Britain can no longer afford defence against aliens

The Bugle, audio newspaper for a visual world.

Oi, buglers!

Oi!

Listen up!

Oh, you are.

It's issue 98 of the Bugle, the audio newspaper that protects and nurtures all that is precious and wonderful about human life, like a vulnerable baby egg, brooding it under our life-giving down until it is all plump and warm and ready to hatch, and then we crack it, scramble it, and eat it with a dash of pepper.

I'm Andy Zoltzmann, but I think it's about time you all started referring to me as Zoltor the Pitiless Emperor of all things.

I think I need a bit of rebranding, John, at this stage of my career.

What do you reckon?

Not a bad idea.

Have you hiding an expensive consultancy phone?

Yeah, it costs me £250,000.

Look at that.

And across the pond in New York City, the Lord of Darkness, the Prince of Pain, John Oliver.

Hello, Zoltor.

Hello, Buglers.

Andy, we've been collecting stuff this week at work to send to a charity Give to the Troops where you put together some care packages for those serving abroad during the holidays.

Now, I happened to get sent an Xbox a while ago at work with some free games in it, so I'll put that into the box and then immediately worry what the games in it were.

You know, you certainly wouldn't want to send Call of Duty to people who are living in the middle of that game and are unable to find any power-ups.

So I quickly went back to check what the free game was in the box, having not ever looked at it before, and it was Kung Fu Panda.

Much better.

So somewhere in Afghanistan this holiday season, Andy, some US troops are going to be playing Kung Fu Panda.

I do like the idea of that.

But yeah, Christmas is coming.

And I got a Christmas tree last weekend.

And it's f ⁇ ing huge.

It was genuinely difficult carrying it home.

There were times I wasn't sure I was going to make it, but now I have a tree in my house and it really feels like that.

It's less like having a Christmas tree in your house and more like having an actual tree.

That's always been my motto with Christmas Andy.

Go big or go home.

Or go big and then try to go home.

What have you put on it?

I mean, squirrels or

are you going with the nature decoration?

I haven't decorated it yet, so I haven't had time.

So I think that's why it does just feel like a

I'll decorate it this weekend.

I made some Christmas decorations as well.

Oh yeah, what'd you make?

I have a collection of old cigarette cards, glued some of them together.

So we now have a Christmas decoration to hang on our Christmas tree.

Our secular Christmas tree of course.

Yeah.

Involving four England cricketers from the 1930s.

You are ruining Christmas for your children before they got a chance to enjoy it.

They're going to be going to their friend's house in the future saying, but where are you cricketers?

We've also got a little model that we put on last year that Miranda bought in Mexico of a...

is a little toy of some Sandinista rebels.

Well, with little wooden machine guns, these little woolly dolls.

They are developing different traditions, Andy.

So this is Bugle 98.

And 60% of the way through this episode, we'll therefore be at Bugle 98.6, which is the normal human body temperature in Fahrenheit.

Now, Fahrenheit, John, that is a loser's way of measuring temperature.

Fancy formulating a temperature scale with naught as the freezing point of brine.

What a twat that guy was.

For f sake, what the f was that legs thinking?

Sorry, that was probably a bit over the top.

Just doing his job, I guess.

He had to earn a living.

And if he did it, formulating irritatingly numbered temperature scales in the early 18th century, who am I to criticise the lad?

Little Danny Fahrenheit.

What the heck?

I'm not going to back down.

That's not my game.

He started this argument off.

He hasn't apologised.

It's my job as a comedian, John, to hold up the mirror to temperature measuring scales and call it how I see it.

So give me Celsius any day.

Nor ice, 100, boily.

A bit below 100.

Perfect for making most teas.

But Fahrenheit, the stupid Prussian prick, had to go with 32 and 212 for the freezing and boiling point of water.

Life, John, is simply too short for dealing with those kind of calculations.

No wonder the bastard died.

And as always, some sections of the bugle are going straight into me.

This week, a Christmas present section.

Now, credit crunch or no credit crunch, John.

And the answer is still a credit crunch our society is doggedly refusing to give up spending money on garbage in an effort to paper over the cracks in our personal and family relationships sorry am i spoiling the magic now most uh sections in all these newspapers and websites are separated by gender gifts for him gifts for her or by age gifts for kids or gifts for the nearly dead but these divisions are sexist ageist and racist so the bugle christmas gift section is demarcated by psychological state so we will suggest gifts for people who are fleeing their innermost fears.

