Life
Putting Fletcher in the shades
Some years ago, when the last Conservative government was limping towards defeat, someone published a book called 101 Uses for…
Girl power
Mrs Oakley returned from her latest book club with an uplifting story. The Mother Superior of an Irish convent was…
How dare they sell the beaches where I played as a child
Porto Cheli Nothing is moving, not a twig nor a leaf, and I find myself missing the cows, the mountains…
A road trip in the company of Long John Silver and an exciting pair of thighs
I live in south Devon. Last week I went up to north Devon, to visit a friend who was renting…
The pleasures of being a boring old unmarried couple
The problem with not getting married, I am increasingly realising, is that you cannot get divorced. There is no mechanism…
The word ‘holiday’ has become a political taboo
It’s August in Tuscany, and the market towns are eerily quiet, presumably because most of their inhabitants are off on…
Bridge
Some bridge hands are so sad that they make you want to cry. At least, that’s how my friend Lou…
Olympiad
The Tromsø Olympiad finishes on Thursday 14 August, too late for any definitive conclusions to be drawn here as to…
no. 327
White to play. This is from Kasimdzhanov–Kramnik, Tromsø Olympiad 2014. How did White blast through? Answers to me at The…
Pet sounds
In Competition No. 2860 you were invited to submit a short ode on the death of a pet in unusual…
2175: Elated grunt
Across unclued lights combine with down ones to form anagrams of the titles (one of two words) of four works…
Solution to 2172: Para
Gerry Goffin, popular LYRICIST (40), died on 19 June 2014. He wrote the perimetric songs IT MIGHT AS WELL RAIN…
Mark Simmonds was just saying what a lot of MPs think
I feel some sympathy for Mark Simmonds, the Conservative MP who’s resigned as a minister and is stepping down at…
Battle for Britain
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How oneupmanship wrecks things for everyone
‘There’s a little bit of a fascist in all of us. For some, the tragedy of human want may provoke…
Dear Mary: What do we do with a teenage guest who hogs the bathroom?
Q. We have taken a flat in Edinburgh for a month and a young girl, temporarily homeless and a friend…
Visiting Burgundy from my hospital bed
There have been some splendid rumours about my health. According to the most exotic, I was cas-evacked from a hill…
Is Boris Johnson standing for Parliament — or running for it?
‘Boris Johnson broke cover yesterday to declare that he will run for parliament,’ the Times reported last week. The Mirror…
Escape to Burgundy
There have been some splendid rumours about my health. According to the most exotic, I was cas-evacked from a hill…
How oneupmanship ruins things for everyone
‘There’s a little bit of a fascist in all of us. For some, the tragedy of human want may provoke…
Greece is calling – three more years and then I move south
Porto Cheli I have been thinking about my children and my own strange boyhood as I gaze up at the…
I might have no testosterone but I do have a Fiat Barchetta
I’ve might have no testosterone. (My production is currently being stopped by injection once every three months.) But what I…
Will I end up in Belmarsh for fiddling kitten heels?
A parcel has arrived addressed to ‘Cydney Kite’. The spaniel is ecstatic. She has never received her own mail before,…
If you want real stress, move to the country
It’s much more stressful to live in the country than in a town. There are always threats of one kind…
Bridge
Two very exciting tournaments drew to a close last week. The first was the Spingold, the main teams event in…
