Life
Battle for Britain – 7th September 2013
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Sport: Nigel Lawson on the Ashes
Those of us who watched the last day of the final Ashes Test of the present series enjoyed a rare…
Dear Mary
Q. In response to correspondence re. wedding gifts: there is no need for a couple to have a list at…
A Roald Dahl tea? It reminds me more of Jimmy Savile
One Aldwych, an Edwardian grand hotel near Waterloo Bridge, is serving a Jimmy Savile tribute tea. It is not explicitly…
Dot Wordsworth: We've been self-whipping since 1672
Isabel Hardman of this parish explained after last week’s government defeat that a deluded theory among the party leadership had…
Jimmy and the chocolate factory
One Aldwych, an Edwardian grand hotel near Waterloo Bridge, is serving a Jimmy Savile tribute tea. It is not explicitly…
A phoenix from the Ashes
Those of us who watched the last day of the final Ashes Test of the present series enjoyed a rare…
Taki: Stephen Fry and the gay lobby should cool it over the Winter Olympics
Gstaad I’ve met Stephen Fry twice in my life, both times long ago. The first time at a dinner given…
Jeremy Clarke: The day I walked into a postcard
This time last year the postman delivered a picture postcard depicting a village square in Provence. The photograph on the…
Melissa Kite: Warning. I gallop
What is the point of living in a free country if you cannot do dangerous things every now and again?…
Alexander Chancellor: Why was Bradley Manning ever allowed to join the army?
I have been puzzling about why the United States authorities ever thought that Bradley Manning, who was jailed last week…
Most of the racing crowd were saddened that Godolphin was dragged through the mire
Driving to Newmarket through a biblical-style deluge that had sheep, cattle and horses queuing in twos in case Noah had…
Bridge
The Ukip treasurer Stuart Wheeler’s recent comments about women being less good than men at bridge (and chess, and poker)…
Hedgehog fund
The Hedgehog is a respected chess formation, usually adopted as Black, where the defender crouches behind a wall of pawns…
Puzzle no. 281
Black to play. This is from Caruana-Adams, Dortmund 2013. Despite play being in an endgame Adams sacrificed a piece. His…
Bookish
In Competition No. 2812 you were invited to provide a poem celebrating bookshops. Space is tight, which leaves room only…
2128: Carbon copy
This puzzle marks a 42/27 by 11 in 17/19. Five other unclued lights (one twice hyphened) together suggest another form…
Solution to 2125: Nil desperandum
The part quotation was ‘BUT WESTWARD, LOOK, THE LAND’ (1/5/28) from Say not the struggle naught availeth by Arthur Hugh Clough.…
Sorry, Rayhan Uddin, but your comprehensive didn’t teach you how to think
An acquaintance of mine called Daisy Christodoulou has just published a book called Seven Myths about Education. It’s a merciless…
The Battle for Britain – 31 August 2013
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Think fracking’s bad for the countryside? Just look at farming…
I’m off to Balcombe this weekend. In fact I might even carry a placard and paint my face with a…
Dear Mary: How can I stop this bore reading his novel aloud?
Q. Is there a polite way of halting a wannabe novelist from reading his oeuvre aloud to an unwilling audience?…
Dining in style at David Cameron’s favourite Italian
It is impossible to think about any Italian region without wondering ‘What if?’ Sardinia lacks the glamour, grandeur and menace…
Vikings
‘What’s he saying now?’ asked my husband in a provoking manner when an actor read out a bit of the…
A dinner fit for a prime minister
It is impossible to think about any Italian region without wondering ‘What if?’ Sardinia lacks the glamour, grandeur and menace…
