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Aries


Phew! You really put a lot of effort in to enjoying Christmas. Expect your family to stage an intervention over your 'erratic' behaviour in the coming months. It's not all about you, you pig.


Taurus


You are a thoughtful, inquisitive and spiritual person. You are brave, courageous and action oriented. Not only that, but you are also forward-looking, forward-thinking and interested in what the future holds for you. You should trust your intuition and loosen your purse strings to do more of what you want to do. This will be a sound investment in your future.


A longer version of this horoscope is available on our premium service number 09799 696969. Call now. You’re worth it.


Gemini


Romance is in the air, but tread carefully - the blonde from number 11 already thinks you are a bit odd, so don't push your luck. Remember - a Restraining Order is no substitute for true love.


Cancer


You will be described as resembling a Greek god this month. Unfortunately, they will be referring to Hephaestus who possessed physical traits that diverge sharply from the traditional depictions of divine beauty. He had an ugly face, scraggly beard, massive hands, and a limp. Still, he was a craftsman and had inner strength. We can't all be Brad Pitt. And, from what I hear, he probably smelled better than Brad Pitt.


Leo


The most exciting moment for you this month will be when you are involved in 'an unexpected item in the bagging area' incident. That's what you get when you buy items from the middle aisle in LIDL, you crazy MOFO!


Virgo


The mysteries of life all have a perfectly simple explanation so tell the truth to yourself. You know how the stain got on the duvet.


Libra


Start 2026 in a no nonsense frame of mind. Don't waste your money signing up for gym classes, spend it on cakes instead.


Scorpio


You find out you have inherited a small fortune from an estranged uncle, but you have to spend it in 30 days to inherit the bulk of his esta ... No, hang on, that's "Brewster's Millions", I must be picking up interference from the Classic Film Channel, there are some crazy atmospherics today. Still, it is slightly more plausible than the tosh I sometimes come up with. Perhaps I need to invest in a new copy of Halliwell.


Sagittarius


You are going to have a bobby dazzler of a year ... in 2027. As for 2026: meh.


Capricorn


No matter where you do and what you do, Dorking will always have happened. Make your peace. Seek acceptance or double down, I don't care which.


Aquarius


The Celestials have taken umbrage at you for some reason, and your reading is shrouded in mist. Whatever is going to happen, it will not be good, so expect smitings, plagues and attacks by mythical creatures: the Celestials are definitely Old School in this respect.


Pisces


So, you had a great Christmas party and then a wonderful break with the family. Marvellous. However, your boss will want a word with you about that young lady you got off with. It turns out, she's his niece who's doing GCSEs this year. Oops. Happy New Year!



Authors



Lockjaw: Aries, Cancer, Leo, Sagittarius


Deskpilot: Taurus, Libra


Flasharry: Gemini, Scorpio, Aquarius


Simonjjames: Virgo, Capricorn


Sinnick: Pisces


ree

It's the time of year for celebrating the work of everyone who contributes to NewsBiscuit as writers, editors, cartoonists and the various backroom activities that keep this site running.


We've had a fair few new writers join us this year - welcome - and hopefully this post will find itself opened by people who don't know that much about NewsBiscuit, so a little background might help.


The site exists to provide a space for aspiring and existing comedy writers to hone their comedy writing skills. We don't pay for submissions, but equally don't claim copyright to published or unpublished offerings. None of the editors or other people involved in running the site get paid, and any funds received through the sale of books and donations is used to keep the site running and to satisfy our legal obligations. If you have bought one or more of our books this year (or read them via Amazon Kindle Unlimited - we get paid per page read), thank you. The same goes to anyone who had donated during the year.


There are five categories in this annual competition plus the ultimate Writer of the Year - the person who through a combination of fine writing and consistent persistence has been published often enough to accrue more points than any other writer on the site.


Before that we'd like to acknowledge all the writers who have submitted work in the various formats we publish, regardless of whether you were published or not. Without your contribution we wouldn't have a site to run. This year we have published contributions from nearly one hundred writers. We have published 2282 Front Pages, News in Briefs, Features and Headlines. In addition we attributed 85 hat-tips to writers who pitched in to help improve or just contribute to other persons' submissions.


And let's not forget about the cartoons and the people who create them. We don't include cartoons in the Writer of the Month competition, so there aren't any points to add up, but this year 757 cartoons were published originating from just twelve contributors. In alphabetical order they were: BillClay, Deskpilot, Granger, hughdwink, joe, kman3609, Lockjaw, Modelmaker, sdferris5, Throngsman and watchermark. Of special note is the contributions by Modelmaker who has produced over 500 cartoons and Lockjaw (over 200) who provide the lion's share of the cartoons.


The first category is for the Hat Tip - this generates one point per hat-tip and this year it feels like there's been more collaboration than in previous years. Hopefully that will continue to increase. The top ten contributors, ranked from number one to number ten are:


 

Hat Tip WOTY

1

Deskpilot

2

FlashArry

3

sinnick

4

Modelmaker

5

SteveB

6

Lockjaw

7

james_doc

8

simonjjames

9

Sir Lupus

10

Titus


well done Deskpilot, and many thanks to those other contributors.


