It's hard keeping up with Tiger Woods' collection of alleged girlfriends. Not just because they keep popping up like fluffy rats in a fairground sideshow; nor because they're as likely to deny, as to admit, any involvement with the great sportsman – leading to suspicions they've been silenced by money. It's hard keeping up because they're so interchangeable. Mr Woods diligently favours the Las Vegas Babe look: white-skinned, breasty, leggy, bottle-blonde, perma-smiling, not seemingly overburdened with intelligence.
The ladies pursue the same occupation (cocktail waitress/party hostess/ model/whatever) they have stripper Christian names – Jamie, Jaimee, Cori, Mindy, Holly – and suspiciously symbolic surnames: Grubbs, Moquin, Jungers, Rist, like characters in a modern Dickens novel. They all met Tiger in nightclubs, bars and hotels where they were sized up by his minders, then propositioned. Most claim to have had long affairs with Woods since 2005 (when he married Elin Nordegren). So was he seeing them simultaneously? But how could he tell the difference? Here's a quiz to remind you what makes Tiger's babes individually special.
Which Tiger Babe, according to her supportive ex-boyfriend, tried to secure a photo-shoot in Playboy magazine, but was told "her breasts were too small"? (Answer: Jaimee Grubbs)
Which Babe is the talented co-star of the films Lingerie or Bust, Diary of a Horny Housewife and My First Sex Teacher 18? [We're not sure if she starred in the 17 previous My First Sex Teacher movies. It's a popular franchise.] (Holly Sampson)
Whose underwear was especially admired by Tiger Woods, albeit for an unusual reason? (Cori's: "My red panties with black lace. He had a thing about red and wore it on Fridays as it was his mother's favourite colour.")
Which Babe revealed that she and Tiger regularly took an insomnia pill called Ambien, to heighten sexual ecstacy? (Rachel Uchitel. Another babe revealed his alleged fondness for Vicodin – it was, prosaically, to assuage pain in his knee.)
Which Babe worked for trashygirls.com, an LA-based website which supplies scantily-clad girls for VIP parties? (Jamie Jungers)
Which Babe, says RadarOnline.com, has already allegedly made "between $1,210,000 and $3,210,000" out of preserving a discreet silence? (Rachel Uchitel)
Which Babe, in a rare departure from the cheesecake professions, works as a marketing manager for a bank? (although, cards on the table, it's actually The Bank nightclub) and is a glossy brunette among a sea of fake blondes? (Kalika Moquin)
Which Babe once auditioned for an American reality TV show, explaining on her interview tape: "Boys, right now, they're more like toys to me"? (Jaimee Grubbs)
Which Babe held down a job not a 300-yard drive from the Woods family home? (Mindy Lawton, 34-year-old waitress at Perkins, a café in Windermere, Orlando. Tiger and his wife used to drop in for breakfast. Mindy visited the family home when Woods' wife was abroad.)
John Walsh
Just the thing for the Bond villain in your life
So now we know why the all those RBS bankers quit their jobs rather than face a Christmas without bonuses – so they could buy one of these: the 58x38-metre Wally Hermès Yacht, complete with 20 crew members, a warm pool, a helipad, and a jogging track "inspired by coastal paths". Yes, it's the first sure sign that either a) we're almost out of that pesky recession; or b) really, really incredibly rich people just don't give a foc'sle what we think of their spending habits.
The triangular-hulled WHY yacht – why, indeed? – was designed by Monaco-based yacht-makers Wally in collaboration with the luxury goods brand Hermès, and would make an ideal purchase for any aspiring Bond villain. Despite the undoubtedly dastardly price tag, the boat is friendly to the environment; it's powered in part by 900 square metres of solar panel.
"We didn't design a boat, we gave shape to an idea", says Gabriele Pezzini, design director of Hermès. (To be fair, Gabriele, you did also design a boat.) The yacht's stern seems to invite choppy seas to overwhelm it, yet the manufacturers insist it has been tested in large swells at a tank facility in Sweden. Not that the Bransons, Berezovskys or Brins that will be its target market are ever likely to find out if it's ocean-worthy. The WHY could supposedly manage four Atlantic crossings, but I can't imagine it ever leaving the Riviera.
Tim Walker
Music to eat food by
Compilation albums are the last refuge of those buying presents for friends they don't like much, or for family members whose taste they're unsure of. This, at least, explains the weighty mass of CDs such as The Best Sixties Album in the World...Ever, Pop Princess 2009 and Top Gear Seriously Rock & Roll. But what about 101 Dinner Party Songs? This compilation, currently being advertised on TV, is aimed at people buying for themselves, although if they can't decide what tunes to play at supper, it seems unlikely they'll be able to seize the day and actually buy this album. Maybe their mates should club together to get them a few CDs...
Rebecca Armstrong
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