Dutiful father

Being a dutiful father, when he's not being the managing director of Smart and Cook, Paul Meehan recently gave in to 'pester power' and agreed to take his two daughters to a pop concert recently. However, within minutes he had formed an opinion of garage band Blazin' Squad, which is unprintable. Having been left nonplussed by such lyrics as: "Bone, bone, bone, bone, bone, bone, bone, bone, bone, so tell me whatcha gonna do when there ain't nowhere to run?", he promptly retreated to the relative sanctity of the adjoining amusement arcade where he spent the remainder of the evening, no doubt in the company of other fathers, sheltering from the unpleasant side effects of the generation gap.

Following the endeavours of PB's deputy editor, Nicolle, to obtain house contents cover last month - only to find that an improbable and suspicious number of brokers' computer systems were 'throwing wobblies' - her mysterious powers to affect IT systems this month grew evermore potent. While putting the finishing touches to this month's interview with David Howden and awaiting a couple of details to be e-mailed from Howden's public relations agency, Rodber Thorneycroft, a telephone call was eventually received to inform her that their system had 'gone caput' after the building had been struck by a freak, one-off lightning strike. PB's publisher would, however, like to assure all external companies dealing with PB editorial staff that, despite the mounting body of evidence, computer bugs have not actually become so advanced they now take the form of trade magazine journalists with supernatural powers.