And we suggest a novelty hot water bottle with their own face as a hopeful eight-year-old child on the front.

Snuggle up to that lost future every night.

Gifts for people trying to find meaning in a sadistic universe.

A desktop deer hunting game with four realistic but cute battery-operated noise-sensitive plastic stags to shoot, and a fully functioning miniature 4cm long shotgun plus collapsible cardboard moorland and 10 sachets of real blood to smear on your face after a kill.

You can go stalking and killing in your lunch break without even leaving your desk.

Gifts for the irritatingly contented, a weekend break at a harsh reality spa.

Their own personal pessimism trainer will bang on incessantly about how life is little but a compulsory subscription to Pain and Suffering weekly magazine, and desolation is the only true feeling, with complimentary toweling, dressing gown and slippers in every room.

And also gifts for those on an unattainable quest for true lasting personal satisfaction.

A remote control pencil sharpener.

And in the bugle soundproof safe this week.

That's right, it's back in the repair shop.

It's Irish business and media magnate, former head of HJ Hines and renowned international rugby star, Tony O'Reilly.

Oh, hey, Tony.

Unquestionably, the billionaire most adept at running with a rugby ball across the line and putting that ball on the ground.

Mr.

O'Reilly, thank you for agreeing to join us.

Are you okay for water and air?

Good.

Top story this week, Britain is

Andy.

Great Britain may be about to be not so great anymore.

In fact, it may not even be good again.

Details of the UK economy came out this week, which seemed to suggest that Britain is in a Disney world of shit.

We are the man walking away from the casino at six in the morning with his pockets inside out, working out what to tell his wife.

We haven't just sold our children's Christmas bikes to fund our gambling habit, we've sold their great-grandchildren's bikes too.

Homer bikes they were going to be.

That's what really stings.

Figures announced revealed that the UK is operating with the largest deficit in peacetime history.

That means that the last time we had a deficit like this, we were at least using that money to stop Hitler from taking over the world.

At least, in hindsight, that didn't seem like a luxury purchase.

You can't really have buyers' remorse with purchasing something like Freedom from the Nazi Party.

But this time we've spent even more money, only instead of fighting fascism, we've bought plasma screen TVs and houses we can't afford.

And banks as well.

And banks, yeah.

So for more than they're probably worth.

Yep.

But you're right, the end of the world is night.

If by world you mean Britain, which you might as well.

Sorry, I wrote that line in the 1850s.

But the pre-budget report took place.

And it did reveal that Britain as a nation is totally financially screwed.

The Sun newspaper, the rogue, distant cousin of this audio publication that we're hoping not to have to spend too much of Christmas with, it's got anger management issues and shouts a lot.

It ran with the headline, Darling, that's the Chancellor Alator Darling.

The headline was, Darling just screwed more people than Tiger Woods, in massive letters on the front page, meaning presumably in excess of about eight.

And inferring that perhaps the worst effects of the recovery from the financial crisis were being focused on young women who use too much makeup.

It's pretty vague to say more more people than Tiger Woods screwed, John, but I guess that's maybe that's a compliment to the Chancellor that in resolving the economic crisis he's only managed to affect about 10 people.

Clearly, he is the genius that no one claims he is.

It does seem the recession is going to be quite a bit rougher in the UK than elsewhere, and it's hard to fully understand why without understanding at least something about economics, which I don't and I'm not willing to do.

But it seems it has a lot to do with Iceland mortgages and institutionalised greed.

Would that sweeping generalisation be fair, Andy?

Yeah, I think, you know, that seems about right.

Are any of those things wrong?

They don't feel wrong.

You know, we all like Iceland.

Yeah.

We all like to have a house, and if we weren't greedy, we'd all starve to death.

There you go.

The medical diagnosis for the British economy seems to be just short of calling for an emergency priest to come and administer the last rites, but only just short of that.

That priest is very much still on call and is being told to keep his voice warmed up.

I think by this time next year, we will probably be a suburb of Monte Carlo.

If the diagnosis is this serious then what is the government's prescription?

