Life
Christmas crossword: The winners
The first prize of £100, three prizes of £25 and six further prizes of the Chambers Dictionary of Great Quotations (2015)…
Macaronic
In Competition No. 2930 you were invited to submit up to 16 lines of macaronic verse. A dictionary of poetic…
Your problems solved
Q. What can be done when more people than you can cater for accept an invitation? We are giving a…
The Battle of Brussels
My friends divide into three groups. There are those who are determined to anticipate Lent. There is a larger number…
High life
Gstaad War and Peace has been in the news lately, so what was it that Leo wrote about all happy…
Long life
Before the start of Aladdin in Milton Keynes this week a promotional video showed Brian Blessed in oriental costume bellowing…
Long life
Before the start of Aladdin in Milton Keynes this week a promotional video showed Brian Blessed in oriental costume bellowing…
Low life
I was at home in Devon for the month of December. My sister was also there and her tyrannical, wildly…
Low life
I was at home in Devon for the month of December. My sister was also there and her tyrannical, wildly…
Waybread
‘Did you say “fabric”?’ asked my husband when I was telling him about words that have just been added to…
Real life
All disputes are now a clash of rights in which both sides compete to see who has the greatest claim…
Tell the truth about benefit claimants and the left shuts you down
Next month sees the release of Trumbo, a biopic about Dalton Trumbo, the screenwriter who was blacklisted by the Hollywood…
Tell the truth about benefit claimants and the left shuts you down
Next month sees the release of Trumbo, a biopic about Dalton Trumbo, the screenwriter who was blacklisted by the Hollywood…
Q: What is a good school? A: One that other people like
A few months ago I received a call from someone running a small private school near New York. They believed…
Wild life
On New Year’s Day I took the family out for an evening walk on the ranch. Along the verges, lush…
Bridge
Forgive me for the outdated, clichéd expression but …GIRL POWER! The surprise winners of last weekend’s TGRs auction pairs were…
The consolations of old age
OK sports fans, what do Dame Vivien Duffield and Evelyn Waugh have in common? The answer is absolutely nothing, so…
The palpable tragedy of New Year’s Eve in A&E
The new year was two hours young. My boy and I were side by side on a row of three…
Doing The Birdie Song on the back of a trainee racehorse
‘Start at the back and try to pass as many horses as you can,’ said the trainer, as we stepped…
A tale of a Teflon-coated hen pheasant
This is an uplifting story of survival with which to usher in the New Year. At Stoke Park, my home…
Why the north needs Red Rum
The well-bred Sea Pigeon, who had finished seventh in the Derby when trained at Beckhampton by Jeremy Tree, was later…
Bridge
Call me nuts but on 29 December I left lovely, sunny, delicious France for the fairly unlovely Royal National Hotel…
Winter’s tail
The London Classic, the end of the million-dollar Grand Tour, was something of a damp squib. A surfeit of draws…
Puzzle no. 390
Black to play. This is a variation from Carlsen-Grischuk, London Classic 2015. Carlsen won but this week’s puzzle shows how…
Nostradamus
In Competition No. 2929 you were invited to submit an acrostic poem containing some predictions for the next decade, in…
