Foghorn - No. 50

SPECIAL SPORTS NUMBER

Issue 50The best of British cartooning talent

FOGHORN

FOOTYARATHON!Combined soccer and track events

Will it ever happen ?

with like totally awesome yah

Royal Wedding Supplement!

THE FOGHORN2 WWW.PROCARTOONISTS.ORG

NEWS

The magazine of the Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation (FECO UK)

FOGHORNFOGHORN Issue 50

Published in Great Britain by theProfessional Cartoonists’Organisation (FECO UK)

PCO PatronsLibby Purves Andrew MarrBill Tidy Martin Wainwright

Foghorn EditorBill Stott

tel: +44 (0) 160 646002email: [email protected]

Foghorn Sub-EditorRoger Penwill

tel: +44 (0) 1584 711854email: [email protected]

Foghorn Layout/DesignCathy Simpson

tel:+44 (0) 1527 570309email:[email protected]

PCO Press Offi ceemail: [email protected]

Web infoPCO (FECO UK) website:

http://www.procartoonists.org

BLOGHORNhttp://thebloghorn.org/

What is Foghorn? British cartoon art has a great, ignoble history and currently boasts a huge pool of talent. It

deserves a higher media presence than it currently enjoys. Our aim

is to make sure it gets it. We want to promote cartoon art domestically and internationally by encouraging high standards of artwork and service, looking after

the interests of cartoonists and promoting their work in all kinds

of media.

CopyrightAll the images in this magazine are the intellectual property and

copyright of their individual creators and must not be copied or reproduced, in any format,

without their consent.

Front Cover: John JensenBack Cover: Martin Honeysett

Foghorn (Online) ISSN 1758-6640

Glossop: 0 Pangolin: 38

So! The Great Day is almost upon us, and Foghorn leaps in with its own tribute to commoners throughout the nation. Never, in the fi eld of Royal shenanigans has so much tosh been talked by etc etc. And not content with providing you, dear readers, with unique insights into what it means to be a commoner (q.v. Cameron D. Rich but common), Foghorn steals a march on the 2012 running and jumping types with its

own authoritative view on various sweaty activities…and heralds the altogether wonderful Shrewsbury International Cartoon Festival. More commoners there than you can shake a felt tip at….

Bill Stott, Foghorn Ed.

Our Respects to Dave Parker

Dave Parker, cartoonist and good bloke died on the 18th of March. He had been battling with lung cancer, but his son reports that he was still making jokes right up to the very last moment.

Cartoon-wise, Dave had been there, done that, had a shedload of T shirts. Distinctly irreplaceable, admired and loved by everyone who knew him.

Our sympathy to his family.

Even as you, dear reader, loll about the place eating waffl es, your dogged Foghorn team are preparing the next shock-fi lled issue which will focus on... wait for it...

THE BRITISH ABROAD!!

Yes indeed.

A no-holds barred look at us out of our comfort zones and into utterly unsuitable shorts. So get busy - send us your gags, preferably coloured, and any funny writing which will not attract law suits.

Deadline is May 20th.

THE FOGHORN 3WWW.PROCARTOONISTS.ORG

SHREWSBURY CARTOON FESTIVAL TANTALISING GLIMPSE

WWW.PROCARTOONISTS.ORG

Despite cutbacks all round us, the Festival sails serenely on for another annual outing, unbelievably Number Eight. This time we are leaping unashamedly onto the Olympics bandwagon admirably early before everyone’s really tired of it.

So the theme is Sport, specially the Olympic variety - you know: synchronised beach velopeding, small-bore ping-pong and the like. As Rebecca Ennis-Coe has eloquently put it “Everyone’s gagging for it”. Maybe.

Shrewsbury had a hand in the development of the modern Olympics, in that the town held a festival of Olympian games back in 1864, way before most of us were born. This had been inspired by the annual games at nearby Much Wenlock, started in 1850 by Dr William Penny Brookes and still held today. Brookes was visited by Baron de Coubertin (real name Pierre Frédy) who went back to France, filched Brookes concept and set up the modern Olympics.

