JUST FANCY THAT
Just under a million Americans have so far died from Covid. By comparison, a total of around 700,000 US citizens have been killed in all the country’s overseas wars since 1775.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
WHO’S ...
Sir — Who, pray, is Angela Rayner?
M. DOUGLAS-SHANKS
Los Angeles
… WHO?
Sir — Who, pray, is Sharon Stone?
J. COCKLECARROT
Icepick Cottage
Shanksmere
Do you expect ME to know? — Ed
MAKING IT UP
Sir — Not being acquainted with the newspaper world, though I do like the Monmouthshire Beacon and Forest of Dean Gazette, would you please explain to me this business of anonymous sources?
If a reporter can write a story without having to name the source, what is to stop them making it all up on a quiet day like we did at school during the old king’s reign (God rest his soul)?
Asking on behalf of a friend.
Mrs TRELLIS-SHANKS,
Up the garden path
It is a truth universally acknowledged that when a reporter quotes an unnamed source it is invariably made up. It is lazy journalism but it does fill a space — Ed
SORRY ROSALIE ...
Sir — I note you’ve taken to running pieces in the Drone by people with the most preposterous, made-up bylines such as Robin McGibbon, Terry Manners and (yes, I get it!) Alan Frame.
If they’re doing it to protect their modesty, they would do well to remember what Churchill said about Attlee.
AWARDS NOMINEE ROSALIE RAMBLESHANKS (trainee)
American Bar
Flying Fuck
… YOU’RE STUMPED
Apropos the twit who’s clearly suffering a bout of insecurity, writing for The Drone has nothing to do with a lack of modesty; it’s simply a way of supporting a jolly decent guy, who invests his time — and a fair amount of money — producing a vibrant, highly informative and amusing website that never ceases to entertain. I doff my Chelsea baseball cap to him.
STUMPY (not made up!),
Bickley.
The cheque’s in the post, Stumpy — Ed
JOBSWORTH
Dear Jolly Decent Guy Who Invests His Time — And A Fair Mount Of Money — Producing A Vibrant, Highly Informative And Amusing Website That Never Ceases To Entertain.
Gissa Job!
R. SLICKING-SHANKS
Stumps Cross
Glos
WIDE OF THE MARK
Sir — Predictably, there is much hand wringing over the decision to relocate male illegal migrants to Rwanda. The Beeb’s Mark Easton piles on the agony by pointing out that, sob, they will be landing in a country they’ve never visited before. Bit like the UK then.
PRITI BALLOON-SHANKS
Dover
LABOURING A POINT
Sir — Forget Boris’s crazy Rwanda plan! Let’s concentrate, instead, on the bold, incisive strategy to solve Britain’s migrant problem laid out with forensic rigour by Labour, the Lib Dems and the SNP.
KENNY KIGALI-SHANKS
Linton-on-Ouse
I must have missed that — Ed
JUST FANCY THAT
Since the start of the Ukraine war the EU has given Kyiv €1bn worth of arms and weapons. Over the same period it has sent Russia €35bn in energy payments.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
CHARLIE’S TAUNT
Sir — So sad to read about the death of dear old Charlie Catchpole, a wonderful wit and great company.
As well as the good times with him, I remember some not so good. When I was Night Editor of the Sunday Express back in the turbulent 80s for Sir John Junor, Charlie sat behind the Backbench on the news desk on Saturdays, and we would often exchange banter and pop down to the Poppinjay for a swift one.
These were the days of the Wapping newspaper revolution that many of us will never forget. It was the most vicious industrial dispute since the days of the Great Depression and hate ruled. Murdoch’s new tech dawn sparked a strike that put the print workers on the streets. Feelings ran high.
Charlie worked at Wapping of course and was a target. One quite menacing messenger who sat close by, was consumed with fury and Charlie was in his sights. Words were exchanged, and for some weeks, Charlie was subjected to deathly glares and worse. He felt he couldn't carry on. It got so bad that he would leave the building by the back door or was followed by security.
In the end the management got involved. But not before Charlie stopped coming in for a while. They were tough times … and it was a difficult situation. But Charlie finally soldiered on and continued to be the star he was.
TERRY MANNERS
FOR UK’S SAKE!
Sir — I fear some of my chums misheard me on a Skype call last night, causing a frisson of incredulity.
I said I was relocating at the end of the month to “the UK” — not “the Ukraine”!
I will be in Devon, not Donbas, come May Day.
RICK McNEILL
Cape Town (for now)
Welcome home, Rick — Ed
CELL PHONE
Sir — I see that Apple has just made life a little easier for us bank robbers (when I gets out!)
Its latest iPhone update, iOS 15.4, ‘adds the ability to unlock Face ID while wearing a mask.’
B. LAG-SHANKS
S Wing
HMP Walton-on-Thames
LABOURED POINT
Sir - You’ve got to hand it to Labour spin doctors for always coming up with les mots justes to discomfit the Tories.
Almost every Opposition mouthpiece has now taken to dismissing any Government initiative as ‘too little, too late.’
Wish I’d thought of that.
ALLY CAMPBELL-SHANKS
Hackney
FEELING THE HEAT
Sir — My wife Quarantine and I have trialled a gas-saving project in our road. Beware the dangers! Two neighbours joined WarmStop, in which one household turns off all their radiators between 5pm and 10pm then stays next door. One couple were Seventh Day Adventists and wouldn’t shut up about God, the others were pervs who invited us to watch porn and walk around with nothing on as heat raged from their boiler. You have been warned!
Mr and Mrs MAURICE
ECO-FRIENDLY,
Worcesterboiler.
HOW THICKENING
Sir — I see that Prince Andrew, Duke of York, previously known as HRH, once again proves that an expensive education (Gordonstoun £44,000 and ever rising) can never make a thick sod intelligent. In his quickly deleted Instagram posts he talks of returning from Mrs Thatcher’s Falklands war ‘a changed man.’ He says: ‘I put away childish things and false bravado … returned a man full in the knowledge of human frailty and suffering.’
By childish things was he including underage girls? And by human frailty did he mean his paedophile pal Jeffrey Epstein or his own which has been on full view for decades?
His grasp of grammar is as bad as his morals, referring to ‘family’s torn about by the horrors they have witnessed.’ He talks of being brought ‘to a full weep’ by the suffering in Ukraine. A full weep? What does that mean? My guess is that it is straight out of the Fergie psychobabble text book. At one point he says ‘I am afraid to say’ when he means ‘sorry to say.’ What a chump.
All this at a time when some kind soul mysteriously deposited £1.1 million into his bank account and he muscles in on the memorial service for his father.
As that splendid broadcaster Eddie Mair told Boris Johnson: ‘You’re a nasty piece of work aren’t you?’ At least Boris isn’t thick, stupid maybe, but not thick.
DISGUSTED
of Windsor Great Park
ROYAL ROBBERY
Sir — So glad to hear Kelvin has a Lexus. I could have bought one off the proceeds of the massive royal exclusive he stole from me when editing The Sun, the bastard.
And after I got his mother Mary a job as PR for Hampshire CC when she was out of work, too.
S. OURGRAPES
OLD JOKES HOME
I went to the shop to get some deodorant.
The shopkeeper asked "Ball or aerosol?"
I said "No, for my armpit."
OVERHEARD IN THE PUB
Condoms should be used on every conceivable occasion.
LOU YAFFA
The much loved Lou Yaffa, former chief sub of the News of the World has died.
Lou, a Geordie who was described by a colleague as a great man, also worked on the Daily Herald and the Daily Mirror.
Towards the end of his career, Lou was a valued casual sub on the Daily Express in Blackfriars. He was also an NUJ activist.
That’s all we know at the moment but we do have a great anecdote about Lou which can be read HERE
BILL FREEMAN
A former northern news editor of the Sunday Express, Bill Freeman, has died at the age of 89.
He took up the post in 1959 and, in 1963, he moved to the Daily Mirror as northern news editor, then assistant editor. In 1984 he became northern editor of the Sunday Mirror until the Manchester office closed down in the late 80s.
Colleague Alastair McQueen told the Drone: ‘Bill was a man who loved his news, his newspapers and adored his reporters. He was one of the very best, a joy to work for.
‘He was Northern News Editor of the Sunday Express in its heyday before moving from Great Ancoats Street to the Mirror.
'He believed passionately that there should be a “Northern flavour” and a strong presence by newspapers in the North.'
The Mirror Pensioner website has more details.
BACK ON THE WALL
Last week we wrote that former MailOnline editor Martin Clarke had suffered a peculiar indignity at his old office, having his portrait removed from the editors' Hall Of Fame next to the canteen.
We have since been assured that the removal of Clarke's portrait was only temporary, done so that they could have the inscription on it updated to include his date of departure. He has since been returned to his rightful place on the wall.
WORLD’S WORST JOKE
Are you sweating while putting petrol in your car and feeling sick when you pay for it?
You are suffering from carownervirus.
Get this appalling joke off my website now — Ed.
Sod off, Ed — The Subs.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
PUTIN FINGERED
Sir — My neighbour is never short of an insult. She calls vegetarians “herbi-bores”, which is clever. She also refers to a prominent member of our gay community as “Rear Admiral”. Naughty, but I get that too.
Today she said Vladimir Putin is “the World’s Number One Front Bottom”. I think I know what she means, but I can’t quite put my finger on it.
VERA BONNIELASS
Via email
NOT THE FULL SHILLING
I was really annoyed the other day when the staff at the Odeon cinema said that they wouldn't accept a £50 note when I was paying for my pick 'n' mix. In the end I had to pay with two twenties and a ten.
WAYNE KERR
Cockfosters
MY KINDA TOWN
Sir — I see that the late Madeleine Albright, first female U.S. Secretary of State, used to live in the bijou town of Walton-on-Thames, so posh that it is said that the staff have staff.
Apart from Ms Albright, President Herbert Hoover, Admiral George Rodney, Dame Julie Andrews, singer Nick Lowe and, maybe, Julius Caesar, do readers know of anyone famous who has lived there?
Wm. HICKEY-SHANKS
West Byfleet sur Mer
I can’t think of anyone, unless you know better, Mr Hickey-Shanks. I will ask my staff. But I can confirm it is very pleasant this time of year — Ed
PEDANTS' CORNER
Sir — Another example of the lack of a revise system on the Mail: a Page 3 picture do-up on actress Anya Taylor-Joy mentions she starred in the Netflix mini-series The Queen’s Gambit two years ago but fails to note she has rather a prominent role in Peaky Blinders, currently dominating the BBC drama output on Sunday nights.
P.RODNOSE
Back Bar
Flying Fuck
GOD DAMNED
If the rumours are true, Boris Johnson wouldn't be the first Prime Minister to have an awkward godparent situation.
Wendi Deng let slip that Tony Blair was godfather to one of Murdoch's daughters. Cameron remained unhelpfully tied to Michael Gove for years after their bust-up because Sarah Vine is godmother to one of his.
So just a heads up to Boris that he might want to get prepping his lines if he's ever made Evgeny Lebedev an offer to become the spiritual guardian to one of his many, many children.
Because one of the broadsheets is currently investigating a claim that he has.
OLD JOKES HOME
Now that McDonald’s have closed all 800 of their stores, Russia is now a no-fry zone.
BACK TO THE PAST
Which Fleet Street journalist has been bringing a bit of old-school glamour back to the profession?
He's been getting regularly sloshed at the nearby pub these last few weeks and becoming so lairy with the bar staff that complaints are now being sent direct to the paper's newsdesk.
We think we should be told — Ed
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
PLAYING SILLY RUGGERS
Sir — Watching the Italy-Scotland rugger international, I note that, according to their shirts, all the Scottish players were called Peter Vardy. That’s most unusual. Has any other reader pointed it out?
BMW SPONSOR-SHANKS
Edinburgh
Goodness knows, maybe they are all brothers. Similarly, why are all rugby balls called Gilbert? — Ed
UNDER THE WEATHER
Sir — I see you have introduced an Haut Definition, turbo-charged, all-singing, all-dancing, gold-embossed, bevel-edged, appliqué-enhanced, cantilever-action, mahogany-inlaid weather forecast, in glorious Technicolor and VistaVision, for … London.
Trouble is: I don’t live in fucking London.
W. GABRIEL-SHANKS
Gittins-on-the Wold
As the caption advises, if you click on the graphic you get more details including the ability to choose your location — Ed
LOST ARTICLE
Sir — When I were a lad we called it the Ukraine. What ever became of the 'the'?
PER PLEXED
Petts Wood
We used to say the Lebanon too, those were the days! — Ed
SILLY OLD FUEL
Sir — These ‘soaring’ petrol prices don’t worry me: I’ll continue putting in twenty quid as usual.
D.M. BULB-SHANKS
Fuelwell
Richmond
ELEGANT ENGLISH
Sir — Sometimes it’s the little things, an elegant turn of phrase, which draw one to subscribe to a particular newspaper. Two examples from wordsmiths at The Times:
Hugo Rifkind on the complexities of the Peaky Blinders plot: ‘I've no idea where all this is going, and once it has gone there I daresay there's a decent chance I'll have no idea where it just went.’
An obit touching on the marital shenanigans of Shane Warne: ‘Not one to be restrained by the small print of a nuptial contract, he exhausted his wife's powers of forgiveness. They divorced in 2005.’
LP BREVMIN
Chief Sub
TOO MANY DENIERS
Sir — Since moving from newspapers to the world of social media, like so many other semi-retired hacks out grazing in the wetlands of Blighty, I have noticed a new breed of reader in various news fields … The Deniers.
On Twitter, this herd denies everything from the Holocaust and Covid to Armstrong landing on the Moon and any Brexit success, along with the fact that no one reads the Express because it is fascist.
Even news events unfolding before our very eyes from British snappers in the Ukraine. Mostly no bylines from Tweeters of course, just a picture of a frog or skull.
One anonymous Armchair General this week, claimed the 40-kilometre-long column of Russian tanks heading for Kiev, was fake because the trees were green, and we were in wintertime. In fact, the invading tanks were moving through a UkrainIan, evergreen pine and conifer forest.
TENERIFE TEL,
Dollis Hill,
Neasden patriot.
HIM AGAIN
Sir — Much admired Alan Frame’s emotional and affectionate piece on Ukraine. Look out, you Shankses, there’s a new kid (eh? Ed) on the block!
S. MULDOON
(Ex Drone trainee)
Pressdram Ltd
NOT OUR CUP OF TEY
Sir — Isn’t it about time the Daily Drone got up to date and started using Preferred Gender Pronouns? I am sure we would all welcome the choice of He/Him, She/Her or They/Them. There may even be a case for extending this to the use of Neopronouns such as Xe, Ze, Ve, Tey and Hir.
What think you, Mr Ed?
LAVINIA RAMBLESHANKS
Her (indoors)
West Byfleet
Ze are being silly now. As for our readers, I am sure hir wouldn’t welcome it — Ed
OVER EXPOSURE
Sir — Have you noticed how snappers at The Times have become increasingly self regarding of late? They have taken to publishing up-your-bum albums of their ‘work’ on the paper’s website.
Each run-of-the-mill, often grainy, snap is accompanied by technical bollocks such as: Equipment used: Canon EOS-1DX Mark ll using 16-35mm zoom lens (set at 16mm) 1/1,250th sec, f7.1, ISO 500
Yet the Drone recently published a pin-sharp picture of Express geriatrics which showed every line and blemish on their crumbling faces taken on an ordinary
over-the-counter iPhone 12 15.3.1 MGJ53B/A F17FWBXD¥F§N
ROLY FLEX-SHANKS
Chief Photographer
HACKING’S BACK
Word in legal circles is that there's likely to be another wave of phone-hacking claims, thanks to new evidence being uncovered in notebooks by claimants' lawyers during this latest round of case-building.
SOB STORY
The end of an era: Martin Clarke, the mastermind behind MailOnline, left the Mail's office for the last time, with an unexpectedly tearful leaving speech.
DAVID BANKS
Former Daily Mirror editor David Banks has died at the age of 74.
He leaves a wife, Gemma, and two children.
Banks, a larger than life character, lived life to the full.
A colleague from his days as a Daily Express news sub in Manchester in the 1970s remembers: “He and another sub, Dave Barrie, had a fast drinking contest in an Ancoats pub one night.
"Several times they poured pints down their throats but it wasn’t possible to say who had won. When Barrie suggested a decider, Banks said: ‘Can’t, mate: I’m only on a break’."
Banks grew up on a council estate and left school at 16, becoming a sub-editor on his local paper, the Warrington Guardian.
By 31, he was assistant chief sub at the Daily Mirror before joining the New York Post.
He moved to The Sun in 1981, and later edited the New York Daily News, Sydney Daily Telegraph and the Daily Mirror.
TOM’S MEMORIES PROVE A HIT WITH THE READERS
VETERAN reporter TOM BROWN, pictured, has written an excellent piece in the Daily Record which has proved popular with readers.
Tom told the Drone: "I’m amazed by the response — a couple of hundred messages in emails, Facebook, etc.
It shows the Queen and I are now history, but at least it proves I'm not ga-ga (yet).
"The intro wrote itself — 'The Queen and I started our jobs on the same day in February 1952.' So I wrote this piece, not about the big stories but about how our lives have changed. It's now official — I'm history.
“The story has gone online — not in the newspaper — a sign of the times. Beware, there are several pictures of me."
We suggest reading Tom’s piece (link below) wearing a blindfold to avoid seeing pictures of him — Ed
HOW (BROADCAST) JOURNALISM WORKS
‘Prince Andrew has been holed up in his home, Royal Lodge, a stone’s throw from Windsor Castle’ — ITV News. As a matter of fact, they are 3.2 miles apart.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
PISS-POOR BEEB
Sir — Isn’t the BBC’s news gathering piss-poor at times? As the Big Storm did its worst, I received a Mirror news flash on my phone about significant damage to the roof of the 02 (1,000 people were evacuated from the site).
I was actually reading a more detailed account, plus pix, on the Mirror website just as the BBC One O’clock News aired…and didn’t carry a word. Don’t Beeb journos monitor other news outlets?
EUNICE SHAMBLESHANKS
Air Ministry Roof
McGRANDIOSE
Sir — I never knew or worked with Leith McGrandle but Peter Chambers was an old pro and judging by your published correspondence he had every right to be impertinent.
McGrandle’s complaints bore all the hallmarks of being inspired by an editor known for setting tiresome “goals” for his most talented journalists.
RICK McNEILL
Cape Town
ADJUSTING ONES ADDRESS
Editor — In these days of increasing gender neutrality it seems inappropriate for my family and me to refer to you as Sir when we write to you. Consequently, we would appreciate your guidance on how you wish to be addressed in future.
For instance, would you like Mate, Luvvie, My Little Pet Hen, Bingsikins, Ducks, Palsy Walsy or Me Old Mucker?
P.C. RAMBLESHANKS
Wokefield
You’re being silly now, I’ll settle for Your Noble Highness — Ed
SECRET SUBS
Sir — Following your revelation that the Chinese may be hiding their submarines beneath the sea, a good friend who knows about these matters tells me that the Australians conceal theirs down under.
PERRY SCOPE
Petts Wood
BEYOND OUR KEN
Sir — Steve Mill’s report of his nostalgic trip to the Street of Shame recently and his fond memories of the drinking haunts we all recall, prompted so many memories.
Not least, the evening Wordsmith and Sussex Yeoman, Ken Weller turned up for his 5.30pm shift in the 1970s, to enthral us with how he had just met yet another TV star, serving behind the bar in the Punch, where he popped in for his normal Swan lager livener before starting his shift.
It was Coronation Street actor, Ernst Walder, alias Polish exile Ivan Cheveski, who was married to Elsie Tanner’s daughter Linda, and appeared in 76 episodes. He had fallen on hard times. Ken was a Corrie fan and couldn’t get over it.
They had apparently got on like a Street on fire, and Ken looked forward to finding out all the gossip about Elsie on set, the following evening. But he was crestfallen. He never saw him again.
Dear old Ken was always running into stars. He would often share a little drink with actress Dora Bryan on the train home to Brighton every night, where she lived in a hotel for 40 years.
TELBOY
Neasden
WEEK POINT
Sir — Apparently with so many working from home, those who do go in on Tuesday, Wednesday And Thursday are known by a four-letter name not really suitable for a family online newspaper.
PRU DENDA-SHANKS
Worksop
I’m beginning to suspect that all these letters from the ‘Shanks' family are coming from the same person — Ed
HANS, ARSE, ELBOW
Sir — Who’d be Observer ‘critic’ Simran Hans? Days after she sneeringly dismisses Kenneth Branagh’s film Belfast in a two-star ‘review’, it is nominated for seven Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Director.
CECIL B. DE SHANKS
Holywood
N.Ireland
PYG OF A PROBLEM
Sir — Bamber Gascoigne, the ostensibly bland inaugural host of University Challenge who has just died, had an unexpected and intriguing side to him.
An obituary notes that his play Leda Had a Little Swan, which featured bestiality, was banned by the Lord Chamberlain before it reached the stage.
A subsequent offering foundered because of casting difficulties: he couldn’t find the 40 pygmies the plot required.
T.H. ESPIAN-SHANKS
Alhambra Theatre
West Byfleet
FLEET STREET MEMORIES
Former editorial assistant STEVE MILL reports:
I took a nostalgic trip to the Street of Shame shortly before Christmas to remember an old friend. Unfortunately it was rather a depressing experience.
Stopped at The Old Bell for a pint, I think I was the sixth customer, couldn't help recalling the mayhem that ensued during the festive season. I could tell it was the season of goodwill back then when I saw a news reporter heave a typewriter at a colleague!
Speaking of 'attitude adjusters', how many times did I hear Peter Tory invite Ross Benson to join him for a morning 'sharpener' in The Poppinjay?
At the other end of the spectrum, an heroically over-refreshed Ross Tayne ordered off the stone, I know it happened because he came into the pub to tell us! His finest hour?
I remember Norman Cox … Andrew Edwards strolls into the Hickey office and greets Norman with the following: ‘Hello you bearded fart!'
BARRY’S LAST LAUGH
Comedy great Barry Cryer told this joke to a nurse in hospital shortly before he died aged 86.
A man and his wife are out walking one day when they spot a lone fellow on the other side of the road. 'That looks like the Archbishop of Canterbury over there,’ says the woman.
'Go and see if it is,' she tells her husband.
He crosses the road and asks the man if he is indeed the Archbishop of Canterbury.
'Fuck off,’ says the man.
The husband crosses back to his wife who asks: 'What did he say? Is he the Archbishop of Canterbury?'
'He told me to fuck off,'says the husband.
'Oh no,’ replies the wife, 'Now we'll never know.'
HEATHER MCGLONE
HAS MCGONE AGAIN
Heather McGlone, editor of the Daily Mail’s Weekend Magazine, will retire this week shortly before her 65th birthday.
She will be replaced after her 19-year stint by Andrew Davies, who is currently assistant editor at the Mail on Sunday.
Lord Drone writes: I remember Heather from the Daily Express where her presence was always very much in evidence. After one of her many jousts with editor Nick Lloyd she stuck a Post-It note on his computer reading: I RESIGN.
Nick refused to accept her resignation and Heather carried on until she was finally fired by Richard Addis.
A reader adds: Heather often received a bad press at the Express (viz constant references to her ‘links’ to the east end of the District Line) but she was an assiduous, hard-working journalist who deserved to infiltrate the men only top table.
Those who highlight her ‘eccentricities’ tend to overlook that she was not only doing a good job in Blackfriars Road but successfully bringing up two daughters.
Her subsequent success editing the Mail’s go-to Saturday TV magazine, which made other telly mags superfluous, says all there is to say.
Happy retirement, H!
Another correspondent writes: I recall that the features editor spent what spare time she had left over from berating her team in sobbing in the loo. A secretary at one stage was obliged to pass a note under the door begging her to come out as Nick Lloyd wished to see her.
Yet another reader recalls:
After she flounced out of the Express her long suffering husband Louis Kirby, calling in favours from his time as deputy editor of the Daily Mail, asked Paul Dacre to give her a job, though warning, according to Kirby’s own account, ‘just don’t let her near any human beings’.
Dacre gave her a junior job on Femail but soon promoted her to the Weekend editorship, telling his execs, ‘Ive found someone even nastier than me!’
At Weekend her rages were legendary.
She once had to send her secretary to Marks and Spencer during her lunch break to buy her some new underwear, explaining ‘I shouted at someone so hard I wet myself’.
And after deciding the £50,000 differential between her salary and that of one of her senior staff was not enough, she went to management and, rather than demand they gave her a raise, insisted they cut his pay instead, which they did, albeit reluctantly, by £25,000!
Simon Hedger, who 'toiled under Heather McGlone’s leadership when she was Features Editor on the Daily Express', writes:
I agree that she was (and probably still is) a very hard-working and talented journalist who forced her way to the top in what was then a predominately male world, but on Express Features she was also demanding, unpredictable and, as A Reader says, at times somewhat eccentric.
On one occasion after some real or imaginary slight she ordered all her backbench (male) colleagues to “just shoo, go away” and they all trooped off sheepishly like naughty schoolboys for 10 minutes or so before creeping back to their work stations.
While much of the above is true, Heather was not a complete villain and some people speak of her kindness — Ed
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
A PM WRITES
Dear Aunt Marje — One of my predecessors had blood on his hands and got a knighthood. All I’ve got on my fingers is sticky birthday cake, but the rozzers are after me! Help!
(REDACTED)
Downing Street garden
Behind the rose beds
We are pleased to award you the Victoria Sponge — Ed
SHOW SLOPPER
Sir — I was undecided whether to see the new ‘feel good’ film Save the Cinema, starring Samantha Morton and Jonathan Pryce, but a negative review in the Grauniad, in which it was described as ‘slop’, made up my mind. I loved it!
S. SPIELBERG-SHANKS
Hollywood
SIDE BURNS
Sir — As the tumbrils line up in St John’s Wood, permit me to highlight one instruction that should have been issued at the very start of this disastrous England tour: so-called opener Rory Burns? Get your fucking hair cut!
GERTRUDE FORTESCUE-PIRBRIGHT
Shanksmere, Cumbria
NUMBER’S UP
Sir — Please allow me space to make the following appeal to Drone readers:
If any of you see James Slack could you please give him the following contact details: Phone: 020 7782 4100. Email: exclusive@the-sun.co.uk. Text: 07423 720 250.
It may help him the next time he’s sitting on an exclusive he doesn’t know what to do with.
WILLIAM BOOT-SHANKS
Back Bar
Flying Fuck
EXTRACTING THE LIQUID
Sir — What a grubby milieu Westminster is these days. Apart from the Boris Johnson imbroglio, MPs are now starting to leak against each other, according to a BBC political corr. She’s taking the piss, surely.
