THERE are some topics this broadsheet seems to have a psychotic obsession with. Here are some we’ve honestly heard enough about…
People leaving London
For a paper based in the capital, the Guardian is desperate to tell us why no one should live there. We don’t care if Louise escaped the rat race to open a yurt retreat in Devon. And with 300,000 people expected to leave London this year, for Christ’s sake don’t write an article about every single one of them.
Wild swimming
Every Guardian journalist must take their trunks or cozzie to work each day, because chances are they’ll be dispatched to write a twee 1,000-word article on the ‘joys’ of doing front crawl in a murky lake in Cornwall. Nope. It looks grim. We’re never going to try it.
Bitcoin
Only about one per cent of their readers understand it, with even fewer likely to invest. That doesn’t put them off endless ‘long reads’ on cryptocurrency. The only thing that’s stopped them doing more is the recent trend for non-fungible tokens. No idea what those are either.
High-end dramas
The paper loves to do episode-by-episode recaps of any show that’s vaguely interesting. Game of Thrones and Line of Duty are just about fair enough. But Bake Off? Masterchef? Next it’ll be a liveblog of The Chase or a knob-by-knob review of Tuesday night’s Naked Attraction.
Avocados
A versatile foodstuff, and it also goes a long way in a newspaper. Not just the endless avocado on toast and guacamole recipes – there’s also the health benefits, beauty products and some articles resembling April Fools’ jokes, such as the dangers of cutting them, or ‘avocado hand’.
Cycling
If a story features a bike you can bet your arse it’s in the paper. From Dutch cycling holidays to bike lane disputes, nothing is off limits. They also take pleasure in thoroughly reporting the only sport more boring than cricket: professional cycling.
