Newsflash

HILARY TO YOUR INBOX Join the Hilary Army and get updates, news and blogs sent direct to your Inbox. Why not?

Just send an email to hilary.fortnum@yahoo.co.uk

 

 

 
powered_by.png, 1 kB

Home arrow News / Blogs arrow Blogs, thoughts and emails arrow The Tommy Cannon 1 minute sprint
The Tommy Cannon 1 minute sprint PDF Print E-mail
Wednesday, 17 February 2010

  

I’ll tell you what is valuable and interesting - details about the minutiae of a celebrity’s lifestyle. I’ll tell you who is a celebrity – Tommy Cannon. 

It was therefore a valid experiment, and not a total waste of time, when I sent the following email to all of the national tabloid newspapers in the UK to see who wanted the goss’ on Tommy most. 

To – The Tabloid Press 

Hi, 

Do you want some information about Tommy Cannon? 

Regards, 

Hilary 

It took the Daily Mirror a pedestrian 1 hour and 37 minutes to tell me that “We are always interested in potential stories” and I was astonished that the Daily Star did not even acknowledge receipt. The Daily Mail took a plodding 2 hours and 15 minutes to pipe up with their interest “What do you know?”. The Express were presumably too busy being angry about Princess Diana’s death to even look at my email.  

The newspaper which excelled itself, however, was the Sun.  Within 1 minute, yes 1 minute, I had a response and two minutes later another journalist from the same ‘paper had got in touch. What was particularly helpful was that the second journo gave me some info which I didn’t have already. His email read as follows - that's weird we saw him out last night with Chris Moyles.......”.  So I took up the cudgels with the first journo (on a first come first saved basis). 

The Sun 

As in Cannon and Ball?

Hilary   

Yes, that's the one. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy_Cannon 

The Sun 

What's he been up to then? 

regards 

Hilary  

He's been out on the town with Chris Moyles. 

The Sun 

Hey Hilary, what was it about? 

Hilary  

I understand that it is likely he was toasting the success of his book "Christianity for Beginners". 

Yes, this is a real book. If you want to live your life in a way that is consistent with the Christian faith, and in so doing guarantee an eternity in the afterlife, but you nonetheless don’t have time to read the bible – why not get a brief overview from a 1980s comedy double act? Available through Amazon from 1p. 

cannon 

Or perhaps – are you bored of the Gospel according to Matthew, Mark, Luke or John? Then try the Gospel according to Cannon and Ball. I understand that it is similar to some of the early scriptures in the New Testament but with more twanging of braces. 

cab 

Anyway, back to the Sun … 

The Sun 

is that the story? 

Hilary  

The story could be headed "Cannon Godder" with a sub headline "Funnyman toasts success of mediocre religious tome with mediocre DJ". 

Presumably Moyles has now found God also, which is a story in itself I'd guess. What about "Chris-tian Moyles" or "Canon and Moyles". I would assume that your readers' knowledge of Christian traditions will allow them to understand that the spelling of "Canon" with one "n" is a reference to a biblical canon (whilst also referencing the 80s comedian) rather than a typo. 

The Sun 

Moyles wasnt there 

Hilary  

I have a very reliable source which says that the two were together. If that was a lie then it would be terribly upsetting and also contrary to the teachings of Cannon and Canons. So, let me get this right. Sun journo number 2 had misled me? This couldn’t be right could it? 

Hilary (to Sun journo 2) 

Hi, can you confirm whether or not Cannon was out with Moyles last night? I have a source which conflicts with that intel. 

But the second journalist never got back to me. Perhaps there was no veracity in his story. This does make sense as I find it hard to believe that anyone, let alone Tommy Cannon, would choose to spend the evening with Chris Moyles.  

 

 

 

 
Next >
© 2010 hilaryfortnum.co.uk
Joomla! is Free Software released under the GNU/GPL License.