Renowned visual pundits have been gathered (well, a bunch of cartoonists) for their take on sport. Their cartoons

comprise the field in the “Personal Bests” exhibition and many of them will be drawing for the public on the festival weekend (14th- 17th April). Irish cartoonists give us a touch of the O’Lympics in a new collection. Peter Schrank reviews the sport of politics in his “Schrank Wrapped” exhibition, and we delve into the British Cartoon Archive for a new collection of Giles Olympian cartoons. Cath Tate Cards is showing a collection of Jackie Fleming’s work titled “Give us a sporting chance”.

The usual heady mix of activities for the public (talks, clinics, Big Boards, caricatures, Humurals, reverse caricaturing, festival shop) will happen on the festival weekend. Readers Digest will be there with a Beat the Cartoonist stall and prizes! The Square will have a somewhat Victorian theme this year which will include a live Melodrawma, created before your very eyes.

And Barry the Shrew and Queen Victoria will be appearing live.

Shrewsbury 2011

Another year, another Shrewsbury International Cartoon Festival

Details on the festival website shrewsburycartoonfestival.com and in the festival brochure.

olympic sports of old shropshire.

a few that have not made it through

Random Acts of Humour


FEATURE STEVE WAY

OK, you are only in the limelight every four years but it is so less complicated than being a cartoonist. True there’re the early starts, the grind of training, the running through pain bit, though surely that doesn’t hurt as much as spilling black ink on the new carpet?

I Have Always Envied Athletes’ Lifestyle

Steve Way argues that cartoonists represent the country better than a host of Golds in Cycling and Swimming.

and to restrict the flow of rostrums to a trickle. ‘There’s still loads of gags unused’ they wail to patient art directors ‘I can only take 3’ Reasonable athletic odds but then their finals tend not to have 300 people and all-comers on the starting line.

No, I’m sure the iron will of Olympians, their PR smarts as the camera is thrust into their panting second place face, would fade. They could then all have the same prozac adjusted, shot pot of a chip on the shoulder we all walk around with. Would be fun to see them in the pub. Moaning ‘Track and field is not what it used to be and I ran that time in Oslo, the wind was

I guess it is the simplicity, purity of Sporty life I admire. They turn up, do their best and, apart from the occasional heartbreak when they get their tactics wrong, they only lose to people with faster twitch muscle genes, or keener hand eye co-ordination. So it is easy to shrug off fourth place and not have your day ruined.It is just so less fair to be a cartoonist. We lose out to people who can’t draw as well as us; aren’t funny; and to a joke we did a year ago but wasn’t taken at the time. It is also paste-up, to boot. Grrrrhhh.

Now add the deep inner need editors have to limit the number of gold medals handed to cartoonists

non existent but did they allow it?... No’.

The folk at the National Lottery would soon see that cartoonists are mentally tougher and they should fund us, not runners and rowers. We are used to losing. The public think we do a drawing in under ten seconds.

Yes, we represent the country better than a host of golds in cycling and swimming. One joke sold out of thousands drawn, is a more apt British triumph than any medal table. Bring it on, there is a lot of room for sponsorship on my pen caps.

Steve Way

‘You’d better eat your medal before it melts’. ‘She’s terrified of getting

verruccas!’


FEATURE LADY VIOLET

Foghorn’s very own ‘Agony Aunt’ Lady Violet Spume, answers your nasty little personal problems.

(Dictation by Lady Violet’s private secretary, Clive Goddard)

Dear Lady Violet,At a recent “show and tell” evening at my local over 60s club, I was very attracted to a man I have never been formally introduced to. Against my bet-ter judgement and only hours later, I found myself giving it the old Bangkok Banana with him in his shed. You can imagine my shame when I discovered that he is a retired taxidermist and ex-Coldstream Guard. How can I possibly extricate myself from this dreadful situation ?

Yours etc,Col. [retd] Winslow Farthardly

Lady V: Dear Colonel Farthardly,I am sure you will never again indulge in this kind of tomfoolery without proper inspection of the other party’s credentials and outbuildings. As you and I are only too sadly aware, the current expression is ‘You just can’t get the staff’ - on refl ection, an unfortunate utterance in this scenario.

