,” reflected Mr Cameron. “However, the management of BVT tell me that, if the price is right, they can bolt together enough of the basic hull sections of HMS Queen Elizabeth to keep it floating the right way up within a year or so. HMS Quee, as it would then be called, would then be towed to the Med, where it will look very frightening indeed - especially to our pilots, as its flight deck will still be under construction in Birkenhead.”

“Fortunately this will not pose any operational difficulties, as its complement of F-35 aircraft will exist only on a purchase order in a Lockheed-Martin filing cabinet,” he added. “In practical terms, this means that Britain’s main contribution to the interdiction of Libya will be a staggering quantity of aviation fuel burned by aircraft flying to Libya from hundreds, if not thousands, of miles away.”

However, in an unexpected twist Colonel Gaddafi suddenly announced a unilateral cessation of hostilities, spoiling everybody’s fun and games and raising the prospect of the West’s political leaders lining up to shake his blood-soaked hand all over again in the not-too-distant future if they want any of his country’s vast oil reserves.

BBC Finally Drags Moyles Out Of Barricaded Studio

Radio 1 DJ Chris Moyles was finally dragged, kicking and screaming and talking shite, away from a microphone this morning after desperate BBC producers gave up trying to get through his barricaded door and knocked down a wall adjoining his studio, finally bringing to a merciful end 52 harrowing hours of pig-headed ignorance and muzak.

The nation’s ordeal began on Wednesday, when Moyles and his underling, Tragedy Dave, dragged several large filing cabinets full of pies into his padded studio, wedged them firmly against the heavy steel door and welded it shut.

The airwaves of Britain were then jammed on all frequencies as Moyles launched into a marathon of spectacularly ill-informed ranting about everything from the Alternative Vote System - of which he knows nothing - to the deliberations of the UN Security Council - of which he knows nothing - via a broad spectrum of current affairs, celebrity trivia and music – of which he knows nothing.

Jimmy Carr will need years of expensive trauma counselling

“We tried removing the door with cutting torches, but Moyles had welded all the filing cabinets together, making it impossible to pull clear,” said a sweating Andy Parfitt, the controller of Radio 1. “In the end, we had to coax light entertainers out of the BBC canteen and assemble them into teams, taking turns swinging sledgehammers at the adjoining wall. Poor old Stephen Fry may never recover from having to do a proper day's work for the first time in his life.”

After many tiring hours of hammering, a large enough hole had been made for little Jimmy Carr to squeeze through. However, Moyles swiftly stunned the well-spoken comic with a mighty stinking belch he had been fuelling with dozens of mince pies for such an eventuality, tied him to a chair and tortured him with a battery of monumentally banal twatticisms.

Several hours later, as the last remnants of the wall were knocked out, a massed charge led by Jeremy Paxman managed to overpower the 35-stone ignoramus and his drooling henchman in desperate hand-to-hand fighting, and the barrage of offensive inanity was finally brought to a close.

As a solemn mark of the ordeal which Britain has endured, tonight’s BBC Comic Relief event will be renamed BBC – What A Relief.

“After what it’s just been through, the nation could do with a bloody good belly-laugh,” said director general Mark Thompson. “Unfortunately, the best we could dig up is the rotting corpse of Alan Partridge, a valium addict waving a teddy bear in front of a camcorder and the worst episode of Doctor Who ever filmed.”

“I’d suggest you all sink about twelve pints before switching the telly on this evening,” he warned. “Christ knows, you’re going to need it.”

Radiation Now Known To Cause Orgasms, Warn Scientists

The latest research into the effects of radiation shows a clear link between small doses being introduced into the atmosphere and spontaneous multiple orgasms in humans on the other side of the world, according to a report published today.

“We have been monitoring Facebook, Twitter and YouTube carefully over the last couple of days,” explained project leader Dr Gary Clipboard. “And every time a small quantity of radioactive isotopes is released into the atmosphere, it’s almost immediately followed by frenzied moans of delight as people halfway across the world are worked into a lather, resulting in copious emissions all over the screen.”

Unfortunately, swallowing this is no help at all

Dr Clipboard’s observations have led him to believe that exposure to radioactive transmissions seems to affect only certain types of people, however.

“The loudest shrieks seem to come from those who left school at 16 but are convinced they know more than you,” he noted. “It seems that even the merest mention of the word ‘radiation’ acts on the most suggestible area of the brain – in these cases, that’s the part which handles everything but remembering to breathe. This leads to rapid overstimulation of the imagination, and the victim is suddenly racked with intense feelings of smugness, loses all self-control and almost immediately starts squirting juicy comments all over the place.”

The only prescribed treatment known to work in such cases, unfortunately, is to pre-administer several doses of a difficult substance which scientists call ‘education’.

“I regret to say that there is no hope whatsoever for these poor unfortunates,” concluded Dr Clipboard sadly. “We’ve tried to administer simple diagrams but, like the more complicated articles we tried initially, they just seem to pass straight through without being absorbed at all. Racked by the throes of their tragic degeneration, victims experience an unquenchable thirst for video posted by their fellow sufferers. Finally there’s an insufferable outburst of uncontrollable gloating, and I’m afraid it’s all over the internet.”

The resulting ignorance has a half-life measured in decades, he warned.

Meanwhile, fears are now growing that the unplanned bursts may soon contaminate those who did pay attention at school, but have tragically since lost the ability to remember that atoms do not violently split themselves.

