Station Of Critical Review By Kennedy Hiscox-Wormegay: Bryan Stamford's 'So Big, They Swim'

(A note to regular Beware! readers: Hiscox-Wormegay is currently suspended from duties, pending disciplinary action. Relief reviewer Dex Diabolo is keeping his seat warm. Enjoy!)

From deep within 2018's left field comes Bryan Stamford's So Big, They Swim, a 500-page opus which, when still only a rumour, threatened to turn establishment palaeontology on its head. It was claimed that the BBC was so concerned by its imminent release that it cancelled production on David Attenborough's twelve-part Giants Of The Past series and deleted everything in their back catalogue which referenced sauropod dinosaurs. The specialist blog, Sauropod Humeri - Photo Of The Month (or 'SH-POM!'), was inundated with interview requests from numerous journalists, all of them asking how they could have been so wrong.

So what's the deal?

For years, palaeontologists have been in agreement that dinosaurs went about their day-to-day lives doing the do on solid ground. This model is in stark contrast to a proposed nineteenth century idea, which suggested that some of the larger animals were simply too heavy to exist on dry ground, and must have used water to support their mass. However, decades of actual, real-life, no-nonsense scientific research, by real scientists—and not weirdo jack-of-all-trade university-of-life types—has demonstrated repeatedly that sauropods were well-adapted to an entirely terrestrial existence. In fact, if taken as aquatic animals, sauropods were utterly, utterly awful animals, destined to die out during the testing phase.

New (Old) Kid On The Block

Stamford in his days as a rock 'n' roll
violinist, before he became a rock 'n' roll
flautist for Dr. Eam. (Public Domain)

Enter onto the stage Bryan Stamford, a fringe theory science writer who lists amongst his skills "rock 'n' roll flautist for D Ream tribute band, Dr. Eam" and "Butlins Debating Society under 11s coach, 1976." He also founded seventeen popular(-)science radio programmes (all of which were only pitched; none were picked up) and lists numerous television appearances on his online CV. However, most of these seem to comprise Stamford's presence in the audience only, and are the source of much disagreement on his Wikipedia entry's 'Talk' section.

And then, something mindbogglingly crazy happened. We presume that someone from the publisher, HarpistCollier, about to retire and with nothing to lose, was getting sozzled at the bar on some cruises ship (where Stamford was either lecturing or playing his rock 'n' roll flute) and overheard one of Stamford's self-aggrandising conversations about how he—and he alone—knew the truth about dinosaurs, and that Big Palaeo was suppressing the truth.

The transcript would probably look something like this:

Collin Harper, a commissioning editor from the well-known publisher HarpistCollier, is due to retire and is thinking about how his dream of 'going out with a bang' remains unfulfilled. About to call it a night, he overhears the arse-send of a conversation between a dapper septuagenarian with an impressively full head of white hair, and a couple of bored middle-aged cruise-goers getting pissed the night before a medical conference.

Stamford: ...and that's when I realised that palaeontologists had got it wrong for nearly seventy years! And I thought, "I can't believe how ridiculous those ivory tower palaeontologists are! Stupid, simple, small-minded! I mean… I mean... *chortle* They're fucking ridiculous!"

The two guests seem taken aback by a well-spoken senior citizen dropping an F bomb so casually. Their journey is linked to a medical conference, so they are broadly familiar with science journals.

Cruiser 1: So, have you published your studies?

Stamford: *Snorts* Of course not! THEY don't want this stuff out there!

Cruiser 2: Who are they?

Stamford: And that's not to say I didn't try! I contacted all of the top journals: Country Life, The Watchtower, Take A Break... They wanted to see my supplementary data! Can you believe that? Take A Break wanted to see my data! The nerve of those stupid, small-minded bastards! The woman at Watchtower said she had debated enough palaeontologist types to know that "long-necked dinosaurs" didn't need to live in lakes. Can you believe that? Big Palaeo got to the johoes!

