BBC NEWSAmericasAfricaEuropeMiddle EastSouth AsiaAsia Pacific
BBCiNEWS  SPORT  WEATHER  WORLD SERVICE  A-Z INDEX    

BBC News World Edition
    You are in: UK 
News Front Page
Africa
Americas
Asia-Pacific
Europe
Middle East
South Asia
UK
England
N Ireland
Scotland
Wales
Politics
Education
Business
Entertainment
Science/Nature
Technology
Health
-------------
Talking Point
-------------
Country Profiles
In Depth
-------------
Programmes
-------------
BBC Sport
News image
BBC Weather
News image
SERVICES
-------------
News image
EDITIONS
 Friday, 17 January, 2003, 17:50 GMT
Amazing tales from Planet Tabloid
This week, naked holidays, the perfect luggage in which to pack that factor 50, and our regular pun-writing competition. But first...

News image
Q: Pop moppet Britney Spears has kick-started her love life after last year's bruising split with Justin Timberlake. Who's the lucky fella?

A:Well that rather depends. It's either the aforementioned former mousketeer (Mirror) or it's tattooed badboy Fred Dunst of Limp Bizkit (Daily Mail and Sun). You decide.

Boxing for charity: Grant Bovey and Ricky Gervais
Gervais (right) and Bovey squared up for charidee
But what are you doing inside reading the red-tops when you could make like Ricky Gervais and J-Lo (never thought you'd see those two in the same sentence, huh?) and get ready to rumble.

Yes, combat is one of the hottest hobbies for 2003, and before long we will all be boxing, kick-boxing, and martial arting - all in the aim of getting fit. And, of course, being fashionable (cooking, DIY and yoga now officially being frowned upon).

Meanwhile, the Mirror has played cupid with the lovelorn unfortunates on Corrie, Brookie et al. As soap love = pain + heartache + humiliation, the only thing for it is to look beyond the character's street/square/close for their perfect match.

EastEnders' Kat Slater and Coronation Street's Dev Allahan are both natural-born flirts; and Enders' hardman Phil Mitchell is surely the soulmate of Brookside's Jacqui Farnham. Hark - is that wedding bells we hear?

No room

No room this week to bring you news about a number of exciting stories, including Kate Winslet's Photoshop diet. Last week GQ admitted to digitally trimming her curves; now Harper's Bazaar stands accused of grafting her head onto a slim body double.

Richard Branson naked
I do like to be beside the seaside
Neither is there room to tell you about how Britons just wanna be in the nuddie - bookings for naturist holidays are up a whopping 200%. Just remember to pack that factor 50.

And there's no space whatsoever to tell you about how MPs have been banned from sending rude e-mails. One Lib Dem complained that such a move would stymie even the grey man of politics: "Even John Major was known to describe colleagues as bastards."

News image
But there's always room for Punorama, the punning contest for amateurs who admire the headline writers' art.

Last week we invited you to pun away on the worrying warning from doctors that wearing Britney Spears-style hipsters can be a health hazard, trapping a nerve and then giving the wearer "tingling or burning" sensations.

Racing up the charts were Stephen Thompson and Phil Groves with their rival renditions of "Hip me baby one more time". But the pair face stiff competition from the melodious Bek Barker with a cover version of "Hipster be square"; "I've got the hippie hippie ache" from Darren Spicer is a new entry, while Robbo The Doc storms into the top ten with "It could cause a cute sciatica". Not 'alf! But still top of the pops is Ian Carson with that old classic "Midriff crisis".

Now that's over, please turn your attention to next week's offerings. Your puns, please, for the story that Sylvester Stallone is to bring back Rambo one more time, and the ultimate enemy he's going to be taking on is none other than Osama bin Laden.

On your marks. Set. Pun.

Your pun



Your name



News image
And so on to Planet Lifestyle, a world in which the broadsheets' style gurus reign supreme.

Thanks to no-frills airlines, Britons are rushing to have mini-breaks in places with no vowels. And a weekend away means a swish new bag to pack all those holiday essentials into, right?

Lo! Topshop has wrestled the humble shopping trolley off the blue-rinse brigade and restyled it for the High Street, reports the Daily Telegraph.

Even everyone's newly-favourite-again-cheeky-chappie Jamie Oliver has leopard print version which, he says, he picked up "in a gay area of Paris".

And in those weekends when you just can't get away, it's just the thing to wheel around the farmers' market.

Links to more UK stories are at the foot of the page.


 E-mail this story to a friend

Links to more UK stories

© BBC^^ Back to top

News Front Page | Africa | Americas | Asia-Pacific | Europe | Middle East |
South Asia | UK | Business | Entertainment | Science/Nature |
Technology | Health | Talking Point | Country Profiles | In Depth |
Programmes