ALUMNOTS
Not being the brightest horse in the stable, Tara Palmer-Tomkinson would have a few problems grappling with the intellectual elements of Oxford life. However, as many people bypass the work side of a degree with considerable success, I suspect she would cope.
Tara Palmer-Tompkinson's primary mode of existence at Oxford would be hanging out at parties, uninvited, or invited only because she would come to the opening of an envelope anyway. People would try to move her on to somebody else's party, in the same way that a farmer might move a band of travelling pikies off his land.
The conspicuous lack of other D-list celebrities in Oxford (although not when it comes to speakers at the Union) would make it difficult for her to get the media attention she so lusts after.
However, there a plenty of people in the university who would like to be D-list celebrities, or at least consider themselves to be, so this would not be a significant issue. Her belief that she is superior to others by virtue of being in a newspaper and having spoken to a real famous person for 23 seconds would not leave her out of place at Oxford either.
The nightclubs and bops that provide the staple diet of cheese many students feel necessary to live off would undoubtedly be below Palmer-Tomkinson.
Venues that do not play songs produced by the luminaries of cheese culture, such as Chesney, Britney, or anyone from the cultural Chernobyl that is 1980s music, are too few in Oxford to proove adequate for an established socialite.
This might suggest that Oxford would have nothing to gain if she turned up one Friday night: wrong. Whilst many would despise her, Tara Palmer-Tomkinson's unique and charming ways of letting her presence be known would entertain people in the same way as animals at the zoo.
She would learn to adapt to a new and highly cheesy environment in a way that would be best described as 'character building', introducing her to novel concepts such as ropey student nights. Anyone that livens up a town as dull as this must be good, even if it turns out to be Tara.
6th Oct 2004