Barnaby Taylor 123 Celebrity News, celebrity, Dr Don't Know, Falcon Boy and Bewilder Bird versus Dr Don’t Know in a Battle for all the Life of all the Planets, Falcon Boy: A Fairly Hopeless Hero, Panic Town, Television, Volume I

Breaking News

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Hi everyone

Here is the next thrilling installment from Falcon Boy and Bewilder Bird versus Dr Don’t Know in a Battle for all the Life of all the Planet

Please take a look and let me know what you think. All feedback is gratefully received. Click the link to find out more …

2. Dr Don’t Know meets Juniper Jarvis

Like almost all of some parts of the rest of the world, Panic Town had the choice of nearly twenty-seven television channels. Yet for most people, 123 Celebrity News was the only channel of choice.

123 Celebrity News was beamed, bounced, screened, recorded, streamed, downloaded, torrented, zipped, compressed, shared, copied, replayed, burnt, backed-up, archived, data-managed and saved for later all day every day so that Panic Town could gorge itself on celebrity news until it falls into an audiovisual stupor.

The breaking news this morning was coming live from the steps of the Town Hall and was a celebrity feast like no other has ever been witnessed. It was guaranteed to revitalise even the most constipated of viewers.

‘Hi everyone, my name is Juniper Jarvis and I’m reporting live for 123 Celebrity News. I’m with that well-known bad guy and all-round celebrity supervillain, the legendary Dr Don’t Know.’

For most people in Panic Town, the concept of twenty-four hour news meant exactly what it said. They imagined that presenters like Juniper had to present the news for twenty-four hours at a time.

As a result, these same people were permanently perplexed when they bumped into Juniper while they were walking down the street. Or shopping at a supermarket she had been invited to open. Entered a talent contest she was judging. Or looking in through the front window of her ground floor apartment as they just happened to be walking past.

‘Why aren’t you reporting the news?’ people asked when they saw her.

‘Shouldn’t you be on the television instead of standing in this queue?’ people would say, as Juniper patiently queued to pay her television license at the Panic Town National Bank.

‘Who’s going to give me the latest celebrity gossip while you’re busy treating yourself to a week’s groceries?’ inquired the cashier in Food and Things, Panic Town’s most successful supermarket superstore.

Some of the same people also thought that whenever they met Juniper out and about, that she was reporting live for some reason or other, and so they were somehow part of the story. Even the obvious absence of cameras and other news-reporting equipment didn’t stop people believing this.

‘They can build a camera so small nowadays that it is only visible to house flies, microscopes and scientists.’

‘Juniper’s left eye is a camera lens and whenever she talks to anyone, she is simultaneously transmitting live footage to the watching world.’

‘Juniper has a microphone embedded in her index finger and this gives her the real edge when it comes to news reporting.’

‘Juniper’s feet are actually the metal feet of a tripod that were grafted onto her body whilst she was on a so-called ‘holiday’.

‘Juniper has gills inserted into her neck so that she can do interviews in monsoons, waterfalls or underwater.’

As you can imagine, it was hard work being Juniper Jarvis but she would never let this get in the way of doing her job.

‘The breaking news this morning is that Dr Don’t Know has kidnapped Falcon Boy and Bewilder Bird, and is holding them both prisoner in an undisclosed location.’

Juniper paused briefly to let the impact of her news sink in.

‘Even despite the cataclysmic severity of the situation, and bearing in mind any possible calamity now facing the entire Solar System, Dr Don’t Know has kindly agreed to take time out of his busy schedule to be interviewed.’

Whether working with international master criminals, small children underachieving in some delightful way, celebrity ponies and other quirky mammals in the public eye, film stars – the obviously famous and their not so obviously-famous counterparts – even the occasional over-achieving citizen, they all got the same balanced approach from Juniper.

‘So, Dr Don’t Know, perhaps you could tell our viewers why you have decided to commit such an act?’

In case you hadn’t heard, are new to this type of thing, or are simply flicking through the channels looking for something to watch while the adverts are on, Dr Don’t Know is an internationally-known career criminal, reportedly responsible for more than three-quarters of all the crimes that have taken in and around Panic Town over the last fifteen years.

