High life | 9 July 2015

Wow, what a week. London may be bad for one’s health, but it sure makes it fun on the way to where we’re all going. I’m determined not to mention Greece — too much has been written about my poor country, most of it quite nice — so I will stick to London in general and The Spectator in particular. It began with a nostalgic party for about 28 chez George and Lita Livanos, childhood friends, in their treasure-filled house in Mayfair. A drunken lunch in a St James’s club followed, five old buddies reminiscing about the days when hangovers didn’t register. Then it was on to The Spectator’s summer party, which was ruined for me by the warning that a letter to me from Speccie girls would appear in the magazine the next day, and by the fact that my colleague Hugo Rifkind shoved me under a shower in the gents that left me drenched and looking as though I was perspiring in an excessive Hellenic manner.