Spring has most definitely arrived here in Gypping in the Marsh, and what a pleasure it is to welcome it. Looking out of my study window as I type, the crocuses are coming into bloom and yesterday I saw the first daffodil of the year.

A single daffodil grows up from a rubbish-strewn pavement, with a rat scurrying past

Spring has sprung in Gypping in the Marsh

I think it was Wordsworth who penned those immortal lines:

Earth has not anything to show more fair,
Than that bunch of daffodils over there.

Or words to that effect. Eng lit was never my strong point at Eton, to be perfectly honest. It did not help that our English teacher, Mrs Robinson, was a fine-looking woman with a tendency to wear above-the-knee skirts, high-heeled patent leather shoes and blouses with rather a plunging neckline. That meant that concentration was a hard thing to come by for a young chap like myself when attempting to address the finer points of poetry and prose.

Aah, Mrs Robinson... that brings back memories. She had something of a soft spot for me, as it happens, despite my general uselessness when it came to her specialist subject. Let us just say that she managed to teach me a lot more after hours in the book cupboard than she ever managed to in her English lessons.

Anyway, I digress. Back to business. I am sad to have to report that two completely inexcusable instances of vandalism have taken place in Gypping in the Marsh in the past week: two cars have been vandalised. Firstly, some yob has spray-painted a swastika onto the windscreen of Mr Brunner's Tesla, and sprayed 'Swasticar' onto its bonnet. I realise that Elon Musk is hardly the most popular man on the planet at the moment - I myself fervently wish that he would get a move on with his Mars plans and book himself a seat on each test flight - but this is no excuse for wanton damage done to other people's property.

A blue Tesla car with a swastika spray-painted onto the windscreen, and 'Swasticar' spray-painted onto the bonnet

The vandalised Tesla

But it is not only the odious Mr Musk that people seem to have a grudge against right now; Beaker, my PA, also had his car vandalised this week. An unidentified miscreant has spray-painted 'Down with Russia' onto the side of his ancient Lada Riva. Beaker's car is hardly what one would call desirable - although Beaker refers to it as a 'classic', I think it is best described as a crumbling heap of rust - but he is extremely attached to it and is very upset.

A rusty old beige-coloured Lada Riva, with 'Down with Russia' spray-painted onto the side

Beaker's vandalised Lada

If anyone has any information that could help to identify the perpetrators, please do contact the local police. Hopefully that will give them something useful to do, in contrast to persecuting perfectly law-abiding servants of the people over trumped-up so-called charges such as 'polluting controlled waters', 'dangerous driving', 'failing to stop after and report an accident' and 'causing actual bodily harm'. Not that I am bitter; but my lawyer Welsby had a busy few weeks fielding all that nonsense at the end of last year. Anyway, I would encourage anyone who wants to make a political point to protest in a law-abiding manner, and not to damage and deface the property of decent people.

On a happier note, I am pleased to report that last week's UFO-related shenanigans seem to be over. The tin-hatted rabble that swarmed all over the village last week seem to have grown tired of staring up into the sky pointlessly, and have drifted off elsewhere. I cannot say that I am sad to see them go, despite having made a surprisingly pleasant connection with one of them last week that I am hoping to rekindle in a few weeks' time. I am very much looking forward to seeing whether I can persuade her to remove her tinfoil hat the next time we see each other.

However, just as one mystery disappears, another raises its head to take its place: one of my constituents has reported seeing strange tracks in the mud while walking his dog in the woods along the edge of Gypping Marsh. He photographed the tracks and has posted the photo online, asking people to help work out what sort of animal has left them.

I have reproduced his photograph below. They are definitely not human tracks, but there is a certain ape-like look to them. For the life of me I cannot guess what they are. I have tried discussing the matter with Beaker, but the man seems extremely distracted this week and I cannot get any sense out of him at all about anything. It must be down to what happened to his car.

The strange animal tracks in the mud

The village people are coming up with all kinds of wild theories about what kind of animal might be wandering around on Gypping Marsh, and I have heard the word 'bigfoot' mentioned once or twice. I do not think that is helpful: having hosted that bunch of UFO-obsessed weirdos last week, the last thing we want is to have a bunch of bigfoot-obsessed weirdos taking their place.