Dr Don’t Know is also the world’s leading authority on being nondescript. The trick to being such a successful international criminal mastermind is to be absolutely and completely one hundred and fifty-six percent nondescript.

In fact, Dr Don’t Know is so completely nondescript that my description of him will run out of words right about now.

‘Don’t know,’ says Dr Don’t Know.

These are the only words that anyone has ever heard Dr Don’t Know use and so, unsurprisingly, this is the name he has been given by the press. Why are these the only words that anyone has ever heard Dr Don’t Know use? I don’t know. You would have to ask him, but you don’t have to be a genius to guess what the answer would be.

Dr Don’t Know’s name will be of the utmost importance to all of us a little bit later on. However, for now, all you need to know is how frustrating it is when the only answer that someone gives to a question is ‘Don’t know.’ Try it now with someone you know and see how it feels. When you have finished come back to the story. We’ll be waiting.

‘Ok. Thank you for that,’ continued Juniper. ‘Perhaps you could tell our audience why what you are planning to do is so criminally important, that you have to keep our two favourite heroes prisoner somewhere secret.’

‘Don’t know,’ said Dr Don’t Know.

I imagine you are starting to feel as frustrated as everyone else is with the interview so far. Dr Don’t Know hasn’t told us anything we want to know. And isn’t likely to. We are no nearer to knowing anything. Or knowing anything more than nothing. Or simply knowing nothing.

Juniper held the microphone even closer to the Doctor.

‘Is all this necessary because you are close to committing some wickedly evil crime and need the world’s most intrepid twosome out of the way in case they try to deflect your diabolic aim?’

‘Don’t know,’ said the inscrutable supervillain once again, and even though I know you are probably extremely upset by now with the whole lack-of-information thing, I can only give you my word that you will know more of what you need to know a little later on.

‘So there you have it, folks. You heard it first on 123 Celebrity News. My name is Juniper Jarvis and I will see you all the next time you see me.’

Barnaby Taylor Bewilder Bird, Dr Don't Know, Falcon Boy, Falcon Boy and Bewilder Bird versus Dr Don’t Know in a Battle for all the Life of all the Planets, Falcon Boy: A Fairly Hopeless Hero, Panic Town, Volume I

Ladies and Gentlemen, the Infamous Moon Rope

Here is the latest exciting installment from Falcon Boy and Bewilder Bird versus Dr Don’t Know in a Battle for all the Life of all the Planets. As you know, Dr Don’t Know has kidnapped Falcon Boy and Bewilder Bird and is holding them hostage somewhere secret. In the absence of any real information the forces of law and order have gathered to speculate on Dr Don’t Know’s next step. As always happens in these situations, imaginations run wild and any available intelligence is usually anything but intelligent.

This is just a taster of Falcon Boy and Bewilder Bird versus Dr Don’t Know in a Battle for all the Life of all the Planets and if your appetite has been whetted sufficiently then please feel free to download the full e-book.

You never know; you might even feel moved enough to want to review it. I’m just saying.

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Captain Lori Lorimer of the Panic Town Police Force briefed a panel of Panic Town’s finest notables including, most notably, Councillor Denver Footswerve, the current Mayor. As she nervously scrolled through the slides of her presentation, Captain Lorimer told the noted notables that she had her best minds working on the case.
‘I have my best people working on this one,’ she tried to reassure those gathered. ‘A crack unit, comprised of the finest minds mined from the department.’ She paused, hoping that the pause sounded reassuring.
‘I don’t mind telling you,’ Captain Lorimer continued, ‘that to my mind these minds are some of the finest minds that anyone has ever been minded to assemble.’
She changed the slide of her presentation and aimed her laser pointer at the screen.
‘Our early intelligence is very sketchy but from what we can gather it is only a matter of days before Dr Don’t Know is ready to launch his Moon Rope.’ Captain Lorimer paused again.
On the screen was an artist’s impression of what the mythical Moon Rope might look like. The audience saw two circles representing the Earth and the Moon with a line joining them. Captain Lorimer traced the line with her laser pointer.
‘From what my best minds can so far deduce, the Moon Rope will allow Dr Don’t Know to create an elaborate pulley system connecting the Earth to the Moon.’
‘Why would anyone do anything like this?’ asked Mayor Footswerve anxiously.
Captain Lorimer shuffled her notes nervously.
‘We are not sure why, your Honour,’ she told the Mayor, ‘but all our agents are telling us that their best intelligence is telling them that this is not going to be a good thing.’
Gasps echoed around the room as Captain Lorimer concluded her presentation by predicting that the Moon Rope would likely cause untold electrical disruption. It would also prevent anyone on the entire planet from ever knowing the right time ever again.
‘I’m afraid it doesn’t look good at the moment,’ she told her gasping audience. ‘This Moon Rope could well mean the end of the world for all of us.’
Mayor Denver Footswerve cleared his throat before he spoke. He thought this made him sound more mayoral.
‘I think I speak for all of us here when I say how pleased we are to have your best minds working on our behalf, Captain Lorimer.’ The Mayor paused and I am beginning to wonder whether pausing is as contagious a social habit as yawning.
‘Ladies and gentlemen, I am aware that we are all aware of just precarious the situation sounds but I can’t help wondering, from a Public Relations perspective, whether it will in any way be possible to temper bad news of this magnitude with some good news, no matter how small that good news might be?’
The Mayor looked at Captain Lorimer and she could see panic in his eyes. Being mayor was the only thing he had ever wanted and now it looked like someone was going to go and spoil it before he had the chance to enjoy it.
There was no good news.

Barnaby Taylor Dr Don't Know, Falcon Boy, Volume I

Dr Don’t Know’s Submarine

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Extraordinary stories about extraordinary heroes normally need extraordinary villains with extraordinary gadgets and extraordinary widgets and extraordinary deeds, facilitated by mind-numbingly extraordinary technology.

All this sounds extraordinarily exciting but this story is slightly different, so I need to tone down expectations by rewriting the paragraph you have just finished reading. How about this?

Stories about heroes normally need villains with gadgets and widgets and deeds, facilitated by technology.

That sounds more like it. There is not much about this story that is extraordinary; its heroes, villains, super or otherwise. However, all is not lost.

Dr Don’t Know does have a global crime network. He also has a large submarine that he uses as his secret base but none of this is quite as glamorous as it sounds. Let me explain.

Global crime networks expand and contract over the life of a supervillain and Dr Don’t Know’s network had experienced a downturn in recent years. Profits have been down for a while now and this is why he has a submarine.

During the good times, Dr Don’t Know rented office space in many of the major cities around the world. He also had penthouse apartments and hotels suites on permanent stand-by, just in case the crimes he was working on necessitated an overnight stay somewhere.

Legions and legions of uniformed staff manned these offices and apartments and suites, ready to serve his every criminal whim.

However, all of this renting and hiring and manning and possible overnight-staying was incredibly expensive. When the crime times were good, Dr Don’t Know felt justified in spending this kind of money but once the crime times were not quite so good, Dr Don’t Know’s army of accountants, in the last thing they did for their boss before they were all fired, reviewed Dr Don’t Know’s income and expenditure and concluded that he was paying too much for too much and needed to start cutting back.

So, all of the office space and penthouse apartments and hotel suites were given up, as were the legions of uniformed staff manning them. Realising that he had to base himself somewhere in order to remain both at large and in business, Dr Don’t Know bought a second-hand submarine called Dr Don’t Know’s Submarine.

Straight away, I am sure you will agree that this is a terrible name for anything, let alone the sub-aquatic headquarters of an international master criminal down on his luck. However, in a spirit of team building that he has since come to regret on a daily basis, Dr Don’t Know ran a competition amongst the few employees he had left to name the vessel. The winning name was drawn from a hat.

Dr Don’t Know’s Submarine is a terrible name for the vessel but things could have been a whole lot worse if one of the other entries had been picked instead. Imagine if the submarine had been called Float Float or Crime Swim? What about Giant Swimming Flying Thing? Sea Sky 33? Dr Don’t Know’s Evil Underwater Submarine and Criminal Hidden Hideout Machine?

Dr Don’t Know’s Submarine constantly patrolled the waters of the world, hoping to avoid detection by staying partially submerged for hours at a time.

According to its operating manual, Dr Don’t Know’s Submarine can also fly short distances and be driven the wrong way down a motorway but no one, Dr Don’t Know included, has been brave enough to put this to the test.

To find out more about Dr Don’t Know and his submarine click here. You can also follow Dr Don’t Know on Twitter but don’t expect him to say much.

Barnaby Taylor Falcon Boy, Volume I

‘Who is ordinary and who isn’t ordinary?’

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Who is ordinary and who isn’t ordinary? Who decides who is extraordinary and who isn’t extraordinary? Perhaps these questions make more sense when we consider the possibility that the central character of this adventure could easily have been someone else.

For example, we could be reading about the adventures of a small ingenious boy called Dunstable Johnson who is very handy in tight situations. Or, we could all be thrilling to the adventures of a swashbuckling amateur wrestler called Erica ‘Neck Brace’ Larkin. Erica investigates local mysteries in between wrestling bouts. This is just for starters.

The battle to rescue Falcon Boy and Bewilder Bird from the clutches of the evil Dr Don’t Know and, by doing so, save the world from apparent destruction could have centred around the players and coaching staff of Wolseley Street F.C, an U12s amateur football team.

Football has all the hallmarks of great adventure as players grapple with triumph and adversity as they seek to win a championship or avoid being relegated. There is plenty of drama in an adventure like this.

If you don’t like stories about footballers, then what about a rather nifty and exciting robot called Rocky Random? Rocky has a propulsion unit in his boots and can cross oceans if necessary. He is handy to know in a global emergency.

No? How about Eucalyptus McKenzie, the cartoon koala bear and government agent? The adventures of Eucalyptus McKenzie are yet to be written but I am pretty sure that this isn’t the last we will hear about this daring koala bear.

For more thoughts on who is ordinary and who isn’t ordinary click here. If you want to follow someone who is both ordinary and extraordinary then why not click here?

Barnaby Taylor Falcon Boy

Welcome to the Queue

You are too late. Nothing works anymore. The world has gone wrong. The planet still spins in space but forlornly now, sullen, lopsided; different somehow.

Everything is broken.

Buildings. Streets. Trains. Aeroplanes. Elevators. Bicycles. Radios. Washing machines. Traffic lights. Percolators. Skylines. Exit lights. Frying pans. Pavements. Alarm clocks. Egg timers. Boats. Chandeliers. Lawnmowers. Aquariums. Fax machines. Easter eggs. Personal organisers. Microwaves. Trumpets. Newspapers. Riding schools. Candelabras. Curling tongs. Football boots.

Headphones. Shoe laces. Tin foil. Fountain pens. Picture frames. Step ladders. Garden furniture. Swimming pools. Beach huts. Kettles. Handkerchiefs. Record players.

Jigsaw puzzles. Curling tongs. Waste paper baskets. Oven gloves. Paint brushes. Perfume bottles. Standard lamps. Printing presses. Immersion heaters. Car boot sales. Drum sticks. Room dividers. Stair rods.

Journals. Diaries. Dictionaries. Letters. Cards for all occasions. Notes. Novels. Plays. Scripts. Emails. Submissions.

Hobbies. Habits. Fads. Fashions.

Movements. Waves. Histories. Cultures.

Desires. Ambitions. Ideas.

Questions?

All the whole world does now is queue. Whole countries united in their queuing. Continents. The whole world. As far as the eye can see. Visible from space.

No one can remember a time before the Queue. Only the Queue. Now. And nothing else. Forever.

But no one cares. All they care about is the Queue. There is nothing else to care about. Only the Queue.

What a way to live your life. Being born. Growing up. Dying. All in the Queue. A life defined by waiting in line. Life after life after life. One after the other. Everyone in the Queue.

Forever. All you will ever know. Nothing more. Only the Queue.

The world is really rubbish now. Really rubbish.

Really, really rubbish.

So what has gone wrong?

Dr Don’t Know is what has gone wrong.

Dr Don’t Know?

The world’s greatest supervillain.

The world’s last supervillain.

Last?

Well, he won, didn’t he? His evil plan succeeded. And now the world looks the way he has always wanted it to.

His evil plan?

You had better come with me.

For more on Dr Don’t Know and his evil plan click here. He is also on Twitter and is happy to answer any questions you might have …