Name: The Cursed Mug.
Age: Who knows?
Appearance: Be-handled, personalised, cursed.
It’s a mug. It’s cursed.
How can a mug be cursed? One sip from it and you’re doomed.
My God. What’s in this mug? Tea or whatever. But it’s not what’s in it, it’s what’s on it.
And what’s on it? In this case, the words: “Chancellor Philip Hammond.”
Who would drink from such a mug? Philip Hammond, the chancellor of the exchequer. He was pictured drinking from it just before he announced the budget on Tuesday.
What happened to him? Nothing yet. But if the Curse has its way, he will soon be out of a job.
Can you quickly explain to me how this works? In 2016, the international development secretary, Justine Greening, left her post shortly after being photographed drinking from a mug emblazoned with her title.
Uh-huh. Then in April Amber Rudd resigned as home secretary after drinking from a “Home Secretary” mug.
Resigned, you say? And as recently as July, Boris Johnson stepped down as foreign secretary shortly after he was pictured with …
Don’t tell me, a mug that said “Foreign Secretary” on it? Exactly! It’s like the Strictly Curse, but for hot beverages and cabinet ministers!
No, it isn’t. The Strictly Curse involves relationship strain brought about by long hours of practising sexy dance moves with someone other than one’s current main squeeze. This is just people drinking coffee and quitting their jobs. But the mugs!
Where do these cursed vessels come from, anyway? Emma Bridgewater makes them.
Is she a witch? She’s a ceramics designer. Whenever someone becomes a cabinet minister, she sends them a personalised mug, as a marketing exercise.
So everyone in the cabinet has one of these mugs? That is my understanding.
Including people who have not left their jobs? Yes: clearly they were smart enough to drink only from non-personalised china.
And is there any reason to think Hammond’s position is threatened? What more reason do you need?
I believe this is an example of what we call confirmation bias. No, we call it the Curse of the Mugs.
You may have found some photographic evidence to support your illusory correlation, but you’re also ignoring all the evidence that doesn’t. The mugs don’t lie.
Do say: “More tea, Mr Grayling?”
Don’t say: “It was all so sudden, I bought her this ‘World’s Greatest Girlfriend’ mug, and the next day she ran off with her dance partner.”