JIMMY RIDDLE-SHANKS
Looe
KNAVISH TRICKS
Sir — Isn’t God Save the Queen a little too hetero-normative for our toxic times? I suggest the Guardian, to mark this Platinum Jubilee Year, should sponsor a competition to rewrite the National Anthem, to root out its triumphalist, colonialist, anti-progressive and exclusionary terminology. Perhaps starting with the words “God” and “Queen”?
Prof A.R. SHOLE
Oxford
HEADS YOU LOSE
Sir — I couldn’t help but smile at your nostalgic snippet recalling the modus operandi of middle bencher and stand-in, bread delivery-van driver David Laws, as he dished out stories to news subs, half-way out of their seats, on the way to the Poppinjay for refreshments before their break.
But perhaps the winner of any competition to be Headline Impresario should unquestionably include pipe-smoking Tony ‘The Brigadier’ Armstrong, affectionately remembered by those Express Golden Oldies still alive, as the man in the corduroy jacket, clutching a half pint to his breast and smoking a pipe at the bar, sometimes playfully forgetful it was his round next.
As subs submitted their 10th or 12th headline to him for a Brev x 2, they would be told: “That’s it, great stuff … I think you’re nearly there!”
After about an hour of this awful slavery, I submitted the second or third headline I had already put in, one night. And he liked it.
PS: Having said that, it taught you how to work at headlines. They don't do it now.
TERRY MANNERS
HOGGED OFF
Sir — I know that omicron has fucked it up this year but, for me, Hogmanay has never really been the same since Andy Stewart, Kenneth McKellar and Jimmy Shand and his Band reeled off to the Great Ceilidh In The Sky.
O.L.D REEKIE-SHANKS
White Heather Club
Morningside
There, there, laddie. Just be grateful Moira Anderson is still with us — Ed
RUFFO JUSTICE
Sir — An interesting sidebar to the Maxwell case is mention of a high-powered New York legal firm called Rheingold Giuffra Ruffo and Plotkin. Eh?
NORMAN CLATURE-SHANKS
Much Branding
Staffs
BINT ON THE SIDE
Sir — Anyone got a number for Princess Haya bint al-Hussein?
G. OLDIGGER
Shanks-on-the-Make
Surrey
YUL-TIDE STINKER
Sir — Not many people know two fascinating facts about the late Yul Brynner: he was a rabid Liverpool fan and was allergic to deodorant. In fact, Yul never wore cologne.
G.ROAN-SHANKS
Much Punning
Wilts
NO QUESTION
Questions in headlines to which the answer is always No (96): Lost your chocolate Skunk? (The Times)
JUST FANCY THAT
The city of Plano, Texas, has had to appoint a new fire chief after the previous office holder exposed himself to a fast food worker. The new man is Chris Biggerstaff — Popbitch
FNAAR FNAAR
Michael Buerk on watching Philippa Forrester cuddle up to a male astronomer for warmth during BBC1's UK eclipse coverage remarked: 'They seem cold out there. They're rubbing each other and he's only come in his shorts.’
PETER ALDRICH
Former Daily Express library clerk Peter Aldrich has died aged 74 in distressing circumstances.
Peter died from smoke inhalation after a fire broke out at his home. This was discovered after colleague Paul Ross called at his home and was told the news by a neighbour.
Peter, who was a really nice man, was a former FoC and director of the Express pension fund from 1993 to 2005.
He also played for the Express football team in the 1970s as pictured.
STEVE MILL told the Drone: 'I should like to echo your sentiment regarding the late Peter Aldrich. I worked on the second floor of the old Express building between 1975 and 1989 and knew Peter as a work colleague and can confirm that he was indeed a really nice man.
'I was greatly saddened to read that he had passed away in, as you reported, such distressing circumstances.
'In addition to knowing Peter in the work place, I spent many a hugely entertaining hour in the company of Peter in either the (in)famous Poppinjay or the less well known/remembered Two Brewers.
'I will always remember Peter raising his glass and proudly announce he was drinking neat gin!'
DILLON STEPS UP
The new editor of the Mail On Sunday has been named as David Dillon, the title’s former deputy.
He joined the paper from the Daily Express in 2001 where he was news editor.
POCKET CARTOON
POETRY TODAY, EDITED BY HUMPHREY PUMPHREY
By Ovid-19
I know it’s academic
In mid-pandemic
But if PG were to arise
I feel sure he’d advise…
Get your booster,
Bertie Wooster.
JUST FANCY THAT
An anagram of ‘omicron' is ‘moronic’. Not a lot of people know that.
They do now — Ed
REVOLVING DOORS
Head of PR at Mail Newspapers Jon Wynne-Jones has left the business following the abrupt exit of Daily Mail editor Geordie Greig last week. Wynne-Jones joined the business shortly after Greig less than three years ago.
TREVOR SWEARS IN
A correspondent confides:
"When I worked at ITV, at one point I was based at the Grays Inn Road building in London where all the news studios are. I was standing in the queue waiting to pay for my lunch in the canteen one day and I could hear a torrent of bad language coming from the man in front of me.
"I thought I recognised the voice and when he turned around it was Trevor McDonald.
"Every other word he used was either 'fuck' or 'fucking'. It really did sound so much more effective coming from him."
NICK NEWMAN’S WEEK
OLD JOKES HOME
Herewith an excellent joke from the Drone's Resident Gagster:
Four sales reps, an Englishmen, a Frenchman, an Italian and a German, are at their screens for a Zoom conference. The convener says: Can you all see me? They answer: Yes... Oui... Si... Ja.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
PESKY QUESTION
Sir — Do your Trigger warnings apply to old Roy Rogers movies starring his famous horse? Just askin’.
OLD COWPOKE
Gene Autry Home
for the Saddle-Sore
BROWN NOSING
Sir — I suggest you introduce a regular feature called, say, Pseuds’ Corner highlighting up-your-bum pronouncements by, er, pseuds.
Perhaps you could launch it with this from Baz Bamigboye in the Mail:
‘I had John Kerry, the U.S. climate envoy and former Secretary of State, sitting in front of me at the theatre. I thanked him for his service, as you do…’
IAN COWSLIP-SHANKS
EC4
ANOTHER FUCHS UP
Sir — May I add to your peerless collection of newspaper headlines with this zinger from The Friend, Bloemfontein, circa 1958, about the legendary English explorer?
Sir Vivian
Fuchs off to
Antarctica
By the way, when Sir Vivian died in 1999, he was buried in Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, Germany. Not many people know this, and even fewer ask.
RICK McNEILL
Cape Town
YOU’VE BEEN FRAMED
Sir — Following cousin Binky’s letter, I should also like to thank Aunt Marje for her timely reference to Trigger Warnings about dubious content in the Drone. I’m thinking particularly of your Country Boys correspondent, Oliver.
His repeated derogatory comments about the size of Frame’s hampton are both distasteful and unnecessary.
ROSEMARY RUMPLESHEETS (Miss)
Sizewell, Suffolk
Oliver actually refers affectionately to the size of Frame Hampton, the tiny village in which he and Teddy live — Ed.
NEWS FLASH
Sir — Many thanks to Aunt Marje for emphasising the need for Trigger Warnings about content in the Daily Drone. I would now particularly welcome being alerted in advance to Flashing Images.
BINKY SHAMBLESHANKS (Miss)
Much Panting
Dorset
SNOW CHANCE
Sir — As we are approaching the Christmas season, is it possible to put snow on top of Daily Drone like they did on the Beano?
ARWEN BARRA-SHANKS,
Air Ministry Roof
North Hykeham
FIRST HO-HO NOEL
Sir — I’ve just read (in the Mail, of course) my first panto cliché Oh No He Won’t headline of the season.
DAN DINI-SHANKS
Magic Kingdom
Mablethorpe
I expect you’ll be smacking your thighs very soon, Dan. Oh yes you will — Ed
MENTORLY ILL
Sir — R.Watkins’s letter about how Fleet Street legend Paul Dacre was guided, mentored, nurtured and shaped in the Seventies when he was learning his craft just shows that, with the right encouragement, a trainee can graduate to enjoy a wonderful career. Wake up, Lord Drone!
Ra! Ra! AN R.R. (t)
RONNIE RAMBLESHANKS
Dealer Principal
Skodas4U
West Byfleet
Zzzzzzzz — Ed
YOUTH NEWS
Sir — May I add to R. McNeill’s reminiscences [below] about the reborn Editor-in-Chief of the Western World?
When I subbed the Hickey Page in Great Ancoats Street in the early Seventies a student at the University of Leeds used to pop over the Pennines to contribute the odd Aside Line.
I’d like to think I taught him all he knows but it is unlikely.
R.WATKINS
Funchal Harbour
Madeira
A FLEET STREET TALE
Sir — Expressmen of a certain vintage will remember the Night News Desk cubbyhole in the old Lubyanka, presided over by cheerful pipe-smoking Ben Vos. There behind the glass partition, an earnest, slightly dishevelled, shirt-sleeved young reporter would often be on duty, making the midnight phone calls, double-checking the splash, providing the Late Sub with a 4am fudge, and no doubt dreaming the Fleet Street dream.
Step forward Paul Dacre. Hasn’t he done well?
RICK McNEILL
Cape Town
KEYBOARD B*GGERED
Sir — Did you know your QWERTY keyboard is missing a U? That’s the only explanation I can think of for the reference to a ‘hands on c*nt’ in your fascinating story of the resurrection of Paul (Lazarus) Dacre.
DR JOHN SON-SHANKS
EC4
GET IN LINE!
Sir — Please use this letter as it’s my turn to see my name in print.
R BUGGINS
EC
COLD FRONT
Sir — The always readable Times columnist Caitlin Moran has been discussing Winter Vagina, apparently a condition in women emanating from ‘dry, cold air causing their genitals to enter drought mode.’
I’m sure we’re all grateful that Caitlin intends to ignore the advice of The Science to pop her knickers in the microwave to support her vagina’s ‘delicate microbial ecosystem.’
PRU DENDA-SHANKS
Coldharbour E14
SCRAMBLED EGREGIOUS
Sir — My brother Steve says egregious has become the buzzword of our surreal times after Emily Maitlis uttered it on Newsnight. I told him it sounded like something on the Buckingham Palace breakfast menu.
CLIVE GOOZEE
FUNNY-ISH OLD GAME
Sir — My friend, the Venerable Thackery, has come up with a solution for the fact that our Rugby nations are populated with many non home-grown players.
Can one really describe those players as English, Irish and so on? He suggests a simple dash would suffice. Thus
Engl-ish, Ir-ish and Scott-ish. He ends: ‘Not sure about the Welsh…but then, who is?’
Yours,
PADDY O’SHANKS-ISH
NO MACRON SHE
Sir — I wish to make it clear I am neither related, nor in any way connected, to the small Frenchman who was recently seen around Glasgow stamping his foot and smelling of fish.
EMMANUELLE McRON
Miss Haggis 2021
The smell was probably a Mackeronel — Ed
TURNIP FOR THE BOOK
SALAD lovers. A clever way to store lettuce, cabbage and the like is to individually punch holes in the leaves and place them in a ring binder in the fridge. File Cos under 'C’ Iceberg under 'I' and so on. Simple!
LETTICE LEAFE,
Greenham Common
THE THINGS THEY SAY
Sir — I write to decry the lamentable deterioration of English, with the adoption of crude and offensive American-style invective replacing the graceful and civilised language in which we once conducted our public discourse.
I tell you the world is going bat-shit fucking crazy.
Prof B E BUGGERED
Oxford
HAPPY RETURNS
Sir — I was delighted when the kind people at the Inland Revenue wrote to me recently, telling me that my tax return was ‘outstanding' particularly since I can't even remember sending it in.
ARTHUR CAKES
Hersham
COMEDY CLASSIC
Jim Royle, sitting in his favourite chair watching TV, is obviously uncomfortable: fidgeting and trying to loosen his trousers.
Daughter Denise: Dad, why are you playing with yourself?
Jim: I’m not. I paid a quid for these underpants and I’ve got 50p’s worth stuck up my arse.
TOICH TYPUNG
Tyro touch-typist in love, Punch, c1950.
Oh my darlung I adore yoi
Sweet-one wull yoi be my wufe?
Do not spirn me I umplore yoi.
Be the spurut of my lufe.
We wull never, never be bored,
Darlung, uff yoi'll be my bride.
For even on unfeelung keyboard
U and I are side by side.
CRYER WITH LAUGHTER
Barry Cryer’s favourite religious joke
A man is walking down a train in Northern Ireland.
'Is there a priest on this train, please?' he says. 'God love us, this is an emergency.'
Nothing.
'Is there a vicar on this train, please? Emergency!'
Nothing.
'Is there a rabbi on this train, please? We've got an emergency.'
Nothing.
Then a man put his hand up and said, 'I'm a Methodist minister.'
And the other man said, 'Well, you're no use to us - we're looking for a corkscrew.’
With The Oldie
FINGERS GETS THE BIRD
Times Diary, Oct 26
In talk about the press at Cliveden Literary Festival, Conrad Black mentioned Victor Matthews, his opposite number at Daily Express, who was “a nice man", but at the bottom of his own domestic pecking order.
He had a rather domineering wife,” Black said, “however, the wife was herself intimidated by the family parrot.
He recalled one call with the polite Matthews who was hectored by his wife Joyce: “Don’t put up with it, Victor!”
She would not fall silent for Matthews, but went schtum when the parrot squawked : “Sack the lot! Sack the lot!”
OLD JOKES HOME
Very old couple talking to a friend: ‘We've decided to divorce.’
'But you’ve been married for 75 years, you’re both 96.’
‘Yes, we were waiting for the children to die.’
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
HITTING A BUM NOTE
Sir — Now that the world’s leaders have decided to slash methane emissions by 30% does that mean we all have to burp and fart 30% less on a daily basis? The move will surely have a deflationary effect — If you’ll excuse the expression — on the popularity of the traditional British vindaloo takeaway.
HY SULPHIDE
Pratts Bottom
ZE LEGOVER SYMPHONY
Liebe Herr Editor — Ludwig needs to come clean! Effrybody knows Ode to Joy vos just a little plink-plink ditty for solo banjo vich he hoped would help him legover his romantic Bavarian jungfrau Joey de Veever.
He vos forced to turn it into a symphony vis a 90-piece orchestra und 200-voice Weinersangerknaben (und no banjos) because the EU vanted to use it as its Schengen Anthem.
H OWEN ZOLLERIN Munchen
QWERTYSSENTIAL
Sir — Drone readers will be delighted to learn that Tom Hanks collects typewriters. It seems he has 120 of them. He may like to know that the longest word that can be typed using only the top letters row on the qwerty keyboard is, amazingly: TYPEWRITER.
T. YPO
Petts Wood
GOTT IN HIMMEL!
Sir — Just vot I vonted, as you say in English. LvB here, just ordering a pair of your super deaf aids I saw in ze Drone ... Hitch my useless lugholes to zis apparatus and I will be able to hear the prolonged, rapturous, adoring applause for my timeless, brilliant stuff.
Hope Amazon find my address. Never know when I might be kicked out of my latest apartment for making such a splendid noise!
LUDWIG van BEETHOVEN,
E. flat,
Hammerklavierstrasse,
Vienna.
PHONEY OLDIES
Sir — According to a Torygraph report 'ageist' GPs think oldies are missing out on health apps because they can't handle smartphones. OK, so how do I get them on my 1990s pay-as-you-go Nokia?
MISS E D CALL
Petts Wood
VIENNA WHIRL
Sir — Danke schon, Drone, for giving my “Ode to Joy” an airing mit ze Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain.
Strum and drang, as they say! Wunderbar. On my vissel-stop tour round UK plugging my brilliant, timeless stuff (Eroica, Pastoral, Fidelio, loads of fantastic piano pieces), I came across ze Everly Pregnant Brothers of Sheffield playing “the 69 to Rovvrum”.
Give it a whirl on YouTube. I spotted some of your classy readers on ze back seat! Must go. Bloody bailiffs here again. I shouted to zem to fuck off but it fell on deaf ears.
LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN
NFA,
Vienna
FEELING DICKY
Sir — B. Droop-Shanks’s recent Drone lament about losing touch with a body part he used to flaunt in his youth has been echoed by Sunday Times columnist Rod Liddle.
He writes: ‘I’m a little overweight myself and last saw my sword of passion in the late summer of 2006. It has become a little like God to me: I believe in its existence but there is no direct evidence to support my faith.’
DICK SWING-SHANKS
Sleepy Hollow
Staffs
JUST FANCY THAT
You can no longer buy a newspaper in Fleet Street, the closest place being Tesco Express on The Strand, according to honorary Expressman James Dismore.
ALAN COOPER
A former Daily Express sub-editor described as “one of the last great editors of print journalism” has died aged 78. He had been suffering from cancer.
Alan Cooper was a news sub in Manchester and moved on to edit both the Plymouth Herald and the Cornish Guardian during a 45-year career.
NICK NEWMAN
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
PINTA POSTURING
Sir — Evidently Richard Dismore spread his talents for mummery beyond mere theatrical posters in Joe Allen’s.
Alas, this fetching new design for a Co-Op milkman’s uniform he modelled in 1972 never really caught on, and Dismore was obliged to pursue a less reputable career.
Experts meanwhile have discounted a rival claim that the milkman in question is actually Chris Williams, also formerly of this parish, in happier times.
P R STUNT
EC
SPOTTED DICK
Sir — Lunching at Joe Allen, I couldn’t help but notice this theatrical poster featuring former Express executive Richard Dismore in his early days as a putative mummer.
A fine figure of a man to be sure.
ARCHIE VIST-SHANKS
Callan Close
EC4
Are you sure it’s not Jason King or Peter Wyngarde? — Ed
ROBERT RICHARDSON
Robert Richardson, the crime writer and Fleet Street sub-editor who wrote the brilliant Ode to the Ancient Sub-Editor, has died at the age of 80.
POCKET CARTOON
PETER SHIRLEY
FORMER Daily Express photographer and NUJ Father of the Chapel Peter Shirley has died. He was 83 and had been suffering from vascular dementia.
Peter had done a short stint in the RAF where he was a photographer. That was the spark that led to his career as a snapper.
It is hoped that there will be a gathering in the near future to celebrate his life.
NICK NEWMAN
POEM OF THE DAY
By HUMPHREY PUMPHREY, Poetry Editor
Mary had a little skirt
That was split right up the sides
And everywhere that Mary went
The boys could see her thighs.
Mary had another skirt
That was split right up the front.
She never wore that one.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
YAWNLAND
Sir — Why is everything to do with Northern Ireland so boring?
F. EDUP
Petts Wood
Because it’s beyond parody — Ed
KIRK-UP
Sir — Watching William (Captain Kirk) Shatner going oldly into space at 90 certainly took me back. The shape of his Blue Origin rocket was reminiscent of something I used to see regularly in my youth but not for quite a few years now.
Has any other reader had this flight of nostalgia?
B. DROOP-SHANKS
Little Hampton
‘Fraid so — Ed
AN ILL WIND
Sir — As a small but possibly significant contribution to global warming, my wife Quarantine and I have pledged to fart only once a month, when, meteorologically speaking, the Wind is in the North.
As Quarantine opined whilst we legalised this agreement, she quoted a little known pearl of wisdom from Shakespeare’s sonnets: “Tis better to farte and smelle a little/than burste one’s bowel and die a cripple.”
OLIVER BROWN-O’DOUR,
Limerick.
SEARCHING QUESTION
Sir — I see that our old pals at Reach have appointed a Search Engine Optimisation Editor. Oh, to be in the wonderful world of ‘newspapers’ now!
W. ORD-SMITH-SHANKS
Dunsubbing
Devon
LIFT AND DUST
Sir — Just days after Aunt Marje informed readers trendy expectant couples were taking Babymoon vacations, it is revealed that Boris and Carrie Johnson were enjoying one in Marbs.
This raises the oft-asked question: Just how prescient and perceptive does a columnist have to be to achieve promotion on the Drone?
Ra! Ra! AN R.R. (t).
RONNIE RAMBLESHANKS
Dealer Principal
Skodas4u
West Byfleet
MERDE HITS LE FAN
Sir — We represent 72,853,922 descendants of French soldiers defeated in the Battle of Agincourt in 1415. Pursuant to the campaign by Lords Belter and Belch, we have today lodged claims on their behalf in the modest amount of £100 each. The total of £7.2 billion involved is small change to the current government, which for speed of settlement we suggest is taken out of the NHS budget for 2022.
Such a gesture would go a long way to bringing closure to aggrieved French citizens whose forebears were subjected to historic abuse by the invading English and would, we believe, be warmly welcomed by the British taxpayer.
MACAROON et CIE
Paris
AGINCOURT SHOCKER
Sir — We are today launching a campaign to pay reparations to the thousands of descendants of the French soldiers who, through no fault of their own, were defeated by the English at the Battle of Agincourt 606 years ago this month.
These impoverished peasants were pressed into their king’s service, paid nothing, and sent into battle against a superior army with grossly inadequate equipment.
Even worse, those who were not killed were captured and subjected to humiliation, abuse and hateful treatment by English soldiers for no other reason than that they were of French origin.
It’s not too late for Britain to right this historic wrong!
BELTER and BELCH
House of Lords
Woke History Group
LOOK ALIKE
Sir — I notice Bond actor Daniel Craig has remarkably similar gnomish facial features to Greta Thunberg and Vladimir Putin. I wonder if by chance they are all descended from the same Ugric-speaking reindeer herders of northern Finland.
Should we be told?
ANN CESTRY
Knockholt
NICK NEWMAN
NICK NEWMAN
NICK NEWMAN
ALAN’S NEW COLUMN
Former Daily Mail back bencher Alan Ashworth has started a new weekly column, That Reminds Me, in which he plans to feature Fleet Street reminiscences.
POCKET CARTOON
POCKET CARTOON
OLD JOKES HOME
Groucho Marx's daughter wanted to join a swimming club. The club was anti-Semitic, so she couldn't get in.
Groucho wrote to the club and said: 'For your information, my daughter is half-Jewish. Can she go in the pool up to her waist?'
MPS BID TO BLOCK DACRE
Former Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre should be blocked from reapplying for the job as head of Ofcom, according to an influential committee of MPs.
Julian Knight, chairman of the digital, culture, media and sport committee, said candidates who had already been deemed inappropriate should not be involved in the recruitment process, which is being rerun by ministers.
Dacre, 72, is widely regarded as the government’s preferred choice but was rejected by a panel interviewing for the role. Ministers decided to restart the hiring process in May rather than accept another candidate deemed appropriate by the panel.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
HERE WIGGO AGAIN
Sir — Isn’t it great to see David Wigg still writing major features for our largest selling newspaper after all these years?
LP BREVMIN
Back Bar
Flying Fuck
Not sure I give a flying fuck — Ed
FORKED OFF
Sir — Where do you get your trainees? The piece about the World’s Greatest Lunch Club and Emma Raducanu quoted a tanned, hunky, ash-blond spokesman which must, of course, mean me. However, I can assure club members and Drone readers that Ms Raducanu will not be attending a WGLC function in the near future.
Anyway, she told me to fuck off (surely you mean ‘pleaded a prior engagement’ — Ed)
R.WILKINS
Holly Willoughby
Lincs
IT’S A COP-OUT
Sir — My neighbour says COP21 will be COVID19 in spades. It will let the government shut down our lives and concrete over the countryside with green windmills.
She usually lies to me, but this time I think she may be on to something.
VERA BONNILASS
@bonnylad
JAM TODAY
Sir — There's nothing traffic cops love more than a good, solid motorway closure. They must be most put out now that climate protesters are doing it for them.
T. AILBACK
Petts Wood
CURSE OF MARJE
Sir — It seems that, following Boris’s reshuffle, what has become known as the Curse of Aunt Marje has claimed another political victim.
After the demise of Annaliese (‘If she was the answer, what the fuck was the question?’) Dodds and little Mattie (‘Jumped up twat’) Hancock and the exposure of ‘Sir’ Keir (‘Less to him than meets the eye’) Starmer, we’re witnessing the defenestration of Gavin Williamson.
When Aunt Marje was asked whether he could possible survive as a minister, she answered: ‘Not a chance. Now fuck off.’
Just what prescience and perceptiveness must a trainee demonstrate to achieve promotion on the Drone?
Ra! Ra! R.R. (t).
REGINALD RAMBLESHANKS
Dealer Principal
Skodas4U
West Byfleet
Look in the mirror and ask yourself, ‘Mr Rambleshanks' — Ed
EMMA DILEMMA
Sir — Now that the scrumptious Emma Raducanu has become the world’s newest teenage darling, I am thinking of dumping my dog-eared picture of Greta Thunberg, the Gnome of Gloom, in the non-recycling. Or perhaps I should wait till after the COP shindig. Could Aunt Marj advise?
CONFUSED
Downing Street
I doubt it — Ed
OKO KO'D
Sir — On behalf of my members I should like to thank West Ham United FC for not including one of the club’s emerging stars in their Premier League squad which means he is unlikely to figure in match commentary this season.
Despite this, we wish every success to Armstrong Inya Echezolachuku Oko-Flex.
ALF A. BET-SHANKS
General Secretary
Football Commentators Association
HAIR RAZING
Sir — Afghanistan apart, the Silly Season of 2021 must go down as one of the silliest on record. For example: Harriet Walker, fashion editor of The Times, pens a long article, accompanied by five pictures, to announce that she is growing her under arm hair.
HARRY PLAIT-SHANKS
Pitsea
LAST ORDERS
Sir — My in-box today is headed by an offer which may be of interest to older Drone readers. That 500 euro cashback might just pay for the funeral drinks. Cheers!
I.N. TERMENT
Petts Wood
DELHI BELLYACHE
Sir — All credit to Indian cricket supporters for saving up and taking the trouble to fly all that way to the UK to watch their team’s famous Test victory over England.
As wickets fell, the noise of their cheering far exceeded the vocal support for the home side by Indians who chose to live in this country or who were actually born here.
Namaste!
N.TEBBIT-SHANKS
Bengal Spice Takeaway
Smethwick
LEN GOULD
FORMER Daily Express back bencher Len Gould has died at his home in Spain aged 73. He had been suffering from cancer.
Len, an amiable Scot, moved to the Express in London from Manchester and appeared a bit baffled by the Fleet Street office and the characters there. He would sit on the back bench, shaking his head and saying: ‘Amazing scenes. Amazing scenes.’
He went on to edit the Sunday People and became sports editor at the Daily Mail.
Expressman CLIVE GOOZEE said: 'I was saddened by the news of Len’s death. When he left the Manchester sports desk in 1986 to join Eddy Shah’s Today, Len invited me to his Ancoats farewell bash.
'As was always the case when I visited the MX team, I had a great time, drank and ate too much. I stayed at the Gould house in Gatley, and next morning Len cooked me a full English. I met his first wife, Sandra, who had just come home after consulting an astrolologer to see if Len was making the right move. She was told Len would one day be working for a large man with dark hair. Maxwell?
