Who will be the next editor of this magazine? Perhaps they will ask me
My breakfast cereal of choice these days is called Classic Crunch and Amaranth – a “rediscovered wonder grain used by the ancient Aztecs and Incas”, according to the packaging. How glamorous. Apparently, being rich in iron and magnesium and high in fibre, it provided the message-carriers of old with the energy they needed to run long distances. That’s good enough for me. I might be late for my Botox appointment, and a quick mince-trot could mean the difference between a youthful complexion and crow’s feet.
So there I was, tucking into a healthy bowl of organic nutrition on Thursday morning, when I thought I'd check my emails. I was just pondering the fact that modern technology had put such message-carriers out of a job when I saw I had an email from this magazine's editor, the lovely John Kampfner, telling me he didn't have a job either. He'd resigned with immediate effect.
I dropped my spoon with immediate effect and could no longer contemplate the almond croissant I had lined up for afters.
What on earth was afoot? I rang the NS to get the gossip, but everyone was speaking in tremulous, faraway voices, saying there was nothing to panic about - it was to be "business as usual". That's as may be, but it was John who asked me to write this page, and without his friendly, fearless presence at the helm I feel a trifle awkward. Like I'm at a party, but the person who invited me has left. I'm not sure of the etiquette in such situations. Should I wander off into the night, or get drunk and sleep with a stranger? Who knows what the future holds? They told us not to panic about Northern Rock, and look what happened there. Maybe the magazine will be nationalised, and that peculiar man with white hair and jet-black eyebrows called Darling will make himself editor.
Someone has to do the job, as sure as eggs, and I may get the call telling me that my camp old nonsense is past its sell-by date and the back page is to be taken over by Ann Widdecombe's Beauty Tips. I'm being eaten away by an E coli of insecurity, as you can tell. Oh well, that's the cut-throat world of publishing for you. It's been fun. Maybe I'll be headhunted by Pick Me Up magazine.
Either way, my working life is about to change. Just a few more weeks left in Cabaret, and then I shall retreat to Kent to write my next novel. That’s the plan, anyway. I’ve acquired a posh literary agent called Eugenie. She was so excited to sign me as a client that she immediately went off on maternity leave and left me in the hands of someone even posher called Lucinda. She’s so posh that I don’t understand what she’s talking about – it just sounds like “ra, ra, ra, ya, yay, ya, ra, ra” when she calls me. I have to reply with meaningless phrases like “I see!” or “You don’t say?”
As for the book, I thought of the title first. Now all I've got to do is dream up a story that fits. Jock Rot. What do you think? It has all sorts of possibilities. A story about a hunky American student called Brett, who visits London and gets drawn into a world of drugs and depravity? Or a parable: a new sexually transmitted disease that seemingly affects only good-looking heterosexual men? Lucinda was keen, as far as I could tell. "Oh, ra, ra rah!" she enthused.
My life has always been full of surprises. Maybe Geoffrey Robinson will call me tomorrow and invite me to be the new editor. If it's a higher circulation he's after I'm fairly sure I'm his man. We'll have a topless David Miliband on the cover for starters. The main feature would be Mohamed Al Fayed and the Duke of Edinburgh "in conversation" - thrashing it out, as it were. Then we'll cut all the political nonsense and have 20 pages of sudoku puzzles instead.
Now where's that almond croissant? I've suddenly got my appetite back. I'll be sitting by the phone . . .
Julian Clary
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