There are a couple of expressions that drive me to fury. Actually, that’s a lie: there are dozens. They include “activist” which means a busybody, often bogus, who gets someone else – usually us taxpayers – to subsidise various witless, …
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An Australian talking dog story
Having been brought up in a pub I acquired a taste for silly jokes that has never left me, so I liked this one, sent to me by the publisher of Meininger’s Wine Guide, for whom I am scratching my …
Read MoreRichly deserved comic masterpiece
You know how every now and then you read something and say “I wish I’d written that”? For one reason or another I’m not really equipped to have written what follows, but how marvellous! It was sent to me by …
Read MoreWhat is this noble lion doing?
Not a very clear picture, I’m afraid, but you must admit he is a magnificent beast. He is lying at, or rather carved into the bottom of the staircase at the Hotel Plaza in Rome, an extraordinary place which epitomises …
Read MoreIt’s a mad world we live in, my masters
Here are three things that struck me when looking at the news tonight. 1. Why do the wrong people end up running things? Or to put it another way, why does shit rise to the top? This occurred to me …
Read MoreAn apology – and a comment
I usually write these things late at night, at insane hours in the early morning or in spare moments – and keep making silly mistakes as a result: yesterday I wrote “worst” instead of worse. Apologies! I should be ashamed …
Read MoreWhy we’re in a worst state than we were
In an exchange last week I was talking about a man called Will Hutton who wrote a book essentially to promote the Bliar called “The State we’re in”. (Incidentally, you can lay odds that anyone called Will is left wing. …
Read MoreWhy does so much marketing stink?
It’s a small world, they say. Maybe that’s why people keep copying each other- badly. We were walking through Duke of York Square near our Chelsea flat when we spotted a sign in the window of a posh shop.It read …
Read MoreLoathsome media nag slapped down. Hurrah!
My Australian partner Mal sent me this, and I must say it filled me with fierce joy. Major General Peter Cosgrove is an “Australian treasure” who was interviewed on the radio recently by one of those politically correct horrors who …
Read MoreWatch out, Ratatouille! Here comes Chef Bird
The first honest money I ever earned was in my parent’s kitchen over 50 years ago. Their restaurant was in the Good Food Guide right from the first edition. I’m still trying to cook – this is the salmonella king …
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