Well there was good and bad news for the people of Britain this week.

Surprisingly good news for bingo players as bingo duty is said to be cut from 22% to 20%.

Strange to see bingo get so high up that list.

Bingo turns out to be an unexpected priority for people.

It's like waiting until the Titanic is halfway through sinking and then immediately promising to improve the breakfast menu.

Well, I don't know, John.

You know, it's just one of the necessities of modern politics that politicians have to be seen to be catering to groups like that.

You know, they have to be seen to be committed to the armed forces and they have to be seen to be giving a fair deal to old women who like bingo.

Is bingo big in America?

I don't think so.

Right.

I've not seen it.

I mean, I know they play it, but I've not, I don't think it has quite the same smash appeal as it does in Britain.

Because obviously, originated, it's one of the things we inherited from the Romans, bingo.

Right, really.

The word bingo is, of course, a Latin verb bingo, bingare, binksi, bingtum,

meaning to randomly cross off numbers as they're pulled out of a bag.

Did it again?

You used that degree again, didn't you?

Yeah, there you go.

Congratulations.

That's 18 years well spent.

The bad news came for bankers with the announcement of the government's intention to impose a one-off 50% tax on bank bonuses of more than £25,000.

But even this was not enough for some people.

Max Hastings in the Daily Mail argued that Stalin would have shot them.

Well,

that may have been true, Max, but you really don't want to judge yourself against the moral barometer that is Joseph Stalin.

Or you can quickly find yourself rounding up poets and sending them to labor camps.

Believe me, that can happen fast.

Well, if you've got the right training system, it can.

But is this actually going to even work with these bankers?

Bearing in mind that the answer to that question is no.

Don't underestimate these consequence Houdinis getting away untouched again.

These fiscal escapologists are already working out ways to avoid having to contribute their minimum legal requirement of tax.

What we have to understand is the only thing they're really guilty of, Andy, is loving money.

That and fraud.

They love money too much.

They just can't handle seeing it taken away and frittered on schools and services when it could be disappearing up their noses in powder form.

It's the love that dare not speak its name, or at least dare not speak it on a tax return.

You can bet that they're already working out ways of getting around this, Andy.

Deferring payments, paying larger salaries instead of bonuses.

If there's a loophole, they'll find it.

And if there isn't a loophole, they'll go ahead and tie one themselves and then find that.

I've got to feel a bit bit sorry for Alistair Darling though.

He's onto a loser with this job and but he did make the startling claim that the recovery was starting from quote a position of strength which led to the kind of childish guffaws from the opposition front bench that probably explain why no one likes them either.

And it was sort of the equivalent of a boxer lying on the canvas with his head spinning with a blurry vision of his opponent the referee leaning over him counting to ten and wondering if he's still alive and then that boxer thinking to himself well that one must have hurt his fist

taking the positives i think you know that's good britain's finances are definitely a real horror story we need as a country one of those financial experts from tv reality shows to sit down with all of us and say look at your incomings look at your outgoings

Face the fact that I'm going to cut up all your credit cards and you can't buy any more pottery dolphins.

You don't need them.

Well, I think that might be what effectively happens.

Only that that person is going to be the IMF or the World Bank.

Yeah.

We're going to be a third world country by this time next year.

We won't be, but it's good to say that.

Yeah.

Where else can Britain tighten its belt Andy?

Well British ambassadors have had their belts tightened a few notches for them as the Chancellor is cutting their perks by £13 million a year.

They're going to have to fly economy on flights under five hours and their receptions are going to be a lot less lavish.

Wow.

Where is the attraction in becoming an ambassador now Andy?

The whole point was to experience pure decadence, such as mountainous trays of Ferrero Rocher, the choice of all confectionery caligulas.

And now what?

A few bits of cheese and pineapple on a stick?

Is that really going to make someone take a job which involves opening unending numbers of supermarkets?

I would have thought not.

Those Ferrero Roches really take the edge off anyone's day.

I'm just worried that we will just run out of diplomacy.

Are we going to have a diplomat, a key diplomat, halfway through a delicate meeting with a volatile despot somewhere, being awfully polite and diplomatic and manoeuvring British interests into a position of strength.

When all of a sudden his diplomacy budget runs out and he blurts out, no mate, you're a

also, and here's another cutback we're making.

