THE INVASION

Kia ora and why hello there fair citizens, my name is Bob.

I have just completed displaying at the IFA 2006 Consumer Electronics Trade Fair here in Berlin, where I had the great pleasure to unveil my company's new innovation in clothing – the light-emitting t-shirt.

Light-emitting t-shirts are the ingenious result of integrating LEDs into the garments' fabric, enabling patrons to wear a t-shirt that will fashionably light-up at the flick of a small hidden switch. Soon we can expect our fine English language to become a little brighter too, with new phrases like:

"Bob my misunderstood and entirely trustworthy muffin, does my backside appear to be overly luminous in this?"

and "You're flashing."

and "I'm sorry, I can't come out tonight – my batteries are low."

Like it or not, fairly soon we can expect to see this wondrous new idea literally change the face of our world. Already our talented and hard-working engineers are adapting the technology to embed multi-coloured sequences, animations and even televisions into the new fabric. The phrase "watching the boob-tube" is set to take on a whole new meaning.

But lest history miscast us as fools, let us also be wary, brothers. Eventually it will become possible to attach a live webcam to one's back, project whatever it sees onto one's front, and become effectively invisible.

And when that day comes, friends, the crime rate in our country is liable to increase exponentially. It will become child's play to, say for example, break into someone's home, wait for them to fall asleep, and then make that smart snivelling spikey-haired Bart Simpson WISH HE'D NEVER HEARD THE NAME OF SIDESHOW ROBERT UNDERDUNK TERWILLIGER. (cough) Just for example.

Right now, it seems to this impartial commentator, that the only practicable way to defend our loved ones from such entirely hypothetical promises, will be to pay an extremely reasonable fee to purchase such invisible fabrics for ourselves. Ultimately, we will all disappear, and in doing so we'll usher in a peaceful new age, free from the folly of judging each other by fickle appearances. I urge you, yes you, to join me in embracing this brave new world.

Thank you. I'm Sideshow Bob – and I'm listening.

Thanks Sideshow Bob for filling in for me today. Hey-hey-hey, kids. What say we blast my guest host into orbit with a cannon?