Cruiser 2: That's a big tick in my book.

Cruiser 1: Haven't you contacted Nature? Or New Scientist? Surely those are more relevant to your cause. I mean work.

Stamford: Pfft! Those fascists? Have you met the tiny-minded, moronic reviewers you have to get past to get published?! If you don't have friends reviewing your work, you're... you're basically fucked! *guffaw*

Cruiser 1: Well, listen... It's been great chatting, but things start early tomorrow so we better get some kip.

The three shake hands and the two conference goers depart, presumably to find a bar on another deck. Stamford watches the two exit, and looks pretty pleased with himself. Collin Harper makes his move.

Harper: Excuse me! Oh, hi, yes, um, I couldn't help but overhear a good deal of your conversation. Would I be right in thinking you're a dinosaur expert?

Stamford: Well, no, not as such. My area is ectoplasm viscosity and its effects on the emotional state of manifestations... So no, not dinosaurs... But yes, I have studied them. Quite intensively, actually! So yes, yes. I am an expert. In dinosaurs. Yes.

Harper: Ah, excellent. Becau——

Stamford: And I'm rock 'n' roll flautist!

Harper: Right... That's great. But it's the dinosaurs I'm more intere——

Stamford: Did you hear that bit about my appearance on Question Time?

Harper: "Hear about..."?

Stamford: When I was talking with those other two. Were you there for that bit?

Harper: I... don't think I——

Stamford: Ah, excellent! Yes, I was on Question Time in 1997. I argued with Philip Hammond, against the use of DNA to convict criminals. The cytoplasmic media of cells is susceptible to paranormal corruption.

Harper: What?

Stamford: Yes, it was a seminal moment in British politics.

Harper: Er... They got you on to talk about that?

Stamford: Yes. Well, no. I was in the audience. But it was still a key moment for the series. I believe it changed that way they took questions from the audience. 

Harper: I bet it did. But listen, I really need to——

Stamford: Did you see my appearance on Trisha?

Harper: *Sigh* I'm from a publishing house!

Stamford: *Splutter* Let me get you a drink!


And that's how we think Stamford got his book deal: a chance encounter with someone who didn't give a shit. We reached out to CollierHarpist for an interview, but they were initially reluctant to comment. In an email, they said, "...Mr Stamford has requested that until the book is officially launched next week, we do not breathe a word of any of this to anyone. As you might understand, our marketing team is frustrated."


Luckily, Stamford had accidentally leaked his own book by posting a DropBox link to a PDF version at his own Facebook page, straining his already fraught relationship with CollierHarpist. Although this was bad news (financially speaking) for the author and publisher, it was great for people hoping to witness the train wreck without having to pay for it. We bagged our download and then sat down to trawl through its general awfulness. Here is our take:

Throughout So Big, They Swim, Stamford describes thousands of minor personal achievements, none of which really relate to the book's premise. For example, in 2001 Stamford attended an event at the American Museum of Natural History, and "successfully" reduced a 7-year-old boy to tears when he told the child that "palaeontologists know fuck all about dinosaurs" and that he could learn more about them from his baby sister. In 2012, whilst driving home from a talk on how cells work together to create cosmic forcefields, he prevented a carjacking by absent-mindedly driving into the back the car being jacked. And it goes on like this for hundreds of pages. When it does manage to stay on topic, the arguments against a terrestrial lifestyle in large dinosaurs rarely make it beyond "I can't believe palaeontologists think this!"

We thought about writing a more-considered review of Stamford's book, but it really wasn't worth the effort to write more than a paragraph. We would say buy it yourself, but save your money and buy something else. Like this. Or this. Or this. Or this.

Station Of Critical Review By Kennedy Hiscox-Wormegay: The 13 O'Clock Podcast

The 13 O'Clock Podcast

Kennedy's Laborious Introduction

Sentiment of greeting, at you, from me! 'Twas too long a period of silence and no-speak, and it was high time for rectification. And here I am, ready to rectify. Rectii. Rectus, Rectum. That's probably Latin for something clever. I shall have my offspring check it on an internet for verification.