Gilbert Murray MP

12th March 2025 - An explanation for the strange footprints in the mud, musing about British and international politics, and Ivanya in a mood

If you remember, I wrote last week that one of my constituents had come across some strange, ape-like footprints in the mud while walking his dog on the edge of Gypping Marsh. Ever since he posted a photograph online, there has been intense speculation about what kind of animal could have made them, with the word 'Bigfoot' having been mentioned more than once. Well, I think I have an explanation for the footprints: Beaker admitted to me the other day that one of his damn apes has escaped. That also explains why he has been so distracted for much of the past week.

Beaker tells me that he had been taking advantage of Mr Chuckle being asleep to clean the excrement and banana skins out the bottom of his cage. However, it appears that the chimp was only feigning sleep: as soon as Beaker opened the cage door and leaned in with his dustpan and brush, Mr Chuckle sprang up, pushed Beaker to one side and leaped out of the cage. Before Beaker truly realised what was going on - he hit his head quite badly on one of the bars when Mr Chuckle shoved him out of the way - Mr Chuckle had grabbed a photograph of Ivanya and run through the open kitchen door.

An empty cage in a filthy kitchen, with excrement and banana skins littering the floor

Mr Chuckle's empty cage

One of Beaker's neighbours saw the chimp escaping over the garden fence and managed to snap a quick photograph of the ape making its getaway. Brave man: having already made Mr Chuckle's acquaintance, if I saw that bloody animal coming towards me, I would drop everything and run. That chimpanzee is not well in the head.

A chimpanzee with a bloody bandage around its head leaping over a wooden garden fence

Mr Chuckle making his getaway

I have instructed Beaker to do everything he can to get Mr Chuckle back into captivity. Noel only knows what that animal could do if left to its own devices. I do not think Beaker knows quite how dangerous chimps can be. My great-uncle Gilbert 'Ahab' Murray, who was a merchant seaman in the 1950s, brought a chimp back with him after a voyage to Africa as a present for his wife, to keep her company while he was away at sea. The creature was apparently completely house-trained and would sit in the lounge, dressed in a sailor's suit, sipping tea quite happily. The chimp - Norbert - was apparently excellent company for Gilbert's wife, Muriel... until the day that it decided to dash her brains out with a toaster.

A black and white photograph of a chimpanzee dressed in a sailor suit drinking tea out of a china cup

Norbert enjoying a cup of tea in great-uncle Gilbert's sitting room

Since then, Beaker has spent every spare moment walking around the village, waving a bunch of bananas around his head in an attempt to lure the chimp back home. Let us all hope his quest is successful.

Anyway, enough of this nonsense about bloody chimps. I spent most of this week in London, and managed to catch up with Ivanya. During a break in our catching up session, she lay back in bed with a glass of wine and a cigarette and asked me to tell her the latest news about the rift that has opened up in Deform UK between Fromage and 'Arthur' Lowe. I cannot quite believe what has been going on myself. How is it that Fromage cannot manage to keep his MPs in line when he has such a tiny number of them? I really am starting to wonder whether it was wise for me to get involved with such an unsavoury and incompetent bunch of idiots. I realise that I probably would not have managed to get back into Parliament without Fromage's assistance, but all this infighting is getting embarrassing. I am keeping myself well and truly out of it. Ivanya listened intently as I filled her in on the latest goings-on in the Deform UK camp.

As well as keeping up with what is going on in the world of British politics thanks to yours truly, Ivanya is very well-versed in the world of international politics. As I uncorked a third bottle, she told me that her colleagues in the Russian Embassy are absolutely delighted with the way that Trump - or 'Krasnov', as they refer to him - is championing Russia's interests on the world stage. I have to admit, I was somewhat dubious when I first heard the story about Trump having been recruited by the KGB - even after having been shown the photographs of what went on in the presidential suite of that Moscow hotel. But Trump's actions on the world stage are definitely leading me to rethink things. What a fool the man is, to have allowed himself to be put into such a compromising position.

