A cheeky little thought
KIM Kardashian turns 36 today. If she decides for some reason to re-locate to Kensington, Denis Bruce muses, would she be known as the London Derriere?
The penny drops
RUSSELL Smith, his gaze alighting on our convenience story yesterday, tells us that after enjoying a meal in the then Yugoslavia, in the 1980s, he approached a waitress and said that he would like to pay.
She called over a waiter, who took him to the door marked WC.
Urbane gorilla
ZSL London Zoo went into lockdown last week after Kumbuka, a silverback gorilla, made a bid for freedom and drank five litres of undiluted blackcurrant squash before being tranquilised. “I’m just glad that it all ended cordially,” said someone who was commenting on the story yesterday.
Close but no cigar
SO there was Tom Russell, the distinctively bearded Scottish rock DJ, attending the Sonisphere Festival down at Knebworth, and staying in his usual hotel.
One Sunday morning, as he relates in his forthcoming autobiography, The Godfather of Rock (pre-order a signed copy for £14.99 on www.tomrussellrocks.com), he got up for an early breakfast and found himself in a lift with six women in their forties. Tom could sense there was a bit of a confab going on. Eventually one of them exclaimed, “It is him.”
He writes: “As I got out of the lift, one of them said, ‘Do you mind if we get an autograph?’ I’m thinking, ‘They must be from Glasgow.’ Then they asked for photographs, and I obliged before they wandered off. Just as they turned the corner, however, I saw one of them looking at the autograph and saying, ‘Who the hell’s Tom Russell?’”
Seasick Steve, the distinctively-bearded US blues musician, had been playing nearby the night before. Got it in one - the women thought Tom was Steve.
A cultured exchange
TEXTING mishaps by adults are the subject of a new book, OMFG: Why Parents Should (Still) Never Text!, by Oscar Harris (BW). Some of the entries are so off-colour that the Diary would be sent home in disgrace if it attempted to publish them, but this one we like. Dad: “Did you move my yoghurt?” Offspring: “No.” Dad: “Looks like the fridge has a case of the Paranormal Activia.”
Making Gatsby great again
AN amusing hashtag on Twitter, arising from the US presidential debate in Las Vegas, imagines book reports as written by a teenage Donald Trump. The kick being, of course, that The Donald has often said that he is too busy to read books.
Among the best ones:
* “Gatsby? He says he was great. I don’t know. People are saying maybe not so great. I’ll make Gatsby great again.”
* “Little Women? Look at their Facebook page. That Jo walked in front of me, and I don’t think so, folks, I don’t think so.”
* “Hogwarts. Tremendous place. They built a wall to keep out the Muggles, I have so much respect. I have property there.”
* “What was Aslan thinking when he made Narnia? Talking animals? I’ll deport them.”
* “It was the best of times? Wrong. It was the worst of times. Bigly bad hombres. Believe me I can make the times great again.”
* “Catch 22? I’ll catch all of ‘em. And believe me folks, I’ll send them back.”
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