I did want to, in the manner of turn-of-the-century R&B mixture Cleopatra, ‘come atcha’ with this Column a little earlier, but unfortunately, or fortunately, I should say, the wholly expected birth of our first child, Leo, somewhat thwarted my attempts to lead a normal life for a while. Not for long, though, I’m already back to doing things I’ve often done in the past, like watch Breaking Bad and laugh at ridiculous Aussie cricketer, Mitchell Johnson.

Awesome

Anyway, some time ago I ran a competition challenging you, my loyal readers, to make up some bizarre stunt you’d be willing to pull in aid of charity. The strangest, or the ones I liked best for whatever reason, would win a copy of I Am Suicide Man, which, as you probably know, is about a man who receives corporate sponsorship to knock himself off.

Anyway, we have two winners for that now – Claire Waldron, who, among other things, expressed a willingness to eat worms, and Singapore-based Dave Benoy, who vowed to grow a moustache for Movember and then dye it in the style of the man with the 24-inch pythons, Hulk ‘The Hulkster’ Hogan.

Well done to both of them. The second competition was much simpler – to be in with a chance of wining, all you had to do was either tweet me that you wanted a book or like a Facebook post that I made. I had more entries to this one – clearly many of you are a little lazy – and below is the official result in the form of a YouTube video, featuring Leo himself drawing the winning ticket from the tombola.

Until next time.

This week’s soundtrack: My Favorite Things – John Coltrane

This week’s e-book recommendation: My Secret History: A Novel – Paul Theroux

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