A Tale of the Extinguished Moon

Mad scientist and Laurie Anderson impersonator Professor Stephen Hawking has warned that there are aliens out there, and they may be less welcoming than the inhabitants of Llanfrothen.

When it comes to astronauts Hawking knows what he's talking about, so for once I agree with him: we need to be careful not to provoke these deranged space bugs.

It's only a matter of time before the triphallic crab pupae of Queequeg IV intercept a live broadcast of a U2 concert and naturally launch a battery of intergalactic sulphuric spunk missiles at the general Isle of Man area.

I'm aware that I may not measure up to Guardian or BBC standards in terms of celebrating the vibrant diversity of cultural responses to encounters with The Other, but on this occasion I simply don't want to be drowned and fried in flying space spoff because some interdimensional star-spawn blames me for Bono.

And further two-handed research on the Intern Net has established that we will only have ourselves to blame for our imminent obliteration.

You see, at some point in the otherwise excellent 1970s, Mankind sent the Voyager 1 spaceship into the cosmic ether with a message of greeting for any bored xenomorphs out there.

What NASA hurled skywards was a vinyl 33" containing a "Hooked on Bach" record, Da Vinci's drawing of a man with six limbs, and a porn flick. A 1970s porn flick, with bad hair, wicka-wacka plastic funk soundtrack and lots of lobstering. Oh, and it was narrated by Jimmy Carter.

It would be harder to imagine a more irritating communication without involving George Galloway and Jive Bunny. Moreover, it gave an inaccurate impression of the human race, shower of bastards though we may be.

I think we need to correct these mistakes fast, and send a new cosmopod beyond Pluto with a fair representation of what we have to offer our distant neighbours.

The vessel should contain a pair of Manolo Blahniks, a recording of a man breaking wind, and a Benny Hill DVD. The shoes and gastric eruption tell you all there is to know about the respective sexes, and Benny Hill sums up modern civilisation in an unflinching yet digestible manner.

The 1970s mission also lacked a crucial contribution from our Soviet co-planetarians. From the mid-1950s onwards the Russians liked nothing better than to fire small animals at Saturn, hence all the monkey skeletons in decaying orbits around the Earth and that little dog who's probably now worshipped as a demiurge on Neptune.

This Great Coalition of Ours is trying to improve relations with the Kremlin on the basis of a shared interest in evil, so I propose that we honour the Reds' previous space endeavours by packing Limahl out of Kajagoogoo into the cone of the craft.

He would give the aliens a fair idea of what pets Paris Hilton likes. And an affordable supply of Ryvita, hair gel and Embassy Number 1s ought to keep him going, given his slender build and necessarily restricted movements.

The Betelgeusians would be impressed by our level of development and obviously benign intent, especially the concern we show to the bald, Irish and underdressed in the work of Hill, and would request a meeting of envoys.

The obvious choice would be a delegation from the United Nations General Assembly, but I'm not sure that alien life is as convinced that the problematic emissions in the Horseshoe Nebula are all the fault of Israel. So I'd suggest a small mission of the sagest groovers we have to offer.

There is an emerging consensus that the acme of all human achievement - cultural, intellectual, acrobatic and erotic - was reached in the British popular music scene in 1980-1994.

From this Golden Bough I would pluck the first and finest fruits to establish contact with the carnivorous kelp of Alpha Centauri, namely Shakin' Stevens, Pete Wylie, and Bez out of The Happy Mondays.

Shaky combines hip-gyration with deserved modesty, Wylie has the righteous, random wrath of Jeremiah, and Bez adds something of Zen as well as pharmacology. They will be universally respected in the Heavens as they are on Earth.

The reply from the Venusians is easy to predict. "We thank you for the welcome afforded by Ambassador Shaky and the warning about the Sony Corporation provided by Special Envoy Wylie. We shall endeavour to seek out and neutralise this threat with our scrotal infibulator beam.

"Soon we shall send our own leading scholars to share their starry wisdom with your elders, those who are learnèd in your science of hydroponics, that which they call "Gabba", and the Belgian House.

"As for Counsellor Bez, we ask that he tarry a while with us. We have so much to learn from him. Oh, and Limahl is doing splendidly in our maritime breeding programme."

The Midrash Rabbah to Genesis 3:9 posits that God created and destroyed many worlds before He allowed this one to dangle harmlessly just beneath the Moon for a few thousand years.

Let us not give Him good cause to destroy the Earth again for all our sins.

But above all let us not irk the alkaloid rhombuses of Cnychbant Felix into doing the same, just because we wouldn't frogmarch Simply Red and Edwina Currie onto a leaky coracle off the North Korean coast and let international geo-politics take its course.

...and the Pope said...

"It's butter!"

Any the wiser? Neither am I.

Wanker Ashman told an interminable joke one dinner in college, and my mind went forth to slay approved dragons and weave baroque fancies of the érotique half way through.

I returned from Cappadocia via both of the girls out of Strawberry Switchblade in time for the punchline, with which I began this post.

Pride precluded me from asking Wanker to explain, so I've spent the last 28 years haunted by what John Paul II's dairy dilemma had been (while hoping it had nothing to do with choirboys and Last Tango in Paris).

The same thing happened today. I lapped into The Tethered Goat at 1630 sharp to take delivery of my quart of Champion's Speckled Johnson, only to hear our local barrister end an anecdote with the scholarly flourish: "... but I have told a donkey to fuck off!"

Cue gummy guffaws from the assembled rustics, but I'm frankly baffled by this rhetorical pay-off. What was the feed line?

• "Have you ever shunned a Shetland?"
• 
  
• "Do you parlay with ponies?"
• 
  
• "How about Muffin the Mule?"