The last time I did dare venture out to offer my critical reviews, I was prevented by the cad, Dex Diabolo. And a cad he is. I would have had plenty to say about the wonders of Peter Davison's The Hunt For The Ptero-dactyle Apostates, amazing and full of wonder as it is. But shunned were I, and quiet I stayed.

But not no more. I am back, returned from the hospital ward where I was stowed, to bring to you my most achieviest achievement to date. Upon my headstone will be chiseled the words, "Here lay the greatest critic, Kennedy Hiscox-Wormegay, whose words toppled libraries."

(Kennedy won't be writing the headers, 'cos he's sh*t at them. - Ed.)

Jenny's and Tom's Guilty Pleasures: Real-Word Criminality and Bat-Shit Crazy People's Bat-Shit Crazy Paranormal Experiences

As my legion of four regular readers will attest, I am decidedly unfamiliar with the trappings of the Wide World Web. That said, I have been known to venture into its wiry and electronical depths, to drag facts out into the light for the consumption of my legion, which includes my psychiatrist, his psychiatrist, the editor of Beware! The Zine, and the guy who delivers my meals-on-wheels and who also proof-reads my work.

This week's wondrous digital offerings are made in the old British colony of the United States of America, which is an island off Cuba. It is a podcast, which is like a worm cast which you find on a beach, but instead of containing worm guts and sand, it contains information.

The 13 O'Clock Podcast is still relatively young, but has swept forward with its foul-mouthed, common-sense attitudes toward famous paranormal events and real-life crime stuff. The routine is of a weekly arrangement, alternating between spooky things, such as ghostly intrusions and cryptozoological weirdies, and evil murder killy moments of life-ending ferocity. 'Tis clear that the podcast boss and goth-fringe-wearer, Jenny Ashford, is dedicated to the study of these two disparate subjects, and she is accompanied by goth companion and romantic property, Tom Ross, who provides exposition and vape sound effects. The vaping is very audible. Is there a hidden message in the puff pattern of Tom Ross? Perhaps he is crying out for help? Or perhaps he is crying out for more vape? Or perhaps I am overthinking this.

But it is true that Tom vapes A LOT.  He sounds like a train puffing steam. He is Tom The Vape Engine.

(Enough with the vape talk! We don't need a lawsuit!- Ed)

Jenny Ashford and Tom Ross, of the 13 O'Clock Podcast.

One should make mention of the fruity linguistic palette with which Ashford and Ross paint their wordy deliberations. They like to use what colonists call curse-words, but which Britons call potty-mouth. Never in a million minutes did I think I would hear so exotic a word as f-f-f... Ack! I cannot bring myself to repeat it, lest I explosively blush all the blood out of my face and onto the floor! I shall leave such naughty-word-talk to Messrs Ashford and Ross! They are good at it.

"POLTERGEIST!"

This is what Tom shouts when Jenny describes a ghostly anything. It seems that once in Tom's young life, he lived upon a mountain where spectral mammoths did wander, and his home was invaded by them. I may have an incorrect end of the stick, but that is the gist. And every time Jenny does suggest a ghost, Tom doth utter, "Poltergiest!" and "That'll be poltergeist activity!" and "Are there kids there? That's poltergeist!" I think he really likes poltergeists. Or maybe just the word. Jenny Ashford wrote a book with Tom about his mammoth poltergeist problem.

Tom does not ever sound like a mad person in the podcast, and this lends weight to any strange things he might make utterance of. The Mammoth Mountain Poltergiest can be purchased here. Read it and know of Tom Ross's unusual life before he was an army man.

