Paper Monitor
A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.
As predicted in Tuesday's Paper Monitor, the Jake Myerson drugs saga rumbles on today.
The Times interviews Ma and Pa Myerson at "the breakfast bar of their airy kitchen in their Gothic former rectory". But regular readers of Myerson's confessional brand of writing will be brought up short by the address - Walworth Rd, the same "skanky" street once home to Jade Goody. Spiritually, at least, it's a world away from the leafy streets which were the backdrop to Julie Myerson's first non-fiction book ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ: The Story of Everyone Who Ever Lived in our House. (See from the Magazine's archive.)
The T2 cover story - and page five news story revealing Myerson to be the anonymous author of the Weekend Guardian's Living with Teenagers column - are not only illustrated with photos of Julie and husband Jonathan in their lovely home, but their errant son, who, worryingly, is dressed as Pete Doherty would if he forgot to put on his skinny jeans, saggy T-shirt and narrow scarf of a morning. And his pants.
It's March, young man!
But whereas Doherty habitual accessorises with a drooping fag, Myerson Junior opts, touchingly, for a copy of the Guardian and two cartons of juice. Life on the streets, eh?
Meanwhile, it's time for another instalment of Paper Monitor's occasional "strange names in the news" strand, with, in this case, a nod to a Your Letters favourite, nominative determinism. The Times dispatches its best man to carry out an in-depth investigation into whether medium-size eggs are indeed yummier than large. His name? Steve Bird. (In a blind taste test, he finds they are indeed "more eggy".)
Speaking of yolks - boom boom! the old ones are always the good ones - Daily Express columnist Ann Widdecombe reveals - apropos of Peter Mandelson being custarded - that someone once threw an egg at her in a church.
God moves in mysterious ways? That's for you to decide, based on your own belief system and political leaning. Paper Monitor, needless to say, has no view either way.