Alice Jones: Even Ascot isn't this fussy about hats
Locog would like to vet your T-shirts at London 2012 venues
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Your support makes all the difference.I've been waiting for an opportunity to go roller skating in my giant sombrero with a bayonet tucked under my arm, but it seems the Olympic Park won't be the place to do it. All three accessories feature on Locog's list of prohibited items for ticket holders planning to visit any of the London 2012 venues. Killjoys.
Much of the list will be no surprise to anyone who has ever been to an airport – no firearms, no illegal substances, no liquids, aerosols or gels over 100ml (not even if they're in a clear plastic bag). Pets, tents and "soft-sided bags over 25l in capacity" are also out. Bit finicky, but fine.
It's the restricted items list, on page two, where things get draconian, if not downright weird. Whistles, klaxons and drums, Frisbees and balls are contraband, in case anybody dares to have fun while watching. Oversized hats are unwelcome, ditto golf umbrellas, to prevent selfish spectators from obscuring the view. What, though, constitutes an oversized hat? Will a 6ft 8in man in a beret be waved through but a child in towering wizard hat (it could happen) be barred? Venue staff are already under enough pressure without adding measuring trilby brims to their list of duties.
Similarly, who will dictate how much food is "excessive" – another item on the restricted list? One man's blowout is another man's light snack, and no one likes to be told that they're greedy. The ban on picnics and too many munchies could, of course, be another way of herding crowds towards the Games' munificent sponsors beneath the Golden Arches. With 1,500 seats, the world's largest McDonald's will have room for everyone. Already the official sponsors' stranglehold on the site is so tight that chips can only be sold outside McDonald's if they are accompanying fish, and pints of Pimm's are to be doled out brandless – probably in brown paper bags.
By far the most sinister feature of the lists, though, is the Olympics dress code. It doesn't stop at hats, bags, and umbrellas. Locog would also like to vet your T-shirts. "Any objects or clothing bearing political statements or overt commercial identification intended for 'ambush marketing'" are verboten.
Leaving aside the mysteries of "ambush marketing", this would logically rule out everything from "statement" Che T-shirts to heavily logo-ed Hollister hoodies. Fashion experts might say that this is no bad thing, but that's not the point. It appears that what would really make Locog happy would be if every spectator turned up carrying only his or her wallet, craving fast food and dressed in Ronald McDonald onesies and Coca-Cola-themed fascinators. And you thought Ascot was fussy.
Who caters to the radio needs of 30-somethings?
It says a lot for my dogged devotion to Radio 1 that my sister, aged 36, felt the need to text me first thing on Wednesday with the news that Chris Moyles was leaving the breakfast show after eight years. "Maybe you can migrate back from the Today programme now?" she wondered. Like many, I grew up with the noisy zoo as my morning soundtrack, zoning in and out of Simon Mayo's Confessions and Mark and Lard's Bird or Bloke, wishing I was part of Chris Evans' or Zoe Ball's zany crew – but Moyles and his shouty shock jockery and endless, meandering banter broke me. That, and old age.
Radio 4 beckoned a few years ago. What began as grudging professional obligation has become near religious routine. I've moved almost seamlessly from tutting at Moyles' self-aggrandising to sighing at John Humphrys'. Easy. So I'm amazed to discover that, at 30, I'm still below the average age for a Radio 1 listener – which is 32, or 33 for the breakfast show. The station has made no secret of the fact that it wants younger listeners and Nick Grimshaw, 27 and full of vim, wit and enthusiasm for music, looks like a smart replacement.
With Radio 4 listeners averaging around 55, though, perhaps an even smarter move would be to come up with a breakfast option to appeal to 30-somethings who are old enough to know better, but don't want to be reminded of the fact first thing every morning.
Jessica Hynes gets my gold medal
With Olympocalypse dawning, it's a good moment to acknowledge the one copper-bottomed success to have already come out of London 2012 – the sublime Twenty Twelve. The BBC comedy has returned for a final hurrah in the last weeks before kick-off and once more the Olympics Deliverance Committee is vying with the real-life organisers for who can come up with the most gloriously absurd top line.
It's just a shame that the best new sitcom since The Thick of It has to end this summer. Is it too much to hope that Ian Fletcher and his team might move on to "deliver" another global event post-Games? At the very least, there must be a spin-off series to come out of Perfect Curve, home to Jessica Hynes' supremely irritating Head of Brand and Queen of Claptrap, Siobhan Sharpe. I'd, like, totally, watch it.
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