However, I fear for your reputation when this matter is exposed in ‘News of the World’, or one of those other frightful organs so beloved of the lower orders. You must protect yourself. Acquire forged documents demonstrating that this vagabond is in fact a member of the Royal Family of a little-known European state - like Luxembourg - and therefore no disgrace will accrue when your ‘Kinks and Queens’ activities become more widely celebrated.

P.S. I may have unaccountably misinterpreted the nature of your enquiry, in which case extra virgin olive oil (available from Fortnum & Masons) should suffi ce.

Dear Lady Spume,I haven’t never wrote to a toff before but I am in the family way due to me getting it on with one of your ilk a bloke that is the son of a Lord that has a Stately Home near where I live in a maisnette with my Dad he has just done fi ve years for gbh. I have always been big boned but my Dad has notised that somthinge is going on as I am writing this whilst stuck in the kitchen doorway and my Dad is very left of centere. Shall I make the toff blokes son marry me hes not much to look at but as a Frerrarry or what ?

Yours fathfulleyAshleigh-Sheridan Fishwick.

Lady V: Dear Miss Fishwick,Your letter is sadly typical of many I receive from you disgusting female commoners, with your inattention to grammar and spelling. However, your deprived upbringing - I believe I detect the presence of the words ‘left’, ‘of’ and ‘centre’ somewhere in all that illiterate mire - can have only predictable results.

Firstly, you need to extricate yourself from the kitchen doorway; one or two days without food should bring favourable results. Then learn to read and write correctly, in a manner befi tting your elders and betters when you attempt to communicate with them.

olympic sports of old shropshire.

a few that have not made it through


Usian Bolt.

You all know the name. He’s the fastest man on earth, capable of running 100 metres in 9.58 seconds.

I’ve been scouring the internet to try to find out who’s the second fastest man on earth. I’ve found several possible contenders, with the most likely being Tyson Gay, who can manage 100 metres in 9,69 seconds. That’s about a hundredth of a second slower than Bolt, which is enough time to relegate him to the dustbin of history. That’s the curse of being second for you.

You’ve certainly got to admire Usian Bolt for putting in all the practice that’s got him where he is, with his inevitable nickname of Lightning Bolt. The training regime must be punishing, the dedication absolute and the sacrifice of time something of a burden. You’ve got to admire the guy who came second too, for the same reasons. What was his name again?

All that effort and sacrifice, all in order to hone a skill that’s of absolutely no use at all except for dashing for a bus, and all just to be able to do it very slightly faster than someone else can do it.

Personally, I think that if you want to dedicate years of your life to becoming good at anything it really ought to be something that’s got a

modicum of usefulness about it. I know that I’m on shaky ground here, having chosen to devote my own particular life to the dubious end of improving my skills as a cartoonist, but what I was thinking along the lines of was how nice it would be if people dedicated themselves to becoming, say, the world’s greatest neurosurgeon or the world’s best famine relief organizer rather than the world’s fastest bus catcher.

Athletics is essentially a group of unnecessarily over trained over achievers running round a circular track, getting nowhere fast, all for the vacuous honour of getting nowhere before anybody else does. The whole thing strikes me as being such a pointless waste of over achievement.

But maybe I’ve got it all wrong.Maybe the athletes know precisely what they are doing. Maybe they know full well that their race is achieving little other than incrementally nudging downwards

a somewhat inconsequential temporal statistic. Today, 10.58 seconds for 100 metres. Tomorrow, 10.53? The thing about athletics – and about sport in general – is that it is one of the areas of human activity where its contrived rules and goals are so transparently devoid of import beyond their own bounds that they only help to highlight the total pointlessness of their pursuit.But in what way is that different to life in general, apart from in its obviousness?

Most of us kid ourselves that we devote our time to doing meaningful and purposeful activities that will in some way be for the general good and benefit of the human race. Some people teach. Some are doctors. Some empty bins. Or to put it another way, some people teach us how to navigate our way through our empty and meaningless lives, some cure illnesses so that we can extend our stay in our empty and meaningless lives, some empty the rubbish from our empty and meaningless lives.