I hope you're sitting down for this.

The UK Ministry of Defence has officially decided to close down its UFO reporting service, saying that it is, and I quote, an inappropriate use of defence resources.

The Ministry has closed down the voicemail and email addresses as well formerly available for reported sightings.

That phone line, I'm guessing, was undoubtedly used for reported sightings, but I would have thought more used for late-night prank phone calls.

So there was this fascinating statement on the Ministry of Defence website reporting on this closing down of the UFO reporting service.

The MOD has no opinion on the existence or otherwise of extraterrestrial life.

That can't possibly be true.

That cannot be true.

I mean, it's it's proved that it's not true by shutting down its UFO reporting service.

However, it continues.

In over 50 years, no UFO report has revealed any evidence of a potential threat to the United Kingdom.

Whoa!

Where did that come from?

Well, that's kind of ambiguous, though, isn't it?

Yeah.

Because, you know, there might be a threat to the planet Earth.

Yeah.

But maybe they've only found UFOs that are willing to cut a deal with Britain in order to attack the rest of the planet.

Great news.

We could be back on top again.

Recession or no recession.

That is definitely not saying there are no little green men coming down to see Britain.

It continues.

As you said, it's an inappropriate use of defence resources.

Furthermore, responding to reported UFO sightings diverts MOD resources from tasks that are relevant to defence.

This is why our troops have not been adequately equipped in the wars we've been involved in, John, because we spend, I don't know what the exact budget is, I think it's around £3 billion a year manning this foam line.

It's complacency, John.

That's what I'm worried about.

It's the complacency.

The British Sources Bureau has apparently warned the government to be on their toes.

And you know what?

They're right.

We've left ourselves wide open here, Andy.

Now would be the perfect time for the aliens to strike.

Now that we've reassigned the one-man desk job at £40,000 a year that was allocated to the branch.

But yeah, just because there haven't been any genuine UFO sightings so far in the glorious 20 billion year history of this incredible nation, It doesn't mean there won't ever be them.

Without this desk, we'll look pretty silly for diverting those resources into ephemeral fripperies like adequately equipping our armed forces for the day's trendy military campaigns, maintaining peace in global trouble spots and making sure our nukes don't get cobwebs.

It's a very different movie.

Like the Americans had Independence Day, Will Smith against the alien invasion.

Really, clearly our movie would just be a man called Nigel sitting behind a desk taking phone calls.

Oh look, it's the aliens.

Well no, please don't come down and destroy us.

Don't do that.

Nobel Prize news now and on Thursday President Barack Hussein Obama was finally awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

He say finally.

Years and years and years of peace.

Not so much that, the fact he was going to receive was of course announced a few months ago to a rapturous global response of what?

Really?

Why?

okay I guess

President Obama irked some Norwegians for truncating their three-day schedule of events organized around his receipt of the prize and let me tell you you do not want to see an irked Norwegian Andy they're like normal Norwegians only slightly redder

Vikings basically yeah basically

his response to the Norwegians complaining that

he wasn't going to be taking part in all their events was that, well, on one hand he was going to only be there for 24 hours and also he was the fing president.

And as the president, he really doesn't have time to sit through a chamber music concert by some Norwegian 15-year-olds.

Appealing as that undeniably sounds.

Slightly unfortunate timing, as many people have pointed out, that he's picked up the award just after committing 30,000 more troops.

to a war that he dealt with it pretty well, I thought, although some of his American critics seem to be disappointed that in his acceptance speech he didn't focus more on the US jobs and housing markets.

He had to cancel a lunch with the King of Norway, and the one I feel sorry for here is the little king, John.

Yeah.

Because

word is he got really hungry without his lunch.

And it was going to be his favourite, too.

He'd already decided was going to have moose burger and antler chips.

No, nice.

But it would have been a pretty awkward lunch, I guess.

The king would have kicked off.

So, Mr.

President, tell me what you think of the Norwegian film scene.

Well, I'm a bit out of the loop, to be honest, your Norwegian Majesty.

Oh, come on, you must have a favourite Norwegian film director.

Fill me in, someone.

Fill me in.

Uh, I like Ingmar Bergman.

He's fing Swedish!