A blurry photograph showing two women frolicking on a bed in a posh hotel room

One of the pictures showing the depraved goings-on in the presidential suite of the Moscow hotel back in 2013

Unfortunately, after that, things soured between Ivanya and I. Ivanya was keen to know what I was doing to try to improve Anglo-Russian relations. Being Russian herself, she is very keen that I make the most of my position to do whatever I can to correct the unfortunately negative view that many British people have of Russia and its people. My friend Georgy has also been prompting me in a similar way. I explained to Ivanya that although I have contacted several British newspapers and offered to write pro-Russian articles for them, not a single editor has been interested, and that I really do think the best way I can influence people is through this blog.

Ivanya seemed unconvinced by this and turned rather surly, which is most unlike her. She told me that if I really loved her, I would be doing a lot more to combat the anti-Russian bias that is so prevalent throughout the country. I had been hoping to spend quite a bit more time with her that day, but she flounced out of bed, threw her clothes on and left, sulkily telling me that she had things to do. As a parting shot, she told me that if I wanted to carry on seeing her, I would have to "get my act together and start standing up for Mother Russia".

An angry-looking woman dressed in a fur coat, holding a bottle of wine

Ivanya flouncing out in a bad mood

That certainly was an unfortunate end to our catching up session. Ivanya has never acted like that before; she had a steely glint in her eye that was entirely new to me. I was most put out.

What is more, despite our earlier 'catching up', I found myself to be - how shall I put this? - not entirely satisfied. So I got straight on the telephone to a long-standing lady acquaintance of mine - a woman of many exceptional talents - who was happily able to visit me within the hour and resolve matters satisfactorily. It certainly pays to have a large contacts book.

Hopefully Ivanya will have calmed down a bit when I next see her. And hopefully Beaker will have caught that damn ape.

Gilbert Murray MP

19th March 2025 - An update from Beaker

Hello, it is not Mr Murray writing this. It is me Beaker Mr Murray's Personal Assistant. I am writing this because Mr Murray was going to write his weekly blog this morning but he had to hurry off somewhere and he told me that he wouldn't have time to do it and he asked me if I could do it for him this week so that is what I am doing.

It is all a bit odd really. I was at Mr Murray's house in Gypping in the Marsh this morning going through his post while he had his breakfast and he had a lot of post because what he does is he leaves his post to build up all week and then he gets me to open it and deal with it every Wednesday. Mr Murray has a very strange breakfast. I normally have a piece of toast or some Weetabix because I like toast and Weetabix and I have a mug of tea too because I like tea but Mr Murray never seems to eat anything for breakfast. The only things I have seen him have for breakfast are strong black coffee and whisky or brandy and sometimes he pours them together in the same mug.

Anyway I was going through Mr Murray's post this morning and most of it was boring stuff like it usually is like letters from his constituents complaining about things like potholes and Cornish people and the smell coming from my back garden and some of it was bills like it usually is but there was one big brown envelope that had words on it saying PHOTOGRAPHS DO NOT BEND and I said to Mr Murray Yes they do look and I showed him and he wasn't very happy with me and he snapped at me to stop messing about and just open it.

A brown envelope addressed to Gilbert Murray MP, stating 'Photographs do not bend'

The brown envelope

So while Mr Murray was pouring himself another whisky I opened the envelope and lots of big photographs fell out and I flicked through them and I was very confused at what I saw. They were not very good photographs. They were very grainy and a bit blurry but from what I could make out they seemed to have been taken in a few different places and they all showed Mr Murray and some different women and lots of them were taken in bedrooms and I think I recognised the bedroom here at Hemlock Cottage and the bedroom in Mr Murray's London flat and there was another bedroom which was maybe in a hotel. And in the photographs that were taken in bedrooms Mr Murray and the women he was with were doing things together that I found a bit confusing and they didn't have very many clothes on.

One of the women was Madame Oohlala who was the dog trainer that Mr Murray got in to clean his London flat last year when he ended up in hospital when her feather duster got stuck up his bottom and in the photographs Madame Oohlala was doing something very unusual with her feather duster and having seen that I'm not surprised that it got stuck up Mr Murray's bottom and the photograph makes me wonder whether Mr Murray told me the whole truth when he said that he accidentally sat on her feather duster and I am far from being the cleanest person in the world but if you ask me that's no way to clean a flat.

