Life
For the love of gin
I’d missed the train, and the next was due in 45 minutes, so I popped into the nearby salon for…
Is it easier to leave the EU than Norton AntiVirus?
Leaving Norton, the antivirus software package, is a bit like trying to leave the EU. You may think, once you…
Bridge
Anyone who doubts that bridge keeps your brain sharp in old age should have a game with Bernard Teltcher. Bernard…
Peaceful solution
In the recent super-tournament in St Louis, Magnus Carlsen, Fabiano Caruana and Lev Aronian opted to share the laurels. According to…
no. 522
White to play. This position is a variation from Caruana-Karjakin, St Louis 2018. Can you spot White’s classic mating finish?…
Living dangerously
In Competition No. 3064 you were invited to supply a newspaper leading article exposing the hitherto unsuspected corrupting influence of…
2375: 2
2 describes a pair of unclued lights (three words altogether), which in turn include the others. Across 12 Single…
2372: Spot-on
The key phrase is LIKE A TANSY (39). The scientific name of the tansy is TANACETUM VULGARE (4A 12); remaining…
The neo-Marxist takeover of our universities
According to Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt, America’s universities have succumbed to ‘safetyism’, whereby students are protected from anything that…
Battle for Britain
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So farewell, Alastair Cook: a wonderful cricketer and exemplary sportsman
I first became aware of Alastair Cook in the Ashes summer of 2005 when he was named the Young Cricketer…
Dear Mary: I can’t put names to faces – and it’s starting to upset friends
Q. I am in my mid-sixties and have started to suffer from nominal aphasia. At a recent wedding in the…
I am served up a crime against breakfast: Sketch reviewed
Sketch is a restaurant and art gallery in Conduit Street, Mayfair. There is a photograph of the Queen in the…
Optics: stingy pub measures and politicians’ images
If you’d like to buy a copy of Newton’s Opticks: or, A Treatise of the Reflexions, Refractions, Inflexions and Colours…
Wild flowers and mountain peaks are no substitute for a pretty woman
Gstaad The pastoral heaven of this place can get very dull during the summer months. Green hillsides, neat farmsteads, pleasing…
What would Oscar tell his dad first about our eventful fortnight in the south of France?
I was present in the room when Oscar encountered his father for the first time since returning from his fortnight…
When you compare ragwort to Islamic extremism, who should be more offended?
When I made a joke about ragwort being like Islamic extremism, I expected someone to write in. I was fully…
Why Goodwood is the toughest course for jockeys
Having spent most of my life among politicians I guess I have become unaccustomed to candour. The only example I…
Bridge
All the best players today are technically excellent in card play. They know all the odds and end plays to…
Shak attack
The Azeri grandmaster Shakhriyar Mamedyarov has been distinguishing himself recently at both classical and speed chess time limits. Last month…
no. 521
White to play. This is from Mamedyarov–Georgiadis, Biel 2018. Many of Mamedyarov’s games feature a kingside attack based upon a…
Pundemic
In Competition No. 3063 you were invited to submit a poem about puns containing puns. Dryden regarded paronomasia as…
2374: Watch your step
The unclued lights (three of two words) are of a kind. Across 1 Slices top of sausage in…
to 2371: In a paddy
The unclued lights and those clued without thematic definition (2, 11, 26, 33 and 42) are Irish forenames. Nuala Considine’s…
Why is a BBC executive calling for the removal of middle-aged white men from television?
Cassian Harrison, the editor of BBC Four, told the Edinburgh International Television Festival last week that no one wants to…