The next category is Headlines. A difficult medium to be funny in as the writer has a short character count to write a topical (usually) joke with a powerful punchline. But it still only attracts one point each per headline! Out of over 1200 headlines the authors who were most frequently published, again in rank order and listing the top ten, are:


Headline WOTY

1

Deskpilot

2

mcdabble

3

tonymc

4

Titus

5

Modelmaker

6

MrQ

7

bigbadbob

8

dominic_mcg

9

jim Skinz

10

Adrian Bamforth

Again, congratulations to Deskpilot. McDabble gets an honourable mention with nearly 140 headlines published.


The Features award (it's listed as LA on the monthly stats, a hang-over from the old site when it was called Left Alert despite featuring on the right hand side of the page for the last few years) is awarded to longer or more off-beat submissions and attracts four points. The top ranked contributors to this category, (I've included more than ten as everyone from FlashArry and below are equally ranked) with number one listed first are:



Features WOTY

1

Lockjaw

2

Deskpilot

3

SteveB

4

Alba Late

5

ChrisF

6

sinnick

7

Sydalg

8

FlashArry

9

hokeyloci

10

james_doc

11

jeremynh

12

nicka

13

rowly

So congrats to Lockjaw who collates and produces the monthly horoscope.


News-in-Briefs are (generally) shorter than the Front Page offerings and accrue two points in the WOTM competition. Typically two a day except on weekends where we tend to publish one. However this isn't a hard and fast rule with extra NiBs published when there's enough publishable material and/or there are some so topical they would spoil otherwise. The top ten authors are:



NiB WOTY

1

wrenfoe

2

Deskpilot

3

Throngsman

4

eppursimuove

5

jeremynh

6

billclay

7

Sully

8

Titus

9

simonjjames

10

james_doc

Gratz to Wrenfoe for heading this category. So successful we named an arbitrary rule after him (the Wren Rule)


Finally, before we get to Writer of the Year, we have the Front Page winners. The Front Page is the category many of the writers aspire to, usually but not always a longer form prose.



Front Page WOTY

1

Deskpilot

2

eppursimuove

3

jeremynh

4

Throngsman

5

Sully

6

james_doc

7

billclay

8

SteveB

9

nicka

10

wrenfoe

Desktop being top of the list shouldn't be a surprise to regular readers of NewsBiscuit, as he is so often on the Front Page and wins Writer of the Month more often than not.


Which brings us to the Writer of the Year award, gained through amassing the most points throughout the year. Deskpilot wins the ultimate accolade, and well deservedly. Not only does Deskpilot regularly score points in all the categories in each month, he scores highly. Unrelated to this he also does a lot of background stuff for this site, which is generally unreported.


Well done Deskpilot.




Writer of the Year

1

Deskpilot

2

eppursimuove

3

wrenfoe

4

Throngsman

5

mcdabble

6

jeremynh

7

Titus

8

Modelmaker

9

tonymc

10

billclay

Happy New Year toall our readers, writers, editors and backroom people




ree


ree

Deskpilot has pulled it off again scoring what is one of the largest scores I can recall since the competition started eight years ago. Jeremynh and I drew joint second and third place goes to McDabble with an impressive headlines score.


As usual the links to all the subs are below, followed by the Cartoon of the month and tail-ended with the headlines that were published this month.


Then I'll be off to calculate the Writer of the Year, so look out for another posting, possibly tonight!


Front Page, News in Brief and Features


apepper



billclay







Chipchase



DavidH



Deskpilot




















Dominic_mcg



Emerick Meriwether




eppursimuove




harrypalmer



ian searle



James_Doc





Jamie Dodger



jeremynh













Lockjaw




McDabble





Midfield Diamond




Newsbiscuit Editorial Team



Robowurzel



Scribbles





Sir Lupus




SteveB



Sully







Throngsman














Titus



Walter Eagle



Wrenfoe












youngbsl



Cartoon of the month goes to Deskpilot with Trump mobile phone: shipping now!!!


Headlines


Adrian Bamforth        


BBC: Trump lawsuit will not affect Mrs Brown's Boys repeats schedules

Builder offers to cover Bayeux Tapestry for half the cost using tarpaulin

Crown Jewels attackers taken into custardy

Repeats of Roy Rogers TV shows to come with Trigger warning


apepper    

      

Dickens' Christmas Carol may have been ghost written

Doctor says Trump's stool sample "normal" after hearing his speeches


BillClay    

        

Bill for Covid enquiry forwarded to Michelle Mone

Gaping hole causes unexpected canal leakage

New Trump warship looks suspiciously like a Venezuelan oil tanker painted gold

Pathetic, whiny man to get made up Peace prize from sycophantic football bellend

World Darts Federation creates an Orange Piece of Crap Prize


Deskpilot    

   

Bayeux tapestry: was the truth embroidered?