PUZZLE CORNER (for older readers)

Rearrange these words to form a sentence*:

SMILEY CULTURE 

 

‘POLICE OFFICER’ 

HIT

* in the unlikely event of any of the officers involved ever being charged with manslaughter

UK To Introduce Variant Of Burmese Forced Labour Scheme

Congratulations - you're all Spartacus

Britain is to introduce its own version of the forced labour scheme long favoured by Burma’s ruling junta, proclaimed employment minister Chris Grayling today, promising that it would only be inflicted on all those jobless bastards.

“When the Burmese military or its puppet government wants some hard manual labour done, the nearest village is ordered to provide the necessary slave workforce or else,” enthused Mr Grayling. “Well, what could be fairer than Britain’s private sector issuing the same ultimatum to our Jobcentres?”

Under the government’s shake-up of the welfare system, every scrounging workshy in the country will be coerced into doing whatever the service industries tell them for four weeks every year, or lose all benefits for three months - ensuring that they will get evicted and starve, and serve the bastards right.

“It’s a dream come true!” said one delighted supermarket manager. “We’ll be able to sack all these smart-arse students, then just take them on after they graduate, a month at a time, and we won’t even have to pay their National Insurance. It’s bloody brilliant, and we look forward to its inevitable expansion to full slavery all year round.”

Mr Grayling said the draconian move would give the jobless – none of whom, of course, have so much as lifted a finger in their entire lives – the inspirational gift of experiencing all the “habits and routines” of daily working life, with the obvious exception of the habit of being paid.

"I've been really worried by some of the jobsearch interviews I've sat through where people are clearly losing their focus,” said Mr Grayling, “In fact, sometimes I could have sworn my advisor was snoring. But then I got elected and became an MP, which certainly beats working.”

Saudi Forces Finally Find A Use For All The Arms We Sold Them

Once the ammo has been fired, an M1A1 can stow up to 1600kg of duty-free goods

As they pour into neighbouring Bahrain, the armed forces of Saudi Arabia report that they are eagerly looking forward to finally getting some use out of the massive stockpiles of hi-tech weaponry they have been buying from Britain and America for decades.

“Lately we’ve been trying them out on our own minorities, which is nice,” smiled one Saudi brigadier-general, “But you just don’t get the same kick out of it compared to the thrill of massacring unarmed foreigners.”

The only country in the world to be named after its owners sent the troops in after receiving a request from Bahrain’s Sunni-dominated government, when the latter realised they hadn’t bought nearly enough British and American killing machinery to exterminate their protesting Shia population.

Meanwhile, the Saudis continued to call for the West to enforce a no-fly zone in Libya.

“Ideally, of course, we’d do it ourselves with all the lovely Tornadoes that British Aerospace kindly sold us, after they’d given us a big enough bribe,” said King Abdullah’s fourth son’s second wife’s nephew twice removed, who is therefore the minister of something. “They’ll be retiring once we’ve uncrated the new Typhoons you’ve just sold us, and it would be nice to see them win their spurs before they’re scrapped.”

“The thing is, though, that Gaddafi is barmy enough to shoot back,” he added. “So it’s really much better that you shoulder the risk. Britain and America have a fine tradition of military funerals, you see, and we don’t.”

Cream Of British Acting Talent Confuse Chitty Chitty Bang Bang With Art

In an overdramatic letter to the Observer today, Britain’s world-beating luvvies begged the government not to cut funding to the arts, pointing out that many of them had won gongs which in some undefined way contributed £7bn to the nation’s economy.

“With the heart-rending reductions announced in last year's ghastly Spending Review, the terrifying withdrawal of simply huge amounts of local authority support, the stomach-churning abolition of the poor, defenceless UK Film Council and the cruel and brutal financial pressures faced by the innocent little Arts Councils and the dear old BBC, we are currently facing the deadliest threat to funding the arts and culture have experienced in the entire history of mankind,” they wrote on a tear-stained sheet of RSC stationery.

The tragic decline of David Tennant from 2009 to today can only get worse

“Oh, and something about paintings and stuff too,” they added in a postscript.

As a typical example of how funding is affecting ordinary British actors, they highlighted the terrible plight of David Tennant, who used to earn £1m a year but is now unable to afford even the most basic personal grooming tools.

“We are seeing the titans of Britain’s thespian community losing their jobs daily to Martine McCutcheon and caterwauling members of the public,” sobbed Dame Helen Mirren, who achieved international recognition with her critically-acclaimed breasts in John Landis’ epic movie adaptation of Shakespeare’s An American Werewolf In London. “Without a big fat subsidy, how long can the benighted corners of this land continue to be culturally enriched by hand-me-down versions of West End musicals based on Disney movies or some sort of wafer-thin narrative linking pop hits of the 70s?”

“If anything, it’s an understatement to say that this so-called government is committing intellectual genocide against the matinee audiences of Great Britain,” explained Tony Robinson, as he prepared to be buried for 100 years in a time capsule, in a last-ditch attempt to keep Channel 4 paying for Time Team.

“Please, please give me another series,” begged one-time TV satirist Rory Bremner as he desperately tried to perfect his impressions of Lauren Laverne, Jimmy Carr, David Mitchell and Charlie Brooker. “Look, the Two Johns are on pensions now - I can probably get them for free.”