Right.  First of all, you have been tricked.  I am not actually Sinead O'Connor, and I am not writing an open letter to Miley Cyrus.  My letters to Miley are private, just between me, her and the NSA.  And any rumours you may have heard about that are probably untrue.

It's actually, readers, that time of year again - where 'that time of year' means, when I need money.  I haven't hit you people up since November 2012.  Donations have mostly tapered off some time ago, as they are wont to do.  And despite my carefully cultivated image as a fop and bon viveur - a ruse, my dear messieurs and madames, which conceals my lowly origins - this is not an income stream I can do without.

And do not be pretending that nothing major has happened on this blog between then and now.  I mean, what did this blog do over the last year or so?  Oh nothin'.  Nothing. At. All.  And it's not like I had anything useful to say about the Woolwich killing, the Left's failures, anti-racist strategy, the rise of UKIP, anti-austerity strategy, the attack on the welfare state, Taksim square, Syria, the endless niqab 'debate', the Tea Party, the Grangemouth defeat, and above all Miley Cyrus.  It's not like I've got myself denounced by everyone from the SWP and its fragments, to Newsweek, to the Golden Dawn.  It's not like I do all this for you, you utter selfish bastards.

Now, don't be tight.  Don't be thinking, "I didn't like what you wrote about such-and-such fiasco, so I can't in good conscience give you money."  What will your conscience look like if I stamp it into the pavement?  Flat, that's what it will look like.  It will look like conscience road-kill.  And don't be thinking, "you haven't written as prodigiously as in previous years, so I will hold on to my thousand million pounds* for now".  Because if you are thinking that, I will personally come and give you a colonoscopy with a cheese grater.  I have been busy, often for reasons not unconnected to a minor episode I documented on this blog early last year.  But I still wrote for you, didn't I?  Exactly.  And don't be thinking, "you're not a very nice person, so I won't give you money."  Nice?  Who the fuck wants nice?  You don't want nice.  What you want is, when someone is on the wrong side of the argument, for me to be their worst fucking nightmare.  Which, mission accomplished.

So, kindly set aside your rationalisations and help a blogger out.  I want to see Paypal's server overloaded with your munificence.

Actually, the above isn't the real post.  The real post is, in fact, an open letter to Miley Cyrus.  So here goes:

Dear Miley,

As an older person, I often write to young women whom I do not know and patronise them about  dressing in suggestive clothing and putting all that muck on their face.  Because that is the wrong kind of objectification.  Go and objectify yourself properly.  And please have a look at the attached photograph and tell me if you think my new beard is cool.  I mean, maybe you're into beards, I don't know.  Cos, like, I grew it for you Miley.  Erm.  Write back soon.  Or at all.

Yours etc...

*hint.