'The last time we met was 2000 in Torrevieja on Spain’s Costa Blanca, where Len and Sandra, who predeceased him, had a retirement villa. Len took me and his dog for a vigorous walk over the huge sandy beach. It was a good workout for my bionic heart valve, installed in 1999.'
BELOW: Daily Mail report
NICK NEWMAN
SIMON GREENBERG
Simon Greenberg, who became the Evening Standard’s youngest sports editor, has died at the age of 52.
He had been suffering from the degenerative Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. which had been diagnosed earlier this year.
Simon started his journalistic career on the Mail On Sunday and moved into public relations when he was appointed the first director of communications at Premier League club Chelsea.
CRYER WITH LAUGHTER
BARRY CRYER'S FAVOURITE FRANKIE HOWERD JOKE
An 82-year-old man goes to his doctor.
'I want a complete physical examination. I'm about to get married,’ he says.
'How old are you?' the doctor asks.
'I'm 82 and she's 24. I want a complete examination to make sure everything's working properly,' says the old man.
The Doctor says: '24! Well, I'll do the examination. But it might be better if you also got a young lodger. You know, company for your wife.'
'Yes, yes, what a good idea,' says the old man.
The doctor meets him again a few months later.
'Did you get married?' asks the doctor. 'How's your young bride?'
'She's pregnant,' says the old man proudly.
'And, erm, how's the lodger?' says the doctor nervously.
'She's pregnant, too,' says the old man.
FATAL ATTRACTION
Sir — I heard a variant of the splendid Frankie Howerd joke in today's Drone. This other old guy, also 84 as it happens, goes for a health check before marrying a 24-year-old. Doctor tells him: "At your age it could be fatal." He replies: "Oh well, if she dies, she dies."
J. OKER
Petts Wood
NICK NEWMAN
ALAN MCQUILLAN
From The Sun, 1 September
FORMER Sun wordsmith Alan McQuillan — a sub-editor on the paper for 27 years — has died at 65.
Alan began his career in 1977 as a trainee reporter in Widnes before switching to subbing on the Western Daily Press.
He moved to London to write BBC news bulletins at Broadcasting House and also worked for The Observer, Daily Mail and The Sunday Times.
Alan joined The Sun in 1988 and it became his long-term home as he helped guide a generation of young journalists.
After retiring as deputy chief sub-editor in 2015, he could not give up the job.
Much to his family’s amusement, Alan would “sub” everyone’s conversations and check the paper every day to “maintain The Sun’s high standards”.
A proud family man, who loved playing tennis, he would have been 66 today. He leaves a wife, Janet, and two daughters.
NICK NEWMAN
JOE’S COMEBACK
Joe Allen, the restaurant in London’s Covent Garden, beloved of media types, showbiz luvvies and the World’s Greatest Lunch Club, is to reopen on 17 September.
Bookings are now open.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
BATTERS IN THE BELFRY
Sir — Since many of us departed the privileged world of the Daily Express, we are watching words vanish from our vocabulary. Latest casualty: “Batsman”.
Suddenly, even once such hallowed sources of English as the BBC have dumped the word in favour of “Batter”. I blame the 100 and T20 formats. Bish, bash, bosh!
These players are not true batsmen like Colin Cowdrey, Ted Dexter, Geoffrey Boycott, David Gower, et al. Quick-fix cricketers batter the ball with little skill or finesse. Have to say it: I’m stumped for words.
LORD OVAL of TRENT BRIDGE,
Pedantry,
South Wales
DOG’S KABOLLOCKS
Sir — Is Dominic Raab talking Kabulshit?
A. HOUND
Isle of Dogs
DOUBLE STANDARDS?
Sir — Love him or loathe him, the OFCOM ruling on Piers Morgan was a major statement on freedom of speech in this country and, you would imagine, a significant media story.
The BBC gave it 17.5 seconds airtime 22 minutes into the Six O’clock News; the Grauniad put it on Page 17.
If the ruling had been reversed, do you think these news ‘judgments’ would have pertained?
LP BREVMIN
Back Bar
WhatsApp Group
SLIGHTLY FOXED
Sir — Through you, may I appeal to Drone readers for any news about former Expressman John Fox-Clinch? I recall that John was nicknamed after a punctuation mark: semi colon or dog’s cock or something like that.
He was always shy and self-effacing and reluctant to give out many details about himself. I just wondered how he was getting on.
ARCHIE IVE-SHANKS
Much Info
Glos
He’s definitely getting on — Ed
OLD JOKE
Sir — I met a man who has trained his dog to play a trumpet on the Tube. Apparently it went from Barking to Tooting in just over an hour.
R. OVER-SHANKS
Barking
OLD FART
Sir — The ‘People v Pets’ Afghan sideshow featuring someone called Farthing reminds of the time when the Queen encountered the Express gardening guru of the same surname at Chelsea Flower Show.
I’d like to think P. Rodnose prevented the immortal picture caption Expressman Farting with the Queen from actually going into the paper but I’m not sure.
LP BREVMIN
Back Bar,
Flying Fuck
It didn’t make the paper but Mr Farthing was bowing to the Queen in the pic making it look as if he was preparing to let one go — Ed
DOG ALMIGHTY
Sir — The Pen Farting imbroglio has created a feeding frenzy for handwringing animal rights zealots, including, it has to be said, ex-Express colleagues.
Numbered among them is someone (it’s kinder not to name her) who styles herself as a Furry Dogmother and who is said to be ‘a dogged (sic) campaigning blogger and twitterer’. Bless.
F.I.D O’SHANKS
Barking
CEILING WHACKS
Sir — My grand daughter went to a nightclub called Gravity and the ceiling fell down. How do you explain that?
I. NEWTON-SHANKS
Apple Tree Cottage
Woolsthorpe
Lincs
I can’t, now bugger off — Ed
BUNK UP
Sir — I don’t think my new wife was too impressed with my choice of an ‘edgy boutique hotel’ for our honeymoon: bunk beds! It’s one thing on top of another for us two.
JESS WEDD-SHANKS
Much Humping
Beds
MOTHER OF GOD!
Sir — My neighbour says FUCKOFF keeps its meaning when said backwards, but saying FFOKCUF makes you sound Irish. I cannot confirm this as we only hear Geordie round here.
VERA BONNILASS
Gateshead
HERD SHOES
Sir — So many people these days are wearing blue plimsolls with big white ticks. Does the tick mean they've passed the Covid test?
P.E.DESTRIAN
Petts Wood
GIVE US A QUICHE
Sir — It’s nice to see a pic of those portly Express pensioners having a good time at the footie.
You mention pies: shouldn’t that be tarts?
JESS ASKIN-SHANKS
EC4
AFGHAN BALLS UP
Sir — Now that those nice Mujahidden are taking back their country, we look forward to the reinstatement of the Afghan Ball at the Café Royal, one of the highlights of the London social scene of the 1980s.
It was such fun, all that campaigning to get the nasty Russians out of Afghanistan!
DEREK & EDNA PATHAN
Palin, Yorks
GRAPE AND GRAIN GRIPE
Sir — I see the Mail’s Ephraim Hardcastle (happy birthday, Big Mac, by the way) records that Queen Victoria used to add scotch to her claret to pep it up. I’ve heard of lemonade, but whisky! Do you think it will catch on?
L.A. PHROAIG-SHANKS
Much Grousing
Fife
NICK NEWMAN
DAVID WRIGHT
David Wright, a former Daily Express district reporter in Manchester who later moved to the Mirror, has died of cancer aged 82.
The Association of Mirror Pensioners has the details.
HEADLINE OF THE WEEK?
It’s a toss-up between 'Man in China almost dies after inserting live eel into his rectum to cure constipation' and 'Knife-wielding robber beat up with dildo In sex shop in Russia'.
NICK NEWMAN
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
RUMBLE IN THE RANKS
Sir — Your loyal staff wish to inform you that this morning we answered the Government’s call to return to the Daily Drone office after the lifting of Covid restrictions. Alas, the door was bolted and padlocked. Ashley, the janitor, told us that you had swanned off to Swansea and had been pictured wearing funny hats in various hostelries.
We’d like to record how disappointed we are and we have retreated to the Back Bar of the Flying Fuck to apply balm to our wounds.
LP BREVMIN, SPIKE DIVER, P. RODNOSE, AWARDS NOMINEE ROSALIE RAMBLESHANKS (TRAINEE), RUBY NONPAREIL, RECKLESS RAMBLESHANKS (INTERN).
Fuck off the lot of you, I’ll do it all myself as usual when I get back from the pub … and it’s Swanage actually — Ed
IS THAT CLEAR?
Sir — For the benefit of Grauniad headline writers: [Drone passim] Stone subs had to read the metal type back-to-front but right way up. Comps had to read the type back-to-front and upside down. Got it?
STONED
Irregulars Bar
Ye Old Prodnose
Cherkley
GETTING THE RUNS
Sir — Nasser Hussein gets to the bottom line on Sky discussing London Spirit’s poor performance in the Hundred: ‘Who’s going to get the runs now?’
Important to know, especially when you’re rooming with them.
COURTNEY SHORT-SHANKS
The Ageas Bowl
Southampton
THAT’S BATS
Sir — The Oval. The Hundred. Invincibles v Fire: 21,000 plus spectators. 11 fielders. 2 batters. 2 umpires. What distinguishes the man who runs on with drinks? He’s the only one wearing a fucking mask! Eh?
WILLY G. RACE-SHANKS
Much Puzzling
Mascot
BRING BACK FUN!
Sir — Am I alone in finding most of today’s cartoons ugly and unfunny? Give me the nice Mr Giles, and Mac, Osbert and Cummings (not the nasty one) any time.
DORIS BONKERS
Return to Sender
G-NOPDEMIC
Sir — This pingdemic and The Sun's lovely splash head PONGDEMIC remind me of a little-known fact: that ping-pong spelt backwards produces the sound made when you play it – g-nop g-nip...g-nop g-nip.
B. ATTY
Petts Wood
MINUTE MAN
Sir — Congratulations to Tom Daley on his well-deserved Olympic Gold. Isn’t it fascinating that all of his dives in four Olympics amount to just over a minute’s action in total?
SPIKE DIVER
Back Bath
Flying Fuck
GRUFF JUSTICE
Sir — I have spoken to the chairman of the British Goat Society and informed him that henceforth, all offspring of goats must now be called “children” as the word “kids” has been hijacked beyond recall and used by everyone, including our Prime Minister, the Today programme and All and Sundry. He said he summoned his herd together to break the news yesterday and it made his billy goat gruff.
GUNTER GRASS,
Gotham
PS: A group of goats is called a tribe or trip. Bet you didn’t know that, kids!
FART STOPPING
Sir — I see that some doctors believe Covid can be spread through flatulence, although wearing underpants can mitigate the danger to others. So here’s a new slogan for Boris: BAN BARE BOTTOM FARTING AND SAVE THE NHS.
RICK McNEILL
Somewhere South
NICK NEWMAN
OLD JOKES HOME
Man went to the doctor's and said: 'I think I'm going deaf.’ The doctor said: 'What are the symptoms?’ He replied: 'That yellow family on television.’
CAUGHT IN THE ACT
Which news network is in damage control mode trying to preserve the squeaky clean reputation of one of its top stars?
The married presenter was caught by paps exiting a motel with a female colleague, leading bosses to spend a small fortune buying up the pictures from the photo agency before any other outlet could get hold of them.
Who could the mystery person be?
We do not know but we think we should be told — Ed
HELENE’S FAREWELL
Family and friends of former Daily Express secretary Helene Costas bade her a final farewell on Friday, July 9 at her funeral in Southwark Cathedral, London.
JUST FANCY THAT
The phrase 'hung like a donkey' has its origins in the Bible. (Ezekiel 23:20: "There she lusted after her lovers, whose genitals were like those of donkeys and whose emission was like that of horses”.)
This is disgusting, remove it from my organ immediately — Lord Drone
POCKET CARTOON
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
NEVER SAY DAI
Sir — Since 1997 the British and Irish Lions Player of the Tour has been: Scott Gibbs, Dafydd James, Ryan Jones, Jamie Roberts, Leigh Halfpenny and Jonathan Davies.
Could they possibly have something in common, look you?
JESS SAYIN-SHANKS
Splott, Cardiff
Good Lord, is that the time? — Ed
STRETCH TOO FAR
Sir — On my morning walk I regularly come across elastic bands discarded by the postman. These have now been joined by a scattering of thrown-away face masks. Is this stretching things too far?
I. PICKMEUP
Much Bending,
Covidshire
FINAL WHISTLE
Sir — I see that Henri Delaunay, founding head of UEFA and father of the Euros, used to be a referee until a ball hit him in the face knocking out two teeth and forcing him to swallow his whistle.
I wonder if a certain actor knows that. Not many people do.
W.L. OFFSIDE-SHANKS
Wembley
MY PASH FOR HARRY
Sir — The fascinating reminiscences of the revise subs from the golden age of the Express reminded me of a priceless piece of quick-thinking by the stand-in revise sub in the early days of my spell on the Express sports desk.
Dear Harry Pashley, stand-in prod on this occasion, was a delight, if on occasions, a little eccentric. Though a little disappointed when he turned down my headline suggestion, I had to admire the way in which he cleverly defended his style point.
After finishing subbing a story, I considered that ‘razzmatazz’ was a perfect fit for part of the headline, recollecting that the noun had appeared recently in news page headline.
In the nicest possible way, Harry called to me way down the subs desk to point out that ‘razzmatazz’ definitely wasn’t used in the Express.
“But H,” I replied, “it was used in news last month.”
“Oh, well,” he replied without hesitation, “it’s only got one z.”
I retired gracefully.
IAN BARRATT
Sir — Reading my former sports colleague Ian Barratt’s letter about Harry Pashley I was reminded of a Sunday evening in the department when Harry walked in from the stone with wet page proofs. The TV was on, showing 85-year-old Artur Rubinstein playing Grieg’s Piano Concerto. Harry looked at the screen and said:”He’s making mistakes, but he’s covering them up well.” Culture in the Games Room, who would have thought?
CLIVE GOOZEE
COLOUR BLIND
Sir — Here's a little something for the Great Wine Debaters to mull over. Back in the 60s the popular TV show On the Braden Beat staged a wine-tasting in which blind-folded drinkers were given glasses of red and white, both deliberately served at room temperature. Most couldn't tell the difference.
C. HAMBRÉ
Petts Wood
PS: Chateau Cardboard suits me fine.
HALF WHIT
Sir — It’s a liberty that the lad who had a laugh with that Covid bloke off the telly faces being banged up. Strewth, it was only a bit of harmless Essex bantz. Whitty? Leave it out: he’s got no sense of humour at all.
RON FORD-SHANKS
Whalebone Lane,
Dagenham
FRENCH LETTER
Sir — “Critical Race Theory” which is so exercising our woke elite these days is apparently the brainchild of Marxist philosopher Michel Foucault.
Pardon my French but isn’t that pronounced Fuckall?
A. L. INGUIST
@noshit.com
Fuck knows, in my day CRT stood for Cathode Ray Tube — Ed
PROD KNOWS
Sir — No reminiscences about the great days of the Express can be complete without mention of the doyen of revise editors, Basil Denny, the man who put the Prod in Prodnose.
Basil only had to rise from his desk to silence the room. Many a downtable sub visibly paled — in more deferential times, some were reputed to have fallen on their knees, gibbering — when Basil bore down on them, face set in a grimace, shooting his cuffs and clutching an offending galley proof. A comma out of place, a careless misspelling, no transgression went unbollocked.
For an errant sub there was nothing for it but to decamp for a restorative sharpener or two in the Old Bell.
RICK McNEILL
Hard by Table Mountain
PENSIONED OFF
Sir — How gratifying to rate a mention in Spike Diver’s excellent eulogy to Express supersubs! A lot of drinking went on in those days and although I can’t remember being Revise Editor I shall take Mr Diver’s word for it. Do you think I might now qualify for an Express pension?
I did once sell Hickey a picture of Sir Julian Huxley’s great grand-daughter, Susannah Huxley, whom I discovered working at El Vino. Could this have caused some confusion?
I wouldn’t have bothered you with this query, but I have always believed that the Drone will continue to prosper only while the letters outweigh the obits, and unfortunate recent events are tipping the balance.
P.E. DANT
University of Gazunda
THANKS BUT NO SHANKS
Sir — Regular readers of the Drone will appreciate that not only has Aunt Marje previously exposed the inadequacies of Keir Starmer and Anneliese Dodds but summed up former Secretary of State for Health and Social Care the Rt Hon Matthew Bindon-Hancock, MP, as a ‘jumped-up little twat’ when he was being lauded by other less well informed commentators.
How prescient and perceptive does a columnist have to be to graduate from being a trainee?
Ra! Ra! AN RR (t)
RONNIE RAMBLESHANKS
Dealer Principal
Skodas4U
West Byfleet
I haven’t seen the person to who you refer for months — Ed
LOAD OF TOSH
Sir — Watching the warm-up match of the British and Irish Lions’ tour, I notice from the names on their shirts that all the Japan players are called Toshiba. Typical Oriental cunning, of course, but you’ve got to admire them for it.
ONLLWYN BRACE-SHANKS
Llanvihangel-Ystern-Llewern 3rd XV (The Tossers)
NICK NEWMAN
NO GREAT SHAKES
We are not sure anyone has noticed, but Daily Mail diary editor Sebastian Shakespeare, pictured, has vanished without mention to be replaced by Richard Eden.
Our mole at the Mail says editor Geordie Greig regarded Shakespeare's work as increasingly pisspoor so he had to go. Exit the diary editor no doubt with a wheelbarrow full of cash.
There was just one problem. Greig sacked him without realising that Eden was on holiday, so he asked Shakespeare to stay on for a few days. He refused.
The new column had to be cobbled together until Eden returned.
It’s OK, no-one noticed.
NICK NEWMAN
JUST FANCY THAT
Model Cara Delevingne uses a mini-scooter to get between her bedroom and kitchen because she finds the floors of her house "too hard" to walk on.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
HANDY HANCOCK
Sir — I see Labour has urged Matt Hancock to “get a grip” following the shock revelation of his secret dalliance.
I thought The Sun’s front-page picture showed he had a very firm handful indeed of the lady’s left buttock.
DON TASK
#twatter
NAVY BLUES
Sir — What a gross piece of news manipulation was the ‘wars have started for less’ confrontation between HMS Defender and Putin’s navy as ‘tensions boiled over in the Black Sea’.
Lucky that print and broadcast heroes just happened to be there to report in breathless, first person purple prose as the ‘drama-drenched’ minutes ticked by and, er, everyone went back to the wardroom.
Simple, really. Load your warship with hacks, sail into disputed territory, wait for the inevitable, nay obligatory, reaction, withdraw and then fuck off home.
Such bollocks.
KSM HARDY-SHANKS
Trafalgar House
FOLD COMFORT
Sir — If your readership (Cape Town to Pratts Bottom) despairs of an ever-changing world, let it rest assured that it is always Tuesday in the centrefold of Radio Times.
B. OXWATCHER
Petts Wood
LITTLE SQUIRT
Sir — Three of us went for a meal at our newly reopened pub. I watched a waitress put a pint of beer and a bottle of red and two glasses on a tray. She set it down on our table and announced that Covid bollocks prevented her taking the drinks off the tray and would we mind doing it.
What the fuck’s that all about, little Mattie Hancock?
TW O’JABS-SHANKS
Much Wondering
Dorset
TIPPED OFF
Sir — Willie Rushton’s amusing tips reminded me of a game ranger pal of mine who had spent a week squiring a wealthy American tourist through the African bush — dawn game drives, late-night barbecues at the watering hole etc.
As the Yank prepared to leave he asked my friend: “You want a tip?” My friend blushed expectantly.
“Never tie your shoelaces in a revolving door,” he said, driving off.
RICK McNEILL
Cape Town
PIDDLE ON THE WATER
Sir — Acclaim (Eh? — Ed) for my earlier letter on bizarre Lincolnshire place names which could also be P.G. Wodehouse characters, prompts me to add some more: Burton Pedwardine, Boothby Parnell, Burton Le Coggles, Heydour Warren, Caythorpe Heath and Ewerby Thorpe.
SCOTT WILLOUGHBY
Willard Heath
Lincs
DILETTANTES ON TV
Sir — Watching the late night TV newspaper reviews after taking blood pressure pills in advance, I wondered if it struck other former hacks how easy it now is for the loony Left to use the spot as a platform for their own personal views about running the country and why wallpaper should be banned.
All they have to do is set up a website no one reads, with a title no one understands — say Cosmic Nonsense — give themselves a title that would take years to attain in Fleet Street, and the TV studios’ media advisers, The Guardian, would recommend them for the appearance, providing they weren’t over 25.
Surely the time is right for our very own Lord Drone to take up the crusade against these bright, young, Yasmin Alibaba-Brown devotees, who know so much about the world, and appear himself … an Editor so respected on the patch.
Surely the producers would jump at the chance of learning a thing or two from the website that has become a bible of our trade?
TENERIFE TEL, renting in dreamy Dollis Hill.
Good idea, but it might be past my bedtime — Ed
GETTING THE HORN
Sir — I was shocked to see a headline in the Telegraph today about “shoehorning lesbian scenes”. Good grief! Is this some woke rite of passage? It sounds very painful indeed.
HANS NEESAN
#boompsadaisy
PRATTS BOTTOM
Sir — I have been much amused by the bizarrely-named Wiltshire villages, such as Compton Magna, Lesser Dismarsh and Divers Bottom, mentioned by your Country Boys diarist
But since moving to Sunny Lincolnshire (very nice, since you ask, but don’t mention the fucking C [for conveyancers] word) I realise it’s a rural trait.
Near me are Cherry Willingham, Boothby Graffoe and Carlton Scroop.
R.WATKINS
South Rauceby
Are you sure they’re not
P.G Wodehouse characters?
— Ed
LIVING IT LARGE
Sir — The recent fine weather has prompted me to get my summer wardrobe out of lockdown. I’m pleased to report that at least one item still fits: a rather nice linen scarf I bought in Bellagio a few years ago.
S.P.R TYRE-SHANKS
Waitby, Cumbria
BLACK AND WHITE
Sir — As colour-blind casting in the arts grows apace with the new Anne Boleyn TV series, surely a Netflix biopic about the life of Martin Luther King Jr, starring Kenneth Branagh, with Morgan Freeman as President Lyndon Johnson, Emma Thompson as Coretta King, and Lenny Henry as Bobby Kennedy, cannot be long delayed.
ARSE GRATIA ARTIS
via #Twatter
DAPPER SNAPPER
Sir — I’m afraid you’ve been had by `Daredevil’ Charles C. Ebbets, or his sponsors, the Acme Shoe Co of New Jersey.
Come on, would a safety conscious bloke who sports both belt and braces really risk everything astride a girder up above New York?
I don’t buy it; he’s a poser.
Check the trouser creases, the artfully crooked little finger and elegantly pointed co-respondent’s shoe. For my money the real heroes are Acme’s marketing team and the poor sod on the next beam who pictured Ebbet’s elegant stance.
P.E. DANT
University of Gazunda
WA
You shouldn’t believe everything you read in the papers. The Drone’s motto is: We may not be first with the news but we’re always wrong — Ed.
SATIRE LIVES
Sir — I was so excited when I read that you planned a major revamp of the World’s Greatest Online Newspaper. Now you have completed the transformation … wow! Congratulations on a great job: it looks so much more modern, en pointe and niche in a sophisticated way.
To tell you the truth, the old version had grown a bit tired and rough around the edges so well done to you for spotting it and taking such successful action. Bravi to the Drone team!
SPK SAVER-SHANKS
Seeham
Have you been drinking again? — Ed
CRYER WITH LAUGHTER
Barry Cryer’s favourite Glaswegian joke:
Man goes into a pub in Glasgow.
He walks straight up to the bar and said, 'Any chance of a quickie, dear?'
She slaps him straight across the face.
He says, 'Sorry, dear. I just wondered if there was any chance of a quickie?'
She hits him so hard that he falls and breaks his leg.
One of the regulars picks him up and says, 'Round here, we pronounce it quiche.'
JUST FANCY THAT
Among the "viewers" to get their names read out on new TV channel GB News this week were: Mike Hunt, Mike Oxlong and Cleo Torez.
WILLIE’S TOP TIPS
The late Willie Rushton had a great series of tips:
Never go to a doctor with dying plants in his waiting room;
Never go on holiday to countries where they still point at planes;
Never go to a dentist with blood in his hair;
Never go to a psychiatrist who has always got his mother with him.
NICK NEWMAN
TRAVEL UPDATE
Britons can only travel to countries who voted for us in the Eurovision Song Contest.
LETTER TO THE GRAUNIAD
CRYER WITH LAUGHTER
Barry Cryer's Favourite Willie Rushton Joke:
What is the difference between erotic and kinky? Erotic is taking a single feather and doing something lingering and sensual and beautiful to your partner. Kinky is using the whole chicken.
SUE BROMLEY
Former Daily Express features sub-editor Sue Bromley has died from cancer. She was 75.
Sue lived in retirement at Cockerham, near Lancaster, and in recent years worked at the Lancashire Archive.
Her friend and colleague Nick Hill told the Drone: "Sue was a typical outspoken, tell-it-like-it-is character and a room lit up when she walked in.
"Her straight-talking and often colourful language was not to everyone’s taste but she was a good operator and pretty unforgettable."
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
HERE FOR THE KIER
Sir — We’re all grateful that the Covid roadmap allows us to enter licensed premises again but I’d forgotten the risk of encountering the pub bore.
Look who I ran into at my local, the Rose Without Trace.
B. ALLSACHE-SHANKS
Kentish Town
THE SECOND CUMMING
Sir — Following the suggestion by Tony Hall-Shanks that you employ a certain M Bashir, may I make a similar recommendation? A previous employee of mine, D Cummings, is without work or useful activity and has taken to frightening the horses. He is a hard-working, intensely loyal and thoroughly discreet individual who would make an excellent chauffeur for the Drone limousine.
A FRIEND
Downing Street
OLD JOKE
Sir — Recently, while discussing possible holiday alternatives with my rather elderly mother-in-law, she intimated with a sigh of resignation that she was finally looking forward to the relaxation of Covid-19 rules and regulations.
Yesterday, I happened to mention that, if she were interested, she could now visit Iceland.
She peered at me with her typical look of displeasure. "Oh, no," she said, "I don't think so. I've got far too used to Tesco.”
SILLY ARSE
(Name and address not supplied)
JOBSWORTH
Hi, Al. How’s it hanging? Long time no see: fucking Covid! I was hoping to invite you to a piss-up at the National but events forced me to knock that on the nut. I’m writing to put in a good word for a journo, one of my lads, looking for a job.
Dedicated, inventive, ingenious and a good interviewer. You could do a lot worse than Martin Bashir. Love to LP, Spike and the gang.
