So, as Danny Boyle’s opening ceremony takes place tonight – celebrating everything quintessentially English – I thought I’d come up with an alternative opening ceremony.

The event kicks off with the traditional British summer scene of a group of youths hanging around near a bus stop spitting, swearing and being generally unpleasant.

The action then moves inside to a sweltering office.

Someone gets up to turn on the air-conditioning. Then five minutes later someone else gets up to turn it off. This continues all summer.

Someone then starts coughing. Followed by a quarter of the opening ceremony’s cast. This lasts for three months until the coughing baton is passed to another group, etc.

A continuous cycle of coughing is, therefore, maintained for a whole year (My opening ceremony is slightly longer than Boyle’s).

We are then in a traditional English pub. A French couple enter with their well-behaved child.

The pub’s regulars go quiet, stare, and the couple are told children are not allowed.

We then skip to 10.30pm (“Sunday hours Sir”) and everyone is kicked out.

The rest of the world then start laughing at us for being “11 o’clock bed boys”).

Action then moves to a normal English street – with independent shops being replaced by Tesco, Starbucks and McDonald’s.

A bunch of hooded youths then turn up and trash it – looting everything except the book shop.

A group of intellectuals are then wheeled in talking about “youth disenfranchisement and Government cuts” rather than the truth – morons on the rob.

Everyone involved then downs tools and goes on strike for three weeks because someone has been told to wear a tie.

The ceremony then ends with the cast unable to get home because of signalling problems on the trains and Tube.

Enjoy!