New Challenge for Hadron Hot Shots

Fresh from their success at perhaps locating something that logically doesn't exist, the scientists at CERN have set them selves a new, far more challenging ... challenge.

"We through with the Briggs, or Higgs, or whatever the Hell it was called," snarled Dr Adophus Quipp, Scientist In Charge Od Something Scientific, from the Boys Own Top Secret Bunker that his team have been hollowing out under the Alps in alleged pursuit of a thing that no-one can see even if they find it.

"That's old hat.  Griggs is done.  No-one is interested any more.  We live in a time of instant gratification, twenty four hour rolling news and 50 Shades of Grey.  No-one is interested in depth or quality or even point any more,.  So we decided, 'What Hell?  We've found something that potentially doesn't exist - or at least, we're saying we have, it isn't like any of you klutzes could tell if we were just making it all up, hahaha, so why not go after something that definitely doesn't exist."

Dr Quipp explained how his team spent hours sitting about, drinking coffee while pretending to carry out highly technical experiments in particle physics.

"When we got bored, we'd go paint-balling in the tunnels we we claiming to be zapping atoms down," the demented Doctor gloated.  "I mean, how thick are you guys?  You gave us millinos upon millions of dollars, Euros and doubloons to make a giant network of tunnels under the mountains.  Do you have any idea how big particles are?  Their tiny, man!  See this" - at this point, Dr Quipp brandished the tip of his little finger at our correspondent - "This is like a particle.  that's how small they are.  Why the Hell do you think we'd need these thousands upon millions of miles of tunnels to race something that small?  Huh?  Idiots.  You could have done it on a slot car track.  Though we had loads of those, too, and circuits that ran right through the Alps."

Quizzed as to why his team had decided to abandon their idyllic troglodyte existence and return to the surface, Quipp explained that cabin fever, fear of cannibalism and a lack of suitable breeding partners forced them to reconsider their options.

"It was the classic combination that made us recant our vows to dwell evermore by the shores of the Sunless Sea," he said, mournfully.  "We had reached the stage where some of our members had become certifiably insane, and we were considering drawing lots as to who would be eaten first.  Coffee supplies had been exhausted, and we were trying to extract the caffeine that had built up in our body tissues, when someone - I won't reveal who it was, but it was me - had the brilliant idea of returning to the surface and tricking you clowns all over again."

Asked as to what the teams new project might be, Quipp could barely contain his smugness.  "We've proved that the Bigg Bassoon, something that only sort of exists, exists, so we decided to take things to a whole new level.  We decided to prove that something that doesn't exist at all exists.  We had a short list - Andy Murray's Grand Slam triumphs, the point of the Monarchy, Lenny Henry's funniness - but in the end we settled on the only real challenge, the Holy grail, the Mecca, the Everest of Things That Don't Exist.  We've decided to try locate David Cameron's principles."