Whoever fed me that one is fired.

Hey, Mr.

President, why are you eating those pickled herring wounds?

I'm sorry, I'm just uh I'm a bit worried about Afghanistan, the environment, the economy, my healthcare bill, the general responsibilities of being the most powerful man in the world and a symbolic figurehead whose successes and failures are fiercely scrutinised around the planet.

It's just kind of put me off my food, even these delightful pickled herring wounds.

Go on, try them.

Yasser Arafat ate his when he won the the Nobel and Henry Kissinger ate moose balls.

Real moose balls if you know what I'm saying.

Mr.

President, are you on the phone?

Yeah, sorry, I had to take a call about troop deployments in Helmand and achievable goals for carbon emissions in developing countries.

Is main course nearly ready?

Not until you eat your wombs.

Oh, since I'm supposed to be meeting the heads of the World Bank, IMF and the World Development Fund in 20 minutes to discuss further methods of moderating the after effects of the credit crunch on smaller nations.

Well you'd better eat your wombs then.

Obama did, however, attend a banquet and deliver a lecture, as well as watching, again, I quote, a torchlight procession from a balcony of the Grand Hotel fitted with bulletproof glass.

That for me is always a beautiful representation of Andy of how humanity values its peace advocates.

An alien looking down on Earth would see a peace prize winner standing behind bulletproof glass.

And that alien would be free to do that unsupervised because Britain's canned its UFO division.

Well, hopefully the Norwegians are taking better care of this.

But the Nobel Committee chairman Thor Bjorn Jaglund suggested that the award will encourage the President to achieve his goal.

So rather than rewarding what he's achieved, it's helping him to achieve it.

So what I want to know, John, from the International Olympic Committee, is where's my 400 metre hurdles gold medal?

Yeah.

To encourage me to get into shape and get better at negotiating obstacles in my life.

Each Nobel laureate, including Obama, receives a diploma, a medal and 10 million kroner, which works works out at $1.4 million.

They may have to boost that a little higher, Andy, just to make peace more competitive in the marketplace.

You could make a lot more money than that just being a mid-level Afghan warlord.

As you say, his speech was really genuinely impressive, and Sarah Palin reacted to his speech during her never-ending book tour by saying this.

She said, I liked what he said.

I thumbed through my book quickly this morning to say, wow, that really sounded familiar.

Because I I talked in the book too about the fallen nature of man and why war is necessary at times I'm pretty sure you wrote nothing of the sort

but it is very impressive how quickly she can bend the question from the acceptance speech of the Nobel Peace Prize to her own piece of shit book

well in more Sarah Palin news John she wrote an article urging Obama to boycott the Copenhagen climate conference basically because of the email leak rather than go to it because of the absolute vast swathes of scientific evidence suggesting that we really should at least pay attention.

Now, I know that ignoring huge quantities of reliable evidence in favour of tiny shreds of obvious bullshit has long been a central tenet of Republican thinking.

For example, the reasons for going to war in Iraq to belief in Christianity.

But this woman is really taking every opportunity to prove quite how unqualified she is to be elected president in 2012, which, to my mind, gives her at least a 60% chance of winning.

In her article, article she said, I've always believed that policy should be based on sound science.

No you haven't.

You do realise that science and the hand of God are two extremely different things.

I know you realise that because you keep pointing it out.

Last week we had talked about the major environment conference about to take place in Copenhagen featuring delegates from 192 countries.

Well now it's underway and how do you think this update on its progress is going to start?

Is it going to be the talks are going wonderfully well or the talks are in disarray?

Place your bets.

Okay, last bet's in.

Here we go.

The UN Copenhagen climate talks are in disarray.

Disarray!

We're paying out to disarray!

After developing countries reacted furiously to leaked documents that show that world leaders are going to be asked to sign an agreement that hands more power to rich countries, sidelines the UN's role in all future climate change negotiations and completely abandons the Kyoto Treaty.

That seems less like a step backwards, Andy, and more like a pole vault backwards.

They've absolutely bobcut it.

They've done the reverse bubka.

The secret draft agreement has become known as the Danish text, and it's a sad reflection of what's been dominating the news here last week.

That when I first heard that term, I just assumed that Tiger Woods had been caught sending pornographic text messages to a stripper from Denmark.