Maybe athletes know all this. Maybe they are in fact philosopher-athletes who have embraced the ultimate pointlessness of life and who, while running round their track are thinking ‘Look at me – I’m running a pointless race with a pointless goal, which is a perfect metaphor for life in general. But I’m going to run with it anyway.’

Second Place in the Human RaceChris Madden ponders the cheerful futility of existence. And sport.

“No guns - it’s a security thing”.“He’s put knife crime

behind him - he’s training for 2012”R

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LETTERS TO THE ED

Letters to theEditor

The Editor, Foghorn Magazine, 7 Birch Grove, Lostock Green,

Northwich. CW9 7SS E-mail: [email protected]

“Clap - El Presidente just got a butterfl y!”

Random acts of humour

An easy mistake to make ...

Olympic Victory

Dear Editor, My Great Uncle on my mother’s side, Edward Arthur Dinge, missed out on selection for the UK 1936 Olympic Team due to his not being very good at anything. Interestingly, the team motor-coach taking the team to Hendon aerodrome en route for Berlin had a puncture during which no-one was hurt. Lucky old Uncle Ted, I say. Yours truly

Emily Dawbarn [Miss. No relation]

Willies in Hands

Sir.

I’m assuming its “Sir” It usually is, isn’t it? The reins of power are nearly always in the hands of the willied sex, are they not?I am etc.,

Angriana Ghastlie

Pangolin Dream

Dear Ed., I note in the last issue of your magazine that pangolins were hardly mentioned.

There was a time that Foghorn was the pangolins’ champion, ensuring a national level of awareness which encouraged we volunteers at Glossop Pangolin Sanctuary to redouble our efforts to fi nd some. As you know, pangolins are rare in Derbyshire, but in the last six months alone, we have nearly seen four. So the pangolin issue has not gone away. Far from it. As I type, a large neutered tom called Wilberforce has just walked across my patio. He could so easily have been a pangolin.

Faithfully,

Name [J.T.Thump]witheld.


THE POTTING SHED

The Potting Shedwith Cathy Simpson.

The sap’s rising, the sukebind’s in fl ower and the news is telling us there’s going to be a right royal wedding. So, welcome to the Foghorn Potting Shed! Blushing in the borders are Binky Homebrew, Euphorbia Marmelade and Gordon Honkmonster. Our chairman, Alan Goatrouser, is the one with his right hand stuffed down his left wellington boot, claiming to have dropped his wedding ring.

We just have the one query today - but it’s one close to the heart of the nation, and is sent to us by Philippa Moonhowler of Quatford.

“Well, I was putting together a bridal bouquet for my sister and thought it would be good to follow the proper ‘Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue’ theme, all traditional-like, you know? So I put together this really ace bouquet, which had the following stuff in it:

- Some dried-out banana skins along with some daffs which someone had given my mum and she’d forgotten to water and they’d gone all brown and wrinkly and looked even older than mum and these would do great for the ‘something old’ bit.

- Then my next brainwave was when I spotted some nice dandelions which had self-seeded in the compost and had opened only that morning. Bingo! Just the thing to count as ‘something new’!

- ‘Something borrowed’, well I had to think about this one I don’t mind saying and I was going to put them back, really I was, but the nicest fl owers in our cul-de-sac were already growing in my sister’s front garden. But I didn’t think she’d notice the bald patch given that she’d be going on honeymoon to Margate in the afternoon. So bits of her herbaceous border joined the daffs and the dandelions and right royal they looked, too.

‘Something blue’, yeah well this was a bit tricky to begin with and then I remembered that Stilton at the back of the fridge and stuck it in chunks on some planting canes. In a way this was also a bit of borrowing being that the canes come from next door’s garden.

Well of course I didn’t give the bouquet to my sister until the last minute so it would be a surprise but she didn’t look very pleased. But that was nothing compared to

what happened when she threw the bouquet into the air to see who was going to get married next. I don’t want to go on about it, but can I have your advice on the following matters:

What should I put in the bouquet next time my sister gets married (probably in a couple of months time)? What fl owers should I take to the hospital when I visit that lady that got hit by the bouquet, and the bloke who had the unfortunate incident with the banana skin and the portable baptismal font? What’s the best way of getting planting canes out of a church organ’s pipes?”

