Yesterday Cathy stumbled acorss some figures about national debts and such, which led to us discussing various facets of international loans and such. (Did you know the UK's debt is almost as high as the US despite only having about 20% of the population? per head, we owe way more than the US and yet that's probably the nation which talk more than any other about these debts.) Anyway, one of the things that came up was how everyone owes everyone else a pile of money, and how these debts never get paid because most Western nations struggle to run on their annual budget anyway so they borrow more and more to help keep things running and to pay off some of the interest on their existing debts etc. All of which was starting to sound like one of those bad adverts with Carol "The Evil One" Vorderman telling everyone that she got a thrid in engineering and therefore can solve all their money problems and save their soul from eternal damnation.

Now personally I blame the Carol Vorderman imagery (well, I blame that woman for many things so why not this too?) but bizarrely things then took a turn for the worse. Within seconds I'd managed a spoof advert and a Gordon Brown impression - two things I truly recommend any sane person alive should avoid. But despite my twisted mind, it was somewhat amusing to imagine Gordon Brown sitting down for a biscuit in the afternoon. He flips on the TV and sees someone offering debt-consolidation services which makes him realise that yes, debt is getting him down, and the stress was stopping him enjoying himself and realising his full potential. So he picks up the phone and calls to discuss rolling Britain's debts into one easy, monthly payment. Around this point sanity prevailed and we moved on - wary of just how the ptions could go once the caring and highly trained call-centre employee asked about the Chancellor's debts and calculated the commision on a $7trillion loan.