It was created, this agreement, by a group of individuals known as the Circle of Commitment, which sounds genuinely creepy.

That does does sound like it is.

Yeah, probably three weeks away from an armed siege and a mass suicide.

Yeah, it sounds as if all the members signed it by stripping down to their waist and dripping candle wax seals all over each other.

In Brussels this week, Britain and France pledged £1.5 billion spread over three years to an international global warming fund.

And again, I think this needs to be put into context, John, because £1.5 billion over three years...

Well, that sounds like quite a lot.

But the global market for mobile phone ringtones is worth about £5 billion a year.

God.

So it shows that as a species, we will not stand for our politicians making financial pledges to mollify the devastating effects of climate change.

We don't really like the idea of other people getting free x-rays and plaster casts when they're stupid enough to have their legs broken by a crazy motorcyclist when our legs still work fine.

But as a species, we will spend £5 billion a year making our phone sound slightly different to, or exactly the same as, other people's phones take that darwin take that that is one in the eye for evolution john as a species we are going backwards

feature section now and celebrations celebrate good times come home it's a celebration

Sports is not about winning or losing, Andy.

It's about how you play the game.

More specifically, how you celebrate doing something good in that game.

American football of course set the gold standard in the 1980s for players spiking the ball and doing all kind of elaborate touchdown dances and this was ridiculously eventually clamped down on by the NFL.

But then along came the great Chad Johnson, soon to be known to buglers as the great Chad Ochocenco, the black Mexican, or as he's now nicknamed himself, the interesting one.

Now

I love Ocho Ochel Sinko, Andy, I don't think I've been shy about saying that, but I love him even more after last weekend, when he was fired $30,000 by the NFL for celebrating a touchdown by putting on a grey poncho and a sombrero.

Outstanding.

That kind of behaviour should only be encouraged.

In a letter that the NFL sent him this week, the league wrote, During the second quarter of the Bengals game, you were observed gesturing for and then wearing a decorative poncho and sombrero in the bench area.

Compounding your violation is the fact that your actions were premeditated and deliberate.

Prior to the game, on your publicly accessible Twitter account, you posted the following.

What I've planned for today will get me fined when I score, but it's so worth it.

He responded to that by on his Twitter feed saying, this Sunday, when I score, I'm taking that loud horn from the Viking mascot and using it.

Is that a fine as well?

I'm guessing, yes.

He said on Wednesday that he's not sure why the fine is increasing so much, but then went on to say, that's okay.

They keep jacking them up.

I'll keep jacking up the celebrations.

Good!

Earlier in his career, he was regularly fined for a celebration.

Some of his most memorable, as I think we've mentioned, included doing a river dance, pretending to perform CPR on a football, and using the Enzone pylon as a golf club.

And when he was asked after all this, whether the celebrations had been worth a fine, he reportedly said, damn right it was, that shit was funny.

It's got to see people prepared to suffer and pay for their art.

Damn right it was.

Of course there's a wonderful tradition of ludicrous celebrations in

all sports.

I think one of the best I saw was at mascot rugby at the

outstanding.

That was great.

The Premiership rugby competition final at halftime.

I don't know if they still do it.

I've not been for a couple of years, but they used to have a game of full contact rugby between the mascots of the Cloughs.

It was the best part of the game.

It was the best part of the rugby season, Joe.

It was the best part of the sporting year for me.

Full contact rugby between about 12 or 14 men dressed as camels, sharks, wasps.

Just pile driving each other to the floor.

And I think one of the best celebrations, I can't remember, I think it was the

sail shark.

Yeah.

Managed to decapitate one of the other mascots and ran over, took the corner flag out, stuck the, I think, the head of a bear or something on it and waved it around.

I remember the first time we saw that mascot rubber, I was laughing so hard I couldn't stand.

I cannot believe that is not the biggest sport in the world.

It makes no sense.

It's better than all other sports.

I don't know if this happens in American sports as well.

I don't know it's probably to testosterone fueled.

But they celebrate the birth of a baby by miming, rocking a baby from side to side.

I think it was Babetto, the Brazilian, was one of the first to do that in the World Cup in USA in 94.

