The Da Vinci Load.

FIRST- LONG LIVE COMEDY IS CANCELLED THIS WEEK FOLLOWING A DOUBLE BOOKING COCK UP.

"The new entrance to the Paris Louvre has become almost as famous as the museum itself. The controversial neomodern glass pyramid designed by Chinese-born American architect I.M. Pei still evokes scorn from traditionalists who feel it destroys the dignity of the Renaissance courtyard."

These words, you might think, come from a Paris guidebook. But no, that's where they belong but this is actually the point where I gave up reading the Da Vinci Code. In Dan Brown's stupid world this is what passes for intelligent writing- i.e. including as many irrellevant and atmosphere ruining facts as you can to show you did some research.

He writes as if he was going to be tested on it, like his editor might say -'It's not a bad story Brown, but have you done any swatting? Put in a few quotes so the examiners know you've read the rough guide to Paris.'

I HATE this kind of writing! The worst example ever is 'Timeline' by Michael 'Jurassic Park' Chriton. It's a time travel story which mostly happens in 14th Century France. He actually includes a bibliography to show all the books he ignored. He ignored dozens of clever physics books, which told him time travel is impossible. He also scoured history books and ignored everything except the parts which allowed him to have huge explosions. Yes, in 14th century france he managed to include two huge explosions, one gunpowder dump (fair enough) and one mill, based on him reading that in certain circumstances, possibly, if the conditions are just right, flour dust can be mildly explosive.

I did actually finish this book, as I wanted to see why the evil billionaire was sending scientists back to study the 14th century castle. Was he planning to go back with machine guns and steal all of the world's gold from idiots with swords? Would he plant a false historical trail making him king? Would he put 1 franc in the first bank to open and then withdraw it again in 1999 with 600 years of interest- making him the richest person on earth?

Nope - he actually wanted his scientists to study the castle, so -get this- he could build a perfect replica, more detailed than any restored castle ever! People would flock to see such a superbly restored castle and they would spend a lot of money in gift shops and hotels. Gift shops and hotels which the evil billionaire had shrewdly bought up. Mwaa ha ha ha!

Da Vinci is rubbish anyway. They say he invented the helicopter. No he didn't. He drew a doodle of a helicopter. He never built it and if he had it wouldn't have worked. It was powered by 4 blokes walking round in a circle for christ's sake! Show me the dictionary where the definition of 'invent' is 'to originate a new machine by drawing a vague scribble of a prototype which is obviously doomed to fail.'

NEXT GIGS-
-MONDAY, BEAT THE FROG, MANCHESTER.
-LONG LIVE COMEDY, DOG AND PARROT- BACK ON THE 19TH SEP.