The Doorhinge Badgerdangler Phenomenon

These days Doorhinge Badgerdangler is probably Britain's best-known celebrity Trilobite Fossil-Arrangement artist, certainly since the wild and heady days of Splurt Hackingcough, the leading Trilobite Fossil-Arranging guru of the late Sixties. Of course, back in the days of Hackingcough, no-one thought that Trilobite Fossil Arrangement could ever be considered a major art form again, let alone the major creative industry it has become today.

Back in the heyday of British Empire, Trilobite Fossil Arrangement was regarded as something only for the upper classes. Every large aristocratic household employed their own Trilobite Fossil Arranger, usually only second in importance after the butler in the household staff hierarchy.

As the Victorian middle-classes expanded there was a growing aspiration towards having what was then seen as essential for any decent household, which meant aping the manners and mores of the upper classes. But most middle-class households could only run to - at best - a housemaid, and - possibly - a cook. So, for those middle-class ladies who wanted a Trilobite Fossil Arranger, but could not afford one, several Trilobite Fossil Arrangement agencies were set up by enterprising individuals in order to meet the burgeoning need.

As industry expanded, a completely new class - the respectable working class - began to create a new demand for Trilobite Fossil arrangements for their homes. The working class could not afford the fees demanded by the Trilobite Fossil Arranging agencies, let alone - of course - have a Trilobite Fossil Arranger of their own. So, eventually a class of Street Trilobite Fossil Arrangers arose, who would wander the streets on a bicycle, calling out for people who needed their Trilobite Fossils arranged to come out onto the street to them.

However, like many similar turn of the century enterprises the whole Trilobite Fossil Arrangement industry suffered through the shock of the First World War. After the war was over, there were not enough experienced men available to revitalise the Trilobite Fossil Arrangement industry that had been allowed to grow dormant over the war years. As the post-war depression spread, not only did Trilobite Fossil arranging itself decline, many of the famous old arrangements were broken up and dispersed. Soon Trilobite Fossil Arranging was just another of the old professions that disappeared as the world left behind the old ways and entered a new age.

Trilobite Fossil Arranging continued its slow decline right up to the arrival of the new pop culture aristocracy in the 1960s. Thanks to Mick Jagger's keen interest in the art, the Rolling Stones become the first rock band to take their own Trilobite Fossil Arranger - Splurt Hackingcough himself, of course - on tour with them. Nowadays, of course, following the Stones' lead, it is now de-rigour for all bands to have their own Trilobite Fossil Arranger as a sign that they've finally made the big time.

But it took the arrival of Doorhinge Badgerdangler finally to bring Trilobite Fossil Arranging back to the masses. Her, now infamous, book 'How To Arrange Trilobite Fossils' became an enormous bestseller, spending several years in the bestseller charts - where it still remains to this day. The subsequent TV series - based on that book - is now widely regarded as being solely responsible for forcing all the major supermarket chains to run out of Trilobite Fossil arranging spatulas, tensing forks and stisking ratchets the day after the first programme was aired.

Despite spending over thirty years at the pinnacle of her profession, and rising to 17^th place in the Sunday Torpor's list of Britain's wealthiest people, Badgerdangler (67) has no wish to retire from Trilobite Fossil Arranging. 'It is in my blood,' she claimed recently. 'I could no more give up Trilobite Fossil Arranging than I could give up nude hang-gliding.'

However, controversy still dogs both Badgerdangler and the art she has given her life to. A government Spokesman recently refused to confirm or deny that Badgerdangler was recently paid an estimated £200 000 for a special one-off Trilobite Fossil Arrangement used as a centre piece for the Downing Street reception to congratulate the Nuneaton Mixed-Doubles Strip Ludo team for their recent victory in the Strip Ludo World Championship finals in New Jersey.