Even Stranger Than Fiction

April Fool's Day might be long gone, but the bizarre news stories just keep on coming. Today we had two women apparently attempting to re-enact Weekend at Bernie's by attempting to check a dead relative on to a flight to Berlin. They'd already got him as far the airport in a taxi. Sadly, they didn't go quite as far I had hoped - they merely pretended he was asleep and had him in a wheelchair, rather than operating his arms with strings, or propping hi up with a broomhandle up his backside. Nor did they try any ventriloquism. Mind you, Weekend at Bernie's wasn't the only movie being re-enacted in recent weeks. Out in the Far East, a South Korean warship was mysteriously and suddenly sunk near North Korean waters, ramping up tension between the two countries. Was it a covert act of aggression by those crazy North Koreans? Or was it part of a wild scheme on the part of a mad media tycoon to cause war between the two Koreas and sell the exclusive TV rights? Can we expect to see a North Korean missile test go wrong next, apparently as a result of South Korean sabotage? Have I seen Tomorrow Never Dies too many times?

Whatever is going on out in Korea, I'm sure we'll send our top man out to deal with it, doubtless on some flimsy pretext that something happening on the other side of the world somehow presents a direct threat to British interests. A bit like Afghanistan. Or Iraq. Anyway, whatever the reason, we'll dispatch our best undercover agent, booking him into several top hotels under his own name and making out sure the villain knows exactly who he is and what he's up to well in advance. Doubtless it will all end with several large explosions but, incredibly, no diplomatic incidents. Frankly, I'm always mildly surprised that most James Bond movies don't climax with him giving the villain a good seeing to up the jacksie, before zipping up his fly and leaving the bad guy nursing his stinging arse and reflecting on how foolish he was in taking on Britain's mighty manhood. I mean, it all makes sense - the fact that 007's a public schoolboy, all those exaggerated displays of macho heterosexuality, the obsession with his 'weapon', the male bonding with the likes of Felix Leiter and the obligatory torture at the hands of the villain. If all that doesn't point to closet homosexuality, I don't know what does. So, I'll be watching the next Bond movie, waiting for the denouement, when Daniel Craig drops his trousers and takes some North Korean warlord roughly from behind.