1. The Origins Of Halloween
Long, long ago in a land frighteningly close to home the place was overrun with Celtic people. It should be noted that this is not a reference to marauding Scottish football supporters, but rather the tribes those same fans descended from many years ago.
The Celts set up home in what is now France and the British Isles. In the 5th Century BC there was a distinct lack of town planning, and a piece of grass could be bought for a reasonable sum, and quickly sold on when someone’s cow did something nasty in the middle of it.
As you can imagine, Saturday nights were a pretty boring affair and entertainment was sparse. One man, Jago Lucas, did suggest that everyone should look at the night sky and watch Orion and The Plough having a fight. Everyone laughed. Not downhearted, Jago passed the theory on to his children in the hope that in a long long time in a place far far away someone would want to see star wars.
One of the most popular ways of passing the nights was by having as many festivals and celebrations their supplies of Paracetamol would allow. There were Fire Festivals, Religious Festivals, Seasonal Festivals. Festivals of the Dead, Festivals of the Nearly Dead and Festivals of the Soon To Be Dead Once The King Signs The Death Warrant. And then they created the Festival of Samhain.
Samhain was believed to be the Lord of the Dead, and had the unfortunate affliction of having a burning pumpkin for a head. The Celts did ponder starting the charity Give Head for Hain, as it wasn’t nice when everyone kept asking when the delicious smelling pumpkin was going to be served. The constant urine extraction and the occasional poke of a searching fork did not give Samhain much to smile about, and on October the 31st he unleashed the spirits of the dead upon the world.
The Celts were of course ecstatic at the prospect of having their souls devoured by hungry ghosts and thought the best way to show their delight was to have another festival. They created huge bonfires made of sacred oak (and many sacred words were used when one of the crowd realised it was their wardrobe), and their Druids performed fire rites in Samhain’s honour. A thank you card would have been simpler.
Not wanting to waste a good fire, the Celts took the opportunity to make sacrifices to the gods. As any respectable community would, they did this by burning criminals and prisoners alive. Even in those days Neighbourhood Watch was clearly well established.
As part of the festival, one of the Druids suggested that they should dress up in dark and mysterious clothes for the occasion. A colleague pointed out they always dressed that way which led to a long silence while the Druids contemplated what this said about their street cred. Eventually it was decided that they should instead disguise themselves as demons to blend in with the thousands of spirits looking for a good time, and hence have more chance of leaving with someone at the end of the night. Waking up next to a druid the next morning was quite a shock for many demons.
Trick or Treat
Trick or Treat does not have the same origins as Halloween. Instead it is thought to come from the 19th Century past time of souling. This took place on November 2nd, but did not involve exorcising the demons that had found their perfect match through Match.com.
Christians would walk from village to village begging for cakes from the residents, similar in many ways to the WI. These cakes would be made from bread and currants, a mouth-watering prospect if ever there was one. For every cake received they would promise to make a prayer for the soul of the baker’s deceased relatives to allow them passage to heaven, where no doubt St Peter would be waiting to greet them…hopefully with a glass of water so they could get rid of the dry bread and currants that had stuck in their throat and choked them to death.
Jack-o-Lanterns
Another tradition of the season is the Jack-o-lantern, an addition from the Irish and relating to a story of someone called Jack. Imagine that.
The story goes that Jack, who believing in the true Irish tradition, was a drunk and a joker. One day Satan just happened to be strolling along a little back road in the country and came across Jack slumped up against a tree, affectionately cuddling a bottle of Guinness. After a short spell of banter during which the Devil tried to coax Jack into carrying out some wicked tasks that involved young Irish maids, haystacks and warm custard, Jack talked Satan into reliving his childhood and climb a large oak tree. Being the dignified and respectable demon he was, Satan obviously thought that as no-one was around it wouldn’t hurt.
However once Satan was up in the tree, Jack took out a knife and, after drunkenly lopping off his little finger, carved a cross into the tree trunk so Satan could not come down. This chuffed Satan no end. He had always wanted to be an environmental protester and wondered if this could be a sign that he should consider a career change. Common Sense then dropped from one of the branches and smacked him in the face with a dead squirrel. The Devil came to his senses and demanded for Jack to let him down.
Jack agreed to do this as long as Satan promised to not to tempt him into doing wicked deeds with Irish maids…he was a big boy and quite capable of doing that on his own. The Devil agreed to this, and in his infinite Irish wisdom, Jack let the angry demon down. No amount of drinking can excuse being that dim.
The tale then goes that when Jack died, presumably as soon as Satan’s hooves hit solid ground, he was denied access to heaven for fraternising with the enemy, and probably because he hadn’t accumulated the correct amount of bread and currant cakes, but he was also denied a place in Hell for tricking the Satan. Instead the Devil gave him a burning ember inside a turnip, grown in his own prize winning garden, to light his way through eternity.