The Unseen Hand

Jenny Ashford likes to write. If it were not for her fondness for talking, one might make a speculation that it is all she does. Write and write. She is of a prolific disposition and has written about subjects other than Tom Ross's poltergeist-ridden childhood. She has written about an unseen hand. Now, one might wonder how much there is to say about a hand which cannot be seen, but I am ensured that this is a metaphor, and that I probably also misunderstood the mammoths in the previous paragraph. This book deals in exclusivity with poltergeist phenomena, which must make Tom Ross very extra happy. It is a lengthy and example-saturated collection of historical and newish cases, and each one is given just enough typed attention to be interesting, but not so much that it should be a different book – such is Jenny Ashford's skilled treatment of The Unseen Hand. The audio book is of welcoming nature, but regular listeners of the podcast might be perturbed by the lack of swearing and also the lack of Tom Ross.

Those who wish to roll their eyes upon the text of this may do so via Amazon, here.

That is all from me. If you missed me, the blame must fall firmly at the feet of Beware!'s editors. If you didn't miss me, you will learn to.

Faithfully yours,

Kennedy H-W

(If you want to hear/see more from Jenny and Tom, and you want to support them, consider purchasing one of their physical or audio books, or go to their Patreon page, here. And don't forget to listen to the podcast! - Ed)

Late Edition! Jenny added that she writes true crime literature, too. Check out 'The Faceless Villain' here.

Readers' Letters

Beware! Gets Mail!

Nine-year-old Istead Hunwicks writes in with a question about guest reviewer Dex Diabolo's recent review of Peter Davison's shitty trash manifesto, The Hunt For The Ptero-Dactyle Apostates.

Beware! says...

Well, Istead, one can only hope. It's worth noting that Mr. Hasselhoff had legal bills to pay, so was simply chancing it. On the other hand, Mr. Davison has his work cut out on the convention circuit, so we're pretty sure he'll be busy answering questions about whether or not he's still in touch with Adric. - B!

Station of Critical Review by Kennedy Hiscox-Wormegay with Dex Diabolo: The Hunt for the Ptero-dactyle Apostates by Former Doctor Peter Davison

A Note From Beware!

Long-time subscribers to Beware! The Zine will note a different tone in today's article. Unfortunately our full-time reviewer, Kennedy Hiscox-Wormegay, is currently receiving treatment for the effects of marsh fever and opium abuse. Whilst we are pleased to report that he is responding well to treatment, it will be some time before he is able to pen reviews again. Until then, we'd like to introduce our guest reviewer, Dex Diabolo, who is on loan to us from crappy ufology conspiracy blog, The Silver Disc - which we're not going to link to. You know the kind of head-case who sits next to you on the bus and insists on telling you how and why 9/11 was an inside job? They almost certainly subscribe to The Silver Disc. And as much as we didn't want to hand over the reviewer reins to Dex, he's all we could get. And, unlike Kennedy, he can string a sentence together.

From Timelord To Fringe Scientist

Up until the mid '80s, Peter Davison was best known as the fifth incarnation of The Doctor, titular character of the BBC science fiction series Doctor Who. However, since surrendering his position as 'gorgeous, young thing' to Colin Baker, Davison has cultivated an unhealthy interest in alternative-scenario palaeontology, penning several books on the subject and maintaining several blogs dedicated to the rapid publication of his unusual ideas. He has attracted much criticism, with dinosaur and pterosaur workers claiming that he is simply bi-passing the peer review process, though he has, on occasion, achieved in this area. Davison has also capitalised on his popularity with his legions of Doctor Who fans in order to force his unusual ideas out into the mainstream; after all, if they'll buy it...

