Paper Monitor
11:25 UK time, Monday, 11 February 2008
A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.
After the Atkins, the F-plan and the Cabbage Soup diet, please be upstanding for Paper Monitor's very own weight loss regime (untold riches surely await): the bodily substances diet. It works like this – try reading a copy of today's Metro while munching on your pastry/cereal/Pop Tart (delete as appropriate) and see how your appetite evaporates with each turn of the page.
Bodily substances has a lot to do with the Paper Monitor Weight Loss Regimeâ„¢ . There's phlegm on the front page, thanks to the headline about firefighters being "spat on".
A few pages in and there's a story about how the growth in fast-food outlets has led rodents to develop a taste for curries and kebabs.
And then comes the big whammy, on page 20. The story of how a gig at a pub in Newcastle descended into a brawl after a performer put his hands down the back of his trousers and then wiped his finger on the face of an audience member.
While the promoter says he's not seen anything like it in 15 years of the job, the singer in question claims it's all part of the act.
"We've done sex acts on stage and I've eaten light bulbs," he says, as if to make the whole episode seem more palatable.
Jim Morrison in the buff; Johnny Rotten covered in mucus… guys, when it comes to outrageous stage acts, your legacies are starting to look decidedly shaky.
Let's focus on more esoteric matters – the Archbishop of Canterbury's musings about Sharia law for the example. The Sun has been out counselling public opinions and neatly distils the reaction thus: "Bash the Bishop". They must have been so proud of their front page headline on Saturday that they've turned it into a brand.
But if there's anything guaranteed to dull the appetite it's an onanism gag.
Is there anything that could possibly revive Paper Monitor's appetite in these gut-churning times? Something fresh, innocent, willowy and unsullied. Why yes, there it is on the front of the Mail, Express and Sun (though, perplexingly, not the Telegraph) – a picture of Keira Knightley.
Mmmmm. Now where's that pain au chocolate gone?
The 