Obviously in modern days, Pumpkins are the preferred object for a Jack-o-lantern as they are easier to cut and smell better when the candle inside gets too hot.
2. The Story Of Guy Fawkes
This month’s tale takes us into the creaking leaking cellars of The Houses of Parliament; an exclusive asylum for people suffering a condition that makes them sound like sheep.
Yes, we are retracing the smoky steps of a guy called Fawkes, whose lesser known cousins, Nives and Spunes, sadly never tread and so are confined to life as a quick one liner.
It is well known that Guy Fawkes was discovered in the cellar of the Houses of Parliament with 1800 pounds of gunpowder. It is not so well known that on hearing the door creak open and seeing the first guard enter the cellar his first comment was “Bugger.”; followed quickly by “There is a perfectly innocent explanation for this!”
The innocent explanation began innocently, as such reasons usually do, when a group of English Roman Catholic conspirators decided that the only way to change the way the country was run was to do the sensible thing and kill everyone involved in running it – despite recent rumours Tony Blair was not related to them.
One person they wanted dead more than any other wasKing James I, who displayed schizophrenic tendencies by also being James VI of Scotland, as well as his ministers, maids, mistresses and monkey. The plot itself was quite simple as far as criminal plots go: to blow up as much as possible in one go.
The man who came up with the plot was called Robert Catesby, a mastermind so great his name is generally overlooked in favour of the man who was simply there to make heap big bang. Guy Fawkes was put in charge of executing the plot due to his explosives experience – he had been a consultant to Crazy Harry on The Muppet Show, Personal Assistant to Wyle E Coyote, and was in talks to make a TV car show, “Go Out With A Bang-er.”
The first problem the plot encountered was just how to get 1800 pounds of explosives under the Houses of Parliament. It wasn’t the type of thing you could just knock on the door and ask.
One of the group, Wee Jimmy McThickhead, suggested they should tunnel into the cellar from a mile away, this way avoiding being spotted by anyone other than a stray sheep. The other members pondered this for the following second then promptly told Jimmy that he could be solely in charge of digging the tunnel. They blindfolded him, put a shovel in his hand, spun him around twice and set him to work. Blissfully unaware that he was being set up as the punch line of this story, and feeling a little disorientated in himself, Wee Jimmy began to dig towards the River Thames.
Meanwhile the rest of group made enquiries about renting one of the cellars under Parliament, and were able to find one available. Fortunately the person who had been renting the last cellar had mysteriously vanished the day before, leaving behind all his possessions, a hole, a cloud of smoke and a burning smell. Having access to the cellars made it much easier to come and go without anyone being suspicious – even carrying kegs of gunpowder apparently. Within a few months of much coming and going, the cellar was full to exploding. Literally.
Somewhere in the midst of this, the group decided that after the destruction of Parliament they would abduct Princess Elizabeth. Sort of an anticlimax all things considered, but it was later discovered that the suggestion had been found in Wee Jimmy McThickhead’s handwriting, who by this time was miles away from Parliament but edging ever closer to the Thames.
The downfall of the plot came when some of the group became concerned that some fellow Catholics would be present in Parliament when the explosion took place. The thought of killing one Catholic among hundreds of other non-Catholics was too much for one conspirator to take, so he sent a letter of warning to the House. The group found out about the letter the following day, but decided to go ahead with the plot regardless.
Early on the morning of November 5th, the Secretary of State ordered a search of the cellars under Parliament, and Guy Fawkes was discovered with hundreds of barrels including one that was heard to say “I didn’t mean to write the letter!” just before it was rolled away with the others. Guy Fawkes was arrested and taken away to be tortured by order of the King.
The guards tortured Fawkes in the worst way possible…they locked him in a room with a continuous loop of Songs of Praise playing on a TV. He cracked immediately and gave the names of the people who had set up the plot.
On the 31st of January, Guy Fawkes and his group were taken to the gallows to be hanged.
And there our tale would end, if it were not for the chit-chit, chit-chit sound coming from somewhere beneath the ground by the bank of the River Thames. Patience forces us to wait a little longer, until finally it happens.
From the end of a long, long, long-long-long tunnel, we are just able to hear the words “I’m in!” before they are lost under a sound usually heard when standing under Niagara Falls.
After a few minutes Wee Jimmy McThickhead is fired from his tunnel on the back of a gusher of river water, only to land half a mile away on the exact spot Fawkes’s gunpowder is being disposed of by a robot with a match. Some people really do have no luck.
