Browned off

Tragic news for Gordon Brown. Desperate as he is to be considered as historically important as his predecessor, one thing is never going to happen. “We can only have one prime minister per century,” Matt Groening, creator of The Simpsons, told People after a sneak preview of the feature film in London. Tony Blair, remember, appeared in 2004. Despite invitations to every US president, he is the only world leader to have done so. Bill Clinton’s appearance – before you write in – was voiced by an actor. Hence all that business about him “doing it” with “real no-foolin’ pigs” in a shed.

Yvette Cooper, one half of Britain's first Cabinet-attending husband-and-wife team (the other half being Ed Balls) tells the Yorkshire Evening Post that fellow passengers on her London-to-Yorkshire train have grown used to her regular cries of dismay when she forgets whether her car is parked at Doncaster or Wakefield. Frequently, she says, she has to call her husband, in the hope that he hasn’t forgotten. Neither Cooper nor Balls is in charge of transport. Good.

A worrying conversation with Caprice, the model, at the launch of the fashion brand, Oli. “I don’t feel safe in London at all,” she told us. “I went to Israel? I was surrounded by all these Palestinians. And I’m, like, a Jew? I felt safer in Jerusalem than I do in London!” And we thought filling our streets with tiny, scared youths with enormous guns would be a bad idea. We have much to learn.

The on-again off-again relationship of Prince William and Kate Middleton is on . . . again. After two weeks of frantic speculation, rumour has it they are back together, for good, and will go public at an upcoming polo match. Ms Middleton has reportedly made more complaints to police about the paparazzi’s incessant pursuit of her. It’s not likely to ease off now.

It was 50 years ago today . . . that Paul McCartney first met John Lennon. Times have changed in the music industry and Sir Paul marked the event by playing an exclusive 90-minute set, including his new song, Here Today, for the iTunes online store before 350 download customers. A video of the show at the Institute of Contemporary Art will be available on iTunes within days.

Did we know that Sir John Major was a cub scout? According to the newsletter of the 1st Old Malden Cub Scouts, “he was certainly a Wolf Cub and went to camp too. Our most famous ex-member enjoyed scouting – without a uniform as his family was strapped for cash.” The picture shows a group of cubs, most in uniform. One, slightly familiar, is forlornly without. Oh, the pathos.

This week the Daily Mail ran a letter from Mrs Patricia Crick, of The Wirral, complaining about the grunts of female tennis players at Wimbledon. Strangely, an identical letter ran in their Irish sister paper, attributed to a Mrs Patricia McMahon, from the considerably more local Dundalk. Letters staff at the paper insist that this must be because of an error of labelling. Phew. Silly old us for having suspected it might be because they wrote both letters themselves.

Postscript

— Spotted: the newly liberated Patricia Hewitt at Garsington Opera, eschewing the black tie dress code in favour of white trainers. “Yes, it was muddy,” says our man with the little binoculars, “but the rest of us coped.”

— Startled to find ourselves in possession of real actual news, we can reveal that Christopher Prentice, formerly Her Majesty’s man in Jordan, is thought to have landed possibly the least desirable job in Whitehall, and will be the next Ambassador to Baghdad. Perhaps after that he can rearrange deck chairs on the Titanic.

— Green übercampaigner Jonathon Porritt has been so active in his fight to save the planet that he has flown more than 62,000 miles in the past year. Not great for his carbon footprint, as some of his fellow activists have pointed out. “Any activists/champions in this area need to be up-front about their own carbon footprint,” Porritt writes on his website, gallantly.

— James Hetfield, the frontman with US metal rockers Metallica, was apparently questioned by security officials at Luton airport when arriving for the Live Earth gig at Wembley. Friends put it down to his “Taliban-like beard”. We’re thinking of a particular scene in This Is Spinal Tap.

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