Q. I am on my gap year and looking for work as a tutor, which I understand is very well paid. The key months for Common Entrance, AS- and A-level revision are almost upon us and, although I have my details up on the noticeboards of various local schools, I have had no inquiries. I can’t afford to advertise and I do not want to sign up with an agency because I don’t want to give up half my wages on commission. Can you recommend an internet site where I can tout myself?
B.W., London SW3
A. No. The following method will reap better results. Have some photo-cards printed up and, crucially, glued to flat magnetic disks as used in sewing — available from Peter Jones’s haberdashery department. Hand these out in the car-parks of the local schools as the mothers are arriving in their 4x4s. Not only will the flibbertigibbets then be able to mount your magnetic card on their fridges rather than losing it, but they will also have a chance to clap eyes on you and see if they like the cut of your gib. Warn the mothers not to put the cards in their wallets where they might distort the magnetic strips on credit cards and you can be assured they will find their way to the rightful surface, where your face can leer out as a constant reminder to them to get their acts together.
Q. My husband went to a fashionable dinner party in London last week and ate mutton there. It was apparently a great success and I would like to have a go at giving mutton to my own guests, but none of my local butchers can supply it. Can you help, Mary?
C.S., Exeter
A. The Prince of Wales has been spearheading the rehabilitation of mutton — its rarity value adds to its new status. You can try it in restaurants such as the Ivy and Paternoster Chophouse, but you can actually buy your own award-winning Scottish Blackface mutton from Ben Weatherall in Dumfries (tel: 01387 730326; www.blackface.co.uk.) A leg in two joints, diced shoulder and chops are delivered in a coolbox overnight. You can keep it in its vacuum packs in the fridge for a week or freeze it for up to a year. Ben has more recipes on his website.
Q. What is the current convention surrounding novelists and the Christian names they allot? A writer friend has given my name to a peripheral, unsympathetic, victim-like character in her latest work. Should I be offended? Should I be flattered? Or, because my name is classless, am I being big-headed to assume that her use of it was not chance? But isn’t it offensive to imply that an author worth her salt writes anything by coincidence? Commenting could show me in a pretty dull light but silence could display a lack of appreciation. Advice please.
Name and address withheld
A. It is more likely that the writer has used your name because you are not a peripheral, unsympathetic victim, rather than because you are. In this way she can confound critics who would accuse her of lacking in imagination for not only basing a character on someone she knows in real life but even for using that person’s name. Congratulate her on the book and say how pleased you were to see your name being used since, paradoxically, it means she holds you in high esteem.
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