Iceland has a new 24-hour news channel, like a CNN or Sky type thing. It’s called, prosaically enough, The New News Channel*.

So why would a nation with a population of fewer than 300,000 need a 24-hour news channel? Precisely. Yet, there it is, broadcasting around the clock, with one of those moving banners at the bottom, announcing ‘breaking news’ as they happen. And therein lies the hilarity. Because, let’s face it, how much ‘breaking news’ can a nation of 300,000 actually deliver up in one day?

Which is why the weekly Spaugstofan, which throughout the winter parodies the week’s events in a half-hour programme every Saturday, did a send-up of the new[s] channel last weekend. During the programme, they kept having to ‘interrupt’ their regular programming for some super-important bit of news, which usually consisted of someone standing somewhere with a microphone, waiting for something to happen and looking really stupid. Meanwhile, they had this hand-operated banner at the bottom, with the ‘breaking news’ moving along, to wit: ‘Milkman sneezes’, ‘Stinky feet a nuisance’, ‘Chicken pieces getting larger’, ‘Walked into pole’, Toilet flushed’, ‘Rats chew through cable‘ etc. etc. In between there would be the weather news: A supremely dull-looking weatherman would appear with ‘Breaking Weather News’ that went something like: ‘A cloud has appeared to block the sun in the west end of Reykjavík. Let’s see this on the map… [map appears]… Yes, it’s precisely from Hofsvallagata 25 to… [listens to ear piece] … What? Oh. Correction: the sun only looked like it would go behind the cloud. In the end it changed direction…” Etc.

I don’t know; maybe you had to be there, but EPI and I were in stitches. Just goes to show: the funniest stuff is always the true stuff.

AND THE BREAKING WEATHER IS:
Ohhh my God, it was soooo dull today. It was majorly majorly overcast which means that daylight hardly managed to perforate the sky so the whole day passed by in a sort of semi-haze. Daylight simulator lamp, please! Why have I not yet gone out and bought one of those muthas?? A: because every time the sun appears I think, oh this ain’t so bad, and anyway Rozanne told me that her simulator lamp did zilch for her, so why spend the money? [A very persuasive argument it is, too. As seen by the fact that I convince myself every time.] Temps are 3°C and sunrise was at… ach, it doesn’t matter, it might as well have stayed un-risen. Boo.

* That’s Nýja fréttastöðin in the vernacular.