Life
2512: Impertinence
Clockwise round the grid from 34 run the answers (6,6,5, 11,4,3,7,4) (one hyphened) to eight riddles followed by the riddler’s…
Critical thinking: the difference between ‘critique’ and ‘criticise’
Six years ago I wrote here about critique, as a noun or verb, and things have gone from bad to…
Harry Potter meets Ikea: Backlot Cafe reviewed
Harry Potter is a fictional orphan locked in a cupboard by his aunt and uncle, after which he discovers a…
Dear Mary: How do we stop our friends’ dogs wrecking our house?
Q. We have old friends who live in the northern hinterlands and have a property in Provence where they normally…
Forget football – rugby is the real beautiful game
The question is surely destined to become a pub quiz staple: ‘Who moved a bottle 18 inches across a table…
What would ‘sensitivity readers’ have made of my student scoops?
‘Whatever you do, don’t call them snowflakes,’ Caroline said the last time I spoke to Oxford students. ‘That’s not a…
I’m gypsy and proud
Exciting news from my father’s cousin in Canada. ‘You asked about our grandfather, there is much to tell,’ he writes.…
2509: Current description - solution
The perimeter quote is from ‘Ode to the West Wind’. The remaining unclued lights were the east wind (24A), south…
Bridge | 26 June 2021
On the whole, I’ve enjoyed playing bridge from the comfort of home during lockdown. One regrettable outcome, however, is that…
Aussie Life
One of the advantages of being an internet sensation is that it greatly reduces the likelihood of you being eaten.…
Aussie Language
The settlement of Christian Porter’s defamation action against the ABC produced the predictable sneering responses from the activists at the…
The Battle for Britain | 19 June 2021
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Charging ahead: how to get the best out of an electric car
Where do you want to go? China or India? I have always found India infinitely more fascinating — for a…
2508: Grovels - solution
The unclued lights (including the pair at 24/28) are CHEESES. First prize Rhidian Llewellyn, London SW14 Runners-up H. Sarson, Guernsey,…
The luxury of being pro-lockdown
I’ve just written an essay for the People’s Lockdown Inquiry, a new collaboration between Buckingham University, the Institute of Ideas…
2511: Changing places
The 12 unclued lights (one of two words) are somehow paired and one solution in each pair is of a…
How to drink in the delights of France (without leaving the country)
It is hard to decide which is more depressing, the extension of the lockdown or the public support for this…
Dear Mary: Has lockdown de-civilised my husband?
Q. Last night I went to dinner with people I had never met before. Because the host was a friend…
Extracts from Shakespeare’s newly discovered play, Charles III
In Competition No. 3203, you were invited to supply an extract from the newly discovered Shakespeare play Charles III. I…
No. 658
Mammadzada — M. Muzychuk, May 2021. In this messy position, Black’s next move prompted instant resignation. What did she play?…
Critical issue: the complex language of gender
Seeing my husband in his armchair snoozing, as his unacknowledged habit is, head back, mouth open, stertorous and blotchy, it…
Macaques and defence
January normally brings cheerful photos from the Gibraltar Chess Festival, where visiting chess-players get an impromptu snap with the Barbary…
Jason Ricci is my mentor, guru and anointed one
A second week recovering in bed in this pleasant south-facing bedroom. If I sit up, my back resting against whitewashed…
Bridge | 19 June 2021
Immense excitement in the relatively tiny world of bridge — the English Bridge Union has announced that the Premier League…
My medical embarrassments are my business and no one else’s
While we were looking forward to Freedom Day, the National Health Service was busy planning something extra special to coincide…
