Can my head lice save us all? | Stewart Lee

At a time when we can feel sympathy even for Boris Johnson, my collection of toxin-resistant nits should give us hope

"Am I right in remembering you cultivate a colony of head lice in your cellar, Lee?" Nicola Bridgens, former artist in residence at London Zoo, for whom I once provided the voice of a depressed black widow in an insect house installation, called me, coveting my Pediculi humanus capitis.

Ten years ago, my little boy had nits. But if Paley's divine watchmaker exists, my precocious son argued, then he engineered lice to live in human hair. They were merely following their natures, so we should not exterminate them. Compromising, I decanted some specimens into a fish tank in the cellar, before destroying the rest like a Mexican god.