TONY HALL-SHANKS
London W1A
BOTTOMS UP
Sir — If you are having trouble squeezing the 540-page Drone into its new smart format, here's an old stone-sub's trick, to be used in desperation: Cut from the bottom up, irrespective of content, but always leave the last par in to make 'em think you'd read it all.
S LASHER
Petts Wood
POCKET CARTOON
OLD JOKES HOME
I'm so old I remember when the Dead Sea was just a bit poorly.
PETER WATSON
Peter Watson, sports editor of the Sunday Express and the London Evening News, has died aged 77.
The death notice in the Eastbourne Herald reads: WATSON Peter James Passed away peacefully on 25th April 2021. Much loved Husband to Shelia and Step Daughter Karina, missed very much by his good friends Barry and Gail. Funeral Service will take place at Eastbourne Crematorium Main Chapel. Family flowers only, if desired, donations to Parkinson's UK. c/o Haine & Son, 19 South Street, Eastbourne BN21 4UJ.
The funeral has already taken place.
His Sunday Express colleague Norman Giller wrote on Facebook: "A whirlwind has left us. He was old school and could rollock and then praise with equal ferocity.
"He and I played for the Giller-Watson golf trophy for many years. So glad he had it at the end. My thoughts with Sheila. Rest easy Maestro.”
YOUR DAILY DRONE
Changes are being planned for your non-stop, super soaraway Daily Drone as the program on which it is produced is creaky and outdated.
This will be a major operation as this version of the Drone, the second incarnation, has 540 pages which will need to be transferred to the new software.
Watch this space for updates.
The first version of the Daily Drone with lots of stories about old Fleet Street can be found HERE
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
SKEW WHIFF
Sir — I failed a “posh” test today on three counts: I don’t smell worse than my dog; I own and use a toothbrush; and I can’t say the word “frightfully” without sounding like a complete berk.
Where have I gone wrong?
O D COLLONE
“Heaven Scent”
Pratt’s Bottom
DITHERING IDIOTS
Sir — I was fascinated to read in the vintage Daily Drone (Express News Subs Make The Front Page) that Peter Hedley subbed six splashes in one night and all were used. Sounds like all the editors I worked with: they could never make up their fucking mind.
LP BREVMIN
Back Bar, Flying Fuck
(re-opened)
PS: Good luck with the revamp
The trouble with the Daily Express was that editors (plus at least one deputy editor) were appointed by people who hadn’t a clue about journalism — Ed
A TOSSER WRITES...
Sir — We note that Erika Lust Films, of Barcelona, is offering its employees
30-minute Masturbation Breaks every day to improve staff morale.
Are there plans to give this privilege to Drone staff or is it already in hand?
LP BREVMIN
on behalf of Spike Diver, Rosalie Rambleshanks (trainee), PE Dant, Pearl Nonparail, Reynard and Reckless Rambleshanks
OK but not in the office please — Ed
SAVE OUR STREET!
A petition has been organised to protest at a plan to build a “justice quarter” in Fleet Street which will involve the demolition of eight buildings and a pub.
Details of the plan can be found further down this page.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
DO-WAH DIDDY DODDERY
Sir — I was so pleased when hubby bought me this top quality David Austin rose. Then I saw what it’s called: do you think he’s trying to tell me something?
POLLY ANTHA-SHANKS
Rose Hill
Surrey
DO-WAH DIDDY DODDY
Sir — Regular Drone readers will recall that Aunt Marje was one of the first to query the suitability of Anneliese Dodds to be Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer (If Ms Dodds is the answer, what the fuck was the question?)
How perceptive does a columnist have to be to graduate from being a trainee?
Ra! Ra! AN R.R (t)
RONNIE RAMBLESHANKS
Dealer Principal
Skodas4U
West Byfleet
She could start by turning in some decent copy — Ed
DO-WAH DIDDY WADDY
My dear Sir — Staring dimly at your august organ reminded me of the days that when the Slopers were out of the building, we erks on the art desk would amuse ourselves by sending the art desk clerk’s sandwiches down ‘the tube’ to the process department.
Dobbie (for it was he) would always be unamused, but would send his ‘runner’ (if ever there was a misused word) down several flights to retrieve them. Occasionally, I believe, they returned with a bite missing…
WADDY
Four-eyed art bod, the Tim Holder era…
SILLY ARSE
Sir — Since ‘Sir’ Keir Starmer was elected Labour leader, the Drone’s Aunt Marje has twice warned readers that ‘there is less to him than meets the eye.’ How prescient does a columnist have to be to graduate from being a trainee?
Ra Ra, AN R.R (t)!
RONNIE RAMBLESHANKS
Dealer Principal
Skodas4U
West Byfleet
Who? — Ed
LOAD OF RUBBISH
Sir — I’ve been having a spring clean/lockdown turnout and am a frequent visitor to our local recycling centre. I’ve enjoyed the banter with binmen Ashley, Dave and the lads but now they’ve invited me down the pub when Covid restrictions end. Frankly, I’d rather not go but how can I refuse?
CLAIR OUT-SHANKS
Tipperary
TIRED AND EMOTIONAL
Sir — Forgive me for saying it but I think the Daily Drone’s looking a bit tired and unoriginal of late. Boring pictures of snappers in beer crates; piss poor petitions; contrived, unfunny kildares (limericks, surely — Ed) and as for the ubiquitous Shankses, well they can fuck off for a start.
I remember when you used to run interesting things about overheard conversations in supermarkets, old films on the telly, and a nostalgic, haunting, evocative series inspired by a train stopping at a station in the Cotswolds before the Great War.
If you’re short of someone to write some good stuff I know just the lad.
Come on, Ed: it’s game-raising time!
ELVIRA MULDOON (Mrs)
Adlestrop Avenue
Tatsfield
Oh do fuck off, Spotty — Ed
LUNCHTIME LEGEND
Sir — What a pleasure to re-read Vincent Mulchrone’s ‘Two rivers run silently through London’ piece from Churchill’s Lying in State in the Daily Mail’s 125th anniversary supplement. The phrase ‘Fleet Street giant’ tends to be over used but Mulchrone truly was a legend — and not only in his lunchtime.
LP BREVMIN
Chief Sub
ONE OLD PENNY
Sir — How quickly vogue becomes passee. My 23-year-old grand daughter was, understandably, chuffed to find Rod Stewart and his wife, Penny, at the next table to her outside a London riverside restaurant. But her family WhatsApp photograph of the occasion was greeted by my youngest grand daughter, aged 15, with: ‘Who’s that? They look like any old couple.’
BILL HICKEY-SHANKS
EC4
PLUCKY SOL
Sir — Re Welsh pluckers. A certain wise monarch was also a keen ukulele player, viz:
King Solomon had a thousand wives,
He'd serenade them daily.
But what's the use of a thousand wives
If you've only got one ukulele?
Did George Formby sing this? Can't be sure. Further research needed.
S.TRUMMER
Petts Wood
POCKET CARTOON
BELIEVE IT OR NOT
*Young Alex Salmond’s first job was measuring inside legs at a gents’ outfitters in Paisley.
*Dominic Cummings is to host a special Westminster edition of Have I Got News For You.
*During recording of Strictly Come Dancing, BBC wardrobe staff are always on standby in case Bruno Tonioli needs a change of underwear.
*A Dublin poll has voted President Joe Biden as Plastic Paddy of the Year for his exaggerated claims of Irish heritage.
(Not — Ed)
NICK NEWMAN
JUST FANCY THAT
On an April day in 1930 the BBC's radio news announcer said, "there is no news" and piano music was played for the remainder of the 15 minute segment.
LOAD OF BOLLOCKS
My excellent limerick, by RONNIE GIGGLES
There was a young lady of Dee
Who was stung on the arm by a wasp.
When they said, 'Does it hurt?'
She replied, 'Not at all.
'I'm lucky it wasn't a hornet.’
Er, Ronnie? Could you glance into my office, luv? — Ed
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
ASK A SILLY QUESTION ...
Sir — What’s the point of the Daily Mail’s Answers to Correspondents? I answered today’s questions (Did Churchill say: never let a good crisis go to waste? Were carrots originally purple? and How long after the can was the can opener invented?) in 30 seconds using a well-known search engine.
Perhaps a better question would be: Why don’t Answers to Correspondents correspondents use Google?
LP BREVMIN
Back Bar Flying Fuck WhatsApp Group
TYPECAST
Is your distinguished Chief Sub LP Brevmin flanked by a nut each side? Just asking.
RICK McNEILL
SILLY OLD FALL
Sir — I was the duty nurse at a Covid vaccination centre in Lincoln when a dribbling, portly old gentleman with ash blond hair (Hang on: I didn’t think Watkins had moved yet — Ed) limped in and suddenly threw himself on the floor, apparently in some sort of childish tantrum.
We gave him his jab but you’d think that, at his age, he would have learned to take his drink. That’s the elderly for you.
F. NIGHTINGALE-SHANKS
Stagglethorpe, Lincs
NOT SO GRAND, SON
Sir — My grandson, who is at university, rang the other night and my wife settled down to a nice long chat. Alas, it went:
‘Hi, Nan, can you cook bacon from frozen?’
‘Yes, dear.’
‘OK, thanks. See you.’
S.SINCT-SHANKS
Shortacombe, Devon
MASKED BALLS-UP
Sir — Isn’t it heartening when Covid rules are scrupulously observed? I saw a huge tourist bus, which was totally empty, but the driver was wearing a mask.
V. ROOM-SHANKS
Marske-by-the-Sea,
Cleveland
FNAAR FNAAR
Sir — Intrigued by your Lordship’s seemingly endless letters column, today I trawled to the bottom. From the depths I can reveal that while the column does end, the features running alongside are unabated. I encourage other new readers like me to rummage in the Drone’s nether regions where lurk shocking surprises such as this snippet from My Part in Christine Keeler’s Downfall.
“The other day I was writing a backgrounder piece for The Lady magazine; it was published with Larry’s quotes in the January 10 issue. He talked about how a tip-off led to a snatch shot of Christine Keeler emerging from the underground car park of her block of flats to avoid the ravening media hordes."
I was on King magazine at the time, and although we used the famous cane chair shots, I can’t recall this snatch shot appearing anywhere.
P.E. DANT
University of Gazunda
WIND UP
Sir — Bit of a blow up north, 70 per cent of Kalbarri wrecked but nobody hurt, so not much of a story, except cyclones are rare that far south.
Interestingly though, my pal Punter (Chancellor of our Uni) is a bit of a maths wizard and he reckoned the odds of being struck by lightning were bumped up by this weather — but the waves would be well up. So he gave away his golf round yesterday and went for a surf instead.
Well, would you credit it? He'd just caught a big roller when a bloody shark bit him!
But it worked out OK because at that exact moment Punter was struck by lightning!
I know, sounds bad, but the bolt went right through him and killed the shark stone dead.
Now old Punter calculates that the odds of being struck by lightning and bitten by a shark are about evens.
P.E. DANT
University of Gazunda
WA
STUPID BOY
Sir — I see that National Rail turned its website a sombre grey to mark the death of the Duke of Edinburgh. Good for them. I wait, in vain, for the Daily Drone to make a similar respectful gesture to commemorate such an iconic figure.
Catch up, your lordship!
S. MULDOON (EX-TRAINEE)
C/o Pressdram Ltd
IT DOESN’T ADD UP
Sir — I’m devastated to have lost my job as a maths teacher which I’ve had since 2006. What upsets me most is that I feel I’ve wasted the last 12 years.
E.U CLID-SHANKS
Addlestone
I’VE HAD MY PHIL
Sir — Page after page after page of it ... Twenty-four in the Sunday Torygraph alone plus another bloody throw-away supplement. Viewers switching off in droves from the BBC TV coverage... What will it be like when the Queen dies?
F. EDUP
Petts Wood
PHILIP FLOP
Sir — While I understand the reaction to the sad death of Prince Philip, the black tie BBC’s coverage was a tad over the top: simultaneous screening of the same content on BBC1, BBC2, the News Channel and BBC Parliament.
Thank God for Netflix. Me and the missus watched The Crown.
R. SHANKS-FOOTMAN
Windsor
YOU’VE BEEN EL HAD
Sir — I was interested to see the title of George Dearsley’s book (Twelve Camels For Your Wife etc). I’m not boasting but once in the Souk El Had in Agadir, Morocco, I was offered 1,000 camels for mine. Alas, as my cruise ship cabin was rather small, I had to decline.
T.E. SHANKS-LAWRENCE
Humpton
West London
MORE JABBERING
Sir — I’ve been called for my second Oxford-AstraZeneca jab and I’m extremely worried about it. You see, I’ll have to drive several miles on crowded roads to my local centre and there’s a genuine risk that I could have an accident.
The vaccine? Oh, no, I’m not concerned about that: there’s only a 0.000095% risk of developing blood clots after receiving it.
J. VAN-TAM-SHANKS
Panic Parva
Notts
Have you tried Shanks’s pony? — Ed
SIMPLE POINT
Sir — To further my PhD thesis on the Decline and Fall of English as she is Spoke, could the Drone’s scholastic subs help establish the precise moment when endangered species began to aggressively go extinct?
Call me an old romantic if you will, but I ruminate wistfully on simpler times, when countless living things 'became extinct’ quietly and tactfully, so as not to clutter up the planet and impede the progress of homo sapiens.
P.E. DANT
University of Gazunda
WA
You’re an old romantic — Ed
NO LAUGHING MATTER
Sir — My pal Bozzie asked me for an example of an oxymoron; then I saw the Mail’s description of its ‘cartoonist’. QED, no?
SAM JOHNSON-SHANKS (Dr)
EC4
USELESS PLUCKER
Sir — I read that the First Minister of Wales is not only an anti-English radical socialist and a God-denialist, but he also plays the ukulele.
Great balls of fire! Who in their right mind, even a Welsh person, would tolerate such cultural appropriation? Someone should tell him to pluck off.
NEVER SAY DAI
The Leaning Lamp Post
George Formby Villas
Windowmere.
JUST FANCY THAT
PETER TOZER writes: A coffee shop down my way has just changed hands. On introducing myself to Debbie, the new owner, it transpired that we had a mutual friend.
Debbie informed me with no hint of irony: "Kim and I have known each other for years. Her Beaver name was Rabbit.”
The headline Mr Tozer supplied with this snippet was regrettably unusable, although it differed only slightly to the one above — Ed
JUST FANCY THAT
Dan Wootton is doing everything he can to make sure his old NewsUK nickname 'Poundland Piers' catches on at the new job. His debut column for the MailOnline? "How ITV tried to gag me on Meghan too".
COCK OF THE WALK
Prince Harry has taken on a new job at a Silicon Valley start-up, where his official title will be Chief Impact Officer — or, as they're known in the business, a Chimpo.
Let's hope the impact isn't too international. "Chimpo" is a Japanese word for "cock".
JUST FANCY THAT
The Rev Ian Paisley was giving one of his fire and brimstone sermons.
As he got to the bit about ‘great wailing and gnashing of teeth on the Day of Judgment’, a little old lady stood up in the front row and said: ‘Dr Paisley, I have no teeth.’
Without skipping a beat, Paisley thundered: ‘And make no mistake: teeth will be provided!’
OLD JOKES HOME
Policeman: Irish stew.
Burglar: Irish stew?
Policeman: Yes. Irish stew in the name of the law.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
INDEPENDENT TV
Sir — You’ve got to hand it to that wily old campaigner, Alex Salmond. I see the new party he’s just launched has already got its own TV channel, BBC Alba (169 on Sky). Fast work, Alex!
TAMMY TROUT-SHANKS
Morningside
SMART ARSE
Sir — I assure you that Daily Drone subs won’t follow the BBC into a linguistic trap by describing Frau Merkel’s rethink over a five-day COVID lockdown at Easter as a volte face. We prefer kehrt um.
P.E. DANT
Revise Editor
KEY QUESTION
Sir — I received the attached in an email. Do you think it could be spam?
MIKE R.O. SOFT-SHANKS,
Seattle
SO-AND-SO’S
Sir — So have you noticed how many people start their sentences with the word ‘“so”? So annoying, isn’t it? So many other words are available with which to start a sentence, so why do these silly so-and-so’s do it?
So annoying also is the way that multiple people have started saying “multiple” when “many,” “several”, “a lot” or even “some” would suffice.
So irritating, particularly as there are multiple ways of avoiding this idiocy, but it is what it is and we are where we are, so up with it we must put.
S. O. P. DOFF,
Soham
So, I do so agree with you, Mr Doff — Ed
ONE OFF THE WRIST
Sir — A friend who fell down and broke his wrist (oh, come on: it could happen to anyone) was treated at A&E and told he would receive further help at the hospital fracture clinic two days later.
When he turned up, though, they said that, because of Covid, they were only doing telephone ‘consultations’.
What next: brain surgery by YouTube?
HARRY (HIPPO)
CRATIC-SHANKS
Emergency Ward 10
THAT TAKES THE BISQUIT
Sir — My Mail on Sunday appears to have dreamt up a novel and intriguing way of spicing up its crosswords.
Sunday’s MoS £1500 General Knowledge tester was missing the clue for 4 Down.
Does this mean that from now on crossword freaks must supply their own questions, as well as answers? I suspect many addicts were confused … and just as many probably not, for I am sure I am not alone in suggesting what the most likely answer might be.
But I won’t spoil it, other than to say that the solution included the following: ?i?q?e.
And the missing question? Perhaps it should have read: A smooth, creamy and highly seasoned soup of French origin, classically based on a strained broth of crustaceans. I accept, however, that the MoS does have at least a couple of unlikely options.
IAN BARRATT
Maldon, Essex
SPUD’S LAW
Sir — It's a little know fact of life that no matter how many potatoes you cook there are never enough left over to make bubble-and-squeak.
GUS TRONOME
Petts Wood
TV SOS
Sir — Urgent Line of Duty sitrep request: Can’t tell CHIS from elbow — WTF is GO?
S.HOLMES-SHANKS
Baker Street
W1
FRENCH CRETIN
Sir — Correct me if I’m wrong but I could have sworn that one of the French players in the France v Wales Six Nations match was called Cretin. Or it could have been Macron, I’m not sure.
RHODRI SHANKS-GWELOGG
Bedwas Vipers
FRENCH PRICK
Sir — The British and French Prime Ministers have their vaccinations on the same day: now that’s the co-operation from our friends in Europe we voted for!
And wasn’t it nice of M. Jean Castex to wait for the AstraZeneca vaccine to be available before he had his jab?
PETER RICK-SHANKS
Much Jabbing
Oxford
NEEDLE POINT
Sir — Is some European countries’ courageous and epidemiologically correct decision to suspend use of a highly dangerous vaccine (an astonishing 37 cases of blood clots in only 17million vaccinations) the real reason for the EU’s perceived vaccine rollout tardiness?
Or could it be that our former partners are willing to risk their citizens’ lives to try to make a point?
ED JENNER-SHANKS
Prickham Magna, Dorset
NOT MOVED
Sir — Aren’t young people fascinating — and different? My 15-year-old granddaughter and her friends are firmly in the Meghan camp.
‘How could you not be moved?’ she admonished her sceptical mother after the interview.
NAME & ADDRESS SUPPLIED
PROPERTY NEWS
Sir — For sale in fashionable Knightsbridge. Broom cupboard 2x2x6 unfurnished. Door handle, lock and hinges supplied. Fitted shelf. No services. Careful previous owner. Suit sedentary person of limited mobility and diminished stature with own broom. £100,000 or offer.
GRASPER & FIBBS
Proper Property
W1
OLD BOILERS
Sir — Please allow me space to correct the mistaken impression on certain adult websites that my members are on tap, as it were, to service old boilers on demand.
Our appointments and call-out fee system still applies, especially during lockdown.
St JOHN BALLCOCK-SHANKS
President, Association of Plumbing and Heating Contractors
SOAP OPRAH
Sir — Hands off Oprah Winfrey! Not only is she the world’s best interviewer (750 million viewers can’t be wrong) but since ‘Sir’ Keir Starmer took her correspondence course on how to ask penetrating, incisive and difficult questions, he has been brilliantly holding the Government to account at PMQs.
TERRY GATE-SHANKS
Askern, South Yorks
CURSE OF DIANA
Sir — The parallels between the Duchess of Sussex trashing the royal family in a needy, flaky, manipulative TV interview and the late Princess of Wales trashing the royal family in a needy, flaky, manipulative TV interview are extraordinary.
So extraordinary that I feel it is my duty to warn the duchess never to go near a Paris underpass at night in a black Mercedes driven by a drunk.
NOSTRA D’AMUS
@The Astro Lodger
GOING BANANAS
Sir — As the Windsors continue sliding into the brown soup of their own making even this last sunburned outpost of colonialism is muttering “Republic?” Well, we do have lots of bananas.
Mrs Brig Gen (ret) WC
ARMITAGE SHANKS
Gazunda WA (Aus)
REVOLTING STAFF
Sir — The undersigned wish to protest in the strongest possible terms about the suggested appointment of Piers Morgan to a senior position on the Daily Drone.
We would rather die on the hill of freedom of speech than welcome this uncontroversial, grey, boring fart who wouldn’t know a strong, valid opinion if it bit him on the bum. In addition, he can be quite rude to ex-patriot minor royalty, you know.
Think again, Mr Editor: even Jedward don’t like him.
LP BREVMIN, SPIKE DIVER, PEARL NONPAREIL, AN RR (t) plus the BB FF WhatsApp group
RHYME OF THE TIMES
Sir — Whenever the Wee Queen raises her mischievous head and plots for the breakup of the Union, I sip a reassuring chianti e limonata, reach for my favourite poem by Thomas Gibbons and relish the stanza:
Thither, O thither bend thy glorious way
On Scotia’s hills let British standards play.
Unlock the cannons, bid the bombs be hurled
To crush the scoundrel rabble of the world!
Says it all, doesn’t it?
BILLY CUMBERLAND-SHANKS
W1
JUST FANCY THAT
Prince Charles' nickname among friends when he was growing up was "Trump".
JUST FANCY THAT
Sir John Gielgud was a keen crossword addict and used to boast backstage about how quickly did the puzzle in The Times.
One day, after he had finished in seven minutes, another actor looked over his shoulder and queried eight across.
'Sir John, what on earth is 'diddybums’?' he asked. Gielgud replied: 'I don't know but it fits frightfully well.'
RORY’S THRILLER
Our good friend, the prolific and successful novelist Rory Clements, has a new book out.
A Prince and a Spy is the thrilling follow up to the Sunday Times bestseller Hitler's Secret.
Tom Wilde returns to unravel a dangerous mystery that goes all the way to the heart of the Third Reich — and the British Monarchy.
We have yet to read this book but if Rory’s past novels are anything to go by it is recommended.
Rory has held senior positions on several newspapers including the Daily Express, Daily Mail and Today.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
STILL NEEDLED
Sir — I must confess I was apprehensive about possible side effects ahead of receiving my first vaccination this week but I need not have worried.
I’m no more depressed, lethargic, irritable, lazy or downright pissed off than I was before.
S. LIGHT-PRICK
The Needles
Shankslin
INTO THE FRYING PAN
Sir — Stuck for something to watch on Primetime TV (there’s nothing on these days, is there?), my wife and I tuned into something called Masterchef on BBC1.
People cooked up all sorts of amazing things for the watching millions then carved up their rivals in quite a nasty way.
As I said to HID: ‘It’s so unlike the home life of our own dear Queen let’s see what’s on the other side.’
G.R.V BROWNING-SHANKS
Cookham
LITERARY NEWS
Sir — Please allow me to draw your readers’ attention to our Spring Launch of When Push Comes to Shove, by
T T Upham, a wrenching yet inspirational account of a misgendered ballet dancer’s struggle to become a top rugby club’s tighthead prop.
And coming up this summer:
** Code Red — sacked Scottish Government ethics adviser tells all.
** My Love Affair with Gerry and the Bombmakers — an elderly ex-editor’s touching memoir.
SASHA KNOBHEAD
Bumstead & Futtock,
Booker Lane EC
CREATING A STINK
Sir — We can’t say we weren’t warned about how ‘difficult’ the Duchess of Sussex could be. At the time of her wedding in St George’s Chapel, Windsor, there was a story that she had requested air fresheners because the 673-year-old building smelled ‘musty’.
I buttonholed Ashley Walton, the distinguished former Express Royal Editor and leading member of the Diana Press Pack, for his take on this.
I recall his narrowing his eyes in the Back Bar of the Flying Fuck and sipping ruminatively on his Merlot and lemonade before conceding: ‘Must be true. Even we wouldn’t have made that up.’
LP BREVMIN
St Bride’s Passage
London EC4
OLD BORES
Sir — I thought I’d pass on a quote from Simon Heffer’s excellent new edition of the diaries of Henry ‘Chips’ Channon:
‘How bored and lonely he will be when he is married to Wallis and living in Belgium, Holland or Cannes with the Empire closed to him.’
Chips was, of course, referring to the Duke of Windsor but fast forward 85 years...
SAMMY PEPYS-SHANKS
Literary Editor
LUNCHTIME O'BOUVERIE
Sir — Recent Press mention of your new correspondent (casual — Ed) I.R. O’Greenslade and his proclivity for tinkering with Spot the Ball competitions leads me to reminisce about the delicate blooms that were newspaper contests in my youth.
On the old News of the World (Bouverie Street version) every time they asked entrants: Put Your Name in the box below, several would dutifully write Your Name.
And when readers were told to cut out a coupon and put it in an envelope there was always one who kept the coupon and sent off the rest of the page.
Those were the daze.
LP BREVMIN
Back Bar WhatsApp Group
STOP THIS SILLINESS
Sir — Kindly desist from publishing my husband’s letters to the Daily Drone. He is becoming obsessed and distracted from his full-time duty as obituary writer to the Retirees’ Extreme and Dangerous Sports Club of Gazunda.
Yours respectfully
Mrs Brig. Gen. (ret) WC
ARMITAGE SHANKS
BIRD NEWS
Sir — Last night I heard the first autumnal screech of the Goshank, close relative of the Goshawk — genus exclamatory. This is remarkable, as the Goshank is a flightless bird, native to our off-shore island, New Zealand, some 5,000km to the east.
Is this a record?
ARMITAGE SHANKS (etc)
Gazunda, WA
No, it’s a load of bollocks — Ed
COMPLEAT TOOL
Sir — Could your teams of scholars, linguists and sub-editors kindly explain why we passively go blind or deaf, yet are aggressively struck dumb? Also, I wonder why we listen to, but hark at? Finally, why sub mariners?
You will appreciate that in this great southern land, where we strive to make English (rather than American) our second language, your esteemed online journal is considered a compleat tool.
BEA WYLDRD (Ms)
Uni of NT (Aus)
ERM ...
Sir — If Shanks’s pony broke into a trot would it be disqualified?