Trash Fiction

The Hunt For The Ptero-dactyle Apostates is Davison's first foray into fiction and, if we're honest, it's mind-blowingly odd. We at Beware! HQ wouldn't have been too surprised if Davison had penned a story about oddly-proportioned aerial reptiles, zipping around the skies of an alternative-timeline Great Britain during the 1940s, but what we got was something entirely different. Davison offers up what can only be described as a semi-autobiographical medieval thriller, where he occupies the role of 'Witch-Finder General', tasked with rounding up those pterosaur workers who fail to adopt his take on palaeo research, putting them on trial and torturing and executing people as he sees fit. It's something of a bloodbath: his constantly-updated findings - and his certainty that each update is correct - mean that it's difficult for other workers to keep up with what is palaeontologically 'legal'. Many of them fall foul, and are subsequently put to death. Adorning the pikes of 'The Tower Of Lagerstatt', we find the heads of notorious traitors and heretics Marcus Wittleton, Bishop Darryl Gnash, Sir Michael Harb-Beeb and the mad monk, David Aherne. It's very much like Game Of Thrones, but with more violence and the flying reptiles are less convincing.

Thinly-Veiled Recruitment Literature

The pace falters about halfway into the first chapter as the tone shifts from trashy novel to political manifesto. One anonymous reviewer remarked that The Hunt For The Ptero-dactyle Apostates was "reminiscent of Cornwall's Camelot Castle Hotel. People book into the hotel for a bed for the night, are subsequently forced to endure terrible, terrible artwork by one of the hoteliers, and are then bombarded with Scientology recruitment literature. Castle Camelot Hotel and Davison are two baby legumes from the same troubled pod."

The Hunt deviates so violently from B-movie-esque storyline to paranoid rant that it's as if two different books have been spliced together, almost mid-sentence. Unfortunately, it remains stuck in this pseudoscientific rut for the remainder of the book, painstakingly dissecting every remark, email, blog article and manuscript ever released by conventional scientists, naming and shaming throughout. It's a long and tedious effort; Peter Davison clearly suffers from some serious science envy. Maybe it was his years as a sci-fi poster boy which led to his inability to distinguish fact from lunatic fiction, or that he had spent every waking moment surrounded by legions of fanboys and yes-men. Whatever the reason, the former-Timelord-turned-internet-pest has been the scourge of conventional science for the last decade, and The Hunt appears to be one last ditch attempt to discredit professional rivals and win over those who hadn't already declared their unconditional love during his stint in Doctor Who.

Station Of Critical Review By Kennedy Hiscox-Wormegay: The TetZoo Podcast

The pleasure of being assigned this particular review should not be overstated, and sits at my feet like a cross between a hot water bottle and a happy dog, minus the smell of new rubber. It is not often that the staff at Beware! The Zine is sent requests to appraise anything specific, but when a typed letter arrives in an unmarked envelope at 3am, well, we'd write a review about the structural integrity of quilted toilet paper if that's how its request was delivered.

Where to start? Well, we're not even sure what we're meant to call the subject of our review. It has been called, variously, TetZoo Podcast, TetZoo Podcats, Tetzoo Podcart, Petting Zoo Food Mart and Non-Christians Against Fish - though under this name, many people assumed it to be a clever hoax - it wasn't. For the sake of simplicity, we shall refer to it as 'Tezpo'. Tezpo backwards is 'Opzet', which is, coincidentally, the name of one of its presenters' pet tapir.

The short-lived TetZoo Top Trumps. 

 Tezpo is the brain-baby of zoological co-conspirators Darren 'Dawn Tyrant' Naish (apparently named for his morning temperament) and John 'Crusher' Conway, who crushed time dedicated to any given Tezpo topic to two minutes, much like a Republican Governor handles educational spending. Twitter users may recognise Naish's name from its association with the #chickensaurus event, whereby he called upon tetrapod lovers to resist a conspiracy by John R. Horner to create an army of giant 'Maximum Chickens'. Seemingly it worked, because chickens are still rather small. Those of an art-appreciating disposition may know Conway through his works of art. He depicts old things. And new things. And some unsettling things. But always beautiful things. Except for this. And this.

Being of a different time, it was of importance-absolute that I did make an effort to acquire a person familiar with the concept of internet. That person is the local postmaster's daughter, Hepzibah. She is of the Age of Digital, and owns an MP3-to-Wax-Cylinder converter, facilitating my scrutiny of these scientific lectures. The Digital Age is not so different to the Wax Age, with the exception that the Wax Age usually falters in Summer.