3. The History of Up Helly Aa
Come fly with me. Come fly, let’s fly away…until we are shot down for trespassing in government airspace. With a bit of luck, a strong wind and a bed sheet it might be possible to get to the destination of this Tale from The Backside. Set in a place where barbarians roam the streets and wild animals live in homes – although they are called residents – this month we float up past the border, over the Scottish Highlands, by Balmoral – where we are mistaken for pheasants and shot at by Prince Phillip – and across the sea to the small island of Shetland.
There are many stories of Shetland, only known and told by people from Shetland, those who have relatives in Shetland or those who are being held in padded cells for their own safety. But Shetland is not a myth. It does exist. This has been proven by many boats crashing and sinking there during calm weather – calm weather being winds of only 70 mph.
Despite all these wondrous stories, passed down from generation to generation through much alcohol, there is only one that we have time, and space, for here.
Picture the scene if you will. Sirens are screaming and fires are howling down in the valley tonight. There’s a man in the shadows with a helmet on his head and an axe shining oh so bright. There’s ash in the air and thunder in the sky, and there’s Vikings on the dirt track streets. Pretty much like a Saturday night in any major town and city.
This is Lerwick, a small town in Shetland, where every year the townsfolk take part in the annual fire festival called Up-Helly-Aa. Although some believe the name to have been derived from a drunken Scot trying to swear, we are sure there is another explanation for the name – we just don’t know what it is.
The occasion is Britain’s biggest fire festival and torchlight procession and takes place on the last Tuesday of January. Dressed as Vikings, hundreds of people flock to Lerwick to walk through the town by the light of flaming torches to the burning site where the fire is made. Imagine the angry mob on their way to hunt down Frankenstein, only dressed as Vikings instead of peasants, and you have the general idea.
Through the streets a Viking longboat, crafted of wood, is carried to the burning site. What do they take a wooden ship to a burning site for, we hear you cry. Think about it folks and see if you get there before us.
Too late we’re there. The ceremony ends at the burning site as the longboat is set alight by eight hundred burning torches. It seems a little extreme to use so many, but it keeps the pyromaniacs happy and saves them torching cars instead.
The night then turns into one of revelry as groups of hard-drinking party-goers visit the 11 local halls to entertain local people with amusing sketches. One person is always guaranteed to draw something rude just for the sake of it. The others carry out sketches that involve no acting skills whatsoever, which is a blessing as very few have any. It can be like watching an ITV sitcom – so good it has you crying tears of sadness for the dearly departed sitcoms of the past.
The Up-Helly-Aa celebrations have taken place in Shetland since the 1800s, and some of the alcohol used today has been fermenting since then. One glass and you forget the rest of the month. One bottle and you forget the rest of your life, stagger to the nearest coffin and quietly climb inside – drunkenly jamming your fingers as you shut the lid.
Many different traditions have been used as part of the festival since its creation, including tar barrels being rolled through the main street – occasionally ending with two tar-barrelers clashing in the middle of the street. It’s so hard to get tar out of cotton too.
In the late 1800s, the name Up-Helly-Aa was created, by that drunken Scot with a love of unintelligible profanity, the new element of disguising yourself was introduced and they instigated the first torchlight procession after hearing there was a witch in the village – killing two birds with one procession.
Up until World War II the festival was mainly attended by young working class men. Afterwards, following a helpful hand by a BBC radio programme – although what could actually be understood across radio waves is questionable - the numbers participating in the festival began to grow until arms and legs were hanging out over the town borders as there wasn’t enough room for everyone inside.
There have been few changes to the festival since that time, other than more and more people attending, more alcohol being consumed, more torches being carried and more hangovers and sick days on the last Wednesday in January.
4. The Story of Jesse James
Let’s take a walk down the street – not your average street. This one is covered in sand, stones and the occasional steaming pile signaling a horse is nearby. The sun checks its Rolex to make sure it is indeed high noon and a stage coach has just run over my foot.
This is the West where the Witch does not reside and they do not store bodies in their back gardens – they decorate saloons with them. The Wild West, so called for the number of residents with Wild as a prefix to their name – a similar thing happened more recently in Nobbington.
So what are we doing here in the Wild West other than waiting to be shot for standing between two duelists – oh it’s ok, they’re dueling banjos so we won’t get hurt in the cross fingering. Well the reason we’re here is that in March 1882, the outlaw Jesse James was shot and died – as people tend to do when they are shot. Join us now on a brief history of Jesse, who was no relation to Sid James or Sharon James but did have a brother called Frank. You know where you are with Frank – I always talk to Frank.
Jesse James was born in ClayCounty– located between BrickCityand PlastercineLake– in 1847. Legend has it that Jesse was born with a pistol in his hand and the first thing he did was pinch the doctor’s watch, the nurse’s bum and the rattles of the other babies on the ward.
