It seems foolish to blog on anything other than the ridiculous furore over what has been dubbed "Manuelgate".

Firstly lets start with that laughably nonsensical name Manuelgate. It stems, in case you are unaware, from Russell Brand aided by Jonathon Ross ringing the actor who played Manuel in Fawlty Towers (Andrew Sachs) and leaving obscene messages about fucking his granddaughter. That's Sachs' granddaughter not Brand's. The prank was stupid but we'll get there. So...Manuelgate. What the tabloids have done there is to take the Richard Nixon Watergate scandal and replace water with Manuel. But the Watergate Scandal was a scandal that took place at the Watergate hotel, it had NOTHING to do with water. So Manulgate means Nada, zilch, squat, and other synonyms that I can't be bothered to research.

Second on to the act itself. It was a puerile, lazy and not very funny prank. If this was a matter of comic worth then the outrage would almost be understandable. But its not. Various other DJs do far more moronic things and nobody cares. There is an entire E4 show devoted to prank calls, but as the recipients aren't famous the population chortles, at least I assume that is what fonejacker is about I don't watch it so that was potentially a lazy uniformed statement. Actually even if that is what the show is about the statement is still lazy and uniformed it just also happens to be true. Ok, so we've established that it was a dumb joke not funny enough to warrant upsetting anyone certainly not an aging actor who brought laughs out of a far wider cross-section of the viewing the public than either of our protagonists. But was it really that out of line?

Brand's show is(was) frequently lauded for it's "breathtaking freshness" which was largely put down to "his anarchic wit". So he was just doing what he was paid all that money to do - be anarchic, break rules. Be a professional twat. It was up to his editors to make sure he didn't cross a line, which he did. What Ross was doing only he knows. One suspects that if you are earning £16million you start to feel a little too cosy and safe and want to cut loose once in a while, tough life huh? Ross used to be a mere peddlar of smut, then he got his new contract and he became a peddlar of smug. Back to the matter at hand, the girl in question that Ross claimed Brand had fucked is a professional slut. What?! I hear you cry. It's true Andrew Sachs' granddaughter is a professional slut. Not liableous, true. She dances with the "Satanic Sluts" burlusque group. Or at least she did before Max Clifford took over her PR.

Anyway, I've forgotten where I was really going with this. I think my point is basically that this whole thing got WAY out of hand. Wow, Fearg you are so insightful I almost pooped myself.

Tata