But it's interesting that you never see the same footballer three months later after their kids had a nasty bout of colic, celebrating a goal by blearily rubbing their eyes, screaming, shut up, for God's sake, you little monster, shut up at the tops of their voices, and checking the internet for flies to South America.

What's your best ever goal celebration, John?

I think my best ever goal celebration was when we played football up in Edinburgh in the

critics game.

I scored that penalty, took off my shirt and ran into the crowd to give it to my dad.

That was a classic.

That was good.

That was like a...

No, they should have made a commercial out of that.

It was like Derek Redmond and his dad, except I was victorious and Derek had failed.

I think my best one was

when we were playing also in Edinburgh.

The comedian Dave Gorman was in goal.

This is a good one.

And he used to have graphs in his shows.

And he'd do a bit and then say, well, let's have a look and see what that has done to the graph.

So, anyway, I got the ball, and I absolutely melted one past him from all of about two yards.

I was gonna say, I mean, it was a tap in, and yet you chose to sell that in by hitting it as hard as you could about half an inch from his face,

and then celebrated by pointing at him and shouting, What's that done to the graph?

Your emails now, and this one comes in from a man who didn't sign it, perhaps because he wants to keep his job.

Anyway, he writes, Andy John and the lovely Tom.

I'm a structural engineer who has recently returned from Dubai, where I worked on the design of a number of tall buildings.

Most of them were mental.

The majority of my time was spent on what would have been the tallest residential structure in the world.

Oh my god.

And it's due for construction when Dubai finally summons up the balls to ask its little brother Abu Dhabi for a loan of £60 billion or so.

Give her the money.

Anyway, this building has an outdoor swimming pool at level 100.

That's 400 meters

and six basement levels, two of which are to be used as accommodation for the 250 or so drivers who will have to be ready to leave their two meters by five meters living quarters to drive their masters around in their Bentleys, which come free with the apartment.

Oh boy.

You can also park your car in your apartment.

Enjoy the stupidity.

Oh, that is excellent.

Keep going dubai the world needs yeah this level well we don't we don't need you but we want you

there's a great email here from elliot line who says dear john and andy and tom has anyone else noticed the curse of gillette first theerion reed damages his reputation by handling the ball against ireland then tiger woods is revealed as an adulterer i'm expecting to read next week that rogue federer has massacred his whole family let's hope that that's not the case elliot but i take your point everyone keep a close eye on the Fed a number of you emailed in about the New Jersey Nets so there's one here from Tom Scamatti who says dear Andy and John in order of curly hairedness I'm sorry to report to you that the bugle curse does not stop at just relationships I know this is really bad news I'm very sad to report that the new official team of the bugle the New Jersey Nets won their game against the Charlotte Bobcats on December the 4th I know score of 97 to 91 this is a truly terrible event but also opens up up the opportunity for a new official team of the Bugle.

May I personally recommend my home team, the Cleveland Browns, an American football team who's currently 1-11 and not expecting a win in the near future.

In fact, the only time they were able to win, it was a score of 6-3 with no touchdown scored.

Hope for a bugle mention, Tom Scomatty.

Well, you have got a Bugle mention, Tom, but also last night, the f ⁇ ing Browns beat the Steelers.

You're even mentioning it now.

Before it was even read on air, the curses applied.

We have incredible power.

One of the third subjects of the bugle curse, this comes in from Dylan in Hong Kong who writes, Dear John and Andy, recently I gained the heart of the girl I loved.

But even more recently, she broke a young 14-year-old boy's heart.

That's right.

My heart.

How did this month-old relationship end?

It all started when my parents decided to go for a holiday in the land of sand, Egypt.

Seeing my parents would be gone for the week, we decided to do a little project at my place.

This consisted of several hours of Xbox Live and a movie.

After our little project, I decided to put on an episode of the Bugle on the speakers.

Uh-oh.

This did not go down well with my girlfriend.

And after a short while, we had an argument about what to listen to next.

Oh, no.

For the next few weeks, our relationship slowly turned into something that even George W.

Bush couldn't smirk at.

And I'm writing to you guys because, ironically, the episode of The Bugle was the one with the curse of the bugle in it.

Oh, no.

Sorry, Jillon, but if she doesn't like the bugle, she's not worth having.

That's it.

She's not a keeper, Dylan.

