JULY 4 WAS one of the greatest days that British sport has known. After an epic 6-3, 4-6, 6-1, 5-7, 92-90 battle, Tim Henman defeated his previously unknown Franco-Germanic American rival Billy Goliath in the Wimbledon men’s final. On winning, Henman smiled with his eyes as well as his mouth, and didn’t do that annoying clenched-fist thing. Later, in interviews, he was interesting, articulate, and didn’t speak as though he was asleep and having a very boring dream. Henman paid particular tribute to the late Cliff Richard, who had attempted to divert the crowd when freak weather conditions briefly interrupted play. “That hailstone must have been the size of a Ford Transit,” the new champion mused.
That very same evening, David Beckham held the Euro 2004 trophy aloft in Lisbon after a 6-0 defeat of a combined Franco-German team which also, inexplicably, contained a smattering of Americans. In a deep-voiced speech which completely omitted the terms “obviously” and “at the end of the day”, Beckham paid tribute to the good behaviour of England fans, many of whom had left the stadium early in order to pick up litter and help old ladies cross roads. Several other members of the team held impromptu press conferences in order to reveal that, actually, they were Scottish, Irish or Welsh. An entire nation could therefore rejoice.
Back in Blighty, Big Brother ended. None of the contestants sold their stories to tabloids or got a TV deal. Meanwhile, house prices stayed stable. The NHS was fine. Fat children got thinner and thin children got fatter. The Daily Mail didn’t discover a new cause of cancer for almost three weeks. Nothing bad happened on farms.
There were no wasps.
Meanwhile, city populations flocked to parks as Britain enjoyed one of its warmest summers for decades. Happily, it rained regularly from 2-3am, thus removing the need for a hosepipe ban. By mid-August, however, pressure for some degree of water rationing was growing. “This is the only responsible course of action,” said one newspaper editorial, “now that a British scientist has invented a water-powered car.”
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The growing irrelevance of oil led to an early US withdrawal from Iraq, and peacekeeping duties were handed over to the new Iraqi government and the UN. “Nobody wants to fight any more,” said one previously militant cleric from the town of Najaf. “Can’t we all just get along?”
Similar sentiments spread through previously troubled regions across much of the world. India and Pakistan both forgot about Kashmir. Civil wars across Africa ended, spontaneously. Sudan discovered a new kind of potato that thrived in deserts. China wandered out of Tibet, whistling innocently. Bangladesh didn’t flood. In Israel, Jew and Palestinian alike were united by the arrival of what appeared to be the Messiah. “It’s incredible,” said one witness. “He ‘s turned up in a fashion that lets all our religious leaders claim that they were right all along, but still leaves Mel Gibson looking pretty stupid. God is truly great!”
On the domestic front, the world of science was rocked again in early September when, after nearly nine months of silence, the Beagle 2 Mars lander suddenly started transmitting. At a hurried press conference, Colin Pillinger, now clean-shaven, announced that first reports indicated the nearby presence of water, gold, uranium, life, Elvis, Marilyn, Kurt Cobain, Shergar and Princess Diana.
Having failed to secure him the job of European Commissioner, Tony Blair decided to send Peter Mandelson as the UK’s first ambassador to the Red Planet. “Manned space missions are not nearly as expensive as they once were,” a Downing Street spokesman explained, “now we have discovered that pigs can fly.”