Putin's guide to selfies

Not many people realise Russian empire was built on ability to take magnificent self portrait, or selfie. Now, whole world is taking selfies but sadly, most are making their selves look like homeless simpleton or sick prostitute.

Here are some tips to make your selfies Putin Hot.

Lighting

Best angle for lighting is 45 degree, to highlight excellent Slavic bone structure. But to take truly breathtaking shot, you need to remember rule number one of KGB interrogation training: always conceal powerful torch behind the dossier you’re holding. Because best lighting for real man comes from directly under jaw. Leon Trotsky’s tiny midget face and huge floppy hair make him look like member of boyband. That’s why no one take him seriously, not even Mexicans. KGB torch technique makes even dissident baby man look like Greek god.

Eyebrows

Some guys have got selfie under control and are cool with Russian Federation. Megastar Justin Bieber for example, understand 90% of good selfie is in eyebrow control. Step 1: squint eyes to tiny slits. Step 2: raise eyebrows. Step 3: make sad blowy mouth. Try it, it’s harder than it looks. When I got urgent text message from Edward Snowdon couple of weeks ago, his profile pic look has all three steps bang on target. I didn’t even read boring text, I just reply “High Five!”

Setting

By this point everyone is staring directly into steely eyes. But you can ruin everything with careless background. Don’t do selfie in mama’s kitchen with 100 stupid cats. Take selfie in freezing dacha with shirt off and trousers belted around ribcage with empty can of Baltika No. 9 and hunting rifle. Every woman melts and every man furious with jealousy. I always thought Lee Harvey Oswald was daydreamer in KGB training but clearly he was paying attention on selfie day.

Quick cheats

To arrange face and home into complex shape takes time – which you might not have. But there are some cheats. Stare into fluorescent strip light for 45 seconds, clench buttocks and calculate square root of 13 in head. Take shot immediately and you have achieved greatest selfie of all – Rasputin style. This is fastest way to achieve legendary insane Russian mystic sex look, which will open doors beyond wildest dreams, hypnotise the masses and seduce the queen. It’s the look all celebrities want for summer 2013, and I would have rocked it at G8 summit was it not stolen by Chancellor Osborne.

Gullible people hit compensation jackpot yet again

GULLIBLE people are to receive yet another compensation payment after taking out insultingly worthless credit card insurance.

The £1.3 billion windfall for the easily-convinced follows similar rewards for taking out loan insurance, mortgage insurance, insurance protection insurance and other things that sound good if you don’t think about them at all.

28-year-old Emma Bradford said: “Whenever I talk to my bank I just say yes to every question they ask because I know they have my best interests at heart.

“As a direct result I now receive thousands of pounds every month in compensation and appeared in this year’s Sunday Times Rich List.

“I’m not sure what I’ll do with the money, I’m basically sitting by the phone waiting for someone to ring up and offer me a timeshare.”

Car salesman Stephen Malley agreed: “I lack the mental ability to understand when I am being misled, and because of this I now have a massive house full of UFO books and homeopathic products.

“People say I’m gullible but that’s not even a proper word, at least it isn’t in the dictionary.”

However chef Carolyn Ryan said: “When I got a credit card, I wasted six hours saying no to questions like ‘Wouldn’t it be reassuring to know that in the event of the sun going nova your payments would be kept up automatically?’

“Why did I bother?”

A spokesman for the British Bankers’ Association said: “We regret that these costs will be passed on to customers with normal brains.”