Adventure travel alert

I've just had a text from Major Jeremy Billycock-Smythe.
He says he's going back into business.
He didn't elaborate - well it was a badly written text that could easily be misconstrued. But if he's just going to catch a bus, for goodness sake, why would be text me?
My fear is that he's going back into the adventure travel business and that's bad news for suckers.
Standby for more information.

Royal mugs going cheap

Major Jeremy Billycock-Smythe has decided to sell his collection of Royal wedding commemorative mugs.
"This has nothing to do with Her Majesty not turning up at my dinner party at Rowbottom," Major BS said today.
"Never did like her anyway. I'm a king chap myself. Well, you need a chap to run anything properly, what?"
Major BS bought the mugs at a market in Oobagoogu some years ago. They were thrown in with two Sherman tanks but neither item was from any recent entanglement.
"I should have bought her a football. Did you see the look at her face when she was presented with one yesterday? Never knew the old dear even sweared. I could have sworn though she was thinking 'WTF' when she examined it."

Major BS's leaky boat of confidence

Major Jeremy Billycock-Smythe has applauded the likelihood now that more illegal refugees will be welcomed into the Australian community as part of their processing.

"I feel qualified to comment on this. After all, I was a bit of a trendsetter in this area, wasn't I, what?" Major BS said.

He was referring to his part in the novel, Major BS: A Top Secret Mission, which has recently become available as an ebook.

It is true that an experiment to place refugees in the community is central to the plot of that book.

But it is also true Major BS is far from a success on that score.

Besides, even if Major BS were not a mere fictional character - a pretend British citizen and knighthood wannabe - he has a very dubious track record when it comes to empathy for illegal refugees.

He once planned to build a tunnel on Nauru, not to facilitate an escape but to get to the detainees so he could find out what they could do for him business-wise.

"I refuse to be silent just because someone says I am not a real person," Major BS said. "I have the same right as anyone else to voice an opinion.

"All I am saying is bring in on. The old shearing shed is now nearly ready."

Bring it on, Wikileaks, says author

JUST when public figures all over the world are ducking for cover from Wikileaks, an Australian author is saying: "Pick on me, pick on me."

John Martin, who wrote the satirical novel Major BS: A Top Secret Mission, says he made a tactical error by putting a warning on the back cover of the book.

It says: "Unfortunately, unless you have a top-level security clearance you probably can't read this book."

"The back cover was meant to be a JOKE, people. Satire. You weren't supposed to take it seriously for goodness sake," Martin now laments.

"You were meant to read the bloody book - not be responsible citizens. Contrary to what you might think, loose lips do not sink funny novels; closed eyes do."

The book started its life as a print-on-demand print-and-ink book but has recently been converted into an ebook for Kindle with Amazon - and Martin is kicking himself for what he calls a miscalculation.

"My only hope now for some exposure is to be outed by Wikileaks. Bring it on Mr Assange, I say. Please."

Has Major BS got a treat for you, Ma'am!

No doubt emboldened by his audacious invitation to the American president when he visits Australia, Major Jeremy Billycock-Smythe now plans to invite the Queen to a dinner party at Rowbottom, not far from Canberra.

Her Majesty is due to visit Australia from October 18 and will attend several engagements in Canberra, including meeting the Prime Minister Julia Gillard, Opposition Leader Tony Abbott and making an appearance at Canberra's world-renowned flower show Floriade, ahead of her attendance at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Perth.

"I know she has a busy schedule but I'm sure she wouldn't mind giving the flower show a miss to fit us in," Major BS said.

"Either that, or bypass the PM or Mr Abbott. I mean, really, it's not like it's the Chelsea Flower Show and it's not like THEY are British citizens like me. They are only in this God-forsaken country because they were born here, what?"

Hot on the heels of securing discarded commemorative mugs for the not-yet-confirmed Barrack Obama dinner at Rowbottom, Major BS has unearthed a batch of mugs commemorating the royal wedding.

Unfortunately, however, they are not from the recent Prince Andrew-Kate Middleton wedding but from from that of Prince Charles and Lady Di in 1981.

"I got them from the Oobagoogu markets. They threw them in with the two Sherman tanks. A bargain, what?"

"Of course, as we all know, the Oobagoogu venture went slightly awry so this really is a silver lining. I knew they'd come in handy one day."

Major BS is known to be still hopeful of securing a knighthood but he would not be drawn on that.

"I really can't say too much. Wink, wink, nudge, nudge. Need to know basis, what?"

Another pain in the r's for US president

US president Barack Obama, or should I say Barrack Obama, will need to dodge controversy when he visits Australia in November.

It is believed that the notorious Major Jeremy Billycock-Smythe is planning to invite the president to one of his dinner parties at Rowbottom, not far from the Australian capital, Canberra.

To raise a toast to the president, it is also believed that Major BS has secured a number of commemorative mugs that were supposed to have been destroyed because of an embarrassing spelling mistake.

The White House has confirmed that Mr Obama will fly into Australia for the first time as president in November - immediately after the APEC leaders meeting he will host in Hawai

It will be the third attempt by the US President to make the trip after a visit was postponed twice early last year because of pressure to remain in Washington during a critical debate over passing health reforms, and later to cope with a disastrous oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

The last time he was expected, 200 mugs celebrating his visit were ordered for the Australia's Parliament House gift shop.

Unfortunately, the mugs, which carried quite good pictures of the president's face, had his first name spelt as "Barrack" instead of "Barack." When someone important who is also a good speller found out, they were ordered to be destroyed.

How some of the mugs might have ended in Major BS possession is a mystery - though that is unlikely to trouble Major BS as long as they were cheap.

It could, however, be be more diplomatically embarrassing than Wikileaks.

Sucking lemons no more

I have finally done it. I left my employer of the last few years, that Australian newspaper of some notoriety, The Daily Lemonsuck. For the first time in years I feel clean. No more doorstopping bereaved mums. No more raising doubts about man-made climate change. No more sticking the knife into Julia every chance. No more Major BS stories.

From now on, you are going to get my truly independent, no Major BS, views.

To my former editor, I have just one thing to say: Phhhhhhhhttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttt