English Tourist Board calls for 'more interesting' murders

Tourism bosses have expressed 'dismay' at the grubby, unphotogenic nature of so many murders nowadays.

'We had one last week, lovely picturesque English village, honeysuckle round the vicarage door, cobbled streets, church bells – some nobody murdered his wife – also of no social status – after too much to drink. Would it have been too much trouble to kill a professor instead? Or to have left anagram clues? I despair'.

The only things keeping English tourism alive are the Royal Family and quaint murders. The ETB is rumoured to be hacked off with the Royal Family also, but they don't voice their concerns in case it scuppers the odd gong down the line.

'England is known for its carefully crafted murders', a spokesman told us. 'Curare, vicars, maybe a vintage car or two. Americans love it. We've asked for GCSE Poisoning to be reintroduced to the curriculum. Can't think why they ever cancelled it'.

Netflix have joined the ETB's campaign, highlighting the boost to the economy from telegenic murders. 'We bring around ten million of your quaint English pounds into the country when we film a mini-series', a mogul said. 'So a retired sea captain and a coupla spinsters hit the deck a little early. So what? We all have to go'.

Image: George Ciobra (@george_ciobra) | Unsplash Photo Community

Royal Family to be turned into Data Centres

In a bold move to modernise the Royal Family, plans have been drawn up to turn the entire institution into a data centre.

'It was either this or turn them into Turkey Twizzlers', a spokesman said. 'And the hygiene people put their foot down.

Princesses Eugenie and Beatrice will make a unique contribution - the heatsink design for the microprocessors will be based on their trademark 'fascinators'. They will not be forgotten, sadly.

Regular Royal duties - waving, opening things, making small talk - will all be done by AI, enabling the whole venture to break even in its first week of operation. Graphs have been drawn. To be fair, they were done by AI so might be total fantasy, but it isn't as if the whole Royalty thing was overly committed to grim reality.

Andrew Mountbatten will play a unique part - in the foundations of Buck House Data Centre, a new central London facility which will be owned by some of the people he used to party with.

Balmoral, Sandringham and vast swathes of British countryside will be covered in computer warehouses so that students will no longer need to write their own essays. It's all fairly asinine, but still slightly less daft than having an actual Royal Family.

Image: WixAI

Harry whines about William like anyone cares any more

"William might take away our titles when he's king," Harry grizzled to the media last week.

"I realise that the world is facing an escalating war in the Middle East which could tip it into recession, hitting struggling families in the UK very hard indeed," continued the ex-royal prince - or duke, or whatever he's become - from his mansion in California.

"So I appreciate the personal issues of a self-obsessed aristocrat and his vain actress wife might not matter quite so much to people as they used to.

"But William might take away our meaningless titles!

"Waah!"

image from Grok