On Sunday I went to the Cheltenham Literary Festival to bang the drum for free schools. I was expecting a warm reception. The local MP is a Lib Dem, but the county council is Conservative. This wouldn’t be like my trip to Manchester last month. Almost as soon as I stepped off the train I
Trainer Sir Mark Prescott once noted that the greyhound races for the anticipated pleasure of sinking its teeth into a fluffy white bunny tail ahead. The human athlete races for the hope of fame and riches. But what’s in it, he asked, for the horse? One thing that has been in it for the racehorse
Caroline went away last Friday, leaving me alone with our four children for the weekend. Given that they’re aged eight and under, and I’d never been in sole charge before, it was something of a test. Could I cope? I hadn’t realised quite how regimented my children’s weekends are until I sat down and digested
I’m writing this from the Conservative party conference in Manchester and I must say it’s nice to be among friends. I mean the drunken hacks at the bar, obviously. This is a conference where we can drink with impunity because, let’s face it, there isn’t much for us to write about. The big story at
I wouldn’t normally take my wife and children to Dumfries and Galloway for the weekend, given the distance and the expense, but the organisers of the Wigtown Literary Festival offered to pay all our rail fares and put us up for the weekend. Wigtown was designated Scotland’s national book town by the Scottish Parliament in
Seeing me leaving the races early one day recently a friend inquired why. ‘Got to finish some painting,’ I replied. ‘Oh, really,’ he said in surprise. ‘Do you do watercolours or oils?’ I would have said, ‘No, walls,’ but he might then have imagined I did murals, so I had to explain that, surrounded as
As winter approaches, with snow forecast for next month, I’m anticipating a massive row with my wife. The problem is that Caroline refuses to switch the central heating on before the first day of winter, which falls on 22 December. It doesn’t matter if temperatures plummet to below zero in the interim. ‘Put on an
The imminence of paying for a 17-year-old to learn to drive brings with it the unwelcome question of insurance. Rather more welcome is recent publicity about insurance revealing yet another conspiracy against the consumer. Some premiums have jumped by up to 40 per cent. The reason usually given — uninsured drivers for whom we all
Poor Sophie Dahl. After appearing on the Today programme to make an appeal for charitable donations to the Roald Dahl Museum, she has become an object of ridicule. This was partly prompted by the amount of money she was asking for and the use for which it was intended: £500,000 does seem like rather a
It is not only the Arabs who have an intimate, almost mystical involvement with the horse. In Istanbul for the Topkapi Trophy, sitting beside the largest kebab I have ever seen (and, I kid you not, it was more than 12 feet long), I was reminded by my genial host Mehmet Kurt that the horse
I’m writing this the day before the West London Free School is due to open and it’s not an exaggeration to say I’ve been looking forward to this moment for two years. The thought of our first cohort of pupils streaming through the gates, resplendent in their WLFS blazers, has sustained me through many a
Next Friday, Boris Johnson will officially open the West London Free School. I’m particularly pleased that the ribbon is being cut by a former editor of this magazine. Next Friday, Boris Johnson will officially open the West London Free School. I’m particularly pleased that the ribbon is being cut by a former editor of this
The lovely thing about Hayley Turner is the girl-next-door quality which she retains despite having become Britain’s highest-profile woman jockey. But while she still sounds genuinely surprised about her achievements her steady gaze reflects the inner confidence she has always needed to mix it with the boys. Most stables in the country would have to
Don’t be fooled – you’d get into Oxford Rachel Johnson calls to tell me she’s doing a piece for the Financial Times saying she wouldn’t have got into Oxford if she’d been applying this year. She’s quite wrong, of course. A myth has grown up among my generation of Oxford graduates that it’s harder for
Feel-good factor The sloping rear roof-line, especially in white, prompted comparisons with a squashed fag packet. It’s a profile that’s supposed to appeal to younger owners. When I first saw it, lowered from the heavens by a crane during a preview party at the Orangery in Kensington Gardens, I wasn’t convinced. But I’ve a poor
I could not understand on Saturday why a fairly standard Newbury card had brought so many vehicles on to the approach roads. All was explained when I saw a group of merry ladies pulling knickers out of their handbags and comparing them. The old Welsh belter Tom Jones was appearing on stage after the day’s
As I write this, my face and hands are covered in scabs. I’d love to say I sustained these injuries while trying to save the Oxfam shop on Ealing Green from looters. (It was looted, by the way.) But the truth is I fell off my bike on the way to lunch with another journalist.
At first, I thought he was the site foreman. He was in his mid-40s, well-built, standing in front of a building site on Madeley Road in Ealing. This leafy suburb in west London, which is about two miles from my house in Acton, was the scene of some of the worst rioting on Monday night
Sometimes, burglars really do mess with the Wrong Guy At 4.20 a.m. last Friday, my friend and neighbour was awoken by the sound of breaking glass. It was one of the panels in his front door and when the noise had died away he could make out the voices of two young men intent on
Qatar at Goodwood Goodwood works. No course in Britain looks prettier on a summer’s day. No course in Britain feeds the media better. Trainers agree that no one looks after 300-year-old turf better than Goodwood’s Clerk of the Course Seamus Buckley. And Goodwood always has an eye to tasteful innovation — the first course to