Perhaps I am not mad after all. I have photographic evidence that the Shreks of Westminster Bridge are real. Although there is some doubt as to if they are real Shreks. I got a couple of tweets today from people who'd chanced across them. First came
this picture of some men pretending to be (amongst other things) a Shrek. Obviously this one isn't a real Shrek, but just because one person has dressed up as a Shrek that doesn't prove there are no real Shreks. There were some suggestions that the men pretending to be Shreks were bothering tourists to make money (so at least it wasn't a dry run for some Shrek terrorist stabbing) and even some unsubstantiated rumours that the Shreks would pick-pocket you. I don't want to compound people's prejudices against Shreks, who already have a bad press and it's easy to dismiss them all as thieves. But perhaps it would be wise to take care of your belongings if you are around a Shrek and have not got to know him properly. And do remember that the ones doing the pick-pocketing are not actual Shreks but just people dressed as Shreks, so they are using the prejudice to deflect attention from their human crimes.
And whilst the previous picture could have been taken anywhere, another one I found myself proves beyond doubt
that there is at least one Shrek on Westminster Bridge and this could well be a real one as he has the hands and everything (it's unlikely a human impersonating a Shrek would go to this level of detail), plus he is fat in a way that no human could be, only a Shrek. I tweeted the picture to David Mitchell to make him eat his words, his hat and his ham hand, but he merely responded that the Shrek looked a bit ill. I told him that of course he looked ill, because every time someone didn't believe in the Shrek, his head would deflate slightly. Every child knows that.
So anyway, I am not going mad and the Shreks of Westminster Bridge are real and I will soon be writing a children's book about them and setting up my own "Shreks of Westminster Bridge" movie franchise and theme world (not affiliated with the motion picture Shrek).
I was glad that there aren't terrorists pretending to be Shreks in London, though news came in of a supposed terrorist plot where some men had planned to attach butcher's knives to a lorry and then drive it into a crowd. This did not seem a million miles away from Charlie Brooker's podcast suggestion to use a massive piece of cheese wire to cut off the feet of everyone in Oxford Street. It would be terrible to think we'd given terrorists the idea, but that doesn't stop me coming up with plans.
I would have thought lorries would have been deadly enough, but the addition of knives is a darkly humorous Dick Dastardly touch. I think I could think of funnier things, but I'd like to see terrorists injecting some humour into their atrocities. I don't think they should do atrocities at all, but if they're going to do them anyway, then why not get a bit inventive with Saw-like gruesome humour. I don't think it would make a terrorist attack any worse because the bad thing about terrorist attacks is that they kill people. That would still happen, so why not put in some jokes as well. Maybe one of your rucksack bombers should have gunge in his backpack which explodes over everyone. The other bombers would have bombs so you'd still achieve your goal of killing innocent people, but then there would be this slightly surreal and odd bomber who would just mess up everyone's clothes. Once those people found out what could have been in the rucksack then I don't think they'd mind.
I'd actually go one step further if I was a terrorist and only use comedy bombs, ones that couldn't kill anyone. You'd get just as much press coverage (possibly even more) and make your point, whilst making the Western world look foolish, but also you wouldn't put off all those people who are appalled at the idea of indiscriminate murder.
But if you're going to insist on killing people as well, then why not just add a couple of jokey elements to the plot - custard pies, snakes in cans or T shirts with amusing slogans to put on your victims. You guys could learn a lot from the Joker is all I am saying.