After his sixteenth birthday, when Jesse was tied to a saloon doorpost wearing only his designer rabbit-skin underwear, he joined his brother Frank in Quantrill’s Raiders. Although they sounded like a hybrid of a local American Football team and a Heavy Metal Rock group, this was actually a guerrilla group that terrorized a number of farms and families during the Civil War. In their spare time they liked to knit winter-wear for when the weather turned cold – this is an unconfirmed fact based on the number of sheep stolen by the gang.
Jesse’s first recorded armed robbery, recorded by a sketch artist who drew a story board used many years later by Hollywoodas they hate to be inaccurate in their movies, happened in 1866 at the Clay County Savings Association. As you can imagine, the amount of money held in the Association was not enough to buy two rounds in the Wetherspoon’s Saloon on Main Street, so the gang did a number of other robberies in the area over the following years.
In 1869, Jesse finally hit the big time by making front page news in a paper read by at least sixty-eight people. The big time just doesn’t get any bigger. The reason for Jesse’s rise to fame came from a robbery on a savings bank in Gallatinduring which Jesse accidentally shot dead the cashier. He had been trying to shoot him live but failed by pointing the gun at him rather than near him. A valuable lesson was learned that day and was passed down through the years in the form of the question, “Who do I have to kill to get some service here?”
As the years rolled on, the James brothers, who’s act was outselling the Marx Brothers but not quite equaling the Chuckle Brothers, continued their incredible string of robberies from Iowa to Texas and from Kansas to West Virginia – a feat made more incredible in that they walked from one robbery to the next. This kept them fit, but also left them frequently knackered.
Having ran out of banks to rob, the gang moved onto stealing from stagecoaches, fairs and trains. In their train robberies, the gang used horses because they were safer than guns and also allowed them to catch the trains much easier than on foot. During his later train robberies, Jesse never robbed the passengers only the safe in the baggage car – this saved him having to accidentally shoot anyone else.
In the mid 1870s, train companies employed a detective agency run by Allan Pinkerton to stop Jesse’s gang. When most of his agents ended up dead, Allan strangely made it a personal matter. He raided the James’s farm, blowing up Jesse’s half-brother and mother – he obviously used a very big foot pump. Once again Jesse was seen in the newspapers, this time in good light and as a sympathetic character. Jesse’s mother survived the attack although she did lose an arm; an advert was placed in the Lost and Found of the local free ads paper but to no avail.
The gang’s most daring raid of the 1870s was on the First National Bank in Minnesota. The robbery should have gone smoothly but ran into trouble when the cashier refused to open the safe. The cashier’s name was Joseph “Trouble” Heywood. Before leaving the bank empty-handed, Frank James shot Heywood dead – learning to shoot live was still proving a problem for the older James brother. On leaving the bank the gang were attacked by a number of local yokels who decided the idea of mindless, bloody violence was just the thing required to make up for the town’s lack of inbreeding.
Other than the James brothers, who were now well down in the popularity polls fighting for bottom spot with the MacDonald Brothers, the gang was destroyed thanks to a rogue nuke missile and a particularly nasty pet beaver.
Jesse and Frank moved to Nashville, where they learned to play guitar and took a fancy to line dancing. In 1879 however, Jesse felt the need to return to robbery – his dancing boots were worn and the crotch of his chaps was beginning to chafe. He recruited a new gang, one that liked Country Rock instead of twang-twang, momma-got-run-over-by-a-train-on-the-lonesome-trail Country music, and set out to rob the Glendaletrain. This was the first of many robberies, although being Country Rockers the gang took a liking to throwing TV sets out of saloon windows onto the heads of other gang members. All in all it was not working as well as Jesse had hoped. By December, Jesse had become too paranoid of the gang members turning on each other and moved back to his home town.
By this time, Jesse only had two gang members he could trust, Bob and Charley Ford. It couldn’t really be called a gang anymore – more of a supermarket aisle granny gathering. Wanting to feel better protected against the government, Jesse asked the Ford Brothers, who were ranking higher than the James Brothers, McDonald Brothers and Marx Brothers but could still not hit the heights of those pesky Chuckle Brothers, to move in with him. A bit quaint and cosy for a group of bank robbers.
What Jesse did not know, was that Bob “Red” Ford was secretly plotting to hand him over to the governor of Missouri On April 3rd 1882, Jesse, while preparing for another robbery, took a moment to look at his hallway and think, “What a fucking shit-tip!” His eyes fell upon a layer of dust on top of one of the pictures hanging there. Noticing the small housing estate that had been built there by resident dust mites, Jesse made the fatal decision to pick up his feather duster and climb up to clean the picture.
Taking the offered moment, a deep breath and a crack at the $64,000 Question, the Ford Brothers shot Jesse in the back of the head, killing him instantly – a common side-effect of being shot in the head.
