Always a journo

Kylie reckons I'm "ever in journalist mode". Which is surely an awful thing to be, but she might be right. After all, I spent six years as a journalist, so some of the journalist culture must have rubbed off on me, like it or not.

Jenny thinks there's still a bit of the journalist in me. I like inventing spoof tabloid headlines ("Refund joy for tearful Belfast couple"), and I do tend to over-react to a dramatic piece of news.

But despite the residual journalistic quirks, I'm still very critical of journalism and the way it distorts, trivialises and sensationalises important issues. I've never regretted leaving journalism for bookselling, even though many people thought I was crazy.

Apart from anything else, journalism nowadays is hard work. Long hours, low salaries, unpaid internships, constant redundancies. It's a far cry from the well-paid, leisurely, drunken activity it was in the sixties.

But I've never properly explained why I left journalism. Just a few of the reasons:

• So often it never gets to the heart of an issue. It trots out a few basic facts and seldom digs deeper or asks awkward questions.
• It spreads rumours and gossip about celebrities and public figures, much of it malicious and untrue.
• It encourages prejudice of all kinds - racism, sexism, xenophobia, hatred of welfare "scroungers" etc.
• It turns minor incidents into huge controversies (famous actress has wardrobe malfunction)
• It's hypocritical. For example, it laments climate breakdown, but welcomes consumerism and long-distance travel.
• It runs with every fad and fashion, however absurd or irresponsible or pointless.

In the end I just felt uncomfortable as a journalist. There were so many dubious practices I simply couldn't buy into. Bookselling by comparison suited me down to the ground. All I had to do was sell interesting books to interesting people. Nothing uncomfortable there. It kept me happy for 23 highly enjoyable years.

But I still admire a clever tabloid headline.

Malicious rumours

Santa Claus has once again had to quash the constant rumours that he doesn't exist. In a statement today, he insists that he is very much alive and the claims of his non-existence are malicious and upsetting.

"Of course I exist" he said, as he poured me a generous glass of prosecco at his luxurious home, Santa Towers in Reindeer City, Lapland. "Here I am, as large as life, as you can see, working hard on the production of this year's Christmas presents. These mischief-makers should shut up and stop distressing all those children who're looking forward to Santa's annual visit.

"Every year I have to deny these absurd rumours that I'm just a fantasy figure who doesn't exist in real life. I may be extremely old, I may have had one too many on occasion, and I may be a little too plump for the smaller chimneys (I leave those to the elves). But I haven't yet kicked the bucket.

"My lawyers are dealing with the most persistent offenders, and they can expect to pay substantial damages to the Exhausted Elves Benevolent Fund."

Children everywhere have been devastated by the claims that he doesn't really exist. Five-year-old Lucy Gristle of Potters Bar, Hertfordshire, cried non-stop for a week after hearing the rumours. "She was inconsolable" said her mother, Melanie. "I tried everything to stop the tears but nothing worked. I don't know how people can bring themselves to start such pernicious tittle-tattle, knowing full well it will break so many children's hearts. They should be ashamed of themselves."

After watching Santa's TV interview, little Lucy is now over the moon and eagerly awaiting his visit. "He's so clever, he always knows exactly what I want" she said. "I only show my present list to mummy, but he finds out somehow and there they all are under the Christmas tree. I love Santa so much."

Baseless rumours

For some years now the media have been suggesting that the supermodel Veronica Trinket and myself are an item. I keep denying this baseless rumour but they still spread it at every opportunity. Even stern legal warnings from Sue, Grabbit and Runne don't deter them.

Anyone with half a brain can see how absurd this idea is. Firstly, I'm very happily married to a red-hot spouse. Secondly, what on earth would a twenty something supermodel see in a crumbling oldie like myself? Thirdly, I suspect there's no such person as Veronica Trinket but the media haven't even bothered to check.

The willowy young blonde who frequently visits me while my partner is away from home is certainly not this Trinket person. She is simply the landscape gardener who tends to the shrubs and young trees when they need some attention. On occasion I offer her a cup of tea or a chocolate biscuit, but absolutely nothing else is offered or asked for. It's true that she bears a slight resemblance to Ms Trinket but that's obviously a mere visual coincidence.

The grainy photos of a smiling young girl, strongly implied to be the secret love-child of our clandestine relationship, are plainly faked by some enterprising newshound whose journalistic career is faltering. The missing left ear and the toeless right foot clearly suggest some rather clumsy fabrication.

As for those doddery old gits who stop me in the street and ask me what my secret is and how they can "grab a bit of the girlie action", I shoo them away with a contemptuous snort. All I'm grabbing at my age is blood pressure pills and reading glasses. They shouldn't believe everything they hear.

Pic: an alleged photo of the alleged Veronica Trinket

Wicked rumours

Malicious rumours are being spread that my blog posts are created in Chinese sweatshops by exhausted children working 23-hour days and paid the equivalent of 5p a week.

This is simply untrue, as a quick phone call to our head office would easily confirm.

Our 147-strong staff work in luxurious conditions
in our purpose-built production centre in Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, and all receive exceptionally generous salaries compared to other less reputable blogging enterprises. World-class chefs, beauticians and hairdressers are on hand day and night to tend to their every whim, and chauffeur-driven limousines make light work of any travel needs.

But don't take my word for it. Here's what 25-year-old concept-facilitator Mandy Mouthwash has to say: "I just love working at nickhereandnow so much. It has totally changed my life. For the first time my creative talents are being recognised and appreciated. I feel I'm making a real contribution to the well-being of society. Not only that, but the guys here are drop-dead gorgeous."

The scurrilous rumours of Chinese child-labour are based on an alleged interview with 7-year-old Wah Shing in one of the tabloid newspapers.

He claims to have been trapped into blog-slavery several years ago and despite repeated attempts to escape his inhuman conditions is still forced to write continuously with no meal or toilet breaks and even when his fingers and eyeballs are bleeding from overuse. Frequently collapsing from malnutrition and exhaustion, he is mercilessly revived with buckets of ice-cold water until he resumes work.

Unstinting inquiries by my staff have failed to locate the elusive Wah Shing, who is clearly a monstrous journalistic invention with as much substance as Tinkerbelle.

I have put the whole distasteful business in the capable hands of my lawyers, Sue Grabbit and Runne.

Pic: The nickhereandnow head office at Chipping Norton