Oh My God - They Killed Kenny - You Hirsute, Scottish Bastard! continued (3/3) By Silver Fox

(1/3), (2/3), (3/3)

Whatever Happened to ...

Those little, sticky, rubber octopi that you threw at the wall and were supposed to climb down it but never actually did..? Music and Lies (Left, two, three..right, two, three..turn, two, three..bile, two, three..)

..some people, including the ginger one out of King Rupert and a cat from Mr Ed are now in a band called Rain Dogs. They play songs on instruments and perform gigs in venues..many lost souls are to be seen around Happy Hull looking bemused at graffiti reading: Kick the slats from the playpen. Now, in this very information super-lay-by, the truth can be revealed! Kick the slats from the playpen are an exciting new act in the long-thought-defunct punk/gregorian chant/skiffle/salsa genre.

They aim to bring music back to the greasy-fingered exhibitionists of this community as well as communities all over the world, and from what I've heard of them, they might just do it. See their debut show at The Bonny Boat near Bob Carver's chip-shop on Wed. 20th October, tickets £14,000/59p - concs.. .. rattling into view once more is that oft-whispered rumour that charismatic local outfit Ernest are high-ranking archimandrites in a cult devoted to the abolition of all earthly pleasures in favour of spiritual enlightenment through constant exposure to the little lavender bags that old people think prevent their clothes stinking of piss. It's not true, probably says someone that has never heard of them .. Blind Frog Ernie (not pictured) .. more soon .. Fuck-Knuckle of the Week (An occasional series profiling the people who thicken and perfume Hull's unique swamp of spiritual death)

This week, I'm nominating whichever nameless functionary at Hull City Council it was that enabled the new ruling on graveyard displays to be passed. Simply put, the new regulations mean that those people, who wish to festoon their loved ones' plots with childhood toys, photos, etc, are no longer allowed to do so.

Anyone caught contravening this draconian new by-law will be fined and sent packing before they've even wiped the tears of mourning from their bereaved faces. As near as I can recall some numpty on the news saying - and you must bear in mind that I was too busy foaming at the mouth and kicking the furniture around to record his words with cool, journalistic aplomb - these bittersweet mementoes are distracting and disturbing to other mourners.

Personally, I'm not much of a one for hanging around the necropolis with a lump in my throat, but if I was, I'd be very aware that grief is a very personal, private affair. We each remember those dear ones who have gone to their reward in our own way; whether it's a simple, stark headstone or illuminated diorama illustrating their lives up until the experiment in auto-erotic asphyxiation went horribly wrong. I find it highly unlikely that anybody who goes to commune with a departed soul is going to be put out by a few snapshots and a mildewed Womble plonked on the next marker.

And nobody who is so consumed by loss that they devote the rest of their lives to turning a grave into one of those Mexican Day of the Dead sort of things is going to bother in tut-tutting at those who lay a simple wreath. They're all going to be too busy filling Kleenexes with their private pain to give a tuppenny fuck about what the mourners next-door are up to.

No; the only people here who are sticking their noses into other peoples' business are Hull City Council. Presumably, the only people who find an excess of graveside paraphernalia distracting and disturbing are those responsible for keeping maintenance costs down so that the city's money can go to important things - that big TV and Name Omitted Due to Legal Advice's Internet subscription; stuff like that.

Foxy's Final Fought

I'll tell you who've got it sewn up, shall I? Xenobiologists. I don't know what sort of college courses you have to take to get yourself going as one of these mountebanks, but considering that xenobiology is the study of extra-terrestrial life forms, I shouldn't think that it involves a particularly onerous study regime, would you?

A vivid imagination and being able to cut a dash in a white coat should just about see you through, I'd have thought, and then it's hello, big money!

This occurred to me at the weekend while I was watching some documentary or other about Life On Other Worlds and saw one of these chancers - presumably being tolerably well-wedged for his input - glibly hypothesising away. I may only be a bookishly-charming singer/songwriter/internet sage with lovely hair, I thought to myself, but I could do that in a New York minute. So, if any NASA spooks are reading this, and would like to know more about the very imminent threat that could very well be being posed by the carnivorous Living Shoes of Pluto, get your chequebooks out and contact me c/o thisisUll.com.

I've drawn a picture of what I think they might look like and everything. Admittedly, they're probably not all purple, but it was the only felt-tip I could find in my desk at the time.

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