The last might be the key to the puzzle, but I was too aware of how the nearby village of Gallowstree Common got its name to distract my quaffing companions from their pewter pots of Abdication Special.

This prompts me to propose a new department of state to this Great Coalition of Ours. I know we are meant to be minding the exchequer and what have you, but frontline public services are a top-shelf priority.

Never mind hospitals and edjucation, I'm talking about re-establishing bonds of respect across the generations and passing on ancient lore from elders to young striplings. We need a Department of Retrospective Anecdote Completion.

This institution would soon replace the National Health and the chaps who leave porn mags under hedges in the public affection. It would not only benefit confused middle-aged drinkers, but also bring slack-trousered youth into the snug bars of Britain to ask their bearded betters about the one that ends "and there was a piece of sweetcorn on the end of it".

Before writing to Theresa May, and not anonymously this time, I'd like to gather some more examples of stories whose punchlines dawdle in the marshalling yard as the set-up and elaboration steam away. Apart from the three cited above, can you Cymru Rouge cadres and fellow-travellers alike think of any others?

One that still nags me in the small hours is "Thank you, Mother Superior, but these Fokkers were Messerschmitts!"

Answers below, please. In the meantime, here's some music:

Myn Duw, mi a wn y daw

A message to all Cymru Rouge supporters:

Fear not, human silage, your votes would not have been wasted.

This Con-Lib affair can't last. Despite the protestations of dominatrices the length and breadth of Baker St, there is only so much humiliation a liberal can take.

The Conservatives too will tire of bleating requests for fair trade ginseng tea at cabinet meetings, Chris Huhne, and elaborate pantomimes of self-protection down the golf club toilets.

It won't need 55% of MPs to dissolve parliament once we're in charge, just an acid bath and a winch.

Then the Day of the Rouge will dawn.

Henffych!

Paul Pot, etc

O Golomendy'r Ddwy Eglwys

An explanation for my long silence. Not an apology, of course, as the election is over and there's no more grovelling from us, you turkey necks.

With no party enjoying anything, let alone a working majority, in the Westminster Parliament, we in the Cymru Rouge are ready to play our role.

The Liberal Democrats received fewer votes than either the Conservatives or Labour, lost several seats and came in third in terms of mandates won. If this makes them kingmakers in the pissoirs of power, then just think how greater is the right to rule of the Rouge, who received no votes at all (apart from MC Ward's postal effort, which I'm proud to say he entrusted to our Passenger Pigeon service rather than the monarchist Royal Mail).

To this end, we present Mr Cameron with our minimum programme:

1. Not a hung parliament, but a hanged parliament. He went to Eton and ought to be able to sort the strong from the weak - both verbs and honourable members.

Mass execution of the Commons would solve the electoral dilemma, provide cheap entertainment for the cowled plague victims of London Town, and focus the minds of any estate agents, duff lawyers, National Union of Students hacks or women who might have considered standing for Westminster next time.

It would also leave the House of Lords as the sole parliamentarians, thereby justifying any jacquerie the bondsmen of England might fancy. Parading a naked, dung-smeared Baroness Kinnock around Lambeth in a cage made of her husband's live bones might seem excessive, but trust a Welshman - it isn't.

Some cadres have asked how the Cymru Rouge can back hanging, as our traditional method of dispatch is the slate enema. The answer the Prif Sasiwn handed down is that we expect the Tories to make concessions, and so must be prepared to meet them halfway on tactical questions before shoving them over the abandoned pit heads of the Rhondda, again and again.

2. Edjucation. This must stop, and we know that the Conservatives agree.

The failed rice harvests that Camden trustafarians, BBC staff and George Monbiot will be busy sieving through their cheesecloth shirts (see Economic Policies and Recreation) must be stored somewhere, and schools, colleges, Kindergärten and non-Russell-Group universities would make excellent silos.

The "new universities" and the University of Wales will remain open, and all surviving academics will be accommodated therein. We expect the sherry drought, heterosexuality and encounters with the student body will take care of them within months.

3. Foreign Policy. Like the Tories, we harbour a deep scepticism about Europe.

They see little to be gained from further expansion of the European Union, consider the euro to be an unwarranted erosion of British sovereignty, and oppose the disaggregation of any more powers to Brussels.

We just don't think Europe should exist, and propose a joint invasion with Communist China. Remember, we are Maoists.

In order to win unthinking Conservative support for a Redder East, we would form an Axis of Edwardian Evil. The Chinamen could dress up like Fu Manchu (and his foxy daughter, we hope), while we will affect the tifter, knuckledusters and kerchief of the East End footpad.

Once we've partitioned the Continent into East Suffolk, Brittany and the Yáng Guǐzi Zìzhìqū Autonomous Region, we'll squeeze the Cabinet into Ulsters, Piccadilly Weepers, Prince Alberts and other late-Victorian charivari, then Nayland their Smiths with an opium pipe.

4. Financial Management. The Conservatives have made a manifesto pledge to cut the budget deficit this fiscal year, while blocking any increase in employers' National Insurance contributions.

We wish to replace the Stock Exchange with the sound of insects feeding on the corpse of Capital.

As you can imagine, this amounts to much the same thing.

So, Mr Cameron, the Cymru Rouge coal mine is open for business. Our shaft is long and dark. Our veins throb with promise. Come plunge our depths. It's time to get some closure.

I'r Gad!

Paul Pot - Brawd Rhif Un

Huw Samphan - Brawd Rhif Dau

Ta Moc Tudor - Brawd Rhif Tri

Mike Peters (out of The Alarm) - Brawd Blawd, Beiblaidd

Prif Sasiwm y Cymry Rouge.