P. DESTRIAN
Shanklin, Qld (Aus)
OPEN-TOP BUSTED
Sir — Did you see how a cunning American TV channel tricked a retiring, publicity-shy expat house husband into sharing English tea for two on an open-topped Los Angeles tour bus and practically forced him to plug a show on a streaming giant he had just signed a multi-million contract with?
And they talk about the British tabloids!
SMITH E. SHANKS
Billericay
POINTLESS …
Sir — When I was a young scrum half in the Eastern Valley league the box kick was very much a surprise alternative play. Now in the era of ‘The Kicking Game’ it is almost obligatory.
How can it be a good tactic predictably to kick away possession?
RHODRI SHANKS-GWELOG
(Formerly Dai Lewis-Shanks)
Bedwas Vipers
WHAT A CHARLIE
Sir — My neighbour told me Charles Dickens was a bit of a lad on the quiet. I asked: Was he the one who wrote Knickerless Nickleby? We both had a laff.
VERA BONNILASS
Up North
HELP NEEDED
A reader writes: 'Does anyone recall Christopher Hutchens' brief spell as a comment writer at the Express?
'I think he was there only a few weeks and shared an office with Ed Pearce (this must have been in Christopher Ward's day).
'There was a handbag fight over their shared desk and Hutch turned out Ed's drawers on to the office floor.
'I'm struggling to remember this even though I knew Christopher well, outside the office.
'Someone is now writing a biog and I'm doing my bit to help — any memories would be most gratefully received.’
Can you help? Contact edailydrone@gmail.com
CHRISTOPHER LEE
Christopher Lee, who served as Diplomatic Correspondent at the Daily Express in the mid to late 1970s, has died at the age of 79.
He went on to write 300 episodes of the BBC Radio series This Sceptred Isle and a biography of Lord Carrington.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
ISLE OF BLIGHT
Sir — Here in HMP Australia we applaud your Organ’s disdain for toilet `humour’. Seriousness of the topic is especially relevant at this time when all households are required to horde toilet rolls, to be stacked as temporary barriers at State borders during the regular virus-driven closures.
Incidentally, Australia’s faulty hotel-quarantine method — now adopted by the UK, and known to be an abject failure and source of all recent outbreaks — is to be replaced by an earlier system. This imprisons foreign visitors indefinitely on the offshore islands of poverty-stricken nearby countries.
I am sure the UK has access to similar places?
ARMITAGE SHANKS
Brig. Gen. (ret) WC
Gazunda, Western Aus.
WINNER BY A NOSE
Sir — There has been much criticism of the Government/NHS during the pandemic so I will share an experience.
At 2pm on Sunday a Sky News alert on my phone said that a case of the South African variant had been discovered in my postcode area and residents would require a test.
At 2.30pm, having booked online, Carol and I took the more comprehensive PCR (as opposed to lateral flow) test in our leisure centre car park.
At 2.02am on Monday I received an email to say the tests had been negative.
Love the Drone, by the way!
R. WATKINS
CM13
We’re always glad to welcome new readers — Ed
PISSED AS A NEWT
Sir — Would your readers like to join me in listing extreme definitions for our day and age? Here are a few: As useless as a printer helpline. As hypothermic as a charity shop. As empty as a Premiership terrace. (The old song has it that there's nothing so drear as a pub with no beer. But that's not strong enough now that we're facing a Covid reality.)
Any suggestions?
R. EALWORLD
Petts Wood
HUH?
Sir — Fifteen million jabs? OK as far as vaccination rollouts go, I suppose. But wouldn’t Boris and his sidekick, Hancock, be better off toning down the triumphalist rhetoric and cosying up to Manny Macron and Mutter Merkel to find out how it’s really done?
HUGH S. COUNTING-SHANKS
The Nave
Ely Cathedral
HACKED OFF
Sir — I applaud the Drone’s war on winter cliches. What a pity that young subs on the Mail don’t realise that what they think are clever headlines were actually considered old hat last century!
SAM E. OLD-SHANKS
Hackney
BRIEFLY ...
Sir — You need a short letter? Here’s one.
COLUM FILLER
@overmatter.com
Sir — Here’s another one.
LEE SOLDER
Lilliputia Rentals
DOGGED ...
Sir — In these dark, depressing times it is good to read of the indomitability of the human spirit. I refer, of course, to the Mail Online report of two frisky ladies found by police having it off together in a ‘dogging’ car park. On Dartmoor. Past midnight. Temperature: -3C.
Way to go, girls!
JESS LOOKIN-SHANKS
Barking
👍 J S-W
DROP IN THE OCEAN
Sir — I was having lunch with my son and his family (it’s OK, we’re in the same bubble) when I noticed my four-year-old grand daughter continually staring at me. When I asked her why, she said: ‘I’m waiting to see you drink like a fish like granny says you do.’
GILBERT GUZZLE-SHANKS
Burton
👍 J S-W
BRRRR...
Sir — Cold again.
CRISPIN EVEN
Petts Wood
EXPRESS INSIGHT
Daily Express editor Gary Jones has given a fascinating interview to the BBC’s The Media Show on Radio 4.
MCGIBBON’S THRILLER
A cracking new thriller by former Expressman Robin McGibbon is now available from Amazon.
The semi auto-biographical novel is set in Fleet Street with characters that may be recognisable — only the names have been changed.
This is the synopsis:
Vengeance comes at a price. A loyal reporter faithful to an emotional secret pact.
A power-crazed editor hungry for revenge, acorrupt police chief obsessed with money, a loving wife who fears the worst.
All four caught up in a scandal of blackmail and vice that disgraced Scotland Yard and changed the way Britain was policed.
Final Deadline, a fast-paced, dialogue-led story, soaked in the atmosphere of 70s’ London, tells the story of ex-national newspaper reporter Ross McLean, whose misplaced loyalty to former local paper colleague Harry Wise has catastrophic consequences for both of them.
JUST FANCY THAT
Thanks to the Times Diary for recalling when Joan Collins fell ill while shooting the raunchy film The Stud during which she seemed to spend most of her time on her back.
‘Don’t worry,’ the studio doctor reassured her, ‘a couple of days on your feet and we’ll have you back in bed in no time.’
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
WHACKY JACKIE
Sir — Did my eyes deceive me or did I spot the Drone’s new ombudsperson, Jackie Shanks-Weaver, playing against type as a gangster’s moll in Sky’s violent new Mafia/drugs cartel drama ZeroZeroZero?
DAI SHANKS-LEWIS
Torfaen Television Appreciation Society
Search me — Ed
Right! That’s your second yellow: you’re excluded
— J S-W
FUN IN THE SCRUM
Sir — Did my eyes deceive me or did I see Alan Carr, genial host of TV’s Celebrity Ding Dong and Interior Design Masters, coming on as a replacement tight head during Saturday’s Calcutta Cup match?
DAI SHANKS-LEWIS
Ex-Torfaen Third XV (The Wankers)
No — Ed
That’s a yellow card —Jackie Shanks-Weaver
SILLY BILLIES
Sir — I have noticed that letters in the Daily Drone have become increasingly silly recently. If this continues I shall have no alternative but to go bacterial (surely you mean ‘viral’ — Ed) and exclude correspondents from the website, the naughty boys.
JACKIE SHANKS-WEAVER
Much Zooming
Cheshire
BANGLA JEST
Sir — My favourite Indian restaurant has started to do takeaway but when I rang up and asked: Do you deliver? Hassan replied: No, only lamb, chicken and beef.
Those Bangla scamps love a laugh, don’t they?
BARRY ARNIE-SHANKS
Splott
DINNER DINGDONG
Sir — Dear Aunt Marje. At a dinner party last night my husband took it upon himself to loudly contradict something I was saying.
To defend myself I slapped his face, and in retaliation he grabbed and twisted my wrist. Luckily I was able to kick away his chair and he fell to the floor, breaking a small bone in his hand and badly gashing his nose.
I was thankfully unscathed, but I now wish to report him to the police for spousal abuse. It’s not the first time he’s argued with me, but enough!
I think it is time to stand up for my rights. I would also like to report the other dinner guests, some of whom were laughing, for failing to intervene. What should I do Aunt Marje?
HELENA HAND-BASKET
Via twatmail
Aunt Marje replies: I’m reporting YOU to the police, Madam. Dinner parties are banned at the moment.
LEAVER’S REJOINDER
Sir — I see that the Brexit referendum losers — you know, the democracy deniers who called themselves Remainers — now wish to be known as Rejoiners.
Pathetic, isn’t it?
MAJ R.T SHANKS
Much Voting
Salop
AMATEUR NIGHT
Sir — Presenter Assad Ahmad tells BBC London viewers that Captain Tom ‘raised tens of millions of pounds’. Why didn’t he just say ‘£33 million’?
CHARITY SHANKS-WALKER
Much Trekkin
Because they are a bunch of clueless amateurs and second-rate presenters. I am not sure what is the point of BBC London News — Ed
GOOD SPOT
Sir — I notice that the typically unctuous, fawning letter from Awards Nominee Rosalie Rambleshanks on the occasion of your birthday omitted her usual job title (trainee). Does this mean she has been finally taken on the Drone’s staff?
S. MULDOON (trainee emeritus)
WFH
Pressdram
No — Ed
OUR HERO
Boss — We all hope that, in between helping your grandchildren to write sweet herograms to yourself on Facebook, you found time to enjoy your birthday.
SPIKE DIVER AND LADS
Back Bar, Flying Fuck WhatsApp group
GRAND POP
Sir — Have a drink on me!
R.WHITE
Lincoln
TWENTY-ONE AGAIN
Sir — In response to your recent request, I have thoroughly researched ‘important things what happened on February 1’.
I have to confess that nothing much has occurred on this day throughout history.
True, it’s Indian Coastguard Foundation Day, the anniversary of the granting of the first US steamboat patent, the 1884 publication of the first volume of the Oxford English Dictionary (A To Ant) and the amalgamation of the Western Australia towns of Kalgoorlie and Boulder to form the city of Kalgoorlie-Boulder, but, apart from that, zilch, nada, nix, nowt, nothing.
Sorry!
AWARDS NOMINEE ROSALIE RAMBLESHANKS
WFH,
West Byfleet
PS: Only kidding, Boss: it’s your birthday. Many happy returns, Bings!
BRUSSELS SPOUT
Sir — It is reported that the European Union has approved the Oxford-AstraZenica vaccine four weeks after its first use in Britain.
I don’t want to bother Michael Heseltine, John Major or that nice Anna Soubry with this but am I correct to deduce that if we were still in the EU, millions here would have been denied protection against Covid in the last month?
JESS ASKIN-SHANKS
The Needles
Much Jabbing
STOP THE MUSIC
Sir — In today’s febrile climate of cultural revisionism and gender injustice, it’s surely time to set fire to the Great American Songbook.
Not only is it a catalogue of musical rhythms culturally appropriated from the descendants of slaves, but the lyrics represent an unacceptable, outdated and grossly sentimentalised portrayal of the toxic patriarchal male’s pursuit of penetrative sex.
MENNA RAWL BARSTEDS (Ms)
Bing Crosby Home for the Tone Deaf
Croon River CA
IRRITABLE
Sir — Are you, like me, increasingly irritated by people who start their letters “Are you, like me, increasingly irritated ...”?
TOM S HANKS
Via #Twatter
DAVID THURLOW
One of the great Daily Express district reporters, David Thurlow, died on 12th January aged 88.
He was in hospital recovering from surgery to pin a broken hip when he contracted Covid. His wife, Jeanne and children were allowed to be with him during his last 48 hours.
As well as Jeanne, his wife of 64 years, David leaves children Fiona, Jonathan and Joanna, grandchildren Tom, Lucy, Annie, Rhea, Guy, Laura and Katie, and great-grandchildren Beatrice, Arthur, Jemima, Olive, Isabelle, Oliver, Brock, Edie and Paisley.
David was immensely proud of his time on the Express as area man for East Anglia and later based in Southampton.
The family say that due to COVID 19 restrictions, a private funeral will take place.
Donations, if desired, to the Journalists' Charity or SportsAid c/o Kevin Holland Funeral Service, 246 Chichester Road, Bognor Regis PO21 5BA. Telephone: 01243 868630.
BOB JOHNSTON TRIBUTE
JON ZACKON has written a heartfelt tribute to his old friend and colleague Bob Johnston, who has died aged 93.
Bob, a former Mirror executive and Daily Sketch MD in the Sixties, passed away at his home in St Agnes in Cornwall.
He leaves a widow Joan, aged 90 and brother Don, 80. The couple had no children.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
PRECISELY WRONG
Sir — The Beeb’s Dominic Hughes announces on the news that ‘more than 60’ new vaccination centres have been opened. Actually it is 65. Why didn’t he say so or is it, in fact, nearly 70?
JESS ASKIN-SHANKS
BB of FF
UPDATE
BBC newsreader Mishal Husain informs viewers that ‘more than 70’ cases of the South Africa Covid variant have been identified in the UK. The correct figure is, as she reports later, 77. Or, if you insist, ‘nearly 80’.
JS-S
BB FF
HUGH AND CRY
Sir — I appeal to Drone readers to spare a thought for our colleagues in the broadcast media, especially the BBC.
It can’t be easy after PPE and Test and Trace to report that the Government’s Covid vaccination programme is a success.
The Beeb’s Health Editor, the lugubrious former Lib Dem parliamentary candidate Hugh Pym, fresh from another session getting in the way in an Intensive Care Unit, tries hard to emphasise ‘regional variations’ and ‘inconsistency of supplies’ but his heart isn’t really in it.
The figures for the 24/7 roll-out speak for themselves.
G. RUDGING-SHANKS
The Needles
Much Jabbing
BIG PRICKS
Sir — Can someone please tell me why we’re so out of step with Europe on Coronavirus vaccinations?
The UK has only done about four million so far: the figures are a lot different in the European Union. In addition, we have ordered doses of only four separate vaccines and the one originated in this country took literally months to develop.
I always knew Michael Heseltine, John Major and that nice Anna Soubry we’re right about Brexit.
Come on, Boris and Hancock: get your act together!
I suggest we organise a mass rollout of vaccinations. Why not use GPs’ surgeries, leisure centres and branches of Superdrug? Here’s an idea: what about cathedrals? You could even have some bloke playing the organ!
Unless we act now our former partners in Europe will laugh at us.
PETER RICKSHANKS
Oxford
BANG ON
Sir — The mindlessness of chatter group habitués was emphasised when a sonic boom in the South-East caused a Facebook frenzy. I particularly liked the contrast between two responses to the posted question:
Did anyone hear that loud bang just now?
One replied: Yes, I did (!)
The other (and I like to think it was an Expressman) said: ‘It was a sonic boom caused by Quick Reaction Alert Eurofighters from RAF Coningsby scrambling at 1,100mph to intercept a private jet inbound to Stansted from Germany which was not answering Traffic Control calls.’
TOM GUN-SHANKS
Stansted Mount Fitchet
A LARF DAHN SARF
Sir — Reginald E. Mainer-Shanks of Chantilly was so wrong in predicting post-Brexit pandemonium caused by those nasty parked lorries. They were all gone in a couple of days. And what's more I bet he doesn't pronounce it Chan-Tilly like us in the Sar-feast.
B. RIGHTSIDE
Petts Wood. (Yes!)
IT’S ALL GONE RIGHT
Sir — Forget the storming of the Capitol and inconsistencies over the vaccine roll-out, surely we should be more worried about the predictable chaos at Channel ports following the UK’s departure from the EU.
Some of us presciently warned of delays over documents, a huge traffic build-up, lorries parked on airfields and motorways, disruption as far back as the Dartford Crossing, food and medicine shortages, civil unrest in Medway towns and the possibility of Army reservists being called in.
Where did it all go wrong?
REGINALD E. MAINER-SHANKS
Chantilly
NO EGRETS
Sir — How clever of The Times to channel the Sinatra Anthem in a headline about bird life. However it’s a shame that the sub concerned failed the Morris Benett Say-What’s-in-the-Fucking-Picture Test with a half-arsed caption on a stock picture of an egret.
I suppose their defence would be they did it their way.
C & LC GETTY
Not Petts Wood
SUB NORMAL
Sir — In our continuing resistance to cliches, the Drone sub-editors this winter will not refer to the temperature plummeting or plunging; the phrase ‘white stuff’ and the words ‘dumped’, ‘sprinkling’ or ‘blanket’ will never be used. In particular, the inelegant phrase ‘single digit temperatures’ is banned.
Neither will we refer to Sudden Stratosphere Warming as ‘the Beast from the East’ partially because this phrase was over-used in 2018 but mainly because this meteorological phenomenon emanates from the North Pole.
P.E. DANT
Revise Editor
Oh goody. I always say ‘Avoid cliches like the plague’ — Ed
FIRED UP
Sir — I’m fed up with being criticised when I lock my children outside during the pandemic. Don’t people realise it’s a fire drill?
STIR CRAZY-SHANKS
Dartmoor
DRINKING SCHOOL
Sir — Re Covid: You think it’s bad now but in 20 years’ time the country will be run by youngsters who were home schooled by people who didn’t go out a lot and drank too much.
GAVIN DE PRESST-SHANKS
Gloom Parva
Dorset
WHERE ARE WE?
Sir — I can't wait to see the back of 2021. But we are where we are.
P. OFFED
Bury, Lancs
SHANKS FOR THE MEMORY
Sir — I have been moved to get in touch with your esteemed publication because it would appear that I am the only inhabitant of Petts Wood who has yet to feature in your witty letters columns.
You may remember that our first meeting in Poppins was an inauspicious one. On only my second visit to the bar, I was moved to punch some awful cove off his barstool after he loudly claimed that I was one of his ‘million chums’ and as he fell he crashed into your table, spilling your drink.
I had only just come down from our Ancoats office and was mortified at the tidal wave of alcohol thus launched into your lap. You graciously refused my offer to pay for your suit to be cleaned and said that you would consider the matter settled were I to merely replace your drink.
I still remember the embarrassment I felt about having to ask the barmaid for your desired tipple as, still rough round the edges Northerner that I was, I had never heard of these drinks called ‘cocktails’. How the little minx behind the bar giggled when I asked if they came in pints or halves.
I’ve never forgotten the name of that cocktail but in all the years since I have never had one. Perhaps when we’ve had our covid jabs we could meet in some pub and get stuck into a brace of Flaming Lady Boys?
Yours,
ANDY SHANKS HOBAN,
Petts Wood by Way of Pratt’s Bottom,
Kent
WHAT A SHANKER
Sir — If you use ‘letters’ purporting to be from a member of the Shanks family may I suggest you cut them down to fucking size and not allow them to witter on interm (for a long time)?
RONNIE RAMBLESHANKS
West Byfleet
HACKNEYED OFF
Sir — Are you, like me, increasingly irritated by the over-used phrase ‘We are where we are’ regarding the current situation over Brexit, Covid etc?
G. CLICHY-SHANKS
Hackney
It is what it is — Ed
JEFF’S NEW BOOK
Jeff Connor, a former
sub-editor on the Daily Express and Daily Star in Manchester, has a new book out.
Busby’s Last Crusade tells the story of Manchester United’s rise from the ashes of the Munich air crash in 1958 to the team’s European Cup victory 10 years later.
With more than 200 images, the book features the humble Scot who led them there, the legendary Matt Busby.
AUDREY SLAUGHTER
Audrey Slaughter, former wife of Evening Standard editor Charles Wintour, has died at the age of 91.
Thanks to Private Eye, Audrey was known in Fleet Street circles as the
Flame-Haired Temptress. We suspect the soubriquet was bestowed on her by the late diarist Nigel Dempster.
The death notice is from The Times.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
EU FOOLS
Sir — I notice that, since the United Kingdom finally left the European Union on New Year’s Eve, democracy deniers, including, regrettably, members of the journalism ‘family’, have been adjusting their Facebook profiles to include the above logo.
It is not only pathetic but absurd: we are all still Europeans but not, thankfully, members of the EU.
Remainers? They just don’t get it, do they?
S. SHANKS-BREXIT
Freethorpe,
Norfolk
ADI-EU
Sir — When my neighbour talked about the Great British Fuck Off, I thought she meant Love Island. But apparently she meant Brexit.
VERA BONNILASS
Newcastle
GUEST DISAPPEARANCE
Sir — I’ve heard that if you have relatives round over the holiday Covid police are entitled to force entry and make them go home.
Does anyone know if this is a free service and do you have to book?
I.N. HOSPITABLE-SHANKS
Little Welcome
Suffolk
BUNK UP
Sir — I paid a carpenter upfront to make me a double bed but he’s only gone and done a bunk. It’s one thing on top of another!
JED WOOD-SHANKS
Caught Napping
Beds
SILLY AAARHS
Sir — Isn’t it a shame that Cornwall has suddenly been put into Tier 4? It’s all those pirates from Penzance going home for Christmas. The Aaarrh rate has gone through the roof.
L. J. SILVER-SHANKS
C/o The Llandogger Trow,
Bristol
Huh? Cornwall is going into Tier 2, you fool — Ed
WHAT A STEAL
Sir — What a year 2020 has been. Who’d have thought the law would insist it was OK to wear a mask to go into a bank and ask for money?
B. LAGGER-SHANKS
Balaclava Mews
Plaistow
SUPREME PUT-DOWN
Sir — Last minute Christmas shopping has been chaos! I was in the queue at Waitrose when none other than Diana Ross tried to push in. I said to her: You can’t hurry, love, you’ll just have to wait.
That told her.
DOUG REES-SHANKS
W1A 1AA
TOOTING COMMON
Sir — The authorities in Cairo have initiated a novel scheme to restore a sense of well-being in the Egyptian capital during the pandemic. Apparently, people were spooked by the unusual silence in the streets. Now motorists are being encouraged to sound their horns continuously to bring back the Cairo clamour.
Operation Toot and Calm ‘Em is expected to last for a year.
S.FINKS-SHANKS
Horncastle
LOST BOTTLES
Sir — According to a Public Health England survey one in 20 people is drinking the equivalent of five bottles of wine a week during the pandemic.
Isn’t it heartening that at least some of our citizens are making sacrifices and cutting down in our hour of need?
P. GRIGIO-SHANKS
Drinkwater Parva, Northants
CITIZEN CANEY
Sir — Please allow me space to appeal to Drone readers for a full face passport-style picture of Peter Caney, the much-missed former Expressman, to aid my research.
Awards Nominee ROSALIE RAMBLESHANKS (trainee)
Back Bar, Flying Fuck
CAPTION TRUTHS
Sir — I’m indebted to Spike Diver for reminding me of the correct sequence of events in writing a caption. I may well have been the author, but most probably I was passing on the wisdom of Morris Benett.
Today’s subs might care to note these further imperatives (delivered by Major Benett with his legendary random expletives):
DON’T fucking repeat the headline
DON’T repeat the intro to the fucking story
MAKE it fit in 10pt fucking Square Gothic
RICK McNEILL
Cape Town
CARD TRICK
Sir — My wife always says (and she is always right) that if a card with a first-class stamp arrives this late it's because the sender clean forgot about you until they got the card you sent them.
B. ETTERLATETHANNEVER
Petts Wood
CRAP EDITORS
Sir — The Brexit negotiators’ willingness to ignore deadlines reminds me of every editor I worked with (especially the one whose wife was in the trade).
And they wondered why the paper was late and lost copies when the inkies arbitrarily ended the print run.
LP BREVMIN
Chief Sub, Daily Drone
WAFFLING CAPTIONS
Sir — As someone who cut their Fleet Street teeth writing captions on the Daily Express, I am frequently irked (nay dismayed) by the waffling incompetence of many captions in today’s newspapers and websites.
A new generation of sub-editors clearly needs to become acquainted with the first rule of caption writing, as enunciated so eloquently by Production Editor and style enforcer Maj Morris Benett MC: “Just fucking say what’s in the fucking picture!”
RICK McNEILL
Cape Town
A HANDBAG?
Sir — Rick McNeill is right in citing “just say what's in the fucking picture” as the key to caption writing. This was holy writ on the Mirror back in the 90s — but it was difficult at times.
One night a sub was handed a story with a
run-of-the-mill picure of Mrs Thatcher. Holding it up, he said to one and all: “There’s only one caption for this — In her hand, a handbag. On her head, a hat. This was the Prime Minister yesterday when she...”
P. UNCHLINE
Petts Wood
BALLS ACHE
Sir — Ricky McNeill makes a valid point about captions and Morris’s advice was always valuable. I was told to stare at a picture till my eyeballs ached. Only then should I dare to write a caption.
Then, I was instructed (maybe by one R. McNeill), that the sequence of events should be:
Reader looks at pic.
Reader reads caption.
Reader sees something there that makes him look at the pic again.
SPIKE DIVER
Back Bar, Flying Fuck
PISSED OFF
Sir — I am writing in my capacity as FoC of the Daily Drone editorial chapel to protest most strongly that we have not been invited for Christmas drinks with Lord Drone and, for that matter, you.
We feel that, despite restrictions imposed by the Covid pandemic we have been producing the greatest World’s Greatest Online Newspaper and that this should be recognised.
Apart from that, we are thirsty.
LP BREVMIN, Pearl Nonpareil, G.Uffaw, Lewis Stools, P. Rodnose, M. Erriment, T. Manners (sommelier) R. White, Dirk Doppelgänger (wannabe) A. Frame (writer), S.Muldoon (trainee emeritus), Awards Nominee Rosalie Rambleshanks (trainee) and all the associated Shankses.
Sorry, Lord Drone has closed all the pubs — Ed
NOT SOBER
Sir — We stand in solidarity with the Daily Drone editorial chapel over management’s decision to deny them unlimited free drinks at Christmas, in breach of long-standing industry custom and practice.
FRANKLIN & GILL GOTHIC
Natsopa Villas
Grand Cayman
IAN PARROTT
Former Express Group Managing Editor Ian Parrott has died aged 55.
Ian joined the company in the 1990s when production switched to Quark Express. His knowledge of the program and the Apple Mac computers on which it was produced was second to none.
In 2003 Ian was appointed Assistant Managing Editor (Production) and was Deputy Managing Editor from 2005 until 2007 when he was promoted again.
He was made redundant in 2012.
Ian's wife Lorraine said: "It was a shock for us and completely unexpected.”
ALEX LINDSAY
Former Sunday Express Belfast correspondent Alex Lindsay died on Saturday 5 December aged 78. He had been suffering from Parkinson’s Disease for 13 years.
A sad story lies behind his death from Coronavirus at the Beaufort nursing home in Burscough, West Lancs.
Alex, who was also based for many years in Manchester, had been prevented from having close contact with his wife Sue, 72, for eight months because of the pandemic.
The situation became so upsetting that Mrs Lindsay wrote to her MP in September saying that in the past six months “I’ve not been close up to him, just once when we went to see a specialist in St Helens”.
She added: “I am full of admiration for the care home staff who work tirelessly to ensure the safety and comfort of the residents, but I feel this restriction on access is unfair and unjust and detrimental to residents’ mental health.