Collector's favourite, John Conway.

Armed with five-hundred-and-forty wax cylinders and enough navy rum to pickle a Harry Secombe, I locked myself away from the harassment of modernity, and began my foray into the world of Naish and Conway. And what a world it is. The first thing which struck me about the ears like an irate spinster was the music. It is very sensible. It lulled me into a false sense of security, for I imagined that the rest of the programme would be similarly sensible. How horrified I was to discover that this show is a blend of dry science, popular science, film reviews and humour. Yes. Humour. I wondered about what else the weary listener should brace themselves for. Interpretative dance? A lecture on why the Empire might not be a good thing, perhaps? Preservation of the Fen dialect?

With the progression of the series, each episode quickly turned into a long list of corrections of mistakes from the previous episode. O! How awful a time the receptionist at Tezpo Headquarters must have when the mail boy brings in those sacks of letters from disillusioned listeners - though, it must be said, it doesn't appear to dissuade people from listening. It is almost as if they listen for the steady stream of errors - perhaps as many as three or four each episode - in the same manner that a social outcast might sit at a bus station recording the busses which pass through like sweetcorn passes unchanged through a child. Common errors include misremembering plot elements from films of the Planet Of The Apes franchise, announcing the discovery of only one new tapir EVERY episode, and mispronouncing the names of everybody referenced in the episode. On several occasions, I believe, Naish even pronounces his own name incorrectly, uttering "nich", and commenting on how it will upset listeners in Jamestown. And maybe Boston. Cohn Jonway never mispronounces his own name, for he is the thinking-organ of this outfit, as demonstrated by the discussions which sway in his favour.

It was not long until Tezpo disciples, or 'podkittens', concocted a method by which the backlash to these errors could be softened.* A drinking game was devised as a call-to-action for weak-willed listeners to ply themselves with thee deville's fluids, numbing the brain and resulting in a fog in which they were hopelessly lost. Drink must be consumed for such incidents as Naish forgets the show is about tetrapods and deviates into a monologue about a film he doesn't like. More drink must be drunk if Conway has not seen that film, and still more drink must be swallowed if Conway then offers forth an opinion about that film which he has not seen. ALL of the drink must then be had should Conway eventually realise that he has seen the film. And this happens for every episode. In addition, there are numerous other drink-worthy elements which recur with such frequency that it is hard to be believe that any Tezpo's listeners survive to hear the wind-down lounge music which terminates each performance. The result is that no one can remember any of Naish's vicious slurs against fish or invertebrates, and no fish-lovers or arachnoculturist harbour any resentment towards him, nor his Conway. The rules for this debauchery may be found here, along with many details such organisations would usually keep to themselves. It is clear from the titles held by its members that this 'Empire' has ideas above its station, with Naish and Conway seemingly keen on elevating their band of infamy to the status of a cult. Beware.

*This is usually attributed to The Shadow Man, Mike Keesey, though, as seems fitting for such an irregular set of individuals, a 'Yodelling Cyclist' has also had considerable input. Irresponsible alcohol consumption, cycling, yodelling. Where will it all end?

The Tetzoo Podcast, hosted by Darren and John, may be enjoyed sensibly here. John Conway's art may be enjoyed and, preferably, purchased here. Darren Naish blogs at Scientific American's site, here. 

You can also support John and Darren at their respective Patreon profiles.

Station Of Critical Review By Kennedy Hiscox-Wormegay: The Fenland Soil Association Soil Grade Card

Given that this here estate on which the Hiscox-Wormegay family has lived, since times of ancient, is built upon fen muds, it makes sense of plenty to review, for your intellectual pleasure, the Fenland Soil Association Soil Grader. This item of equipment was devised by the invading Norman army, the engineers of which being so prodigiously unable to cope with more than type of soil that they had to produce a useful guide. Without this guide, it is entirely possible that Hereward the Wake might have been able to maintain his stranglehold on the fens and made mighty massacre of the French interlopers. That would have been good.

