Bizarre Times

The IRA says it has become a group of warm and fuzzy tree-hugging pacifists. Meanwhile a new round of crazed religious freaks are trying to kill us all - but this time they get a prize - eighty virgins in heaven. The English beat the French for the Olympics. We aren't actually at war with the French but they are crashing planes into Canada.

An English Princess is doing glamour photos for Tatler and Playboy says that Big Brother contestants don't fit with their high-brow image, while Celebrity Love Island contestants do.

It's always raining and yet there is a drought. The G8 spend the year focusing on Africa while people in Niger are quietly starving. Meanwhile four hundred miles above the Earth a man has his head under the bonnet of the space shuttle, holding a portable drill and a hacksaw.