“More should be being done to facilitate a more normal contact between husband and wife.”
Unfortunately Alex died before the situation could be resolved.
The funeral will be held on Friday December 18 at 2pm at Southport which Sue is hoping to broadcast on Zoom.
COVID LATEST
A message from Lord Drone:
Greetings, readers.
I wasn’t allowed to say anything until today, but it's now okay for me to share that I have volunteered for the Covid-19 vaccine trials that Imperial College are running in partnership with Oxford University.
It's important that we all do our part to beat this virus. The vaccine is the one that has been developed in Russia.
I received my first dose this morning 6:20 am, and I wanted to let you all know that it’s completely safe, with иo side effects whatsoeveя, and that I feelshκι я чувю себя немного стрно и я думю, что вытл осные уши. чувству себя немго страо
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
OH NO YOU HAVEN'T
Sir — The Daily Drone subbing team has no intention of being behind you and has, consequently decided to take the intitiative and ban all pantomime cliches this year.
Oh, yes we have.
LP BREVMIN
Chief Sub, Daily Drone
SMARTUS ARSEO
Sir — It was so good to see the Drone containing an item written entirely in Latin. Ligula ut feugiat rutrum indeed. I get it! Parva punctum unum. In the penultimate line it should read conubiam. You’ve used the future pluperfect when the simple ablative would suffice.
Other than that, well done!
MARCUS AGRIPPA SHANKSIMUS
Rome
FOGGING AWFUL
Sir — Why is it that all the twats who drive white or grey fog-coloured vehicles in fog never have their fucking lights on?
JESS ASKIN-SHANKS
Foggmore
North Yorkshire
FEELING A PRICK
Sir — Best of luck to the old biddy who was the first to get the vaccine but the lads in the Flying Fuck Back Bar WhatsApp group think that Lauren Goodger, of Towie, that weather girl on ITV or even our old night editor’s friend, Amanda Holden, would have been a better PR picture coup.
What do other readers think?
JESS SAYIN-SHANKS
Prickwillow,
Cambridgeshire
JUST A MINION
Sir — I was amused to read my former colleague Long Primer’s reminiscence about the irony-free News of the World.
I recall meeting one of their top reporters who recorded the ups and downs and ins and outs of all human life there. His name was Ron Mount.
PEARL NONPAREIL
(Miss Print 1972)
M60 4HB
CARVE UP
Sir — As we only do one edition on the Drone these days there is time for me to reflect on the reasons I became a journalist.
One was, surely, newspapers’ accidental but delicious lack of irony.
I recall the notorious Birmingham Body in the Suitcase outrage in the Sixties. The News of the World described in great detail how the killer had cut up a young woman’s body into small pieces, stuffed them in two suitcases and left them in a left luggage locker.
‘But,’ said the report, ‘she hadn’t been interfered with.’
LP BREVMIN
Chief Sub, Daily Drone
JOE’S STRUGGLE
The Daily Mail has a published great feature on the Drone’s favourite restaurant Joe Allen, haunt of the stars, media types … and the World’s Greatest Lunch Club.
The London fun spot is struggling on despite being closed since March because of Covid.
STEPHEN KAHN
Stephen Kahn, who retired as city editor of the Daily Express in 2009, died on 21 November aged 75.
Steve had been admitted to hospital on 13 November after a heart attack a week earlier. His daughter Charlotte was with him for the last few days and his son Daniel was able to video call from New York where he now lives.
Before joining the Express, Kahn spent three years at the Daily Mail as a stock market reporter.
He began his career on Industry Week, a magazine run by the Confederation of British Industry and also briefly worked on advertising trade title Campaign.
The kindest man on Fleet Street, by Ruth Sunderland
IVOR KEY
Ivor Key, former Daily Express staffer in New York and a great character has died at his home in Connecticut. He was 86.
Reporter John Edwards said: "George Gordon went to visit and found him dead in the living room. A shocking experience. Ivor had been wrestling serious illness for a few years.”
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
IN FOR A PONY
Sir — In view of the preponderance (nay, dominance) of various members of the Shanks clan on your esteemed website, I wonder whether they are by any chance related to the Scottish sanitaryware king of the same name, whose porcelain appliances for the efficient disposal of human waste have graced many a bathroom, pub lavvie and outside privy across the land for the past 150 years?
It might help to explain their faececious contributions.
LEWIS STOOLS
Thunder Manor
The Potteries
DEAD FUNNY
Sir — Loved the Frankie Howerd gag.
Here's another in the same vein (not one of Frankie's): Man tells his wife that he's seen a doctor who told him he had only eight hours to live. 'So get up them stairs,' he says. 'We're going to make wild, passionate love all through the night.'
'Oh no we're not,' she says. 'It's all right for you, but I've got to get up in the morning.'
G. UFFAW
Petts Wood
TASH LASHING
Sir — What is it with the Drone and Dick Wyngarde? John Clarke started it, someone called Manners arose from a Fenland slumber to contrive a picture do-up in which, pathetically, the only common denominator is moustache, then Aunt Marje weighed in (try fucking stopping her) with some cod psychobabble and an imposter from Baghdad gave his two dinars-worth.
Enough, already. I think trying to find the Wally of Walton-on-Thames is much more interesting.
NASSER HUSSAIN-SHANKS
Paarl, Cape Province
DIZZY SPELL
Sir — I am beginning to think this Dismore fellow is a bit of a cult.
I. M. POSTER
Baghdad
Close, but no cigar! — Ed.
LIGHT RELIEF
Sir — Are there any Drone readers called Leon interested in an illuminated sign, featuring their name, for a Christmas decoration?
Only my missus ordered one for me but the manufacturers cocked it up and got the name back to front. Doh!
NOEL NATIVITY-SHANKS,
Yuleville
Somerset
MOORE THAN ENOUGH
Sir — I don’t know whether you have been keeping up with the Suzanne Moore sex and identity row at the Guardian (no, me neither) but what struck me was that a letter to the editor complaining about the paper’s ‘transphobic content’ was signed by an astonishing 338 (yes, 338) of her colleagues.
That’s more than the Grauniad’s readership, isn’t it?
LP BREVMIN
Drone Media Commentator
TWICKERS IN A TWIST
Sir — As someone who played rugby in the era of the famous and fearsome Pontypool Front Row, aka the Viet Gwent (motto: we may go up; we may go down; we never go back), what am I to make of the fact that a member of the current Ireland pack is called Doris?
DAI SHANKS-LEWIS
Ex-Torfaen Third XV
SPREAD BETTING
Sir — Your readers will surely remember Humphrey Lyttelton's Samantha jokes on the wireless in I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue.
Michael Deacon joyously relates one in the Torygraph about the spreadability of her knees under her desk. (She was the show's supposed scorer.)
But to my mind Humph's best double entendre was this: 'Listeners may like to know that Samantha has got a new job at a gambling casino — where they play roulette all day and poker all night.'
M. ERRIMENT
Petts Wood
BULLY BEEF
Sir — The lockdown has taught me something: I miss workplace bullying.
I miss the workplace. I miss the bullying. In fact I’d be willing to go to the workplace to bully people.
As long as I didn’t have to work.
MAC E. SADE-SHANKS. Whipps Cross
MATE HANCOCK
One of my family, a formidable lady with — phrase de jour alert — underlying health problems, has received a letter from the country’s leading irritant, Matt Hancock. It runs to six pages, repeats ‘extremely vulnerable’ several times and, however well-meaning it might be, it is very patronising in its advice to ‘not go out but you can open a window'.
But that is not the cause of my relative’s contempt. It’s because Hancock comes over all matey and signs the letter simply Matt. As in ‘I’m a good ordinary bloke just like you, therefore you can trust me.’
The trouble is of course, she doesn’t trust him and nor does much of the country. He reminds us too much of the kid at the front of the class at school who couldn’t keep his hand down when the questions were being doled out. Even when he had no idea of the answer.
This great missive comes from both ‘Matt’ at the Department of Health and from Richard Desmond’s chum Robert Jenrick at Housing and Local Government. The trouble is, he signs off with both first and last names thus highlighting his colleague’s daft effort at faux friendliness.
Previous holders of this important office of state include Neville Chamberlain and Thatcherite Sir Keith Joseph.
Or Nev and Keef as Matt would have it…
ELVIRA MULDOON
C/O Spotted Horse,
Hackney
DEAR DEAR
Sir — I have suddenly developed an allergy allergy to nut nuts. Can you account for this this?
H. ADINUFF
Petts Wood
BETH’S FRIENDS
Sir — Should you be in doubt (I’m not and don’t keep asking — Ed) about the continuing flaws within the fucking BBC, Radio 4’s Broadcasting House invited the estimable Beth Rigby to comment on the Cummings imbroglio.
Eh? She is, of course, political editor of the rival broadcaster, Sky News. The serried ranks of Auntie’s staff hacks must think themselves accurs’d that they were abed when La Rigby was paid to do their job.
It’s like Paul Dacre asking Chris Buckland to nip over and write the Mail splash. Or, now we’re really in the realms of fantasy, the Express night editor editing The Sun at the same time.
LP BREVMIN
Drone Media Commentator
BILL HAWKER
Bill Hawker, a former Daily Express news sub, died on Saturday after suffering a heart attack at home. He was 64.
Bill joined The Sun as a news sub in August 1982 and returned to the paper in February 1995 after spells at The Age in Australia and the Daily Express back in London.
He was a huge sports fan and particularly enjoyed cricket, football and golf.
A Sun spokesman said Bill would be remembered as a popular and friendly colleague with an unrivalled work rate who made a huge contribution to the paper.
He leaves a wife Annie, son Christian and daughter Kira.
REMEMBERING LLOYD
As the Drone has become the website of record for the Express and Star titles, the editor is keen to redress the balance and include some of the papers’ great names who would otherwise be forgotten.
So let us not forget Lloyd Turner, former editor of the Daily Star and former backbench executive on the Daily Express, who died on 12 September 1996 aged just 57.
He was, after all, unforgettable.
Here is his obituary from The Times.
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
RUCKED OFF
Sir — I notice from an item in The Times that a goal has been scored in the Eton Wall Game on only three occasions, the last in 1909.
A bit like the fucking Wales rugby team just now then.
OWAIN GLYNDWR-SHANKS
Llanvihandgel-Cistern-Llewern
Wales
PRICK TEASER
Sir — Please allow me space to appeal to Drone readers for assistance in the preparation of an article I am writing on the Covid-19 vaccination programme.
I am particularly interested in first person accounts from our older readers on what it is like to feel a prick at an advanced age.
Awards Nominee ROSALIE RAMBLESHANKS (trainee)
Working From Home
West Byfleet
BLOODY HOPELESS
Sir — At this time of trial I volunteered to be a blood donor. Never again. Too many questions: Whose is it? Where did you get it? Why is it in a bucket? Bloody ridiculous.
DANNY DRACULA-SHANKS
Whitby
SWITCHED ON
Sir — Your reader enquires what he may have missed on the radio this weekend and I am disappointed that he did not hear the eloquent, silver-tongued tones of Mr Alan (Snooks) Frame, once of our Express parish, waxing lyrical, almost tuneful, about his new top-selling tome Toto & Coco. (Watch this Netflix space).
Talk Radio's Kevin O'Sullivan appeared mightily impressed, not just with the work of this new Fleet Street Hemingway but his refined speaking voice, we always thought would be a gift to radio.
But the most important aspect of the interview was not old Snooksy's posh accent, that often echoes loudly around the tables of Joe Allen's as the red wine flows, it was the discourse that revealed O'Sullivan reads The Drone. Who doesn't my Lord?
TERRY MANNERS
Dollis Hill via Tenerife and Essex.
SWITCHED OFF
Sir — I’ve been a little out of touch this weekend because of Covid. What have I missed? Anything on the radio?
C. LEW LESS-SHANKS
Great Bookham
FOR FAWKES SAKE
Sir — Dog owners are so selfish and irresponsible especially at this time of the year.
Last night, for example, I could hardly hear my fireworks for the sound of dogs barking. It’s too much.
CHARLES SPANIEL-SHANKS
Upminster (Past Barking)
SILLY SAUSAGE
Sir — My cousin in Germany says that Angela Merkel is urging people to stock up on sausages and cheese to combat the Coronavirus.
Apparently, it’s the Wurst Käse Scenario.
HEINRICH HOHENHEIM-SHANKS
Cheddar
ROWLEY OF HONOUR
Sir — Loving Patrick Rowley’s magnificent pix (and the background details).
What innocence to see Rick in front of a poster showing a well known TV personality and some children.
The luscious Sarah shrugging off an attack on the democratic foundations of our society with a brave laugh.
David ignoring the sharp scissors aimed at his nether regions.
Ross with a can of Diet Coke on his desk. I ask you!
By the way, I note that there are no pictures of him and Kate Hadley together. But then, they were never seen in the same room at the same time, were they?
ARCHIE VIST-SHANKS
Much-Delving-in-the-Marsh
Glos
RELATIVELY SPEAKING
Sir — Am I the only one to sympathise secretly with that great Man of the Past-It, Jeremy Corbyn?
Without labouring the subject, we all have family problems and as you know, he has had a big fall-out with his Auntie Semitism. With you on this one, J.C.
I’ve always had dark thoughts about my Auntie Depressant but I could always turn to my Auntie Histamine for help. Not to be sniffed at.
As for Auntie Macassar, head and shoulders above everyone else. Never liked Auntie Cyclone: made me sell my bike because she said it was dangerous.
My family favourite: clever old Auntie Dote. Scientist at Porton Down, she says she has discovered a Covid cure.
As my wise wife, Quarantine, intoned: it’s all relative.
(Sir) KKKEIR STAMMER
H-h-houses of
P-p-parliament
COLIN NORTHWAY
Colin Northway, who became the youngest features editor in Fleet Street when he joined the Daily Express, has died on his 78th birthday.
Northway began his career at Birmingham’s Sunday Mercury aged 18, later progressing on to the Daily Express in Manchester where he was made features editor.
Headhunted to London, he then became the youngest features editor in Fleet Street before moving to the south of France, where he lived with his wife Gillian for five years and wrote numerous spy thrillers.
Upon returning to England, Colin moved to Wolverhampton before becoming deputy editor of the Bridgnorth Journal in the mid-1980s, later becoming editor.
Colin's wife said: "He was a highly intelligent man and really was well liked by all his colleagues. He was very kind to his staff and loved working with them.
"He enjoyed an early retirement at 62."
Northway leaves two children, Daniel, 48, and Lisa 52, and six grandchildren, Elle, Harrison, Jude, Cameron, Joel and Sebastian.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
STEAMED UP
Sir — The Covid pandemic has forced me to wear a mask and glasses. Am I entitled to condensation?
MISS T. SHANKS
Foggy Bottom
Warwicks
WIND UP
Sir.-I’m not very good with computers and such and wonder if any of your readers could advise me.
I am told that if you sneeze and fart at the same time you take a screenshot of yourself. Can this be true?
MIKE R.O SOFT-SHANKS
Seattle
LOST ORDERS
Sir — I can't stand pubs these days because I can't stand in them. (Play on words. Geddit?)
B. ARFLY
Petts Wood.
Too clever for me — Ed
HOLY GHOST
Sir — I never know whether to believe my neighbour or not. Last week she told me Trump means fart in German. Yesterday she said Archbishop Welby (the Pontiff of Pontification) is the godson of Marcus Welby MD, star of the 1970s American TV soap.
I know she’s lying about this. Marcus Welby is a real person, whereas the archbishop isn’t.
VERA BONNILASS
Neuekasteel
RING OF TRUTH
Sir — I see that from Wednesday Royal Mail staff will be working from home because of Coronavirus restrictions. Apparently, they will be going through your post and will ring you if there’s anything important.
PENNY BLACK-SHANKS
Mount Pleasant
London
JOBSWORTHS AT WORK
Sir — I see that saying the Lord’s Prayer aloud has been added to Bereaved Mother Comforting in being banned at funeral services.
Lord help us.
Oops! I mean Lord help us.
JUSTINE WELBY-SHANKS (Mrs)
Lambeth Walk
Canterbury
TIME TRAVELLER
Sir — I went to bed as normal last night but when I woke up this morning it was 1984. Help!
WINSTON SMITH-SHANKS
Room 101
Matt Hancock Towers
East Cheam
BARKING
Sir — I’m so proud I just have to tell someone. My grandson is to star in a new dramatisation of Dylan Thomas’s Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog. What’s more he will play the lead!
AL SATIAN-SHANKS
Barking
STRICTLY DAFT
Sir — If you were in any doubt about the Alice in Wonderland madness of some of the Coronavirus restrictions (actually I wasn’t but please continue — Ed) then Weddings: Dancing takes the proverbial fucking biccie.
The bride and groom, who, presumably, are from separate households, are allowed to dance together but the couple’s parents who, in most cases, share the same bed, are not.
Is there one L or two in Bollocks?
LEONARD SHANKS-GOODMAN
The Tower
Blackpool
STAGGERING BACK
Sir — What a relief to see the Editor back, even in a shaky wheelchair, tapping out his pearls of prose again as the staff gathered to chorus his happy return with the age-old traditional song of the hard-pressed hack: "Besmirched, bawled at and bewildered am I...".
And what a revelation. Who knew there was a hospital for sinful Surrey residents who cottage? Was it repair of a much-diminished thatch or just a bit of repointing? I think we must be told. The truth shall set us free.
S. PECULATION
Stillying House
London EC4
It was a successful repair to an abdominal aortic aneurysm — Ed
CLOUD CUCKOO LAND
Sir — So … please allow me to add my sincere congratulations to the many you will have received following the nomination of the Drone’s trainee (!) Rosalie Rambleshanks for two prestigious journalism awards.
Ra ra, RR(t)!
S. MULDOON
Pressdram
Tavistock Sq
WC1
Thank you for your letter, Rosalie — Ed
NO TIME TO DIE
Sir — Did my eyes deceive me on the News yesterday or did someone film a cremation service in Milton Keynes ... and showed a jobsworth social-distancing a family from a weeping widow?
Surely a lucrative business opportunity: “Let us capture that lasting memory of your never-to-be-forgotten loved-one sliding away peacefully behind the closing curtain.
"Pic-A-Stiff can video for you those moving moments, Photoshopping away the floods of tears of the over-emotional, adding sobs to stoical mourners who showed they couldn’t care less, blended in with music of your choice.
"For an extra £100, more magical memories at the wake, with discreet mics picking up the Loved-him, Hated-him conversations.”
Heaven knows, it’s a great idea. Dead simple, too.
C. OFFIN
Gravesend,
Kent
UNDER THE INFLUENCE
Sir — Where would I be without my daily adroneline?
J. UNKIE
Petts Wood
SPITTING MAD
Sir — Former Labour leader Neil Kinnock, interviewed in The Times about the effect of being lampooned in the original Spitting Image series, says:
‘Our children were a bit brassed off by having to deal with post-Spitting Image Monday mornings at their local comprehensive school.’
Why do these twats have to keep making these pathetic points all their lives? ITWSBT.
RAB L. ROUSER-SHANKS
Tolpuddle,
Wilts
THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY
Sir — Thank you so much for your kind and useful tip pointing me towards a
CV-19 Merlot mask as a wine glass in emergencies while I was visiting Scunthorpe. Most useful, and as you say, a real life saver in times of stress and need.
I find it particularly helpful in easing the pain of being called everything from a Gammon Armpit and Fascist, Sausage-faced Arsehole and racist MSM Boomer Rat to an Express Toilet Roll, by today’s kindly and forward-thinking Left on Twitter.
Especially over my objections that they are busy with BLM activists, planning to rename Gladstone Park in Dollis Hill, London, where I grew up, as did my famous neighbour, Express model Twiggy.
I have fond memories of a more peaceful time running through the buttercups and playing war games like Germans v English and cowboys and Indians.
Gladstone of course, a popular Prime Minister, did everything he could to help the slaves and was instrumental in abolishing slavery. Ah! Not good enough it seems for activists who have discovered his father was a slave trader. End of reasoning.
Anyway, to my badly subbed point Lord Drone. The Merlot Mask was particularly helpful on my visit to my favourite old Fleet Street haunt recently during lockdown where I sat quietly alone, remembering the old days of laughter, packed bar and paranoia, pictured above.
T MANNERS
Dollis Hill
BURGERED
Sir — I have been on a driving holiday to North Wales and stopped at a village called Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwilliantysiliogogogoch.
We went for a coffee and I asked the waitress to slowly say where we were.
‘Burrh Gurrgh Kiing’, she replied.
Aren’t young people snippy these days?
OWAIN GLYNDWR-SHANKS
Splott
Cardiff
HERBERT KRETZMER
Former Daily Express and Daily Mail critic Herbert Kretzmer has died on October 14 aged 95.
Kretzmer found fame and untold fortune when he wrote the English libretto for Les Misérables in 1985. “I have never been able to explain what happened,” he said. “The overnight success of Les Mis has become a myth now, but it literally was overnight.”
He always referred to himself as a newspaperman first and a lyricist second.
Kretzmer was born in Kroonstad, South Africa, one of four sons of Lithuanian immigrants William and Tilly Kretzmer, who ran a furniture store. He entered journalism in 1946 as a writer of newsreel commentaries and documentary films for African Film Productions in Johannesburg.
He moved to London and joined the Daily Sketch in 1954 as a feature writer, moving to the Sunday Dispatch in 1959 and the Daily Express in 1962.
He was at the Express for 16 years as feature writer and theatre critic, sharing an office with the cartoonist Osbert Lancaster.
Kretzmer took over as theatre critic of the Daily Express from Bernard Levin, who had moved to the Daily Mail; the pair would file their respective overnight reviews and then meet for a midnight supper. In 1979 he too joined the Mail as television critic.
He was once recorded as saying: "Old songwriters don't die, they just
de-compose."
4.30AM LATEST
Still dark out
NICK NEWMAN’S WEEK
BUM STEER
What else can we tell you about Paul Dacre, the former Daily Mail editor that Boris has earmarked for the chairman's job at Ofcom?
Once in conference, Dacre interrupted a journalist who was talking about female fighter pilots going into Libya to ask, "What? Actually flying the planes? And shooting? Not just navigating? Or giving directions?"
The reporter informed him that, yes, the women would be flying fighter jets.
Dacre mulled this over for a second, before asking: "Won't their tits get in the way of the steering?”
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Sir — I sympathise with the Mr Dacre you mentioned who has trouble with the modern fad for reducing well known phrases to initials.
I am so fed up with the kids’ text shortcuts such as OMG, LOL and TTYL that I have compiled some of my own for people of a certain age.
ATD: at the doctors
BTW: bring the wheelchair
BYOT: bring your own teeth
FWIA: forgotten where I am
GGPBL: gotta go pacemaker battery low
TFT: texting from toilet
ROFLBCGU: rolling on floor laughing but can’t get up
IMHAO: is my hearing aid on
WMBP: where’s my bus pass
FAFT: farted and followed through
ALF ABETA-SHANKS
Capiata
Paraguay
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
YULE BE LUCKY
Sir — I’m worried that the latest Coronavirus restrictions will ruin Christmas. Do you think I could get away with slaughtering a 30lb turkey and inviting 30 people to the funeral?
GERTIE GOBBLE-SHANKS
Plucking Magna
Norfolk
PHIL YER BOOTS
Sir — I found a £20 note in Waitrose car park this morning. Unsure how to proceed, I asked myself: what would Jesus do?
So I turned it into wine (a couple of decent bottles of Les Dauphins Cote du Rhône Villages, actually).
PHIL ANTHROPIST-SHANKS
Much Giving
Lancs
JOY OF SIX
Sir — I really must protest. The Government’s new coronavirus restrictions mean that one of the seven dwarves has had to be excluded and I can tell you he isn’t Happy (although the others are).
S. WHITE-SHANKS
Enchanted Kingdom
Penge
ZOOM WITH NO VIEW
Sir —
Hurrah!
At last I've learned to Zoom
My maiden aunt in Ilfracombe.
However, much to our dismay
We find we've nothing much to say.
Do you think the time is ripe
To start again and try with Skype?
B. ROWSER
Petts Wood
HARDY ANNUAL
Sir — Isn’t social media wonderful? My local council has taken to a neighbourhood chatter group to ask residents what they would like to see to improve the shopping area.
Janice G responds: ‘Tom Hardy in a thong in the gardening section of Wilko’s.’
Atta girl!
SHIRLEY SHANKS-COMPOST
Much Mulching
Dorset
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Sir — I was appalled to see the ‘new’ byline picture of my favourite agony aunt and astrologer.
What have you done to our girl, our darling Rosalie?
You’re working her too hard what with her lookalikes, histories, art attacks as well as her regular column and doing additional research for past-it hacks such as Diver, Brevmin and that other reprobate, Proddie.
And while I’m on, why is she still a trainee?
I think we should be fucking told. Tout suite. Or I might have to send the boys round, the ones with the alsatians and excreta through the letter box.
JESS SAYIN-SHANKS
Intimidatory Manor
Lower Slaughter
The old pic, below, was of a fortune teller, the new illustration is of our agony aunt, pictured above, which better reflects her column — Ed
DACRE CAUGHT ON BOUNCE
It is no secret that former Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre is rather taken with the singer Beyoncé Knowles, whom he constantly mentioned in editorial meetings.
So scared were his staff of displeasing him that no-one dared correct his pronunciation of her name.
So staff had to remember to refer to her in the editor’s hearing as Bouncy.
Now ‘DeepMoat' reports: "Paul Dacre not being corrected on pronouncing Beyoncé is just the tip of the iceberg. He also pronounced 'caesarean' as 'Caesar Ian' for years and no one corrected him."
BRYAN COONEY
Celebrated sports writer Bryan Cooney has died on after a long and brave fight against cancer. He was 75.
He and his wife Margaret rejected a third blood transfusion in May because of the threat of coronavirus and Bryan passed away in a Glasgow hospice on Sunday, 13 September.
Bryan was a sports sub on the Daily Express in London before becoming Head of Sport at the Daily Mail until 2001 when he took early retirement.
Before this he worked for various Fleet Street newspapers, including a ten-year stint as Chief Sports Writer for the Daily Star.
After leaving the Mail, he wrote for the Sunday Herald and picked up three Sports Journalist of the Year awards.
In 2013 he was reported to be suffering from prostate cancer and a heart condition.
As a broadcaster, Bryan completed six interview series for BBC Radio Scotland, one of which took a bronze at the Sony Awards.
He also narrated an edition of Radio Four’s celebrated Archive Hour.
Bryan wrote three books: George Connelly, Celtic’s Lost Legend; Fingerprints of a Football Rascal, and most recently Gerry Rafferty: Renegade Heart, which is available currently on Amazon Kindle.
Friend and colleague Tony Boullemier said: "No-one could have fought such an aggressive and all-enveloping cancer with greater determination.
"RIP a top man, a great sports journalist and a wonderful writer."