The killing became a national sensation, with tabloid journalists from around the country trotting in on noble steeds, posh ponies, and in the case of a News of The World Reporter, a scabby ass. The governor of Missouriwas quick to pardon the Ford Brothers, who’s profile had finally succeeded in blowing the arse out of the Chuckle Brothers after blowing the back out of Jesse’s head, and the speed of their pardon – clocked at 234mph as the horse gallops – suggested he was well aware that the Ford Brothers intended to kill Jesse.
The Ford’s took a portion of the reward money for capturing Jesse, all be it stone cold dead and in a box, and fled the state. In the following years, Charlie Ford committed suicide by killing himself and Bob Ford was shot by someone with a gun in Colorado– this was a highly ambitious shooting as Bob Ford was living in Texasat the time.
Jesse’s mother - still missing an arm, short-sighted, bow-legged but other than that doing fine – chose the epitaph for his grave. It read, Murdered by a Traitor and a Coward Who’s Name Shall not be Mentioned.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, Robert Ford was Voldemort’s father.
5. The Sinking Of The Titanic (And the Start of A Franchise)
In the year 1912 many things were different to how they are now – or at least they were for most people reading this as they were not alive.
In the year 1912 the word fuck was used a lot less than is healthy – everyone should have at least one fuck a day- and the word beaver did not send school children into hysterical fits of giggles.
William Shakespeare was long dead, leaving the world a legacy of literature to be forever treasured by connoisseurs and loathed by school children. Alfred Hitchcock was only a child, playing with a rope in the back yard of a spooky motel while some birds pecked his mother’s head in a frenzy. Bob Smit was doing something that no one remembers or cares about…but he was doing it well.
And the final touches were being added to a little known ship, the Titanic. You’ve heard of it? Wow, word travels fast these days.
The story of the Titanic actually starts years earlier, in 1907, when the directors of White Star Line conceived the idea of building the largest cruise liners ever created. They also decided these ships would offer the greatest levels of comfort, elegance and safety ever seen. In hindsight, they should have stuck with concentrating on safety.
The first two designs were named Olympic and, three guesses, Titanic. Work began on the Olympic in 1908 followed by the Titanic in 1909 – in between the construction workers ate lots of sandwiches, had far too many lunch breaks and ran out of teabags on 87,973 occasions.
Thanks to a wild press pack, shipped in direct from the jungle, the Titanic was a legend before it was even ready to sail. Tickets were sold for its initial unveiling, pies were sold for its christening but no one planned the funeral buffet.
The Titanic’s maiden voyage should have taken place on the 20th March 1912, but due to the Olympic already having crashed and needing repair – nothing like a bad omen, folks! – the maiden voyage was delayed until 10th April. More tea was consumed by the workers after being shipped in especially from China on a tiny dinghy – which it should be noted managed not to sink!
The finished ship was the largest movable object known to man, with the exception of John Prescott’s daily lunch. At 883 feet long, 92 feet wide – that’s a lot of feet – weighed 46,328 tons and was forced to go on a diet as it was considered obese for its height. On board were three huge, enormous, gigantic smoke-stacks which were all quite big, and there was also one which was used to take away steam from the kitchen, and smoke from the staff’s contraband cigarettes and transfer it onto the deck for the passengers to enjoy.
Everything about the ship was big – the doors, the rooms, the kitchens, the cabbages and the toilets – three reports were submitted stating that four people had been lost down the toilet bowl due to this. Four chefs taking on work in the kitchens were also reported to have become lost trying to find their way there – one was said to have been found in a passenger room, slumped against the wardrobe, suffering from dehydration and muttering something about a lion and a witch.
And of course, it was big on safety. With a double hull and sixteen watertight compartments should the ship start to leak, the press immediately said it to be unsinkable. Somewhere north-west, an iceberg pricked up its ears and though, “Now there’s a challenge!”
The standards of the facilities were nothing short of amazing – it was like having a Butlin’s Holiday Camp on water. Swimming pools, electric elevators, gymnasium and sports courts…actually it was far better than Butlin’s. On board the ship it was possible to do something different everyday and still not have enough time to do it all – a bit like important work tasks – although they hadn’t managed to add the Dinosaur Enclosure or the Flight Simulator. Bummer.
They also boasted of having two of the best musical ensembles on the Atlantic, which begs the question just how many good musicians can you find floating in the waves of the ocean? After the Titanic’s maiden voyage there were a few more than there had been – which was welcomed by Davy Jones who was in the process of forming a band.
The Titanic set sail on April 10th. On the same date Sergeant Smith of the London Police set his dog on a man stealing his Liquorice Allsorts and Dim Jim from Devon set fire to his pants. Nothing else was set on this day other than Mrs Miggin’s jelly and Little Bobby’s plaster cast.
