Blag Lady and Dr Blog entertained at home for the customary Christmas drinks with champagne and oysters free flowing. Guests arrived and did or didn’t smoke in the front room/back room/take off shoes/christen the new bathroom etc. Dr Blog cracked open quite a few live molluscs, which, being in season, were small, slippy, salty and sea-y. We stuck to champagne as the drink of choice for a full four hours. It was tres tres sophisticated. As the end of the evening approached there was a general move to continue proceedings chez Zandy just down the road. Lady Bling and the Queen of Hearts missed the cab cavalcade and so walked the few short streets down the hill. On the way they passed two fellas, who were deemed to be quite presentable. Moments later Lady Bling felt a rush of wind through her russet locks and the two men ran at them, split them up and attempted to relieve them of their worldly goods. LB shrieked like a banshee and brought good folk to their front doors. But neighbourly help did not arrive before Ms Queenie was pushed to a stairwell floor and kicked in the head a dozen times as she clung on to her Christmas presents for family in Prague.

So an ambulance was duly called. It’s funny, I’ve been reading that Random Acts of Reality blog by Tom Reynolds ambulance-man supremo of the cyber universe and real life paramedic to boot. Now I know we’re supposed to feel in awe of all the great work these noble heroes do, but the ambulance crew that transported us to the hospital that night were smug, patronising and out of order. And let’s get this straight: we do pay their meagre wages. After asking a lot of seemingly friendly questions about the party, they dropped us off at the hospital and informed us at the desk that a ’sober’ member of staff would be there to look after us in due course. Naturally, Blag Lady enquired as to whether they had drunken members of staff as an alternative, as their rather pointed statement seemed to imply.

Yes, we’d all had one or two drinks, it being Christmas and all, but it was hardly ‘binge-drinking-bint gets trolleyed and raped and so deserved it anyway’ territory. According to Tom Reynolds (Mr Random Acts) these guys spend their time mopping up regurgitated Bacardi Breezers with added carrot chunks from the ambulance floor or avoiding HIV/Hep C infection from frothing junkies: so quite frankly you’d think the’d count themselves lucky to have anyone with half a brain and a strong stomach in the back of the vehicle. When we arrived at A&E the last drop off was a man who had been stabbed in the back with a crack pipe – surely a sign of keeping bad company if ever there was one.

You offer these neanderthals (yes, that’s NHS employees to whom I refer) a moment of intelligent discourse and are lumped in with the rest of the puking proletariat. It’s rather like these volunteer police constable types, they do need reminding: ‘no you are NOT doctors, and no you have not been to med school, and you’re not nurses either’. I’ll save my cap doffing for real professionals – aka corporate lawyers. Next time I come across this overinflated puffball of the species I’ll be sure to speak with them in a language they understand – vomit au oysters and champagne.

That spleen vented I end with the muggers’ swag inventory: a Marks and Spencer’s carrier bag containing nothing but a bag of black and white boiled sweets. Humbugs.

G-Force celebrated a significant birthday this weekend. Lady Bling and the Poodle gallivanted off into the sunset but I stayed home and watched telly instead. This included the special investigative documentary in the follow up to the inquiry into whether the royal family got the secret service to bump off Lady Di. The basic thrust was ‘the British public doesn’t want to believe Diana died an ordinary death because she was so speshal so we have constructed a mythical narrative that better suits her stature’. Momo El Fayed said yes, the British establishment couldn’t cope with a princess pregnant by a playboy arab so MI6 did the dirty deed. Her mate Lady Sarah-Somebody said no, Diana wasn’t pregnant because when they were on the yacht ‘and there is no delicate way to put this’ – she had her period. Many conspiracy theories were bandied about involving a dodgy French driver cum police informer, a white Fiat and 11 broken CCTV cameras. Dr Blog, despite a diet high in fibre and Le Carre was unmoved and logical as ever. I found it utterly plausible and completely ridiculous at the same time. I really want to imagine Her Majesty, looking rather like Judi Dench as M, barking out ‘the order’ but I can’t somehow.

