A quarter of a century ago I somehow managed to get out of Paris where I had haunted a cheap hotel for months like a ghost trapped between this world and the next. I drove to Italy where I have lived ever since. I had a great contract with a famous publisher to write a
The plumber and the builder conversed at top speed, making a combined sound that was so strange it seemed likely only bats or aliens from outer space could make sense of it. The chap who had come to price our new bathrooms was gabbling in a thick west Cork accent, giving absolutely nothing away to
I was shocked to read about the behaviour of Joe Biden’s dog, Commander. According to a CNN report based on freedom of information requests, he bit US Secret Service agents on 24 separate occasions between October 2022 and July 2023. There were also numerous other incidents involving the White House staff. These were not playful
Q. I must be the only person with this problem but I would really welcome a solution. I have a lovely neighbour in the flat below who happily has my dog to stay when I go away. She also holds a set of keys to my flat so she can check all is well. This
Gloom. Relentless rain out of a sullen sky enhanced an already pessimistic mood. We were talking geopolitics and agreeing that the West ought to brace itself for a hard landing. Try as we might, we could find no good news, anywhere. Where is the self-belief of the Reagan/Thatcher years? Instead, a culture war is taking
‘Would you believe, looking down at your phone can put about 60lb of force on your neck,’ wrote Dr Miriam Stoppard in the Mirror. ‘Lift your phone up to eye level to avoid text neck.’ I didn’t quite understand about the 60lb, but my husband tells me there are other text ailments, notably text claw,
We’re due at The Press Club at six for a briefing on the Padma Bridge. Rivers here drown in their own plenitude. I don’t normally wear pearls, but shalwar glamour has boxed me into a corner. All I can see of our driver is his left arm and watch. Koranic verses swing from the rear-view
If it is here, tethered by thornsto the soil, for a reason,it is solely to hold him, his shepherd’s ghosthome from a field in Belgium, to let his tired frame restand the breeze call through him A oes heddwch? A oes heddwch? … expecting no answer. Mysterious in the unshorn mistit mourns his absence,waits patiently
Another week gone by in the pubmeans time called on someone elseas if the reaper’s too lazy to aimhigher than the fermented windfalls. The regulars are sad but secretly gladit’s not them in the pine overcoatas they discuss at length how hardit is to drive to that new crematorium. They complain it’s just off the
Our national malaise arises in part from the poor state of many of Britain’s private services. No, not a misprint. I mean private services. Many on the political right berate public services, implying that were they only to be privatised everything would be sweetness and light. Yet modern technology now makes it all too easy
Back in November, 20 horses went to post in the Troytown Chase at Navan. Fourteen were trained in Co. Meath by Gordon Elliott, who provided the winner Coko Beach and four of the first five home. He broke no rules. To those who objected to his mass entry, Elliott retorted that he hadn’t stopped any
