WASHED AND READY TO EAT

Forget the Daily Mail . For a serious read, it’s the Daily Express you need to seek out at your local newsagent’s. The masthead screams 10p, which seems just about acceptable, but the small print dashes our hopes immediately. “10p cheaper than the Daily Mail and ten times better!” The cover price is, in fact, an exorbitant 80p. In the interest of investigative journalism and a strong desire to understand what makes the typical Express reader tick, Washed and Ready to Eat made a decision to shell out. Three key themes tend dominate the paper: Princess Diana, prevailing weather conditions and rising house prices. Although one of these topics might temporarily bump the others off the front page, the relegated topics are never completely forgotten. Take the edition published on Saturday 7th September 2013, for instance. The lead story is the conspiracy theory about the death of the Queen of Hearts in Paris back in the 1990s, but we learn that first-time buyers are returning to the...

Edward Snowden's statement that he might seek asylum in that bastion of democracy, Russia, is decidedly weird. But not as weird as the news reported recently that Putin's government has found a novel way of avoiding the kind of security breach epitomised by Snowden and his pal Julian Assange. According to Izvestya, the Putin government recently put in an order for 20 Triumph Adler typewriters. A source inside the Russian Federal Guard Service was quoted as saying that these low-tech machines each had their own unique signature and that paper reports were the order of the day from now on. This quirky - or should I say querty - approach to government communication in the digital age certainly has security advantages. But all those carbon copies may have a dramatic impact on Russia's CO2 emissions. There may also be other unforeseen consequences.  'Vasily, hurry up and finish the report on our top-secret operation in Damascus. And stop sniffing that f*****g Tippex!'