Paranoia is the lifeblood of all conspiracy theories, as is very detailed, intricate and often tenuous information that usually involves the Knights of the Garter, Dan Brown and men in pointed hats. However, I have long held by the belief that ‘just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean it’s not happening’. The same goes for the Queen of Hearts. When she did that Martin Bashir interview I thought she looked like a desperate woman trying to keep her kids and someone who was truly afraid for her life. It’s weird, but two weeks before ‘the accident’ when I saw those pictures of Dodi El Fayed and Lady Di on the yacht a thought flashed through my mind: I thought, ’she’s not going to get away with this, she’s not got long’. Afterwards, I took this prescience as a post-mass-hysteria-hallucination type of thing that I had made up as my own ‘I knew it was going to happen’ myth.

I don’t know who killed Bambi and I don’t know why Di died, but I do know the ‘must gawp at road kill’ gene is strong in all of us. That’s why Pete Doherty’s interesting. Not because he’s ‘one of the nation’s greatest poets’ (it’s always the pop stars, isn’t it: how come no poets ever get that accolade?) or even because he is Mr Kate Moss, although that does add a certain lustre, but because he’s a walking car crash. (Mixed metaphor, tasteless pun and a cliche in three words, good going Blag…). Pondering on Di and Pete made me think about that bloke Jamie Blandford. Remember him? Pete may have been arrested in Westminster – Lord Jamie Blandford owned Westminster, but was last seen on the South Kilburn estate – which is not like the Highgrove Estate – in 1989 riding a BMX trying to score/sell crack. It was painful, ugly and yet utterly irresistible to watch.

So, back to the making of myth. When she was alive I thought Diana with her crap hair and yucky see through shirts and skirts and royal blue shoulder padded suits with lace ruff necks was a silly bint who should have been whacked by the fashion police. Then Mario Testino got involved and saved her bacon. But the Style Squad are the real crack force. They don’t forget. Just like THEY REMEMBER Susannah (as in Trinny and Susannah) when she was a Sloane with a Barbour, a twinset and an Alice band. The Style Squad would have taken appropriate action. Mario Testino or no Mario Testino. Elton too should watch his back. Now THAT would have been a believable theory.

You know how there are some areas whose charms are lost on all but those who live there? I always felt that way about Kensal Rise. Then there was the Tornado. Now Kensal Risers can feel proud of their own Freak Street Status. ‘It’s global warming’ said M. ‘But didn’t they have tornadoes in London suburbs before climate change?’ I queried. ‘The point is they won’t get any insurance because it’s classed as an Act of God.’ I’m glad to report I was wrong: the Act of God Clause does not appear to apply here. Actually I’m not glad to report that I was wrong, just glad that the folks without walls and roofs can claim on their insurance. There’s something really annoying and crap about having to report you were wrong or even choosing to report you were wrong. The Sun says it is global warming, and if the Sun says it’s global warming, well, it must be. As a matter of fact if it is global warming then that is an Act of Man ( I would say Act of Humankind, but surely that would be inaccurate?) and therefore of course the Act of God clause could not then apply. Have you noticed how now you never get those cod-scientific think tanks sponsored by gas guzzling/peddling corporates issuing reports on how climate change is a load of hippy shit perpetrated by Greenpeace sandal eaters anymore? Funny that. Maybe they don’t like having to report they were wrong either.

Last weekend we stayed with friends in Suffolk and came across this very genteel protest on Aldeburgh High Street. Everything on Aldeburgh High Street is genteel, so an animal rights protest was no exception. I asked the two women pictured if I could take their photo and they said yes as long as I didn’t say anything horrid about them, which of course I would not. This ladies’ retailers is ironically called G & C Butcher, although it sells twinsets, pearls and fur instead of lamb shanks and pork chops. I was given a pink leaflet that said it takes 56 squirrels to make a fur coat, 47 minks etc. I’ve lost the leaflet now, but it haunted me because it had a picture of a fox in a cage which had gnawed its front foot to the bone. We had just been in the butchers in fact, where pheasant was purchased for dinner that night. The next day we also saw a man crouched in the marshes with a gun. He was hunting duck. I think a duck being blasted out of the sky for dinner is fine. Likewise pheasant. Blag Lady says let the birds fly free. Not like these songbirds I saw in Alicante. I wish I’d gone in and bought them and released them to die in the wild.