Euphorbia sums up the feelings of the team:

‘This isn’t advice we give out lightly, but just stay away from anything plant-related, OK? Really, for the rest of your life. If it’ll help, remember the words of the song ‘Beware of the fl owers/Cause I’m sure they’re going to get you/Yeah!’ and sing them to yourself every time you see something with petals.

Take up stamp collecting, or reading, instead.’

Sounds like great advice which will greatly enhance your fl oristry skills, Philippa!

Now, don’t let all those street parties and news of fi nancial meltdown, wars and natural disasters make you neglect your garden! Just send your queries to us and we’ll do all the despairing for you!


THE WEDDLY CEREMOAN BY ARCHBISHOP STANLEY UNWIN CHANNELLED BY IAN ELLERY

Kate ‘not a commoner’ shock!!Unsettling rumours reach Foghorn (writes Royal Correspondent Capt Toby Wemyss) from no less an authority than Professor Ralph Pangolin-Fnaar (Dept of things Not Many People Know, Glossop Uni).

Apparently, after much research, the Prof asserts that, far from being a commoner, Kate Middleton is positively awash with Royal Blood. Says Prof Ralph: “Kate Middleton is positively awash with Royal Blood.”

He goes on to claim the the Middleton line can be traced back to Queen Greta of Saxe-Coburg-Schleswig-Holstein-Chorlton-

cum-Hardy, the celebrated Royal socialite, seen here in 1967 exiting a Goole nightspot. Convincingly,

the super-brainy Prof backs up his dynasty-threatening allegations by comparing Kate’s great aunt Greta with a candid shot of a real commoner, Odo Dirt:


Palace officials remain tight lipped, although a spokeswoman said last night: “As far as the Wedding goes, Kate is as common as they come.”

Prime Minister, Big Dave, avowed champion of UK commoners added “Nothing’s changed. The Common Couple, or at least one half of it, will progress to the Abbey in a Fiat Uno.

Nicky Clogg, Big Dave’s common yesperson, went on to confirm that the no-fly zone was going to be ‘a doddle’ because we haven’t got any aeroplanes.


Snip� ts � om � e Royal Photo A� um


Like watching Stranraer play football, its difficult to establish exactly why people do this; get married, or go to weddings, that is. The latter’s easy – because you’ve been invited. The former is odd. The overwhelming desire to make vows in the presence of friends and family, quite a few of whom are heartily loathed by one or both of the betrothed is hard to comprehend. On the surface, said couple are being nice and inviting all and sundry to join them in having a good time. But dig a little and there are strings – hawsers even – attached.

Once, years ago, wedding attendance was relatively simple. Buy a toaster, have best suit dry- cleaned, turn up, get fed, get drunk, go home. Those days alas, are gone. Toaster thoughts count for nothing now. Guests are presented with a list of items they are allowed to buy,

or two fist fights. Amongst the bridesmaids.

An increasing number of UK brides and grooms go to foreign parts in order to become nuptualized. Doing so on a beach in the Dominican Republic probably beats a rainy afternoon in Glossop, but on the ‘plane coming home, the digits forming in excess of twelve thousand notes must loom large.

Praise be then for our Royal Family and for William and Kate who have selflessly opted to stay in this country for their wedding; are generously allowing the nation’s media complete access to the whole shebang, and will be filling one of our larger places of worship with their chums. Hoorah! The happy couple’s gift list has so far remained secret, but you can bet your toasters that prezzies won’t be coming from Poundland.

CURMUDGEON SPECIAL ROYAL WEDDING FEATURE

often from a particular store and are encouraged to do this online, ensuring that they never see their gift and are robbed of the peculiar pleasure of watching the happy couples’ faces as they unwrap their engraved serviette rings.

These days, many couples opt for what is known as the “Big Wedding” This term does not always refer to the personal dimensions of the engaged types, but usually to the cost and whether or not a marquee [tent, not nobleman] is involved.