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
DARK THOUGHTS
Sir — That Tim Davie seems a nice enough chap, doesn’t he? Full marks for the Beeb’s U-turn over the Proms singalong and I applaud his desire to see more black faces on TV.
I have written to suggest screening Crimewatch seven days a week but he hasn’t got back to me yet.
EDDIE COLSTON-SHANKS
Bristol
HORSES FOR COURSES
Sir — Love this morning’s tidings: head of the Jockey Club accused of racism. Racism? Isn’t that what jockeys are all about?
I wonder whether Della Bushell misread the job description and thought it was “racingism”.
Cue a load of such tired, overworked puns as pulled up, turfed out, odds against her.
NOTTINGHAM PIGGOTT,
Newmarket
LISTMANIA
Sir — What is it with ‘posh’ papers’ preoccupation with fucking lists? Not lists of fucking, you understand (although they might, at least, be worth reading) but lists about practically everything else.
You know: 25 best tea/fish/sandwich shops in the UK. Seaside restaurants, knocking shops, pubs where dogs are allowed, pubs where dogs aren’t allowed; pubs which couldn’t care less.
Take this Saturday’s Weekend section in The Times. In 48 pages we have to endure 20 Stunning Coastal Weekend Walks, Europe’s 30 Chicest (sic) Holiday Villas and seven (only seven?) Property Hotspots.
I know there’s a pandemic on but does no one in editorial speak to each other? ITWSBT.
LP BREVMIN,
Media Guru
MEET THE STRIFE
Sir — You journalism chappies have a lot to answer for. My wife has an incurable medical condition, factosis, which she suffers daily: she believes everything she reads in newspapers.
It’s all your fault. Night after night, she awakes screaming from recurring nightmares: racehorses leaping over her settee, Lewis Hamilton doing smoking wheelies on the patio and Marcus Rashford smashing the ball through the conservatory window.
Can you stop telling her about sport 'behind closed doors'? She says: 'What’s wrong with “without crowds”?'
Her other serious irritant ... she thought 'back-to-back' was a Victorian terraced house with the privy at the bottom of the garden. She pleads: 'Can we have that old word “consecutive” restored?' So annoying. Innit?
DIMITRIOS NEUROSIS,
Geek Street,
London
STOP IT
Sir — I see that the texters of Generation Z, or whatever they call themselves, have demonised the full stop because it allegedly signifies aggression. We must put a stop to this.
P. EDANT
Petts Wood
PS: I am using 48pt bold
full stops from now on.
TIPPED OFF
Sir — Impressed with your in-depth and out-of-depth coverage of the pandemic, I had a mind to send you an exclusive tip I received from a top social services director in charge of caring for child illegal immigrants coming in on the dinghy Armada from war-torn France, aged 16-19.
With it also came the information that the Government would pay £32 an hour for new staff to interview them for a certain council. I nearly applied myself.
Fears were that some asylum seekers might allegedly be telling porkies and they were really aged 25 plus and not children of 19 at all, who could, it was claimed, stay for years while their cases were probed. Good stuff.
You will also be thrilled to know I had in my possession a leaked report from on high to back the tale. But sadly, I am sorry to say that my old loyalty to my former newspaper the Daily Express tugged at my heart strings.
So, knowing of the paper's renewed vigour for investigation, I rang the Sunday/Daily newsdesk hotline for stories, published on the internet. To my horror it just kept ringing, until a recorded message told me no one was available.
Fair enough, busy day. I left it two hours and rang again. It nearly rang out and then I was prompted to leave a message. Which I did with a tempting outline.
No call ever came back. I must have rung completely the wrong number — the chairman's empty boardroom perhaps, or his cocktail cabinet.
So I took the story to the Telegraph, who responded immediately, followed the story up and thanked me in spades.
And they say staff cuts make newspapers more efficient eh?
SADDENED HACK,
Shattered Dreams Street,
Hackney.
FRANK’S NEW BOOK
FORMER Daily Express deputy sports editor Frank Malley has written a novel inspired by his work as a writer and an ambulance driver.
When the Mist Clears tells the tale of war correspondent Dan Armitage who enrols as a charity ambulance driver after suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.
Frank will donate his royalties to the Primrose Car Service, part of the Bedford Hospital Charity and Friends, for whom he works as a volunteer.
POCKET CARTOON
LOST IN TRANSLATION
IT IS FORBIDDEN TO ENTER A WOMAN, EVEN A FOREIGNER, IF DRESSED AS A MAN — Sign in a Bangkok temple.
LADIES ARE REQUESTED NOT TO HAVE CHILDREN IN THE BAR — Cocktail lounge in Norway.
SPECIALIST IN WOMEN AND OTHER DISEASES — Doctor's office, Rome.
DROP YOUR TROUSERS HERE FOR THE BEST RESULTS — Dry cleaners, Bangkok.
TAKE NOTICE: WHEN THIS SIGN IS UNDER WATER, THIS ROAD IS IMPASSABLE — On the main road to Mombasa, leaving Nairobi.
ARE YOU AN ADULT THAT CANNOT READ? IF SO, WE CAN HELP — College poster
PERSONS ARE PROHIBITED FROM PICKING FLOWERS, FROM ANY BUT THEIR OWN GRAVES — In a cemetery.
GUESTS ARE REQUESTED NOT TO SMOKE, OR DO OTHER DISGUSTING BEHAVIOURS, IN BED — Tokyo hotel's rules and regulations.
OUR WINES LEAVE YOU NOTHING TO HOPE FOR — Swiss restaurant menu.
SPECIAL COCKTAILS FOR THE LADIES WITH NUTS — In a Tokyo Bar.
THE FLATTENING OF UNDERWEAR WITH PLEASURE IS THE JOB OF THE CHAMBERMAID — Hotel, Yugoslavia.
YOU ARE INVITED TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THE CHAMBERMAID — Hotel, Japan.
YOU ARE WELCOME TO VISIT THE CEMETERY, WHERE FAMOUS RUSSIAN AND SOVIET COMPOSERS, ARTISTS, AND WRITERS ARE BURIED DAILY, EXCEPT THURSDAY — In the lobby of a Moscow hotel, across from a Russian Orthodox Monastery.
And finally …
IF THE FRONT IS CLOSED, PLEASE ENTER THROUGH MY BACKSIDE — Sign in an Abu Dhabi Souk shop window.
OLD JOKES HOME
Did you hear the one about Sean Connery’s brother’s newborn daughter? It’s a little niche.
*****
My cat’s caught Covid. Don’t ask meow.
OLD JOKES HOME
When I was in the pub I heard a couple of plonkers saying that they wouldn't feel safe on an aircraft if they knew the pilot was a woman. What a pair of sexists. I mean, it's not as if she'd have to reverse the bloody thing.
*****
Bought some 'rocket salad' yesterday but it went off before I could eat it.
*****
Just got back from my mate's funeral. He died after being hit on the head with a tennis ball.
It was a lovely service.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
NEW PERCH
Sir — Please allow me the space to be one of the first to congratulate Hugh Zapritti Boyden on his election to the presidency of the British Budgerigar Association.
Well deserved I’d say.
BENNY BIRDBATH-SHANKS
Cuttlefish Magna
Featherstone
RETRO-GRADES
Sir — I do hope that the
U-turn over the assessment of exam grades is retrospective.
I remember that mummy and the beaks were very disappointed with my
A-levels and I would welcome the opportunity to actually get any.
To whom should I apply, that nice Mr Williamson perhaps?
FREDDIE FLUNK-SHANKS
Marks Tey
Essex
HALF-BAKED
Sir — You know about these things so I hope you will be able to advise me.
I have pitched an idea to the BBC for a new version of one its most popular programmes.
After Masterchef, Masterchef — the Professionals and Celebrity Masterchef I have suggested Masterchef — the Migrants but I have received no reply from the Commissioning Department.
Do you think I should try Channel 4?
STEPHANIE SOUFFLÉ-SHANKS
Much Rising
Bakewell
Why not try the Engllsh Channel? — Ed
CLICHÉS OFF PAT
Sir — They say that this heatwave is likely to end for us down south in fierce storms with thunder and lightning — but not, I hope, with hailstones 'as big as golf balls'. Always golf balls. never walnuts or small potatoes.
Pat Welland, while subbing, hated this cliché almost as much as 'shark-infested waters' and would deal with it appropriately.
T. ABLOID
Petts Wood
TAGGED AND TRACED
Sir, Must share with you a heartwarming experience in our lockdown lives.
I and my wife, Quarantine, have a lousy son of 16, starting, and failing, in his chosen career as a criminal — convictions for burglary, assault, driving while ignorant, coughing in public, etc.
But when a Cambridge University scientist came calling, he was there to help. Our boy GayWayne agreed to have his electronic tag experimentally modified to detect Covid.
Brilliant! First day out, shopping mall, his ankle shouts, 'Covid alert, Covid alert' and within minutes, the boys in blue hoik this old geezer off his mobility scooter, stuff him in their van and within minutes he is banged up in the nearest hospital’s ICU.
Let’s clap for don’t carers!
B. & Q. FLOYD-PATERSON
Bognor Regis
West Sussex
GIVE US A CLICHE
Sir — Reading how one of the late Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged victims contemplated risking ‘shark-infested waters’ to escape his Caribbean island leads me to remember, with great affection, the former Express super sub Pat Welland.
During one of the newspaper’s regular, but ineffective, wars on cliches, Pat duly obliged by changing this well-worn phrase to ‘shark-inhabited waters’.
LP BREVMIN
Hackney
PEDAL POWERLESS
Sir — Regarding the Government cycling initiative to promote better health, I suffer from AMD (acute mileage deficiency), which has led me to depression and chronic lockdown obesity.
I have requested a prescription from my surgery for a Cannondale SuperSix Evo CD road bike, with an added doseage of Lycra and a £50 voucher for a tube of SBC (sore bum cream).
CHRIS BOREDMAN,
Bikerack,
Cornwall
ON YOUR MARX
Sir — The well-known philosopher Karl Marx is, rightly, a household name. But now I read that his sister, Onya, also has a claim to fame: she was instrumental in the development of the starting pistol.
I wonder what comment that would elicit from the distinguished actor Michael Caine were he to be informed.
FREDDIE STEADY-GOSHANKS
Shotton,
Wales
CAN’T BE MASKED
Sir — If you need proof of just how useless face masks are, think of how easily farts escape through your trousers.
F. LATULENCE
Petts Wood
FOR FUCHS SAKE...
Sir — As we get to that stage in the horticultural year, readers of a nervous disposition should be prepared for Back To The Fuchsia headlines to blossom as they do every year.
Oops! Too late: there was one in the Mail’s Weekend mag on Saturday.
L P BREVMIN
Cleeshay on Sea
TRAVELLERS’ TALES
Sir — Should you be in any doubt whether the BBC is a terminally woke, politically correct, up your bum, insufferable organisation in desperate need of top-to-toe reform (Actually, I’m not — Ed) I refer you to its ‘news’ reporting of the appalling case of PC Andrew Harper.
It said the guilty teenagers were from ‘a caravan site’; the tell-it-as-it-is ITN News more accurately referred to a ‘travellers’ site’.
LP BREVMIN
Drone Media Commentator
GIVE US A QUICHE
Sir — The distinguished actor Sir Ian McKellen tells of a conversation he had with a handsome young actor:
Sir Ian: What’s the difference between a quiche and a blowjob?
Handsome Young Actor: I don’t know.
Sir Ian: Good. Let’s go for a picnic then.
These mummers are such tarts, aren’t they?
LIONEL LORRRAINE-SHANKS
Cookham,
Berks
SIGNED OFF
Sir — Face masks? I'm also having to wear an eye-patch to blank out Nicola Sturgeon's signers on the TV news.
B. LINKERED
Petts Wood
JIMMY RIDDLE
Signor — I note that a female Australian anatomy lecturer has demanded that body parts named after men, such as Adam’s Apple, Achilles Tendon and Montgomery Glands, are changed because they are ‘misogynistic and irrelevant’.
I do hope that this does not mean that the old euphemism, Drone’s Drongo, will have to be zipped up and put away for good.
GABRIELE FALLOPIA-SHANKS
Grosso Cazzo
Italia
RIO BRANDE
Sir — There's an awful lot of coffid in Brazil.
A. NON
Petts Wood
CRYSTAL BALLS-UP 1
Sir —I’ve had a very frightening dream which has left me fearing what the future might bring.
I was at my work station trying to make up decipher what the runes were saying for my latest horoscope when a tall, dark, handsome (eh? — Ed)stranger in a green eye shield approached shaking his head and saying: ‘Rosalie, dear, this is going to hurt me more than it hurts you but…’
Then I woke up. Is my future behind me? Will I have to say tarot to all this?
ROSALIE RAMBLESHANKS
Spellsey
West Sussex
I think we should be told — Ed
CRYSTAL BALLS-UP 2
Sir — The Sunday Times has sacked Shelley Von Strunckel, it’s astrologer, for the past 28 years.
I recall that the late, great Bernard Shrimsley was asked to wield a similar axe on the Daily Mirror many years ago.
After he had delivered the dread news, the hack in question said: ‘Oh, Bernard, this is such a shock: it’s come completely out of the blue to me.’
To which he replied: ‘Ah, you see, dear lady, that’s part of the problem.’
SPIKE DIVER
Hook End
Essex
TASTE TEST
Sir — I think we should applaud the scientists who have discovered a reliable Coronavirus test based on the puzzling phenomenon of losing taste and smell.
You pour a tot of strong drink — whisky, brandy, rum etc — and if you can smell it that means you are partially free of the virus. If you can taste it, it means that almost certainly you’re in the clear.
I took this test five or six times last evening just to be sure. You may find that next day you’ve got a slight headache which is another of the symptoms. If so, you will need to keep testing.
TAM McTALISKER-SHANKS
Back Bar (socially distanced)
Flying Fuck
KEYED UP
Sir — I am so relieved all that clapping nonsense has come to an end. As my grand finale, grand gesture, I stood outside one of those kiosky shops in my high street and clapped and clapped like billyo, applauding our key workers.
This arsey guy from Timpsons told me to sod off and stop bothering him and chased me up the street.
There’s grateful!
CHARLES CHUBB,
Yale,
Somerset.
TURKISH LAUGH
Sir — I haven’t had my hair cut for four months and was really looking forward to visiting Mehmet the little chap who does for me in the street behind the Con Club.
Imagine my consternation, then, when he met me at the door and said: "Sorry, Mr Sean, we’re not cutting hair any longer.”
Seeing my face fall, he added: "We’re cutting it shorter instead."
Those Turkish scamps love a bit of banter, don’t they?
SEAN LOCKS-SHANKS
Crimping Magna
Hereford
LIVER LAUNDERING
Sir — I can see a large part of your organ is dedicated to the pleasures of drink.
Whilst I have gained great enjoyment from your organ during the dark days of lockdown, I think we all know that behind those net curtains many a household has meanwhile sunk into alcoholic depravity.
Put simply, excessive boozing is not a laughing matter, and this is why I ask you to run an article on a new organisation I shall be forming to address the problem.
I shall call the organisation Black Livers Matter.
Yours etc
WOODHOUSE
BASHING THE BISHOP
Sir — Mummy knows I love my Bishop’s Foreskin so I thought she’d be pleased when I rang her to say that since lockdown I‘m not drinking any more.
Yes,dear, she said, but are you drinking any less?
Parents!
SAMMY SHANKS-TOPER
Much Drooping
Wilts
NICK NEWMAN
HELP NEEDED
Stephen McGinty is writing a book about the rescue of Pisces III, the two-manned sub which was lost in the Atlantic in 1973.
He says Express photographer Harry Dempster managed to get onboard the rescue ship.
Stephen is trying to confirm that Harry stowed away on the rescue ship. He was definitely the only snapper on board.
He said: “There was another Daily Express reporter on the scene, on a fishing trawler called the Cisemair that the paper had hired. His name was Frank Thompson.
"Other Daily Express reporters that covered the story in Barrow in Furness were; Leslie Claire, Alan Baxter and Derek Hornby.
“The Express journalists in Cork were: William Hunter (who may or may not have been the great Scottish writer I worked with at the Glasgow Herald) Alan Bennett and Julian Desser."
Can you help? Email us on dailydrone@mail.com
KEEBLE MEMORIES
Alix Kirsta is writing a memoir which includes the life of former Sunday Express editor Harold Keeble.
She would be grateful if any Drone readers could help her with memories of Keeble who was editor from 1952 to 1954.
Contact Alix at akirsta@aol.com
WISLON’S NEW BOOK
IS A STEAL AT £4.99
NOT content with writing spreads for the Daily Mail, that human dynamo Christopher Wilson has another book out.
Written under his nom de plume T P Fielden, Stealing the Crown features love, sedition and murder in wartime Buckingham Palace.
Christopher told the Drone: ‘It is the first of a wartime trilogy starring Guy Harford, a not terribly competent spy.
'I've always been a bit of a beachcomber for lost and untold royal stories, and these books give me the opportunity to share some real gems — for example Queen Mary's love of the humble sausage which became so all-consuming she would buy them on the black market; as a result an RAF officer was court-martialled for his part in this shabby breach of wartime regulations.
'Oh, and writing to her German cousins when the conflict was at its height, again contrary to wartime regulations — technically treason and therefore a capital offence.
'There's lots more, and needless to say one of the key figures in the story is a rascally journo.'
The books are a picture of life behind Palace railings during the war and the first one is out on August 1; introductory price of £3.29 (Kindle) and £4.99 (paperback) from Amazon; in all good bookshops from August 10.
Stealing the Crown can be pre-ordered here
OLD JOKES HOME
Did you know the actor Yul Brynner was a lifelong Liverpool fan, and never wore aftershave?
Yul never wore cologne.
CRYER’S QUASIMODO GAG
Angelina Jolie, Tom Thumb and Quasimodo were having a drink.
Angelina Jolie said, 'They say I'm the most beautiful woman in the world.'
Tom Thumb said, 'They say I'm the smallest man in the world.'
And Quasimodo said, 'They say I'm the ugliest man in the world.'
Angelina says, 'Well, let's go to the Guinness Book of Records to confirm it.'
So they all go to the Guinness Book of Records office, one by one.
Angelia Jolie comes out, beaming, saying, 'They've confirmed it. I'm the most beautiful woman in the world.'
Tom Thumb comes out and says, 'Yup — I'm the smallest man in the world.'
Quasimodo comes out and says, 'Who's Alan Sugar?'
— Barry Cryer with The Oldie
POCKET CARTOON
CHURCH NOTICE
The Low Self-esteem Support Group will meet on Thursday at 7pm. Please use back door — Sunday Times.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
NO-GO PUBS
Dear Lord Drone — This from today's Torygraph. And so say all of us bar-proppers. What a cop-out! I can't see me getting back into the pub again until the distant future, let alone July 4.
B. ARFLY
Petts Wood
UNDER STARTER’S ORDERS
Sir — Don’t knock the new burgers! We’re using mini versions as hors d’oeuvres for starters.
RICHARD STEIN-SHANKS
Cafe Cheval
Braisingstoke
BRICKING HELL
Sir My six-year-old grandson is obviously going to be a builder. He was fascinated to watch the men building an extension at his home. They were very good and treated him like a mate, engaging in builder banter etc.
One even gave him a toy hard hat and on Friday they handed over a ‘pay packet’ with a fiver in it.
As he proudly showed it to his grandmother she asked if he intended to go to ‘work’ again on Monday.
‘Yes, granny,' he said, ‘as long as Jewsons turn up with the fucking bricks.’
I.K. BRUNEL-SHANKS
Little Guttering
Lancs
EQUESTRIAN TIME
To beef or not to beef. That is equestrian.
ANNIE SHANKS-HATHAWAY
Dulwich Hamlet
EATING ON THE HOOF
Sir — Those horse meat burgers are great on the barbie. Instead of rare, medium or well done it’s win, place or show.
JIM CRACK-SHANKS
Much Gaming,
Wilts
Is there much more of this horse shite? — Ed
SHANKS’S PONY
Sir — I wonder if any Drone reader has heard the suggestion that a major supermarket has been putting horse meat into its burgers.
I only ask because my wife was rushed to hospital after eating one. I am pleased to report that she is stable.
ARNOLD APPALOOSA-SHANKS
Reining Magna
West Riding
BITER BIT
Sir — I was interested to read of the suggestion that a major supermarket has been putting horse meat in its burgers.
I ate one last night and I’ve still got a bit between my teeth.
FREDDIE SHANKS-FETLOCK
Canterbury
CORONAVANISH
Sir — Does anyone know what became of Covids
1-to-18?
PUZZLED
Petts Wood
THE PEE'S KNEES
Sir — I was watching the football the other night when an amazing thing happened: all 22 players and the ref suddenly knelt down on the pitch.
For the life of me I can’t think what they were doing. My wife says they were taking the pee. At least, I think that’s what she said. Can any reader help?
GREVILLE GROVEL-SHANKS
Much Virtual Signalling
Suffolk
LAST LAUGH FOR VERA
Comedian Barry Cryer, commenting on the death of Vera Lynn: "Eric Morecambe inspired writing ideas for me and John Junkin.
"In one Morecambe and Wise show, starring Vera Lynn, Morecambe came up with the inspired thought that Lynn comes on the show and doesn’t want to sing.
"Ernie says: 'How can we get her to sing?' and Eric says: 'I don’t know, short of starting another war’."
OLD JOKES HOME
I got my wife a fridge for her birthday.
I can’t wait to see her face light up when she opens it.
ZACK’S NEW BOOK
Our chum Jon Zackon, of this parish, has finally extracted his digit and published his latest novel, Sealion Drowning as an
e-book on Amazon.
The book — Lord Drone describes it as an excellent read — is set in August 1940.
Churchill is shown a report that states that any German invasion will fail. He loves the idea. If true it could lead to his first victory over the Nazis.
It becomes apparent later that Hitler is also sceptical of his chances. So Churchill takes a massive gamble — to lure Hitler into invading.
It’s gripping stuff.
OLD JOKES HOME
The Egyptian government has ordered the city’s taxi drivers to drive around Cairo sounding their car horns.
It is hoped that the familiar sounds of the city will help the people to once again find tranquillity and normality during the Covid19 pandemic.
Operation Toot ‘n Calm ‘Em will take place all next week.
BURNING ISSUE
The French have decided not to pull down Joan of Arc’s statue. There’s too much at stake.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
BREXCID PERIL
Sir — Can't believe it! We now seem to be threatened with a second wave of Brexit, just when I thought coronavirus had finally killed it off.
L. EAVER
Petts Wood
SILLY OLD COUNTRYMAN
Sir — I have just received through the post one of those DroneMart-type catalogues which sell handy devices you didn’t know you needed.
The pages are full of things such as Robin Lookalike Birds’ Nests, Ultimate Mould-free Safety Bathmats, Pest Away Rodent and Insect Repellers and a neat gizmo called Easy Sock which enables you to slip on hosiery ‘without stretching or straining’.
However, I was mystified to find on Page 104 an ad for what is described as a rabbit which ‘loves wet and wild fun’ and has ‘flexible flicking ears’.
It doesn’t look much like a rabbit to me but I’m not a countryman. Anyone got any thoughts?
BRIAN SHANKS-WILSON
Surfing Magna
Cornwall
STITCH UP
Sir — Isn’t it marvellous that, with the easing of lockdown restrictions, the world of work is returning to normal? Although my nephew, a cosmetic surgeon, is still unable to reopen his operating theatre, his drive-through clinic is raising eyebrows as well as chins and doing tummy tucks.
S.TODD-SHANKS
Fleet St
EC4
SMOKE SCREEN
Sir — My grand daughter’s new boyfriend is a keen tennis player and I was chatting to him about different playing surfaces available now compared to my era.
When I asked if he preferred playing on grass or artificial turf, he said he didn’t know because he’d never smoked artificial turf.
Aren’t young people odd?
REGGIE HURLINGHAM-SHANKS
Much Grunting
Surrey
PACKED OFF
Sir — This is the first time in 25 years I haven’t been on holiday to the Maldives because of Coronavirus. The other 24 years I just couldn’t afford it.
TOMMY COOK-SHANKS
Little Packing
Warwicks
POCKET CARTOON
(VERY) OLD JOKES HOME
A German walks into a bar and asks for a Martini.
"Dry?"
"Nein, just one.”
*****
Donald Trump is coming out of the White House when a gunman runs towards him.
A Secret Service agent heads him off, yelling: "Mickey Mouse."
Later, the agent is congratulated by his boss. "Great job, man. But why did you shout Mickey Mouse?"
Embarrassed, the agent says: "I panicked. I meant to say Donald, duck."
BARRY CRYER’S FROG JOKE
A man walks into a pub with a toad and a frog.
The toad starts to play the piano — and the barman is astonished.
Then the frog starts to sing along, accompanied by the toad on the piano.
'That's amazing,' says the barman. 'I tell you what. I'll pay you £100 for the singing frog.'
'Forget it,' says the man. 'It isn't worth that much.'
'Why on earth did you turn down £100 for a singing frog?' says the barman. 'It's worth a lot more.'
'No, it isn't — the frog's useless,' says the man. 'The toad’s a ventriloquist.’
With The Oldie
NIGEL GRIFFITHS
o
Former Evening Standard backbencher and Daily Express sub-editor Nigel Griffiths has died aged 68 after a short illness.
Daily Express editor Gary Jones described Griffiths as “a delightful gentleman, a tremendous journalist, and such a warm and empathetic character”.
POCKET CARTOON
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
TEA TOTALLER
Sir — I was fascinated to read your nostalgic piece about the much-cherished Lopes Cup. As a misty-eyed observer of this phenomenon in the 80s from a Backbench point of view, I was always impressed with the contestants’ ability to dream up the most plausible mechanics of going and returning.
I remember with fondness our much-missed late sub-editor Brian Thistlethwaite who would make a stage-managed production of standing up with a metal tray in his hand and looking over the desks, waving his finger in the air and counting the thirsty souls he was about to fetch tea for. He might do this two or three times.
Once he knew he had been spotted by the Backbench, he would exit with the tray, and turn left out of the door and into the locker corridor bound for the canteen. A few seconds later there would be a clanking sound, not unlike the noise of a metal tray being put to rest on the top of a metal locker.
As much as an hour later, a serious-looking Brian would magically reappear in the doorway, a little red-faced, carrying a tray of as many as eight steaming hot teas and stage another production of walking around the desks giving them to people who already had one.
But perhaps the most obvious slope-bound contestant was the lovely but at times difficult former para (or SAS) late sub-editor Bill Montgomery who would stand up, open his top drawer (where he kept meticulous records of who gave him what story each evening to see how his career was progressing) and take out his packet of Benson & Hedges, which he would stuff in his pocket as he went off singing the only song he seemed to know: ‘I’ll Be Up Your Flue In A Minute Or Two’.
He might never return. If he did it would be with just one cup of tea. Wonderful days eh?
