So Harry is a goner. How many times have I heard that? Harry’s all washed up, finished. It was mousecrap then and it’s mousecrap now. I’ve heard it all before. Wrong every time. Harry always bounces back. How many times have I said that, Harry always bounces back and I’m always right.
If I had croaked, which I didn’t do and was never going to do, I can just see the headlines. Pendrivel at Britain Today would have a field day.
GOODBYE TO A MONSTER
with a story to match. Really sticking the boot in. The guys at GUYnacology magazine would be gutted.
HARRY WE LOVED YOU GOODBYE MATE
Maybe The Times would go for something like –
THE WORLD’S MOST FAMOUS HAMSTER DIES
and what about the BBC? I’d be up there with all the biggies.
“Harry the Hamster died tonight in a hospital in Cartagena in Spain. He had been living at the nearby resort of La Manga for several years. A report from Santa Maria del Rosell hospital said that he died peacefully at 4.30 this afternoon. He had been ill for some time. Harry first came to the attention of the public five years ago when a news item in The East London Mercury reported the fact that he had fathered a world record hamster litter. Later Harry was the best known of the so-called X-Pets, illegally genetically modified animals that found their way into the pet shop market and some farms. The origin of the X-Pets still remains a mystery.”
At least you could use Pendrivel to get a laugh. That whining nasal voice at my first press conference. “So Harry, are you an animal who is half human or a human who is half animal?”
A titter of laughter. Then my reply.
“I could ask you the same question.”
Uproar. That one hit the screens within ten minutes and went around the world in an hour. If there was anyone on the planet who hadn’t heard of Harry the Hamster they had now. My face was everywhere. But Pendrivel had had it in for me ever since. I made him look stupid. But as that clever cat Big Cheese said, annoy the media at your peril.
House of Glass 