Life
Spectator competition winners: poems with multisyllabic rhyme words
In Competition No. 3296, you were invited to provide a poem whose rhyme words are all at least three syllables.…
The vegans have landed in West Cork
After a day’s house-hunting in West Cork, I texted the builder boyfriend to say that we were too late. The…
My morphine machine has broken
Monday morning. In comes Frank. Frank is a carer in his late fifties. He comes daily to wash me. Still…
New York’s killer cyclists
New York The most likely place to be injured, or even killed, in the Bagel is the sidewalk, any sidewalk,…
Aussie life
‘Where did all the poof readers go?’ is not a question which would make it into many Australian publications. I…
Language
‘White guilt’ is one of the concepts lying behind the proposed Indigenous Voice. When Prime Minister Albanese announced he had…
The restorative qualities of a great martini
It was a perfect setting for a spring day, next to a 15th-century barn. Other walls and buildings had clearly…
Why are beds flat?
Last month in a Swiss hotel, I came across an idea so beautifully simple that I felt it would be…
The ‘public humiliation diet’ is very effective
As another summer approaches, I’ve embarked on yet another attempt to lose weight. You’d have thought I’d have learnt my…
2598: By any other name – solution
The unclued lights are the former and current names of various products: 2/8A, 12/36, 16/32, 17/34, 13/22. First prize David…
2601: Men of note
The unclued lights are of a kind. Two solutions are initials. Across 1 Officers’ training school – place to write…
Drama in Astana
As I write, six of 14 games of the world championship match between Ian Nepomniachtchi and Ding Liren have been…
The grand shame of the Grand National protestors
When jockey Derek Fox came over from Ireland to join the Scottish stable run by Lucinda Russell and her partner,…
What I’d give for a glass of water
It took five firemen or pompiers to lift me out of bed, carry me down three narrow flights of stairs…