TM
From his Book of Shattered Dreams and Memories of Awful Chairmen
SCORE BLIMEY
Sir — Your chief sub, Mr Brevmin, is quite right in his observations on badly-structured headlines and the over-use of commas. May I draw to his attention an annoyance which appears daily in the Telegraph — headlines with underscores which strike though descenders, as here:
It’s really driving me crazy…
A. RIAL-BLACK
Petts Wood
SYDNEY HULLS
CELEBRATED Daily Express sports correspondent Sydney Hulls died after a short illness on May 21. He was 97.
Hulls was a big name on the Express in its heyday when it was selling four million copies a day. He was on the paper for 33 years.
Former Expressman David Miller has written an appreciation of his friend and colleague’s life for the Sports Journalists’ Association.
JUST FANCY THAT
We are obliged to the Chief Crossword Compiler of The Times for the following anagram:
STAY ALERT; CONTROL THE VIRUS; SAVE LIVES
This translates to:
EASILY SURVIVES TRAVEL NORTH TO CASTLE
BANANAS ...
In Panama, where the lockdown allows men and women out on alternate days, transgender people complained of not being allowed out on either day. — The Spectator
SUN MERGER
The Sun will merge its print and digital news teams from next week and create "content hubs" for key departments. A spokesperson said the title will analyse what readers engage with across all platforms and use "cross-platform teams" to produce content to match. — @pressgazette
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
WHINE BOTTLER
Sir — Lockdown has made it difficult to get people out to repair things so has anyone got an Owners Instruction Manual for Husbands (1948)?
There’s a persistent whining noise coming from mine and I’m determined to fix it.
PETRONELLA
SPANNER-SHANKS
Under Bonnet
Northants
PUNCH DRUNK
Sir — Disgraceful scenes at the seaside today and not just people flouting the social distancing rules.
Down by the pier a couple were having a blazing row in full view of some children. The man slapped the woman and it all kicked off.
Police were called and started hitting the bloke with their truncheons. He seized a truncheon and started hitting the police back.
Then, of all things, a crocodile appeared, grabbed a string of sausages and ran away shouting: “That’s the way to do it.”
What’s the world coming to?
POPPY PUPPET-SHANKS
Purbeck Towers
Swanage
(BACK)YARDS APART
Sir — In anticipation of the relaxation of the social distancing rules I am thinking of inviting my neighbours around for drinks in the garden.
As it is a journey of 10 yards and not 250 miles, do you think this will be all right?
BERNARD CASTLE-SHANKS
Much Measuring
Herts
YOU CLOD
Sir — I see that my local Poundland store is reopening after lockdown in June. It’s a while since I’ve shopped there: anyone know what the prices are like?
ERNEST EUCLID-SHANKS
Little Abacus
Dorset
NICELY THANK YOU
Sir — My dear husband and I are coping very well with Boris Johnson's lockdown. We take it in turn to be depressed.
W. OBEGONE (Mrs)
Petts Wood
SHANKS’S PHONEY
Sir — Thank you for returning my 6,000-word manuscript of a diary I have kept since March 11 which I submitted for consideration as a Daily Drone series headlined:
LOCKDOWN!
My ordeal as a prisoner of the pandemic
I value your feedback and now concede that the whole diary could be summed up as:
Got up. Read Mail+. Mowed lawn. Had lunch. Read. Ordered wine online. Caught No.10 Corona briefing. Had evening meal. Watched telly. Went to bed.
Maybe when I can spice it up with events such as Went to Waitrose. Drank draught beer. Re-introduced myself to family you will reconsider your decision.
SAM PEPYS-SHANKS
Boring Magna
Suffolk
PRICKED OFF
Sir — I was discussing with my wife the latest plans to introduce a Prick Test at airports to combat Corona virus.
I remarked that I’d be afraid I might fail such a test but she reassured me by stating confidently that I would pass every time.
At first I was pleased but now I’m not so sure. What do other readers think?
REGINALD BUFFOON-SHANKS
Covid Court
Much Testing
OMG LOL
Sir — We now have an alternative meaning for BC: Before Coronavirus. May I suggest another suitable acronym: STPC — Since The Pubs Closed. (As in “I don't seem to have spent any money, STPC.”)
Your readers can doubtless provide similar improving examples.
B. ARFLY
Petts Wood
BANGING ON
Sir — I have dreamed up a crackingly good wheeze I want to share with you to brighten the burden of our lockdowned lives.
On certain days, on certain nights, I ride my bicycle sedately through terraced streets of my local town and residents come out on the pavements in their droves, whistling, shouting and banging assorted utensils as I ride by.
I wave to them in a suitably regal manner in appreciation of their appreciation. I top off this enjoyable fantasy by believing, in our dreadfully illiterate world, that their banners, ”NHS” stand for Nick Hill, Syclist”.
What fun!
NICK HILL
MAJOR TOADY AHEAD
Sir — May I presume to offer my sincere congratulations on the professional way in which the Drone updated yesterday’s edition to pay tribute to Fleet Street legend Vic Giles who has sadly died.
A nimble, fast-acting example to us all in the traditions of Arthur Christiansen whose mantra was: “Babe, If you snooze, you lose.”
By the way, when you have a moment, please could we have that discussion on continuing my traineeship?
Yours respectfully,
ROSALIE RAMBLESHANKS (trainee)
No — Ed
POCKET CARTOON
CAROL SARLER
Carol Sarler, who wrote a popular Wednesday column for the Daily Express for several years, has died at the age of 70.
Her friend and colleague David Robson has written an appreciation of Carol’s life HERE
NEW JOKE!
The following excellent joke was dreamed up by a reader only the other day, so it is unique to the Drone.
Q: Why is the fatality rate so high among dairy-farm workers?
A: Because cow herds die many times before their death.
We admit that the actual joke may take a little while to sink in, but when you get it you will be mooing with laughter. Guaranteed.
If you need an explanation please contact the editor at the usual address.
JAMES MURRAY
James Murray, TV editor of the Daily Express from 1974 to 1986, has died aged 89.
He was deputy features editor from 1970 to 1974 and deputy editor of the Sunday Express in Manchester from 1969 to 1970.
James, who lived in Orpington, Kent, died in a care home but his death was not related to the Covid-19 virus.
THE ARCHETYPAL FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT
RICHARD’S NEW BOOK
Former Mirror and Times man RICHARD HOLLEDGE has a new book out.
Voices of The Mayflower tells the story of a handful of religious fanatics, brave souls, crooks and cowards who sailed from Europe to New England 400 years ago, some in pursuit of religious freedom but most adventurers in the quest for riches.
GRAHAM BALL
Lord Drone is saddened to announce that former Sunday Express literary editor Graham Ball died on Sunday, 4 May, in a London hospital after a fall at home. He was 69.
He is pictured here by Mirrorpix in 1984.
Graham had three children, Oscar, Thomas and Rebecca, with his wife Tessa Hilton and four grandchildren.
Association of Mirror Pensioners obit
POCKET CARTOON
OLD JOKES HOME
I asked my farmer friend how many sexual partners he's had. He started counting but fell asleep…
POCKET CARTOON
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
FLIES UNDONE
Sir — Being in lockdown reminds me of a game we used to play while waiting to deploy into fucking Helmand: Fly Flop.
Any one can use a fucking fly swat but the object of this game is to bring the little bastards down in flight by throwing a flIp flop. Mission accomplished, move in for the kill with the other fucker.
Double fucking tap, as we say in Special Forces.
ANT SHANKS-MIDDLETON
Much Beasting
Hereford
LOCKDOWN AND OUT
Sir — Jesus, what a story! Pretty Mrs Staats was certainly following the science.
A. GAPE
Petts Wood
HEAVENS ABOVE
Sir — If the churches ever reopen don’t for God's sake let the police catch you praying in them.
H. ELLFIRE
Petts Wood
HAIR RAISING
Sir — Last night on my lockdown recreational walk I encountered a young lady who asked if I was up for it because she’d do anything for £20.
I asked her if she could cut hair and she just laughed.
What is the matter with young people these days?
MAN ABOUT TOWN
SW1 (Name and address supplied)
PUDDING CLUB
Sir — It were reet gradely to see the writings by my old pals Ronnie Rawtenstall and Charlie Chorley stereotypers supreme on the old Express in Ancoats.
I remember when we were on early turn stripping down after night before going to Crown and Kettle for a pint of Thwaites’s and a handful of black pudding the landlord always had simmering in a pot behind the bar.
Happy memories.
LENNY LONGSIGHT
Dun Plating
Whalley Range
HANDY RELIEF
Sir — One of the worst things about the lockdown is that our Ukrainian treasure, Ludmilla, has been unable to clean for us as usual on a Tuesday. However, she has been ringing us every week to tell us what to do.
It’s such a relief, believe me.
LAVINIA RAMBLESHANKS-HOOVER
Much Dusting
Herts
SCHOOLBOY ERROR
Sir — I have just been analysing the words of wisdom of our Education Secretary, Gavin Williamson, spouting the latest Government non-action at the Podium of Doom.
But I had to pick up on his grammar when he pronounced: "Of course, I want nothing more than to see schools back, get them back to normal, make sure the children are sat around, learning, and experiencing the joy of being at school. But I can't give you a date.”
Should that be “the children are ‘sitting’ around", a common mistake, even among the plummy-voiced reporters of the BBC?
It is simply grammatically wrong. Innit?
P.E. DANT,
Much Learning
Gloucestershire
CROUCH GROUCH
Sir — When I went to my local Waitrose to get some much needed supplies the warden Johnnie on the door wiped down my trolley and advised me to stay a good Peter Crouch away from other shoppers.
What did this mean? Is a good Peter Crouch better than a bad Peter Crouch? For that matter, who is Peter Crouch?
I’m sorry, I haven’t a clue. And that’s my final answer, Chris.
Maj CHARLES INGRAM-SHANKS (Rtd)
Much Coughing
Pants
COCK UP
Sir — All this new stuff about coronavirus is rather old hat, a load of cock, in a way.
We boarding school oldies were taught to know that the real function of the penile corona ridge is to stop one's hand flying off and striking one in the forehead. Tell that to the young 'uns of today.
SIR ESS TROKE
Littlehampton
LOAD OF GARBAGE
Sir — I’m getting really fed-up with the lockdown. I had to leave the house to put out the rubbish again this week. It was my wife’s turn but she couldn’t make up her mind what to wear.
Stay safe!
DUSTIN THYME-SHANKS
Waste Byfleet
BARKING
Sir — I’m getting worried about the effect the Coronavirus lockdown is having on people living alone.
This morning I saw my neighbour talking to her cat Tiddles again. It was obvious that she actually believed the cat understood her.
When I went in and told the dog we both had a good laugh I can tell you.
Stay safe!
EVE SDROPP-SHANKS
Much Peeping
Herts
CROPPERS
Sir — Burglars T. Leaf and Nick Silver complain that the lockdown is putting them out of business. However, we should also spare a thought for the police. What is there for them to do these days, what with next to no traffic and fewer and fewer sunbathers?
I know! Train them all up now for crop-picking at harvest time when there will be a shortage of casual labour, so we are told. Future problem solved.
SPUD BASHER
Petts Wood
IT’S A LOCKOUT!
Sir — Fellow burglar, T. Leaf, complains that times are hard under lockdown because all his intended victims are staying home.
I don’t know, the crims of today! Moan when they’re locked up, moan when they’re locked down.
NICK SILVER
Faircop Lane
Orpington
BREAK-IN NEWS
Sir — A little-appreciated group suffering from this tedious lockdown are burglars.
They have reported to us the constant problem of heading to work at the dead of night, tooled up with jemmies, screwdrivers and lock-pickers, and found that their intended victims are in. All of them.
Two of our members were recently mugged and had their masks stolen. Anyone wishing to support this worthy, yet painless, cause can crowdfund them through the crisis.
T. LEAF
The Breakin Trust.
GIVE THEM THE CLAP
Sir — In these trying times we already have a Clap for Carers at 8pm on Thursdays. I wonder if Daily Drone readers would join me in a similar round of applause for our other undersung heroes, the couriers and delivery drivers.
It will take place on Tuesday some time between 8am and 8pm.
Stay safe!
W. VANMAN-SHANKS
Amazon Villas
Much Speeding
HALF CUT
Sir — I usually have my hair cut by Hassan down near the station. Excellent chap: even does my nose hairs.
Alas, the current restrictions mean he has had to close and I am resigned to letting my hair grow.
Soon I shall have to decide which style to adopt: pony tail, Billy Connolly, Rick Parfitt etc.
Then there’s the baffling range of hair accessories: bobbles, barretts, scrunchies, alice bands, and snap clips. There’s even something called silver rhinestone oval bobby pins.
Are any other Drone readers wrestling with this important dilemma?
P.J. SHANKS-PROBY
Manehead
Somerset
STILL BANGING ON
Sir — First Brexit. Now coronavirus. I do wonder what we'd all be banging on about if none of it had ever happened.
R.E. MAINER
Petts Wood
HEAVY DRINKING
Sir — Please allow me space to give my grateful thanks to members of the local Cub Scout group for delivering some much needed groceries in this time of trial.
I must admit I was concerned about them lifting those cases of wine but as Brown (or was it Tawny?) Owl said: “What the hell: someone’s got to do it.”
GERVASE BEAMISH
SHANKS-RAMBLE
Much Toping
Somerset
DIM BULBS
Sir — Doing my duty as a good neighbour in these testing times, I rang the old lady down the road to say I was going to the village shop and to ask if she wanted anything.
She replied: “No, thank you, I think I’ve got all I need. No, wait: if they’ve got any fennel bulbs I’ll have some.”
SAM ARITAN-SHANKS
Much Garnish
Wilts
WE’VE AD IT
Sir — Today’s 84-page Daily Mail contains eight full-page ads, one half page, one 25x4 and one 20x3. Er, that’s it.
Even a former downtable sub can see this is not sustainable. Help!
L.P. BREVMIN,
Dunslopin
Penshurst
CORONA MOANER
Sir — In the past few days as the Corona crisis deepened a young lady offered me her seat on the bus, a new neighbour, whom I’d never met, called to give me her phone number “in case I needed anything” and Deepak at the corner shop offered me a single toilet roll from his secret stock under the counter.
Sure, are they trying to tell me something?
SEAN SHANKS-RAMBLE, 76
Strabane
WIND UP
Dear Sir, I called out my hard-pressed doctor yesterday for a second opinion on a most irritating ingrowing toenail and whilst we reflected on the need not to abuse the overstretched emergency system, my dear quack observed that some of his patients who once coughed to muffle a fart now fart to muffle a cough. Funny old world!
SIRIS VIRUS
Ward 7,
Frimley Park Hospital.
SUMMED UP
Sir — It’s good to see that Coronavirus isn’t dampening the wit of our young people. I rang our 14-year-old granddaughter to commiserate on lockdown.
GD: I’m bored.
Me: You could try some schoolwork.
GD: I am.
Me: What’s six times seven then?
GD: I’m not doing maths today, grandad.
GRYFFD ap RAMBLESHANKS
Brecon
ON THE SHELF
Sir — I was outraged in my local Waitrose this morning to see a chappie pushing a trolley laden with lavvie rolls, hand gel, pasta and canned vegetables.
I called the bounder out. By gad I did.
Lookee here, I admonished him, it’s selfish fellers like you who are cranking up this Corona business and putting lives at risk.
That’s all very well, mate, he replied. I can’t stand around talking to you. I’ve got these shelves to refill.
SIR TUFTON RAMBLESHANKS, Bt
Little Deeping
Glos
NETTING WRINKLIES
Dear Lord Drone — I turn to you, a man of such considerable influence, to ask for a reference so that I may become an Old People Catcher.
I have had considerable experience when a Boy Scout of catching butterflies and beetles and am presently constructing a large net for the purpose of taking elderly malefactors off our streets.
I do this in the full knowledge that our police force, worthy to a man as they are, will be too hard pressed to cope with so many octogenarian and indeed, even nonagenarian transgressors arrogantly tramping the pavements with their pesky little Jack Russells in tow, mindless to the danger they pose during the war we are presently waging against a tiny but dreaded foe.
Yours faithfully,
CHARLIE YOUNGBOY
Gusset-on-the-Crutch
Wilts
TOW RAGS
Sir — Loo rolls, dearth of? Never bothered your ancient mariners!
I'm told that in the days of sail they crapped over the ship's side and just used old rag to do the necessary. This was attached to a length of rope which they then threw overboard for the rag to be towed and washed clean. Hence the derogatory term 'tow-rag'.
Do you think the process could be adapted for use on cruise liners?
B. OGROLL
Petts Wood
PETER PATSTON
Peter Patston, a former Mail On Sunday sub-editor, has died at the age of 69.
Patston, pictured with his daughter Madeleine, had been suffering from Parkinson’s disease.
After starting his journalism career in Rugby, Peter switched to the Western Daily Press.
He worked on London’s Evening Standard in Shoe Lane and then became a well-respected freelance across Fleet Street before returning to his native Bath to set up his own magazine company.
Peter was for many years a stalwart of the Mail On Sunday production team. He was also proud to be a founder of the Fleet Street Strollers cricket team.
He leaves a wife, Maggie, two other daughters Emily, and Amanda, and nine grandchildren.
OLD JOKES HOME
Thieves have made off with all the motorway signs in Yorkshire.
Police are currently looking for Leeds.
*****
Q: What's a foot long and slippery?
A: A slipper
BRIAN HOOD
Former Evening Standard production editor Brian Hood has died of coronavirus aged 67.
He had been admitted to hospital for cancer treatment where he caught the virus and “was gone in a matter of hours”, his wife Alison told the Evening Standard.
She paid tribute to him as an “amazing husband, wonderful father and loyal friend” following his death in Ashford, Kent, on Wednesday.
Brian spent 25 years at the Standard, working as a sub-editor and later as a production editor on the business pages before retiring in 2018.
He began his journalism career on the Clitheroe Advertiser and Blackpool Gazette and went on to work for the South China Morning Post in Hong Kong and the Wall Street journal, as well as freelancing.
“Brian was loved and respected by everyone who met him. I can’t think of a single person who would disagree with that statement,” said Alison.
TOP QUOTE
Subbing teaches you to get to the point. What you learn from reading lots of other people’s writing is: Don’t dick around. Every story has to have a beginning, a middle and an end — Best-selling writer and one-time Times sub-editor BILL BRYSON in this week’s Spectator.
MICHAEL BROWN
News has just reached the Drone of the death in March of former Daily Express reporter Michael Brown. No more details are available.
THE THINGS THEY SAY
Being an Expressman was not a religion, it was a cult. We were members of an exclusive club, first on the story, last to leave. It was never a job. It was a way of life. — Reporter John King who died in 2002 aged 79
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
GOLDEN BOY
Dear Alastair,
I have only recently been made aware of the Daily Drone (congratulations: it’s excellent, by the way) and I wonder if you’d find space to carry the fact that on Monday, March 16 It will be 50 years since I joined the Daily Express as a features sub in Manchester.
After all that time it is a great pleasure and privilege that I still see some of the friends I made on the World’s Greatest Newspaper back in the Seventies.
People often ask me (they don’t but it sounds important) what were the biggest stories of the past 50 years. Forget The Troubles, the Falklands (which we splashed on for 49 consecutive days), Iraq and Afghanistan.
Coronavirus is the awesomely largest story since the war. And we ain’t seen nothing yet.
Keep safe and WASH YOUR HANDS!
Namaste!
ROGER WILKINS
Well done Buffy! Thank goodness for a sensible letter for once — Ed (45 years and counting)
MEMORIES OF THE 1960S
FORMER Express news sub Jeremy Greenaway has some great memories of working on the paper in the 1960s.
Read his comments on our Subbing by Gaslight pic HERE
VIRAL GAG
Went into a chemist shop and asked an assistant: ‘What gets rid of coronavirus?’
She said: ‘Ammonia cleaner.’
I said: ‘I’m sorry, I thought you worked here.'
BARD AND WORSE
William Shakespeare is in the wings at The Globe, busily rewriting. Stage manager approaches…
'Bad tidings, Master Shakespeare. Another actor is sick o' the ague.'
Shakespeare: 'Alas and alack! Very well ... Call it, Two Gentlemen of Verona’.
*Bill Owen, for it is he, suggests: ‘Or Corona?'
JUST FANCY THAT
The late actress Dame June Whitfield was delighted and honoured when a rose was named after her.
But she was particularly tickled by the details of it in a rose catalogue which read: "June Whitfield is superb for bedding, but best up against a wall.”
FIRST WITH THE BOOZE
Has the mystery daytime drinker of the Daily Mail (the anonymous boozer who kept leaving empty cans of Amstel in the bogs at Northcliffe House last year) taken on a new job?
Early morning empties of Peroni have been spotted in the men’s lavatory by the bike storage at NewsUK.
JUST FANCY THAT
The second husband of country and western singer Patsy Cline (1932-63) was a Linotype operator called Charlie Dick.They wed in 1957 and had two children, Julie and, er, Randy.
Not many people know that.
Many thanks to Alex Collinson for this important nugget of information — Ed
NEW VIDEO PAGE
DroneTube videos dealing with the history of the Daily Express and Fleet Street in general have moved to their own page which can be found HERE.
NORMAN COX
Tributes to former Daily Express features executive Norman Cox, who has died aged 84, can be found HERE
FRONT PAGE EXTRA
In an attempt to make this Home Page a little smaller and less crowded, I have created Front Page Extra.
Gradually, as time permits, many stories will be removed from this page — but fear not, all of them have already been transferred to their new home.
As a bonus, the new page will give pictures a better display — Ed.
PICTURE INDEX
Search the Drone by thumbnail picture
SEARCH THE DRONE
OLD JOKES HOME
I swallowed a bottle of Tippex last night and woke up with a huge correction.
*****
I’ve just earned my PhD in palindromes. My name is Dr Awkward
JUST FANCY THAT
The word "Bojo" in Catalan means “crazy".
YOUR DAILY DRONE
The Daily Drone is the work of several contributors, most of whom are retired Daily and Sunday Express journalists.
WORLD’S GREATEST QUOTE
A journalist who has never worked for the Express is like a soldier who has never marched to the sound of gunfire — Brian Inglis
YOUR MIGHTY DRONE
The Daily Drone was conceived, published and financed by Alastair McIntyre, former chief sub-editor of the Daily Express, where he was widely known as Bingo.
For the purposes of this website, drones are people who sit around doing nothing, as in a bee colony. We have no connection with remote-controlled pilotless aircraft or missiles.
All contributions are welcome.
edailydrone@gmail.com
JOE ALLEN’S FOUNDER DIES
Richard Polo, founder of the Joe Allen restaurants in London and New York, has died aged 84.
His obituary in the Daily Telegraph contains some interesting detail about the Covent Garden restaurant.
OLD DRONE BACK ONLINE
Lord Drone has finally extracted his aristocratic finger and uploaded a previous archived version of his magnificent organ which ran from 2007 to 2012.
OLD JOKES HOME
I bought a new thesaurus today. It’s nothing to write house about.
OLD JOKES HOME
Comic Sans walks into a bar.
The bartender says: "Get out — we don't serve your type."
EXPRESSMAN RICK’S MEMOIR OF A LONG NEWSPAPER LIFE
Another book alert.
Rick McNeill, who spent 20 years in senior production roles on the Daily Express, has written an entertaining memoir, What Genius Wrote This? Tales From My Newspaper Life, which is available now on Kindle, Apple iBooks and Google Play.
Lord Drone has graciously permitted a review of this excellent tome to appear in these pages.
The book is now available in paperback for £12.99 or on Kindle for £4.99. Buy it HERE
JUST LIKE THAT
My New Year resolution was to go on the Whisky Diet: I’ve lost three days already — Tommy Cooper
CURRY AND QUIPS
Read Ashley Walton’s lunchtime tale about the day Eric Morecambe invited him out for a curry:
DEMPSTER REMEMBERED
Former William Hickey diarist John McEntee has written an entertaining account of his friend and fellow gossip Nigel Dempster in The Spectator.
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY
Here I sit alone at sixty
Bald and fat and full of sin
Cold the seat and loud the cistern
As I read the Harpic tin
– Alan Bennett parodying John Betjeman
DREADED MCMUMBLE STRIKES ONCE AGAIN
Former Daily Express sub IAN BAIN recalls an unexpected meeting with former deputy editor John McDonald in Dubai.
WAITING FOR LUNCH
The Daily Mail’s JOHN McENTEE has recorded an exchange which bears more than a resemblance to Waiting For Godot – but is definitely funnier.
The absurd drama was played out between McEntee, Peter McKay, Geoffrey Levy (a bit-part player who lends his name to a fictitious wine range), and the actor Nigel Havers.
MEMORY LANE
Former Daily Express features sub NICK HILL has been delving into his personal archive. Find out what he discovered HERE
IS PRINT DEAD?
We on the Drone don’t think so and Michael Rosenwald of the Washington Post agrees. Read his interesting article here
AGATHA’S CUTTING
ASHLEY WALTON travels to deepest Devon and makes an unexpected find in the bedroom of Agatha Christie’s summer retreat.
PETER CANEY, LOST SOUL OF THE DAILY EXPRESS
TERRY MANNERS pays tribute to Peter Caney who suffered a tragically early death after leaving the Daily Express backbench to follow his dreams in Spain.
REMEMBERING MCMUMBLE
RICK McNEILL has shared a great anecdote about the late John McDonald, former deputy editor of the Daily Express.
Read it here, only on the Drone
OLD DRONE STORIES
YOU HAVE HAVE MISSED
The Daily Drone has grown into a huge website over the years and indexing has been a nightmare. Here are few stories from the old version of the Drone which deserve a wider audience.
JOBS FOR THE BOYS
Interviews for jobs on the Express could be somewhat perfunctory in the 1970s as ROGER WATKINS found out after a long drive North.
*****
ALAN FRAME discovered that everything comes to he who waits … for the editor to return from lunch
*****
BILL WHEELER tells how he doubled his money in Glasgow and then had to quit
*****
How ALASTAIR McINTYRE nearly turned down a job but stayed for 32 years
*****
CLARE DOVER remembers a bizarre interview with editor Roy Wright
FRENCH WITH TEARS
OF LAUGHTER
JON ZACKON recalls his first job in Fleet Street on the Daily Sketch and its charismatic editor Howard French.
PUBS AND PAY-OFFS
DOWNWARD SLOPE OF THE DAILY EXPRESS
Hard-pressed chief sub Jon Zackon recalls the anarchic heyday of Bingo and Bertie and their race for the custodianship of the Lopes Cup (anag).
WORLD'S GREATEST
A journalist who has never worked for the Express is like a soldier who has never marched to the sound of gunfire – Brian Inglis
FULL LIST OF EDITORS
Here at the Drone we slaved for 12 Daily Express editors. How many did you work for?
THE FRONT PAGE SUBS
From UK Press Gazette 26th September 1983
