Life
Life amid Catriona’s cleaning regime
Earlier in this run of glorious October sunshine I was languishing on the bed in the middle of the afternoon…
Bridge | 30 October 2021
It was great to be back playing live bridge at the Portland Club last week. I was lucky enough to…
A brace of new books worth the space in any racing library
In 1986 a young Mark Johnston, having acquired a derelict yard on the Lincolnshire coast, phoned the Jockey Club to…
Aussie Life
Go on, admit it; just when you thought it was safe to go back to the pub, or the office,…
Aussie Language
Andrew Bolt, among others, has been scrupulous in drawing our attention to what he calls ‘race baiting’. For example, Greens…
Bridge | 23 October 2021
YAY! We won the Gold Cup! We played Tim Leslie’s strong team in the 64-board final and beat them on…
Africa’s empty vastness has vanished under the concrete of the present day
Kenya When I was a child in Kenya, the road from the Indian Ocean up to Nairobi was still…
No. 676
White to play. Bjerre–Maiwald, Bundesliga 2021. Black has menacing counterplay, so White’s attack needs an accurate conclusion. What did he…
Eaten by a bear
I don’t like losing at chess. It feels bad in the moment, whether my position subsides like a failed pudding,…
Spectator competition winners: odes on the Marble Arch Mound
In Competition No. 3221, you were invited to submit an ode on the Marble Arch Mound. The 25 metre-high artificial…
2526: Everybody out! - solution
The unclued lights are preceded by ALL (with the title suggesting that ALL is to be omitted). The paired lights…
The poor are too busy trying to make a living to be angry about the global rich-poor divide
New York ‘The City of London is hiding the world’s stolen money’, screams a Bagel Times headline, as bogus…
If a bloke can wear stockings and suspenders in a stable yard why can’t I?
We had gone to visit a friend at a stable yard on a country estate on a crisp autumn Sunday.…
2529: Formerly
The unclued lights (five of two words which include three apostrophes) can be preceded by the same word, all confirmed…
My happiness has given way to a paralysing melancholy
From our hypothetical drone-mounted camera let us look down into a secluded valley in the same series of valleys as…
Vega Sicilia: the best Spanish wine I have ever tasted
Four hundred and fifty years ago this month, a great victory helped to safeguard European civilisation. The battle of Lepanto…
Dear Mary: How do I stop a dinner guest double-dipping?
Q. During lockdown I made good friends with a neighbour who I would never have met otherwise. This man lives…
Virtue signalling is really status signalling
A £19,000-a-year London day school was in the news this week because it has started instructing its pupils about ‘white…
The Battle for Britain | 23 October 2021
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The problem with online property searches
In 1966, the legendary adman David Ogilvy set out to buy a home in France. He boarded a transatlantic liner…
Can a criminal really be ‘prolific’?
The BBC made a documentary about a man sent to prison for being the ‘most prolific rapist in British legal…
Aussie Life
The political career of Christian Porter has been destroyed by the ABC. This is someone who was the Commonwealth Attorney-General…
Aussie Language
A Speccie reader has emailed asking me for an explanation of the word ‘climatarian’. We know what Presbyterians are, she…
My horse is allergic to beige carpet
The horse lorry arrived and lowered its ramp — and I stood in front of it knowing that my thoroughbred…
Acorns and aliens: lunch with Vernon and the Ukrainians
Catriona and I were late for lunch at Vernon’s because I couldn’t get out of bed. The four of them…