Three of the women in the photographs were tied up and one of them in what looked like a hotel room looked like she was maybe asleep because her head was lolling over to one side and if she wasn't asleep then she did not look very well at all because her head was at a very funny angle and Mr Murray was not looking very happy at all in that photograph.

Photographs scattered over a table, next to a glass of whisky and a full ashtray

The photographs

There was a note with the photographs too but I didn't get chance to read that. I was just about to when Mr Murray saw that I was looking through the photographs and he asked me to hand them over to him so I did and he looked through them and he read the note and as he did so he went very pale. I have never seen the colour drain out of somebody's face so quickly before not even when they are suffocating and that is something I have seen happen but that is another story and really it is not something that I want to go into here and it was all a long time ago and I am taking medication nowadays that means I am a lot calmer.

Anyway I asked Mr Murray if he was OK but he just stared at the photographs some more with his mouth open and then he poured himself the biggest whisky I have ever seen anyone pour and he drank it all back in one big gulp. And then he stood up and he picked up all the photographs and the note and he stuffed them all into his briefcase and he told me that he was going out to see his lawyer and that he didn't know when he would be back and he rushed out of the room. And then after a moment he came back in and he grabbed what was left of the bottle of whisky which wasn't very much and he put that in his briefcase too and he picked up his car keys which he had forgotten and that is when he asked me to write his blog for him this week so that is what I am doing.

It is all very strange and I hope he is OK. Mr Murray is not the nicest of people sometimes and sometimes he is mean to me and to other people but I think that beneath it all he has the best interests of his constituents at heart. That is what he tells me anyway.

With Mr Murray not being here I don't really know what to write about in his blog so I think I will give you an update on my infinite monkey theorem experiment where I am trying to find out if you have an infinite number of monkeys and an infinite number of typewriters and an infinite amount of time one of the monkeys will type out the complete works of Shakespeare.

I don't have an infinite number of monkeys and I don't have an infinite number of typewriters. I have three monkeys called Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg who I call my tech bros and I have one ape called Donald Trump who sleeps all the time and I used to have a chimp called Mr Chuckle but he escaped and I have spent a lot of time trying to find him but I have not had any luck yet.

The monkeys have not managed to type out any Shakespeare yet but I am not giving up hope even though Mr Murray tells me I am insane and he keeps on telling me to get rid of them and my neighbours are complaining more and more about the smell of all the monkey poo in the back garden and I am spending so much money on bananas that I am having to borrow money to pay for them all. Here is a photo of their best effort so far. I can't make out any words but I can't read all of the typing because Elon Musk used this piece of paper to wipe his bottom so you never know there might be a bit of Shakespearean text underneath Elon Musk's poo.

A sheet of paper with random characters typed onto it, smeared with excrement

The tech bro's best effort so far, smeared in Elon Musk's poo

I am hoping to be able to get Mr Chuckle back soon because that will be one more pair of hands to type Shakespeare and even though he used to throw his poo at me whenever I come into the kitchen I am missing him. I have been going all over the place with bananas trying to find him and coax him back but it is difficult because I do not know exactly where he has gone. The only clues I have got so far are some footprints in the woods on the edge of Gypping Marsh and the fact that the village greengrocer's shop was broken into a few days ago at night and a load of fruit was taken and I am wondering whether Mr Chuckle did that.

A man standing outside a greengrocer's shop, with a broken window and fruit scattered all over the pavement

The village greengrocer's shop after the break-in

I had better go now because I need to do some more searching for Mr Chuckle. Hopefully Mr Murray will be back writing his own blog next week.

Beaker (Gilbert Murray MP's PA)

26th March 2025 - Mr Murray is missing!

Hello, it is not Mr Murray writing this. It is me Beaker Mr Murray's Personal Assistant. I am writing the blog again this week because Mr Murray is not here. Nobody has seen him all week and he is not answering his phone or picking up messages or replying to emails and I do not know where he is. It is all very strange and a bit worrying.