As I write this I realise I’m surrounded by animals and animal effigies. A postcard lies to my left with seven fondant fancy pigs on it. Their snouts are made of icing and their eyes are chocolate drops. I’ve got a picture of a Dodo on my notice board that says ‘life’s a bitch and then you’re extinct’. A dragon biting its tail is guarding my back door. In the front room I have an ebony monkey from Senegal. A blue glass owl keeps an eye on me from a ledge in the study and I’ve just rehoused a crab-coloured octopus from our newly minimalist bathroom called Sausalito Sid. There is a plastic sheep behind him that I plan to send to Bad Cop mentor as soon as I have recovered the posting gene. Outside in the horse chestnut tree there has been a flock of 17 green parakeets all summer. They make a squeaky screeching noise, that sounds like they are rubber bath toys. They do things as a flock. And then they do not. They have long tails and I suppose they perch rather than nest. As Blag Lady is a distinctly urban creature there is something miraculous about them. Why are they here? Climate change must help. Urban folk lore says they are pet escapees. I saw some in the palm trees in Barcelona above the bird market in the Ramblas. I like to think they exact a wet white revenge from the sky as they screech and circle above their former captors’ heads. Meanwhile I wonder if my flock back home will survive on conkers this winter. The tree is diseased now: a result of the mild winter last year. Apparently a moth that should die off in the cold didn’t and lots of horse chestnuts might die. I try to put that thought out of my mind.

MORE INFO ON MY ROSE-RINGED PARAKEETS.

You know how sometimes you wish you’d thought of something first? The Tetra Brick is a good example. Mr Tetra Brick is very rich. Getting rich off a blog is another matter altogether, and getting rich by being God is even trickier. The other night Sexy Sam organised a night out at Raymond’s Revue Bar, or as it is now known the Soho Review Bar for an evening of comedy. It was good. Not stand-up, but live sketches. A chap came on and introduced himself as God, and then read excerpts from his (God’s) blog, which was mainly about living with a couple called Amber and Nick and how he ended up shagging Amber which was not all that due to a combination of omnipotence, omnipresence and omniscience, but not, it would appear, impotence. God does not fire blanks or fail to get it up to fire blanks etc etc. After the comedy, the party crowd arrived, including an angel with some large, white feathery wings that looked rather heavy as he attempted to shimmy round the pole dancing pole in his white hot pants.

If it wasn’t for that fact that I have seen God’s Blog and also heard him read from it on stage I might doubt the existence of God. Not like Stephen Hawkins with his God Delusion – yes, it’s true, Stephen Hawkins has written a whole book about how he is actually God and just because he can do maths people believe it – but because surely if there was a God FELLAS LIKE THIS would not be left abandoned on London’s winter streets. Admittedly they are warmer these days, which is God’s special way of saying ‘fuck you’, but even so, do you not think that God cares about the stuffed animal kingdom? Teddys have souls and it’s our job to save them. Apparently there is a verb ‘drifting’ which also applies to the photographic capture of abandoned animal effigies. It’s a bit like the Big Game Hunters of the 19th Century in their plus fours.

Blag Lady’s teddys were stolen when she was still quite young while they were sitting out on the front step on an old teak hymn book shelf (hymnal?) so perhaps this explains this latent need. Perhaps God is a teddy? The devil is surely a teddy thief. That’s easy. You would have to be Beelzebub himself to commit such a crime. Let’s see: teddys are omnipresent. Yes, teddys are everywhere all at the same time. That is indisputable. Teddy’s are omniscient: they know if something bad is going to happen. Okay I am going to have to admit defeat. Teddys are not omnipotent. I’ve tried to work it through and I won’t bore you with the details. So, perhaps we can safely say that teddys are demi-Gods. They fulfill nearly all the criteria.

Also, happy birthday to fellow ONIOMANIAC Louisa who shares her birthday with Ms Peachy. I feel like a Radio 2 dj or a pirate: going out to the Peach and the Birthday massive. Now, there’s the answer I forgot. God, as everybody knows, is a DJ.