The mammoth nature of these events necessitates a division between the “Day Do” during which a church ,newly rediscovered faith and a posh lunch[with side plates and spherical bread] are often involved, and the “Evening Do” which features a deaf disc jockey, big speakers, Abba songs, a free bar and, if you’re lucky, one

“I’d like to return this, please.” “Calm down, it’s helping me pay for all this.”


FEATURE CLIVE COLLINS

Clive Collins

Let’s be clear about this. I hated PT at school, because I was a career slob with as much interest in fitness as I had in pushing peas up a hill with my nose.

Picture a tall gawky kid, puffing his way all round Richmond Park, in the certain knowledge that on this Athletics Day, as on every other, I’d be the last one back, and squeegeeing out the showers long after everyone else had gone home. To try to get out of it, I’d lie about

my fitness – limping discreetly – wheezing in the school corridors as the dreaded day approached – everything but flinging myself under a car on the Upper Richmond Road.

I think my general sinking into a lazy unfitness stemmed from being sat regularly, as a very young child, on Weston-Super-Mare beach by my grandparents, and dressed in long trousers and a long-sleeved pullover (in case I caught a cold) – on 75 degree Fahrenheit afternoons. I still don’t think it was natural, and when I tell my wife these stories, she gives me one of the sideways looks that strangers give you when you talk to yourself on a train.

Same with the compulsory swimming classes; we’d all troop onto the bus to take us to Richmond Baths, which in those days was a cracked Victorian pile that reeked of damp and mildew, with its wooden changing shacks. All these years later it’s probably been restored, no doubt after campaigns to save it, but at the time, I’d have happily

lit the fuse to the dynamite. Ever since, I’ve also had an aversion to dressing in damp clothes.

Can’t think why.

Years of this, throughout my schooling, gave me a loathing of all fitness events. Even playing football. Having little or no co-ordination, I was always placed in goal, and I had to watch – frozen on wintry days - as a thundering herd headed for me. My heart would boom like a Mardi Gras parade, as the blur of scuffed leather rose into my vision, getting bigger until it shot through my hands and into the yawning net behind me.

They say sport is character-forming.

Balls! It’s what you do after you leave school, and you stop drinking milk from little smelly bottles, develop whatever skills you acquired away from the sports field and go out into the big wide world.

Clive Collins

P.T. in My Life


BUILDINGS IN THE FOG

Wedding places

If you exclude fields, lakes, Caribbean beaches and anywhere underwater, then buildings are as much part of a wedding as the couple that are stood there competing with the architecture.

From the heights of magnificent cathedrals down to the simplicity of the registry office, the venue sets the tone for the nuptials. This choice immediately tells you so much about the couple getting hitched: wealth (at least of the bride’s parents), taste, religion (if any or pretended), social connections and the like. Even more so these days when marriages have escaped from the aforesaid churches and registry

offices out into castles, mansions, hotels, barns and follies... both here and in foreign fields. Bournemouth Borough Council plans to build a luxury beach hut containing a wedding chapel for which, apparently, there is much demand.

If you are doing the deed in Westminster Abbey you are probably pretty posh, pretty British and certainly have good connections. You expect people to line streets to gawp at you. You’ll have oodles of the folding stuff but are probably old money so you don’t need to flaunt it. The Abbey

will give out that appropriately reserved message for you, grand but refined. Not like a flashy wedding in St. Paul’s with all that gilt, glitz and snazzy floor tiling. It’s not good to get married with a sense of gilt. Choose Gothic architecture for austere and Classic for money-no-object.

A grand Gothic cathedral will provide a tasteful backdrop so long

as the bride doesn’t confound the image by wearing pink. Gothic wasn’t made for pink. Also the vastness of the place absorbs the obligatory cries of the baby-that-really-shouldn’t-have-been-brought-to-the-wedding-because-it-spoils-it-for-everyone-else. Such a dreadful nuisance in anything smaller than a cathedral. I have a friend who enjoys going to christenings and yelling in a deep baritone at key moments. Well, it seems only fair.

