Natasha Bedingfield's strange and desperate new song "I wanna have your babies" is everywhere at the moment. She is the kind of pretty, but clearly slightly mental woman that I would usually go for, but I don't think I could even countenance having Daniel Bedingfield as a brother-in-law, so sorry Natash, you can't have my babies. I wouldn't wish an uncle like that on them. Plus there is something slightly unsettling about the closeness of your relationship with him. I have nothing to back that up, other than a creeping feeling under my skin, but you all know what I'm talking about. And you all agree.
The song though is surprisingly catchy and witty and I am a big fan of people turning their own mad thoughts into art of any kind. Anyone who has seen my latest show will know I am in no position to judge someone for making inappropriate public statements about yourself. But Natasha, I have a suggestion of how you could improve the song. At the moment the chorus runs (from memory), "I wanna have your babies,
I see them springing up like daisies,
It's serious, like crazy."
This is all right, but "babies" does not rhyme with "daisies" or "crazy" and I think the phrase "It's serious, like crazy" is a little weak. It sounds like you've just said that because it rhymes, and then it doesn't actually rhyme. I think the song might be more effective if that final line was "It's serious, like rabies" because rabies rhymes with babies and is also something that is very serious. "Like crazy" isn't serious and doesn't really mean anything, but if you were to point out that the feelings you have are as serious as the dangerous disease of hydrophobia, then people might better understand your feelings. And like a rabies sufferer Natasha is clearly foaming at the mouth, so it would be apt for other reasons.
You really need to change the daisies line too, but I can't think of as good a subsitute for that - possibly "I'm not interested in maybes" which at least rhymes, though isn't as interesting an image as babies popping up out of the ground, under the feet of a mad-eyed, grinning, foam-mouthed Natasha Bedingfield. Maybe you should run your lyrics by me before release from now on Natash. We could look over them whilst having a glass of wine and if you get me drunk enough then I might forget about your terrifying big-faced brother and allow you to extract my gametes to give you the progeny that you so covet.
Good to see that in the immediate aftermath of the terrible shooting at Virginia Tech, the pro guns lobby in America were already arguing that the tragedy could have been averted if only everyone on the campus had been carrying a gun. It wasn't the casual availability of guns that caused this problem, it was in fact down to guns not being available enough. I am sure that if every man, woman and child in America was legally forced to carry a gun then there would be far fewer killings. I know that if I had a gun that I would be shooting at least five of the inconsiderate and rude people I meet every day. But I am surely the exception. Most people would only use them to shoot maniacs on killing sprees, thus making the world a better place.
Maybe it's a crazy dream, but maybe if all Americans were given guns tomorrow morning, by tomorrow evening they would all have successfully shot each other to death and the rest of the world could get on without them. The deaths of millions of people would be sad in the short term, but in the long term more lives would be saved around the world if there were no Americans left to bomb places.
I know it's a crazy dream and there must be some Americans who don't deserve to die. I just can't think of any at the moment, but then I haven't met ALL Americans.
I know I have some readers in the States and of course, I am only kidding around with you. I don't want you all to die. Anyone who reads Warming Up should not be shot to death, just knee-capped so they can't ever go outside again. Just to ensure you don't cause any trouble.
So arm all Americans please. Guns don't kill people, Americans kill people.