It is worrying for me because Mr Murray pays me in cash every week because he says it is best to do it that way and there is no need to get the taxman involved because they have enough to do trying to catch tax-dodgers and so he gives me my wages each week in an envelope. But because Mr Murray is not here he did not pay me last week so I am seriously running out of money and that means that I have not been able to buy any bananas to feed my monkeys and so I have had to feed them the rotting black bananas that have been building up in my hallway and they do not like that and they are starting to act up and get aggressive. Even Donald Trump is starting to get aggressive and he is asleep most of the time. I tried feeding them some of my Weetabix but they didn't like it and they just threw it at me and now I have run out of Weetabix as well as bananas and I don't know what to do.

Piles of boxes and rotting bananas in a dingy hallway

The rotting bananas in Beaker's hallway

I have been round to Mr Murray's house every day to see if he has come back but there is no sign of him. He has obviously not been there all week because his daily deliveries from the milkman have been piling up on his doorstep. Mr Murray doesn't order milk from the milkman like most people because he doesn't like milk. He has a special arrangement with the milkman where the milkman brings him bottles of whisky every day rather than bottles of milk because Mr Murray says that suits him best. But he has not been collecting the whisky bottles from his doorstep and there are lots of bottles there now and I bumped into the milkman and he said he needed paying for the whisky because Mr Murray had not paid him last week and he asked me if I could pay him because I am Mr Murray's PA and when I said that I couldn't he was not very happy.

Bottles of whisky piled up on a front doorstep

Mr Murray's uncollected whisky deliveries

I have asked around the village but nobody has seen Mr Murray since last week when he left in a hurry to go and see his lawyer Mr Welsby. I decided to go and see Mr Welsby myself to see if he had any idea where Mr Murray might be because he was the last person Mr Murray mentioned to me. Mr Welsby is a very good lawyer and he has been good to me in the past when I have had some problems that needed sorting out and I think if it wasn't for Mr Welsby things might have turned out very different for me especially after that misunderstanding involving the farmer's daughter that all went wrong.

Anyway I went to see Mr Welsby and he agreed to see me but he refused to tell me anything about Mr Murray and he said it was because of client confidentiality and he said he was sure that I understood and he said how would I like it if he told anyone else about all the things he has helped me out with in the past and I had a think and I can see what he meant and he had a point.

A stern-looking, distinguished man sitting at a desk in a wood-panelled office

Mr Murray's lawyer, Welsby

So it was a bit of a waste of time going to see Mr Welsby but worse than that it was a waste of money too because before I left his office he wrote out a bill for me for the time he had spent with me and even though I was only in his office for ten minutes the bill was for £160 and I told him that I didn't have £160 and he said that was what his time cost and I had thirty days to pay so now I really need to find Mr Murray otherwise I won't be able to pay Mr Welsby.

After that I decided to go to London to look for Mr Murray because I thought he might have gone to his London flat so I used Mr Murray's season ticket to go to London by train. But when I got to his flat there was no sign of him at all.

When I was leaving the building I bumped into Mr Murray's nice girlfriend Ivanya and I asked her if she had seen Mr Murray and she said that she hadn't and that she had been trying to get in touch with him and that she hadn't been able to and she said that she was worried about him as well and she gave me her phone number and she told me to let her know as soon as I hear from him and then she gave me a peck on the cheek which was very nice and I think I blushed because I think she is very pretty.

An attractive woman in a fur coat, smoking a cigarette and looking worried

Ivanya looking concerned

So now I do not know what to do and I am very worried about Mr Murray and I am starting to think that if I have not heard from him in a few days I should go to the police and report him as missing although I do not want to go to the police because I have had some bad experiences with them in the past and they have not been very understanding. But if Mr Murray does not turn up I think I will have to.

And on top of all that Mr Chuckle my chimp is still missing and he has been missing for weeks now and I don't know what to do about that because I have not got any bananas left to try to catch him with so I am really stuck.

If anyone knows where Mr Murray is please let me know because I am really very worried. And if anyone knows where Mr Chuckle is please let me know too.

Beaker (Gilbert Murray MP's PA)

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Read more about the goings-on in Gypping in the Marsh in 'The Signwriter, in which Gilbert Murray, a forgetful and somewhat hapless signwriter, is offered yet another chance to stand as the next of kin to someone who has died in a car accident along with all of his family, etc etc. How will this particular scammer react to Gilbert's curious mixture of carelessness and pedantry?