A registry office wedding can be pleasant. The building is usually a tween-wars red brick municipal effort set in mature gardens with a pond and non-working fountain, viewed through 2 pairs of French windows either side of some sort of important looking mahogany table. The rumble of the local High Street can be heard, augmented by the colourful cries of the natives. The registrar might wear a nice frock, and lady registrars will dress smartly too. It might be a shame that the CD the groom has carefully burnt with choice music from YouTube doesn’t work on the Office’s system and that the council’s worn copy of the Now - That’s What I Call Nuptials CD has to be used instead.

If you like modern architecture you can admire Future Systems Media Stand (you know - the thing that looks like a Nick Park mouth) whilst you get married at Lord’s cricket ground . A cricket hitch. Presumably that tells the world you like cricket, which might be as well because the reception will have endless obvious puns on that theme (see previous sentence).

So prospective couples these days, seeking a place to do the necessary vowing, have a huge wealth of architecture from which to make the totally the wrong choice.

Roger Penwill


“I’m totally focused on getting my black belt.”

‘I’m determined to find out how that blasted badger still keeps

getting under the fence!’

“Are you sure he tested negative?”

CARTOONS BY LOTS OF PEOPLE


THE FOGHORN GUIDE TO ATHLETICS

THE FOGHORN GUIDE TO ATHLETICScycling, essentially track-ish, actually happen in big sheds call velodromes. Swimming is also not encouraged on track or in the field. Nor does it happen in the swimmodrome.

Generally though, it’s the running types who dominate track activities. Keen observers will have noticed that in recent years, certain fundamental alterations in the social status of athletes. Alf Tupper, for example, was never knighted, and words like “elite” were seldom used. 21st century 100 metres champions tend not to have to fit in training sessions around shifts down the pit and hardly ever smoke pipes. Nowadays even young gels, freed from corsets, stays and long skirts, hurtle about in speedy abandon.

Of course, running is not just about awfully quick hurtling. Some running events, like the 1,000,000 metres take ages, and are always won by Faraway Place representatives - small wiry types several of whom were born during the race.

And then there’s the jumping. Lots of jumping. Long, high, hopping and stepping, and vaulting which is a sort of jumping but with a pole. Some events like hurdles cunningly combine running and jumping, but never with a pole, whilst others such as the pentathalon and the dodecahedrathon include all of the above plus knitting, car mechanics and gurning.

Meanwhile, in the field – the grassy bit in the middle – hurling supplants hurtling and all manner of weighty objects are flung about the place by equally weighty flingers. Hammers, discii and shots, all deposited further from the hurler than your correspondent could carry these lumpen things in a week. Pride of place goes to the javelin, not especially heavy, but cast forth by men and women of great intent. Its dangerous as well. Only in recent years was spear dodging,often undertaken by local prisoners seeking parole- granted if they remained unpunctured at the end of the event- finally banned. Daily Mail readers regularly call for its reinstatatement.

Space does not allow investigation of the other more esoteric sports which comprise athletics. Many of these like judo take place, as does cycling, in a shed and like cycling, nobody but the referee knows who’s won. Judo’s a bit like sailing without the boat. Only a select few know which way is up.

Athletics then combines skill, determination, triumph and heartbreak. Its not over until the finishing line is crossed, and the thin lady’s won and even then, as in the case of Alfredo de Linguini who fell off the podium’s number one spot and broke his tibia in the *Games of ’07, winning’s sometimes not what its cracked up to be.

*Go on then – Google it.

Yet another complex area for your tireless Foghorn researchers to grapple with. Their initial findings make interesting reading.

Apparently, athletics is/are divided into two main bits called respectively, Track and Field, which seems simple enough, but embraces a whole host of highly specialized strenuous, often sweaty activities. Confusing too because lots of events which do not take place on the track and seem, like


FEATURE NATHAN ARISS

My apologies for this briefest of missives, dear fans - must dash: I’m afraid my imminent jazzercise lesson spirits me away!

Mercifully, an actor of my standing so rarely rests, but such are the slings and arrows of the profession en ce moment that I am currently compelled to tread the boards of a quite different guise altogether. Happily, I have always kept myself what I like to term ‘stage-fi ghting fi t’, but one can really never don too many leotards and headbands in pursuit of the old corpus delicti!. And that is why I have recently decided to take up the challenge and join the hoofers – if only for an hour or two of sweaty camaraderie each day!