The Fenland Soil Association Soil Grader card.  A local person doesn't need this. They can taste the difference.
(Graphic by Gareth Monger)

The trained fen eye will immediately make mental note of fact that only two types of soil are on display upon this Old French document. As Canadians are about snow, we are about mud. Summer a single mud does not make. There are a hundred muds. Clay mud, sand mud, wet mud, wetter mud, watery mud, water with mud in.

I once saw a horse drown in mud, for which we erected the type 'horsey mud'. Horsey mud is hard to plough as the conditions are usually sufficient to produce plough-equipmenty mud.

The Fens: an artist's impression.
(Illustration by Gareth Monger)

And so it falls upon me to give reviewer grade to this device of soil grade. If this grader was of fen mind enough to include five hundred soils, I might consider more than one star. But it is failing in the highest possible magnitude. Therefore, no stars. No stars a night sky does not make. Good night.

Station of Critical Review by Kennedy Hiscox-Wormegay: Replacement Carbon Brushes For Hoover Performa 1100

So, dearest of blog-follower, it's early AD2015 and you are still a desperate-enough individual to act upon your requirement of the emotional assistance of both Messrs Cocktail and Hiscox-Wormegay. Ordinarily I'd make urgent-but-vague recommendations that you find yourself either a person of ill repute and spend a couple of days getting the New Year Blues out of your system, but as I am only writing here as a guest, I must remember some basic webiquette.

Advanced plumbing.

Shortly before the New Year insanities began, my servant girl Bertha was pumping water in the yard and my ears made hear of a commotion in one of the outhouses. I shouted at her to do her damned job and make herself aware of the situation with a view to rectifying it, but the smithy at Marten's Forge is dragging his heels over my new pump - and the squeaking is unbearable! To cut a yarn into shorter bits of yarn, Bertha was not able to hear the racket from the outhouse, ergo she didn't attend the issue.  So I had to.

The lickspittle, Bertha.

 Being a gentleman of reasonable standing, I tended to my first responsibility - beating the servant girl. But she is a girl of fortune and, at 73 years, is a good twenty years my junior - and escaped! Lickspittle slodger tramp.

So, without assistance, I ventured into the outhouse. I have yet to install electric lighting in the outhouses as I don't often have the need to go in, and there is a good provision of part-burned candles for the estate staff. But on this occasion, an Edison filament bulb would have been most welcome for, at the end of the room, there was the Hoover laundry box. It was making a terrible din!  It was lurching from side to side like the gin-soaked women queued at the almshouses in the towns, and a great many glowing sparks accompanied a loud and constant crackle.

Eventually, I resolved to send a telegram to the local repairman. He is a man of limited intelligence, owing, in the main, to his coming from The Midlands. Regardless of his geographic shortcomings, I sent the telegram, demanding he attend the estate and either repair the laundry machine or shoot it. When he arrived, it was immediately apparent that he had not brought his shotgun, nor his veterinary trappings. Instead, he produced two small, L-shaped contraptions, which he termed 'brushes'. Being a man of the world, I pride myself on having amassed a good mental inventory of equipment associated with the arts, and these were emphatically not brushes. However, it must be said that whatever devilry this man brought onto the estate, it silenced the Hoover laundry box and enabled me to hunt down the wretched Bertha, wearing clean breeches.

Given that I don't fully comprehend the workings of these so-called 'brushes', I am disinclined to offer them a rating, irrespective of how well they do their job.

----------------

Je suis Charlie

Station of Critical Review by Kennedy Hiscox-Wormegay: Fred Dibnah greetings card

Happy Year of the New, bloggophiles! After the unprecedented success of the critical review of 'Christmas Is Really Fantastic' by that smooth crooner, Frank Sidebottom, it is of extreme necessity that a return is made by the one writer, me, Hiscox-Wormegay. Sidebottom's Christmas offering shot back into the charts following my review, peaking at no. 1 in the Halifax Woolworth vinyl charts, allowing Sidebottom Industries to hire an aggressive legal team which now spends every waking hour trawling the netspace for sound pirates and image tealeaves to send to the e-gallows.

