Never meet your idols

Very cold today, but the town looked so beautiful under clear blue skies, and the way the sun met the mountain tops in the late afternoon ma....

Apologies. The pretentiousness police just pulled me over and let me off with a warning, on the condition that I step away from the cod poetry and talk about something else. How about American Idol? Is that OK, officer? It is? Good.

Idol is now down to the last 11, and this week's celebrity mentor was none other than...Miley Cyrus. A couple of the younger contestants seemed to show genuine admiration and clearly respected the advice that she gave, but it was clear that most of the group were merely tolerating her presence and were smiling and nodding politely as Hannah Montana tried to mould their fledgling careers. Crystal Showersocks has got to be the winner this season, but following his meeting with Miss Cyrus, Casey James might now be my second favourite.

As he walked on to meet her, Casey reached out, shook hands and declared, "Pleased to meet you. I'm a big fan...of your dad."

You should have seen her face.

Bucking the trend

I read today that Starbucks has seen its profits virtually wiped out as a result of the current economic climate. In the article was one of the finest examples of corporate double-speak that I've seen in a long time, from Starbucks chief executive, Howard Schultz:

"With a re-architected cost structure...we began the new fiscal year with a healthier store portfolio that will allow for operating margin expansion."

Kind of sums up the pretentiousness that goes hand in hand with Starbucks; in other words, they're closing the stores that don't make money in order to cut their losses. Now, if Starbucks goes under, we will be faced with a very perplexing problem: where do all the pseudo-intellectual would-be writers go with their laptops (most probably Macs) so that everyone can see them write?

Answers on a postcard, please. An Iced Single Vente, 7 pump Peppermint, Caramel Sauce Top and Bottom, Light Ice, No whip, Mocha postcard.