Bored entomologist persists with tick boxing exercise

Cut price fish bought by cheapskate

Doctors call off strike, but call in sick with flu

Gazans not keen on Xmas footie game in no man's land

Government borrowing: Reeves takes all the credit

Government will reverse all tax rises if enough people complain

Holly Willoughby fined £1,600 for careless queue jumping

Impecunious masochist is always strapped for cash

Israel wins Eurovision after everyone else pulls out

Jake Paul: Come back here and I'll bite your legs off

'Macbeth' Starmer worrying that Burnham would

Man who invented Pot Noodle wins FIFA prize for Science

Man who lives on mountain top says there are downsides

Nativity play director uses a crib sheet

Netanyahu approves new settlement on the Isle of Wight

Netanyahu tells Australia it's all their fault

Plans for new library shelved

Putin says Russia will take Eurovision by force

Salah, Farewell, Auf Wiedersehen, Goodbye...

The Guardian reports first F1 win for Chuck Norris


dominic_mcg 


Italian dinosaur footprints could be David Attenborough's


hokeyloki    

    

England win in Australia - Hell "closely monitoring" temperatures


ian searle     

  

Confused horticulturist not sure what to do when sent on Gardening Leave

Psychologist who postulated 'Imposter Syndrome' doesn't think they deserve the credit

Teachers to be trained to spot early signs of children not liking sprouts


james_doc    

 

Bonny Blue Endorses Reform, "I know all about screwing the UK"


jim skinz       

  

1980s tribute band formed in Yorkshire: T't'pau


Lockjaw 

         

BDSM club out on the lash for Christmas

Pope: no-one can hold a candle to Archbishop Moth


mcdabble   

   

David Walliams denies saying 'Bitty' in editorial meeting

FIFA awards 'The FIFA prize in Economics' to Donald Trump

Frozen Russian assets must be defrosted for 24hrs before use, say experts

GP surgeries overwhelmed with patients 'not feeling Christmassy'

Greenland to annexe Alaska

I ended 8 wars so I'm owed starting one, says Trump

Invisible Man seeks 'Inappropriate Friends' in Balmoral area

Museums now so boring that not even staff notice if stuff goes missing, says report

Parish council accuses Jewish residents of 'attracting extremists'

Putin has only a few days left to make The Simpsons' prediction come true

Scientists discover that Zebras have stripes so they are less likely to be spotted

Scots still not spent coin after 900 years

Trump ballroom will be built to last 1000 years

US is now the world's leading unclear power

Your Party expels every single member in quest for ideological purity


mick turate   

 

Keir Starmer bans all Labour voters from visiting Jeremy Clarkson's pub

Mr Blobby outed in Epstein files

RSPCA Lottery tells cats and dogs to gamble responsibly


Midfield Diamond     


US encourages visits from Australian under-16s


Modelmaker  


Air traffic controllers' strike planned for Christmas Eve 'beyond belief' says Santa Claus

Andrew relinquishes shotguns but retains double-barrelled name

Arguments over the rules of new board game enter 5th day

Genetically modified Brussels sprouts promise half-hearted farts

Global warming blamed for unusually early flu season

Kakologophobics demand 'having a shit' is replaced by the more genteel 'having a Farage'

Pam Bondi's dog given Christmas homework of eating remaining Epstein files

Russia awards Trump the No Balls Peace Prize

Shrinkflation: Terry’s chocolate orange reclassified as chocolate satsuma


robowurzel  

   

Australia bans News Biscuit for under-65s


rowly  

Crop circles discovered in Trump's hair

Starmer offers Putin the Isle of Wight in exchange for Crimea

'Your Party' waiting for appointment at Identity Clinic


santosh    

       

Trump is once again 'very close' to achieving nothing


sinnick    

        

Frenchman gets fed up with egg jokes: 'Un œuf est un œuf'


SteveB 


FIFA kicks racism back into football

Great British Railways loses track


sully    


DoJ apologises for asking Yossarian to do Epstein redactions


Titus   


All juries accidentally permanently discharged

Another Russian general dies in a Special Military Accidental Explosion

Perverted farmworker's crimes described as 'harrowing'

PM spends tax revenue on apprenticeships for youngsters sacked due to increased tax on employers

Proposed international octopus protection plan 'has legs'


tonymc      

      

Badenoch : I love this country, it's only it's poor I hate

Badenoch decides not to ask PM how Covid enquiry is going

Badenoch vows to keep making faces at Starmer

FIFA sells football's soul to Satan

Fraudsters lobby for return of Tory Government

Jesus was English insists Yaxley Lennon

Labours fault Tories closed or sold 219 Courts says Badenoch

Proposed ID cards to clearly specify, Royal, Lord, Peasant or Andrew

World laughs as Britain hands out it's Empire medals


Walter Eagle  


Sinatra upset Muslim leader: Golden Frank incensed Emir


writingbsl    

   

1st century Strep evidence: 4 Hoarsemen of the Apocalypse

Chinese return UK gvt data: too inaccurate




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