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Wednesday
Antiques roadshow
‘My word! I thought the only one of these was in the British Museum!’
Pink unicorns
‘Actually, I want to go back to pink unicorns.’
If you want to talk dirty I’ll have to charge you an extra £12.50
‘If you want to talk dirty I’ll have to charge you an extra £12.50.’
I hear you’ve been drawing on the ceiling again
‘I hear you’ve been drawing on the ceiling again, Michelangelo.’
Do you ever worry that he’s being bullied at work?
‘Do you ever worry that he’s being bullied at work?’
On a clear day you can see the end of the Ulez
‘They say that on a clear day you can see the end of the Ulez.’
British museum pop-up gift shop
I love getting back to nature
‘I love getting back to nature. It makes great content.’
What happened to the great British gangster film?
Cast your minds back 25 years, when Cher’s ‘Believe’ was the biggest hit of the year and Nokia dominated the mobile phone market. These were simpler times. They also happened to better times, at least from a movie perspective. We had The Truman Show, Saving Private Ryan, There’s Something About Mary and American History X. 1998 also saw the release of Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels, arguably the best British gangster movie of the 1990s, maybe even all-time. For some unfathomable reason, the Hatfield-born director, producer and screenwriter opted to ‘branch out’ and try his hand at making different types of movies Guy Ritchie’s debut feature, which celebrates its 25th
My battle with three German children
To Paxos, Homer’s inspiration they say, for Circe’s Isle. These days, there’s still enchantment, albeit of a less carnal kind. Skies are azure, waters pellucid and the days fall quickly into the most indolent of rhythms. Breakfast, swim, book. Drink, lunch, sleep. Swim, book, drink. Dinner, then bed. Sometimes, though, it seems that great swathes of West London and Wiltshire have decamped to the island, gathering in the main port of Gaios. A glut of Panamas, pink faces and pastel linen. Along with much anxious talk – over platters of fried calamari and icy bottles of Santorini white – about Keir Starmer and his proposed private school VAT ‘raid’. No
Mad Max meets Mr Toad: The Morgan Super 3, reviewed
When you first lay eyes on Morgan’s new Super 3 – a three-wheeled car categorised, intriguingly, as a motorbike in the US – it does take a moment to get your bearings. First, in an age when all cars essentially look the same, this one appears to be back to front. Set wide, two front wheels protrude from a bullet-shaped body which tapers off to a narrow, wasp-like tail. At first glance, it looks a bit like a 1930s Bugatti mated with a bobsleigh. But as your eyes adjust to this unconventional layout and configuration – still strange, despite the fact Morgan began making three-wheelers in the 1910s – you
Tuesday
Walking the Essex Way is a wonderful adventure
I’m hiking along a footpath through glorious English countryside, across lush green meadows framed by ancient woodland. I’ve hardly seen a soul today, just a few solitary dogwalkers. I’ve been walking all day and my legs are aching, but I can’t recall the last time I felt so contented, so alive. Welcome to the Essex Way, an epic walking trail that runs right across this rugged county, from Epping, on the edge of London, to Harwich, on the North Sea. I first walked the Essex Way, 81 miles from end to end, a few years ago. Like a lot of weekend hikers, I’d done a fair bit of walking in
Monday
Should you stop taking melatonin?
Do you take it? If not, the chances are you’ll know someone who does. In an age of insomnia, melatonin has become a must-have sleep aid; as ubiquitous as yoga or herbal tea. In America, it is available over the counter and, according to The National Sleep Foundation charity, 27 per cent of adults take it. The use of melatonin has more than quintupled between 1999 and 2018. In the UK, where it is prescription only, melatonin use rose by nearly 900 per cent between 2008 and 2019, and many more of us – exact numbers are unknown – buy it unlicenced online. ‘People say it’s safe because it’s natural. Well, Vitamin A
Time is money at Disneyland
‘We’re all mad here,’ I mumble as I head towards the Cheshire Cat. To my left is the home of the world’s most famous mouse – and a sign warning guests to expect a wait of up to an hour and a half if they want to meet him. This is my tenth trip down a Disney theme park rabbit hole – my third as an adult and my second to Disneyland Paris – so the queues in the ‘most magical place on Earth’ comes as no surprise. But this time there’s a difference: I have my very own fairy godfather. Alex, our VIP tour guide, dressed in a three-piece
What it takes to build a modern home high on the Dorset cliffs
With its golden sand sweeping along the bay towards Lyme Regis, the young river bubbling into the surf and the weathered limestone cliffs rising and falling along the Jurassic coast, there are few more picturesque beaches in the country than the one at Charmouth. And it was, of course, that view that Allan and Ali fell in love with. Ali, who works as an advisor on catastrophic injury awards, and Allan, a retired KC who had spent most of his working life travelling around the north of England dealing with criminal cases, just happened to be passing an estate agents and saw a picture in the window. It wasn’t just love,
Friday
Two tips for York next week and one for tomorrow
York’s Ebor meeting next week is one of the highlights of the racing calendar with four days of quality fare on offer from Wednesday onwards. York is a flat, left-handed track suitable for strong galloping horses yet for some inexplicable reason quite a lot of thoroughbreds fail to act on what should be a fair course for one and all. For that reason, it makes sense to back horses with strong form on the track. Regular readers of this blog will know that I am a big admirer of local trainer Ed Bethell, whose yard is in the Yorkshire Dales. Most of Bethell’s best horses have run at York at
Bring back sex, drugs and rock n’ roll
It’s generally not hard to find a thoroughly depressing, joyless, plaintive, whiny, doom-laden, monotoned, earnest, life-sucking, soul-less, uninspiring, hapless and gloom-inducing article in the leftier British press. In fact, I sometimes wonder if the editors have sacked all their journalists, installed ChatGPT, and simply sit there, sipping Waitrose crémant, as they punch in evermore negative and melancholy prompts like ‘write an article about why something (gardening, cake, quantum engineering) is racist’ or ‘do a travel piece on the joys of zero emission yurting in Macclesfield’. Nonetheless, the other day, an article caught my eye which elicited more than the usual sense of enervating ennui, and endtimes pessimism. It was titled ‘It’s just not worth it: Is this the end of sex, drugs and rock and roll?’. Here’s my message to
The dangers of cargo bikes
My first encounter with the cargo bicycle came more than ten years ago. I was a features writer at the Sunday Telegraph and had three very small children; my assignment was to spend a few weeks trying out three different designs for ferrying kids and shopping and then reach a verdict on which was best. What is a cargo bike, I hear you ask? Put simply, it is a monumental pain in the arse What is a cargo bike, I hear you ask? Put simply, it is a monumental pain in the arse. It is either a bicycle or a tricycle with a box bolted to the front, in which you put your children and other things. It
Why the British seaside still reigns supreme
It’s the time of year to revisit one of life’s great imponderables. British seaside holidays. Why do we do them? Which other experience – save perhaps attending a British boarding school in the past – does as much to remind you of the essential unfairness of life? Forget the costs involved (if Marianna Mazzucato wants to get Britons worked up about ‘rent-seeking’ she should start with holiday cottages) we have the weather to contend with. Like gazpacho, the British seaside holiday would be idyllic if the whole thing were only 20 degrees warmer, but it just wouldn’t work There you are on the beach, having spent 15 minutes viciously applying