On board the Titanic for this voyage were the snobs, the cream of American Society; the nobs, British Nobility; and the slobs, a collection of emigrants hoping to start a new life in America – although not many expected to be joining the little mermaid under the sea.
On the fifth day of the voyage, the Titanic received five different ice warnings. It also received a telegram from the Queen and Sky Digital. Despite the warnings the ship continued to travel across the Atlantic as 22 knots, and the company Managing Director did somersaults across the deck at the thought of the ship arriving in New York a day ahead of schedule. The captain joined in by doing star jumps but was told to stop being a tit and get back to steering the ship.
On the night of April 14th, a sixth ice warning was received. The deckhand taking the wireless warnings, the witless wanker, assumed it was not in their area and put the printout on his desk. It never made it to the Captain, even when the deckhand idly made it into a paper aeroplane and tried to throw it from one end of the deck to the other.
At 11:40, a crow’s nest lookout, who was doing a sterling job of looking out, spotted something straight ahead. It wasn’t a boat or a plane, and unless he’d put on weight he was sure it wasn’t Superman. It turned out to be a ruddy great iceberg – one which had taken up the challenge of sinking the unsinkable and came complete with turbo-boosters and reinforced front rams.
37 seconds later (Who was counting??), the greatest maritime disaster in history began – and according to James Cameron it continued long enough to give people deep vein thrombosis. During the night there was heroism from those who sat through the film in the cinema, terror for those who were forced to go to the cinema to watch even though they had a fear of drowning and tragedy in that Celine Dion didn’t drown before the end credits.
After hitting the iceberg, the Captain reported to the passengers that there had been a crash – just for those who hadn’t felt the almighty jolt of a massive chunk of ice slamming into the side of the ship. Despite this information being passed on, most of the passengers continued to enjoy themselves. Why, you cry! Because the ship was unsinkable of course!
The unsinkable ship plopped beneath the waves at 2.20am on the morning of the 15th. There was a potential cover story created by the ship’s manufacturers, declaring that the Titanic had not actually sank but simply was realising its full potential as a Q designed Above or Below Water Cruise Liner, but it was decided that the story was too far-fetched so was passed to Hollywood for consideration as a “Based on a true story” movie.
That night a total of 705 lives were saved, 1502 lives were lost, everyone got wet, 289 people pissed themselves, 1290 people got pissed and 17 couples went out with a bang (six of them all in one bed performing the unauthorised Karma Sutra position “Going Down On a Sinking Ship).
So ends the tale of the sinking of the Titanic - unfortunately Celine Dion goes on and on.
6. Heads WIll Roll - The Henry VIII Story
Today I want to talk monarchs. Some people will no doubt say that I have been talking complete and utter monarchs for years, but I just laugh at them and quietly plot a suitable revenge in the comfort of my own cell.
One famous monarch with a love of cells, and particularly a love of putting his wives in them before having their heads removed, was Henry VIII. Yep it’s Henry VIII he is, he is, Henry VIII he is.
Born in Greenwich on June 28th 1491, Henry was the second son of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York. Even then parents had a great imagination when thinking of baby names. It could have been worse – they could have called him Liz. He became his father’s heir in 1502 when his brother, Arthur, got stoned and fell on his sword. Henry succeeded the throne in 1509. The same year he succeeded in completing The Times Crossword and Sudoku puzzle in record time, but lost It’s a Royal Knockout to Prince Naseem and King Kong.
In his younger years, Henry was an athletic and highly intelligent individual. Other comments from his university yearbook were “Henry is a whiz with the paper guillotine” and “Henry is very fond of the Queen of Hearts and admires her desire to see everyone in her kingdom headless”. Yes folks, it’s true. Watching Alice in Wonderland was responsible for Henry’s love of beheading.
In 1521, Henry authored a best-selling book attacking Martin Luther and supporting the Roman Catholic Church. For his work, the Pope gave Henry the title “Defender Of The Faith”. With this title Henry was able to take over Flash Gordon’s job in his spare time, and commissioned George Michael to write a song. Unfortunately, Mr Michael was caught in what, for him, was deemed an obscene act – shaving off his stubble– and was swiftly beheaded.
During the early part of Henry’s reign, it was sunny in the south, windy in the North and Michael Fish advised that there would definitely be a heatwave for the country. It did not stop raining for six months. When the water subsided Henry had Michael Fish arrested and beheaded.
Due to Henry’s lack of interest in government, and his many other interests – hunting, beheading random people, sport, beheading the people he didn’t behead the first time – he allowed Thomas Wolsey to take over such matters. Wolsey became Lord Chancellor in 1515, and then soon became a Cardinal.