Well, I must say it has been quite an education – yet again! (I am always indebted to the experiences and lessons gleaned from this, my other, ‘real’ life). On these occasions I always try to fi nd something positive to take away with me, and also to impart something benefi cial in return. Well, I am happy to report that I have had the class in raptures

this week with some of the more hilarious selections from my book, What Exactly Is My Motivation Here – And Where Precisely Did I Put It?!, by Mason Ayres – at well-chosen breaks in proceedings! It is always such a pleasure to fi nd new friends and fresh ears to regale, and this bunch really are so very kind, with all their pleas of “Stop! No more!”, and earnest wishes for my re-employment at the earliest possible time. But I digress…again!

Yes, indeedy! One must absolutely and constantly be in A1, tip-top, lickety-splickety condition, ready to leap into action should ever the call come to play a febrile Chekhovian manic depressive, or even a retarded Ibsen troll, and I am eternally thankful that I have been blessed with what others have termed an ‘athletic frame of mind’ - though the frame of body requires a little MOT and run around the block these days!

And so, once more, it’s off to the Pineapple halls we go, to mix it with those startling sinews and

overly critical self-absorption levels. To be honest – and I know I shouldn’t really be so unkind – but sometimes it takes all my rigour and mental discipline to retain my (above average) Intelligence Quotient when conversing with the ball-heel-changers, but I suspect from my aching limbs and rapidly diminishing waistline that it will all be utterly worth it in the end. Now, where precisely did I put those yellow leg warmers?

Fondest,Mason Ay� s

My Life in ErtMason Ayres’ brain is on holiday this month

Not an option these days! A shark referees water polo at the games of long ago.

Bouncing Billy McGurk(Men’s 400 yd Groins)

joins Montgomery Fibister(Freestyle strainist) in the infamous Underpant Protest of

1948


Got off to a flyer....straight out of the blocks and hit the mark after just one lap of the track. That’s BBC4’s ‘Twenty Twelve’ Olympic Deliverance docu spoof. What other nation’s major broadcaster would be allowed to take the rip out of the build up to their Olympic Games? It’s what we do best. Never mind the athletics, beach volleyball or synchronised swimming...it’s GOLD for TeamGB Satire.

Ever since the launch of the universally detested/derided (officially unconfirmed) London Olympic logo (it hasn’t improved with age or familiarity has it?) it would have been asking a lot to improve on the pretentiousness quota but they have...in leaps and bounds...they’ve smashed it...raised the bar etc, etc.

Twenty Twelve certainly got the rub of the green with their blistering opening burst featuring the foul mouthed ‘London based North of England edgy artist’ (who can they mean?) designed Olympic count down clock. The day after

airing the first episode and the real Olympic timepiece embarrassingly breaks down in Trafalgar Square...PR disaster...couldn’t make it up...only one team in it...one-nil to the satirists!

Written and directed by People Like Us creator John Morton, it would have been much more satisfying to have had the brilliant but sadly ‘unavailable’ Chris Langham do the Roy Mallard-type voice-over commentary. Roger Allam (The Thick Of It’s Peter Mannion) would surely have been a better choice than upbeat David Tennant, but nevertheless the main characters are well observed stereotypes.

Hugh Bonneville’s world-weary, hen-pecked head of the Deliverance Commission just about has a grip on things as Ian Fletcher unlike the ‘ok, absolutely, cool, sure, totally’ PR agency type, Siobhan Sharp, played beautifully by Jessica Hynes ( we’ve all come across this character haven’t we folks?)

At the time of writing I’ve only

seen the opening episode but if they can maintain this cracking pace and phenomenal performance over the next five weeks it’s a nailed on, surefire winner.

Hinted at appearances by London Mayor Boris Johnson and face of the London Olympics, Seb Coe in ‘cameo roles’ can only advance their reputations in a counting down to 2012 sort of way...absolutely...sure...cool...totally.

Never Mind The Legacy...Ok...Ok...OkFoghorn’s resident TV critic Pete Dredge counts to 2012

The Critic

THE LAST WORD

FOGHORN (PRINT) ISSN 1758-8758

Foghorn - No. 50

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