Up to be roasted on this fine evening is something I hoped never to roll eyes across. Imagine the scenario. It's 7.30am and it's your birthday. You've gone to bed late, excited at the prospect of no one reminding you how old and decrepit you've become. Yet some youth-saturated privy stain claiming to be your niece or nephew has dispatched to you a card, in which they have scribed some wit intended to enrage you.  And splashed across the front of the card, like a herring gull struck against the canopy of a BAe Typhoon, is that hideous of northerly, coal-encrusted dumplings, Fred Dibnah.  Now, this is not intended as a slur against the short, lumpy steeple pervert. Indeed, I dare not utter a single nastiness against the good name of the rotund steam imp. But nothing reminds one of the decay of nature quite so much as the laughing, sooty face of Dibnah.

Flat cap pie: Fred Dibnah. (©2014 Robert M. Follen. Used with permission.)

You've pictured the scene, and you've wept lumpy tears at the thought of it. However, it may become a reality. Bob Art Models, a relatively new outfit from Fenlander-Falklander-Fenlander-Suffolk-Londerner-Northerner Robert Follen, is producing micro-batches of these hideous caricatures, available as 140x140mm cards. That's not all Bob Art Models produces; I shall be reviewing other monstrosities over the coming months. But Dibnah is a good place to start for one very excellent reason: it sells. Now, I've seen a lot of the world. In the early years of last century, I led an expedition of forty men to Northern Africa and managed to make it back with almost three of them - for which I was knighted. (I gave the knighthood back when my 2003 single "How To Kill Pygmies" failed to chart.) But in all my travels, I've never met someone who could put Dibnah on a card and get people to part with cash for it - even if it is a very reasonable £2.50 (carriage is free!). Follen is clearly some kind of a genius; he could sell moral destitution to the Taliban and E numbers to Disneyland.

So, as is traditional in reviews, it's time to put stars all over Fred - or not, as may be the case.

There you go, five stars. That means that despite internal protestations, you should go to Bob Art Models's celebrity card repository here and buy up all Robert's stock.

Station of Critical Review by Kennedy Hiscox-Wormegay: Christmas is Really Fantastic - Frank Sidebottom

Being of Solstice Season, I, Kennedy Hiscox-Wormegay of the nearly-Republic of Scotland am in the happy position of being well-placed to offer up a critical response to the Christmas cash-in novelty song "Christmas Is Really Fantastic" by the rock monolith and Timperley tour guide, Frank Sidebottom. His behemothic porportions, entertainally-speaking, are such that any effort by which I might attempt to make avoidance with regards offering up said critical response would be professional suicide.

Owing to my detestation of wordy and letter-spattered ramblings, it is probably of maximised benefit to you, the reader, that I say nothing about this fun-but-irritating E.P. except that it exactly what one should be in the position of expecting from the cephalically-spheroid Sidebottom: song-like (but not excessively so), lyrically competent (yet somehow deceptively incompetent), nasal (yet throaty) and circular - except when purchased on audio cassette, in which case it's to be found crushed and distorted into a rectangular shape.

Nineteen eighty-six was the year in which this here 7" single was ejected upon an unsuspecting public horde. Many people died. Some people didn't. None of that had anything to do with the single's release. But that is the nature of life. Frank might have testified to that, lyrically, in one of the E.P.'s songs. But he didn't. Instead, he chose to squeeze song juice from the oranges of such issues as Christmas, a town called Mull, which is where autograph hunters attack Paul McCartney, and Demon Axe Warriors.

This wouldn't be a review unless this song was in receipt of some hot, gaseous, celestial bodies, so I shall oblige, as is the tradition of my opinionated heritage, with four of them.