The second half of Henry’s reign was cloudy, with thundery outbursts. No one dared give an outlook forecast for fear of rolling heads. Two major issues arose during Henry’s later reign that would change the future of England and the monarchy. These were the need for a successor to the throne and the Protestant Reformation.
Henry had married the widow of his brother, Catherine of Aragon, but by the time she was in her forties she had only given birth to one living child, a girl. This would have been fine, but as England had never been ruled by a queen, Henry wanted a son to succeed him to the throne. He was already contemplating names; Henry perhaps would be suitable.
Henry had fallen in love with Anne Boleyn, the sister of one of his many mistresses. He tried to persuade the Pope to grant an annulment of his marriage to Catherine, saying their contract was not legal. The Pope was bribed with riches and a Porsche, but refused to take the bribes. “I’m the fucking Pope,” he was alleged to have said. “I already have those things”
In May 1529, Cardinal Wolsey failed to get Henry what he wanted. Henry ordered Wolsey to be beheaded, but the Cardinal died before there could be a trial. Not to be outdone, Henry had him beheaded anyway out of principle.
Wolsey’s successor was Thomas Cromwell. Cromwell introduced an Act that took away some of the Pope’s power and his Porsche, and brought about English Reformation. The Archbishop of Canterbury was granted a greater say in the country’s decisions, and the man from Del Monte said yes to the annulment of Henry’s marriage. A week later, Anne Boleyn was crowned queen.
Soon after Henry broke from the Roman Catholic Church, and his Defender of the Faith badge and window sticker were revoked. Henry and the Pope went their separate ways, and Henry won custody of the dog while the Pope took the commemorative plate sets with his face on. A new Act was introduced that took all power away from Rome and from the Pope, and granted supreme rulership to England’s King. In short, Henry had the power of Greyskull in his hands.
This forced many people to take either the side of the church or the side of the King. The most famous side-taker was Thomas More, who was beheaded for treason in 1535. You don’t need to be told which side he chose.
Like the first, Henry’s second marriage brought no sons, but another daughter. The daughter was called Elizabeth. It always helps a marital relationship to call a daughter after an ex-wife. When Henry grew sick of Anne, he did the sensible thing –found her falsely guilty of treason and beheaded in 1536. The same year, Henry received a telegram stating that he needed to stop chopping people’s heads off as they were running out of landfills to put them in.
Next to appear on the Henry Tudor Needs a Wife show, was Jane Seymour. Jane did give Henry a son – Edward – but died 12 days later. Being a wife to Henry was becoming a dangerous job.
The next woman to take up the challenge was Anne of Cleaves. She wore body padding, shin pads and entered the marital bedroom like the Marshmallow Man. Henry decided he could not live with someone who made him think of food – he was watching his waistline (watching it grow mainly) and had the marriage aborted. Having decided to let Anne keep her head, he ordered Thomas Cromwell to be arrested for treason and beheaded instead.
Henry made two more marriages. He used sticky-backed plastic and pritt-stick. The first of these was to Katherine Howard, who he had, surprise surprise, beheaded for adultery in 1542, and Catherine Parr, who outlived him. Neither of these marriages produced any children, but did produce one headless wife, and one who went on to win the Luckiest Woman Alive award at the Pride of Britain Awards 1547.
Henry died in London on 28th January 1547. All worthy single women in the area breathed a sigh of relief and removed the guillotine-proof braces from their necks.
To some Henry was a strong and ruthless leader who reformed England and forced changes through Parliament that he wanted no matter what others thought. To others, he was an overstuffed pig of a man, with an unhealthy obsession for chopping off heads – it was always unhealthy for the person with their head on the block.
In the end, Henry’s reign had led to 6 marriages, one true heir to the throne who was often quite sickly – probably from seeing so many heads rolling around the place – two daughters who would go on to produce no children of their own, and a divided Church.
On the whole it could have been worse – Henry had managed to not behead 95% of the English population and the country found itself with a phenomenal supply of short term footballs. Well, it was better than kicking a pig’s bladder.
7. Bonnie and Clyde : The Musical.
Louisiana – known for swamps, alligators, Jazz music and not much else. Yet on May 23rd, 1934, it was in this soggy state of America that the crime spree of kidnapping murderers Bonnie and Clyde came to an end.
Since their meeting in January, 1930, the pair had taken part in numerous killings and robberies. It apparently stopped the relationship going stale – normal people would have tried going on holiday or hosting an Ann Summers party, where Right Said Fred regularly sing I’m Too Sexy.
At the time of their meeting, Bonnie Parker was a nineteen year old married to an imprisoned murderer and Clyde was twenty-one and unmarried. Obviously the advert on Match.com was perfect in bringing the pair together after Clyde read, “Wife of Murderer looking for fun with a gun” in which she listed her favourite song as I Shot the Sheriff.
