Is everyone here for the editorial meeting? Ok, good. Heavy news week this week, so only the best stories are going to get space. We'll start with Cheddar Headlines. Ten words max, and the headline can be self-explanatory as in 'The Independent', or horrendously convoluted, as in, erm, The Cheesy Headline Game. Once the headline is finished, I'd like a few words containing the story in a news style, please. Subs, clear your desks, and let's get the presses rolling. Spike it once we reach the usual back page move.
Pope Benedict XVI today was seen in public wearing, for the first time, the footwear presented to him by Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende. He carried with him, the sacred shoehorn which was a gift to the pontiff by Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, Archbishop of Westminster. "There is nothing more British than a shoehorn," said the Pope, "and I look forward to utilising it on these splendid wooden shoes." The shoes are decorated with images of windmills and mice and are said to have the power to heal tulips.
The Town Council in Imsold-on-Avon today recommended that the planned demolition of the old Victorian bandstand in Humdrum Park would not be necessary. While rusted, the bandstand can simply be painted to restore it to its former chartreuse glory, Mayor Norbert Browning-Green successfully argued. However the Council also passed an ordinance banning the local band O2 from performing at the bandstand, or anywhere else within city limits. The band, a very poor imitation of U2, has performed in the past at the bandstand and has cost the local municipality dearly for the cleanup of rotten tomatoes and eggs flung at the band from the audience. This, no doubt, also contributed to the premature rusting of the town's most famous edifice. The band O2 is best known for its song "Oh, Zoned Out" is planning to move to the nearby hamlet of Defleppard and change its name to O3.
The Langfield Arts Center is launching its new season of experimental comedies with "Botswana Brothel Brouhaha," by Mike Jeffreys, a knockabout farce set in an African bawdyhouse. All seems well among the prostitutes and their clients, until the madame's fiancé, who believes the building to be a high-class hotel, reveals himself to be a member of the vice squad! Will the ladies of dubious virtue win him over before he discovers the real reason why all the businessmen attending the International Drainage Conference are naked from the waist down? It promises to be riotous fun for all the family, and tickets start at just £5.00. Starring Hugh French as the fiancé (best known as the nervous postman from TV's "Dodgy Doggy Nips"™ dogfood advert), "Botswana Brothel Brouhaha" opens for a one-week run starting on June 15th.