The great letters crisis of 2021 continues unabated. There are reports of people panic writing and stockpiling missives to Tharg. The army have been called in to ensure that letters are delivered and the government has appealed for calm whilst raising the price of stamps.
Here at LETTERSENTERTAINYOU we have basked in the warmth of our many unpublished letters and remember fondly the days when the Magazine printed three pages worth along with Preacher reprints just to fill the thing up. Don’t worry, we get a mighty injection of SEVEN letters in
Prog 2252 with Tharg scraping his barrel and printing any old toot.
First up in the Letter of the Week slot is
Marcus Hanford of emailland. Interestingly (term used advisedly) the last letter printed in the last Input page was also from a Marcus; in that case the Nyahow variety. We’ve not had this many Marcuses since ‘Eldorado’ went two nights a week! This Marcus dressed up as Tharg to run a race and sent in photographic proof. What a rubbish outfit! Our effort including mother’s brooch as a Rosette of Sirius was far more authentic! Tharg lazily asks if Marcus finished the race. We’ll Google that for you Tharg - Yes he did, in 2.04:15 finishing in 2498th position. We’ll done him, especially as he must have been towing a caravan with that time. Excuse us, just getting another cream bun…
This is Marcus’ 4th letter to see print with him previously seen in Prog 2033 following a Letter of the Week debut in 2010’s Prog 1696. He has a rival in his Bristol hometown in the shape of Ella Handford who had a letter printed in Prog 2033 with a “photo of a little girl”. We’re guessing a relative.
Newbie writer
Dave Marsden of Salisbury next. We went there once and found this lovely perfummmm…. Dave joins Elizabeth of Maidstone in the ‘Marsden 1 letter printed gang’ with Lizzy’s offering appearing in Meg 151 (V3.48). Dave talks about a ‘Sacs Magiques’ which of course is (back to Google) a magic bag. He takes exception to two such receptacles appearing in consecutive thrills. Clearly Dave is a new reader and not used to tropes and themes. Or in other words the cookie cutter can only work so much and so fast Dave!
The
Chris Browning version of a good letter next which is sadly a bit of a gusher. Chris likes it all; which is fair enough really. Black and white, cartoony - spidery - he loves the lot. We do prefer a bit of nit picking or bitching in our letters, but if Chris is happy we all should be too. Even if we can’t always follow stuff or it looks a bit busy. Chris knows the score however, with this being his 18th letter to see print. This effort takes him up to joint 16th on the Beast letters board with erstwhile scribe Kevin Hall, who we last saw in Prog 2034 in 2017 when he had moved from East Lothian to County Antrim never to be seen again - in the letters pages at any rate!
Pipe down in front, it’s time for the debut offering of
Steven Pipe of Swindon. He makes it a Pipe party with Carwyn of Gillingham who had her moment in the pipe smoke in Prog 767 in 1992. Steven’s letter reads like a report card with the quality of Tharg’s offering being deemed “Very High” with the droids doing “Sterling work”. He thanks Tharg for his “ Hard Work” and “Expresses Gratitude” for the Damage Report text. Stick that in your Pipe and smoke it!
Colin of Ireland is ‘King ‘ for a day next as he enjoys possibly his first letters outing. We do have a Colin King of Romford gracing Prog 154 but the Irish version will need to claim that one given the distance rules the Beast employs. It’s impressive if it is him as Kings can only move one square at a time! Chess joke there for all the brainiacs out there. There was also a Rodney King who had letters in Progs 1592, 1764 and 2013 but he hasn’t been seen since. No doubt the LAPD caught up with him. Colin likes the podcasts and everything that Tharg sees fit to print, which is good to hear.
Tristan Fitzgerald of Emailland takes the penultimate spot in his second outing following his 2007debut in Prog 1552. At that time he went with ‘Tris’ - wise change there Tristan - don’t be ashamed at being named after the speccy kid in ‘George & Mildred’. Tristan is on the lookout for John Smith whom we met in the bar of the 40th anniversary gathering. He was a bit tired and emotional then but weren’t we all! Oh happy days, no masks and viruses were things that infected our laptops when we tried to watch a funny cat video, honestly dear. Sadly Tharg says John Smith is away doing something else but you can still buy his wares in the shop.
Finally, we get to the end. Comment ‘ratchet set’ if you are still here! Last up is
Jonathan Fisher of Nord Ireland. We read his letter with an Ian Paisley shouty voice in our heads and for that we apologise. Actually, THERE WILL BE NO APOLOGY! Anyway when we read this we’d planned lots of frog puns but after some detailed research we found that the frog was in fact Jeremy not Jonathan.
Anyway this one was a bit green about the gills and we hope it won’t spawn a sequel. It was really amphibiboring and it seems like a Frenchman has had the best bits. Sorry but we’re not wasting Grade A material like that. This is Jonathan’s (ribbit) 8th letter to see print with his first, a Letter of the Week no less, appearing in 2008’s Prog 1606. Jonathan goes flat out and sticks his long tongue over Tharg’s ‘Regened’ issues - he hates them he does! He want’s more killings - well he is from Northern Ireland - and hates this ‘stomm’. Not as tasty as a nice fly is it Jeremy, er, Jonathan?
Overall a good outing here with some saccharine stuff offset with a brickbat at the end. 7 letters is a recent record letter haul and, despite increasing our workload, we do prefer the pithier and the to the point offerings.
Right off to queue for some envelopes and to fight off those who crave our precious letters.