There's a bugle fan for you out there, or at least someone who's willing to tolerate it.

So do keep your emails coming in to thebugle at timesonline.co.uk and thanks for all your suggestions for what should be in the all-time best of the bugle that will be on in between episodes 99 and 100 after New Year.

So to do that, either email us or go to the blog www.timesonline.co.uk slash the bugle.

The blog bit.

What?

That's fine.

The bugle, just tell me.

That'll do.

That'll do.

Yeah, got it.

You nailed it, Andy.

Yeah, I could be a radio DJ.

Yeah, you just wouldn't be very successful.

Yeah, that's not the point.

He could be, technically, yeah.

He never claimed to be a successful one, Tom.

To be fair to the lad.

Yep.

After last week, John, you're not much better to be a radio.

Hey, yeah, no shit.

I'm a mercenary as well.

I'm useless at that.

Bugle sport now, and well, the game is on, John.

After the World Cup draw, which happened just after we recorded last week.

Yes.

A clash of true global titans.

England against the USA.

My country against your country.

No, what?

No.

You splitter.

Traitor.

Oh, you can't have it both ways.

Oh,

you can't.

I'll have my green card, but I won't use it during the World Cup.

Yeah, I'm telling you, my true colours have come shining through because I found out on the way to work, I ran into work, especially because my boss is not only American but a big football fan and holy shit there was some verbal fighting on Friday and it's gone through the week bit of jostling in the corridors little bit of verbal here and there few shoves nothing getting out of hand it's a long way to go until June the 12th where we are going to destroy them

Well, it is finally going to decide which is the greater nation, John.

And I think when you tot up the evidence, we've definitely got the edge.

You think of England?

You think of Shakespeare, you think of America, you think of the Backstreet Boys.

1-0 England.

England's given the world Edward Elgar, Benjamin Britain.

America has given the world Guantanamo Bay.

2-0 England.

England saved the world in two world wars.

America gave the world the film Freddy Got Fingered.

England, the longest-running democracy in the world, the language spoken universally across the planet.

Most of the world's proper sports and the cooked breakfast.

America has given the world serial killer Jeffrey Damer.

So come on, Fabio Capello and his boys.

Do it for humanity.

All joking apart Andy, I will be devastated if England lose this game.

I will not be able to go into work.

This is the highest stakes game.

I don't even mind if they lose the next two.

They cannot lose that game.

Please, I have to go to work.

Please.

So that's about it for this week's Google.

Just time to leave you with a puzzle in replace of the late lamented audio cryptic crosswords, which I know some of you still miss.

The first part of that's true.

And this is the new Tinkwan Supage.

It's a new Japanese rule-less number puzzle, following on from Sudoku.

This has no rules at all.

And this week's numbers are 2, 6, and 19.

So send us your solutions by the time you listen to this.

And you could win an inflatable Emperor Hirohito.

This is the end of Bugle 98.

They're just one more full bugle now until the Shoba's event of this and any other millennial.

Wow, the centre

is huge.

the biggest thing that's ever happened to humanity So forecast for this week John last week we had a forecast about my radio show weather

and basically Britain has fallen to pieces.

There you go.

You know it happened Still available on iPlayer on the BBC website My forecast for this week is also with a little showbiz angle on Thursday next week My daughter is making her showbiz debut Oh, yeah.

In her nursery schools Christmas production.

Wow, but who's she playing?

It's the 12 Days of Christmas then.

Yes.

So So it's largely musical number.

They slightly, it's one of these kind of trendy modern productions, so it's set

in a drugs gang in Baltimore.

Great.

It's not the Christmas wire.

Is Matilda going to play prop joke?

I guess the forecast is, is she going to follow her daddy's footsteps into showbiz?

I'll do it, Matilda.

I'm hoping not.

Thanks for listening, buglers.

We'll be back next week with the final bugle of the decade.

There were no bugles in the last decade, there will have been 99 in this decade.

Curse, food for thought.

Have a lovely week.

Bye-bye.

Bye.

Hi, buglers, it's producer Chris here.

I just wanted to very quickly tell you about my new podcast, Mildly Informed, which is in podcast feeds and YouTube right now.

Quite simply, it's a show where me and my friend Richie review literally anything.

So please come join us wherever you get your podcasts right now.