Soon after their meeting, Clyde was arrested for burglary and sent to prison. Thankfully for Clyde this was not the same penitentiary her husband was being held at, although it was rumoured that her husband had applied for a transfer so he could meet, greet and eat his wife’s new man. The transfer was rejected on the grounds that in order to be a cannibal you needed a special visa, or to be called Hannibal.
Meanwhile, Clyde escaped from prison using a gun Bonnie had smuggled to him during a visit. It is not known how she managed to pass this to him, although they did share a very long kiss and someone did later comment that they thought her tongue was a funny colour. Hot Chocolate stopped by to perform It Started With A Kiss.
Unfortunately for them, although a bonus for the rest of the state, Clyde was recaptured and sent back to prison. Bonnie had hoped he would be sent to New York as she’d heard how good the shopping was there. In 1932, though, Clyde was given parole and together they returned to their life of crime. The Fun Loving Criminals provided the soundtrack.
The FBI began investigating Bonnie and Clyde in December 1932 after a number of car thefts. They also played cards, four agents played as a string quartet and Special Agent Godfrey was suspended for being far too good at playing Grand Theft Auto on his Playstation. A warrant for the pair was issued on May 20th 1933, and a set of Collectors Stamps were issued by the Post Office.
A few months earlier Clyde’s brother, Ivan, was released from prison, and keeping with the family tradition, he immediately joined the pair on their spree. Along for the ride he brought his wife, something which again seemed to be a tradition and was obviously some kind of romantic night out in those days. The final member of the group was a man named William Daniel Jones – that man so famous the only other time he appears in this story is when he is caught.
William Daniel Jones was caught in November 1933. There, that’s that out of the way.
Ivan Barrow was shot dead in July 1933. As it was, July 1933 was as nice a place as any to be shot in, although he would have rather stayed alive and moved to the Florida Keys. His wife was captured at the same time, and was just thankful to know that she would come out of prison to Ivan’s life insurance money. If only she’d known that Ivan had cancelled his insurance policy earlier that year, she would probably have shot him herself.
Somehow, Bonnie and Clyde managed to neither be shot nor captured. This was probably due to them spending most of their time at home while Ivan, his wife and William did all the work. They did escape from many brushes with the law, and after hiring the Sorcerer’s Apprentice the law had many brushes, all carrying pails of water, to escape from. An orchestra was wheeled in on a float to provide the music.
At the end of November 1933, the Dallas sheriff set a trap for the Romeo and Juliet of the highway and booked Dire Straits to play their song. Yet again, the trap failed and Bonnie and Clyde escaped after holding up an attorney on the highway and stealing his car. Holding the attorney up had been a mistake for Clyde who pulled a muscle during the lifting process.
On April 1, 1934, Bonnie and Clyde encountered two young highway patrolmen near Grapevine, Texas. Before the officers could draw their guns, they were shot. Marvin Gaye had heard that it was all going down in the small town and was on hand to play the theme song.
FBI agents followed the trail of Bonnie and Clyde through many states. This led to a doughnut shortage across America. Wanted flyers were pasted on lampposts, doorposts, standing posts and Post Office windows. They wanted more doughnuts, and on the bottom it mentioned they were also seeking information on Bonnie and Clyde.
After some investigation, carried out by school children on work experience while the FBI agents continued to hunt the elusive lost doughnuts, it was discovered that Bonnie and Clyde had been frequenting the home of known criminal Henry Methvin. They had also been painting his fence, feeding his plants and doing his laundry.
Between the FBI and local Louisiana police authorities, they managed to work out the most important discovery of their combined careers; they would never find the lost doughnuts. Instead they concentrated their efforts on tracking the whereabouts of Bonnie and Clyde, who had recently held a party at the home of Henry Methvin. They partied like it was 1999, and Prince was on hand to sing the theme song.
Information gathered by the FBI suggested that Bonnie and Clyde would be returning to the area in the next two days. Just before dawn on the 23rd May 1934, a posse of police and FBI agents hid themselves in the bushes along the highway near Sailes, Louisiana.
Soon Bonnie and Clyde drove down the road in a stolen car. They realised too late that there was an ambush – about the same time bullets started to shatter the car windows. They tried to drive away, and Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band were on standby to sing Born to Run, but the gunfire proved too much for them.
The car flipped over as Clyde lost control, spun in the air, did a pirouette on its rear bumper and came to a perfect landing on its roof before bursting into flames. The police gave the display 5.0 and the FBI gave it 5.5. Bonnie and Clyde won by a 0.5 margin and took the gold medal in the Death Defying Car Stunt category. They were later disqualified when it was discovered they were in fact dead.
Louis Armstrong was flown in especially to perform What a Wonderful World for the closing credits.