A tidal yawn of possibly epic proportions is thought to be heading for London and may break tomorrow, a source has revealed. The yawn’s epicentre has been traced to a vegetable contest staged in Beverley, East Yorkshire, where local compere, James Granite, was feeling rather tired after an evening of scrabble with his wife pushed him nearly twenty minutes past his usual bedtime. He fought the urge for several hours but was eventually unable to stifle the yawn halfway through his congratulation speech for the winner of best Patio, Miss Freda Gerrans.
‘I could tell he was struggling,’ explained the still joyous Miss Gerrans, ‘he is usually so professional, but during the runner beans his speech was a little slurred and by the time he had got to me his legs were doing the trademark wobble. The yawn had become unstoppable.’
Unfortunately the yawn was exaggerated by Mr Granite’s famous lucky loudspeaker and rapidly spread across the vegetable tent, out of the door and down the high Street where the show was being held. Police rushed to place barriers of well slept officers sipping red bull around the perimeter of the town but some were simply unable to fight a yawn of such mounting proportions.
The yawn’s progress is expected to accelerate when it reaches Norfolk and Suffolk and although it will need to cross Essex, where some people are unable to yawn, it will still be travelling at massive speed when it reaches the Northern suburbs of London. Furthermore the estimated arrival time, around 2.00 on a Friday, is expected to increase the damage caused.
‘The possible damage to the UK’s economy is obvious,’ explained Janet Sweethaven the government’s expert on pandiculation, ‘but a Friday arrival, just after many people have lunched at the pub is disasterous. The number of work hours lost as people feel a bit tired and decide to slope off home early could measure in the millions.’
The government has rushed to reduce the damage, using anti-terrorism legislation to push through measures to slow the yawn’s progress.
‘All tonight’s TV schedules in the London area have been replaced by reruns of old party political broadcasts,’ explained the governments head of disaster control Jimmy Frick, ‘that way everyone should get a good night’s sleep.’
