Uncategorized

Wednesday

Tom Goodenough

How to beat the crowds in Rome

Rome is Europe’s most beautiful city, but there’s a downside: the most famous attractions are nearly always overwhelmed with crowds. The line for the Colosseum bakes under the unbearable Roman sun; the Sistine Chapel queue snakes through the Vatican; the Trevi fountain is spoiled by selfie seekers. Fortunately, though, there is a way of avoiding the mob – and seeing a side of the Eternal City that captivated generations of travellers before the modern tourist industry took hold. The best advice for avoiding the throngs is, when in Rome, do as the Romans don’t – and wake up early The best advice for avoiding the throngs is, when in Rome,

Tuesday

Julie Burchill Julie Burchill

The perverse greed of Jamie Oliver

I hoped that we would soon see the back of Jamie Oliver, once a ubiquitous presence on television, as his youthful Golden Labrador-ish appeal waned and his mouth increasingly looked like something you’d find on the end of a fishing rod. But regrettably, like many of the cor blimey pretend meritocrats of his era – from David Beckham to Jonathan Ross – he has proved as determined to hold on to his place on the dung heap of fortune as any old landed toff. It seems the ceaselessly acquisitive Oliver clan want some more of whatever pie is being divided. Is the world ready for Buddy, his 12-year-old son, who

Andrew Cusack

The sad decline of weak beer

For those of us who like kicking back a few pints in the summer sun, Samuel Smith Brewery’s decision to increase the strength of their Alpine Lager from 2.8 to 3.4 per cent has sparked much weeping and gnashing of teeth. Brits may be renowned the world over as lager louts, but there are some of us who actually enjoy the drink itself and want to rejoice in it without getting absolutely wrecked. Drinking for pleasure and refreshment rather than drunkenness is a novel idea for some, but the ‘weak’ Alpine Lager has sat at the apex of the quaffability index. The craft beer revolution of the 2010s has changed

Alexander Larman

Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis’s peculiar apology

Not since the then-couple Johnny Depp and Amber Heard released a pained, hostage-style video in 2016 apologising for bringing their dogs into Australia illegally has there been such an awkward public statement by A-list stars. Now is the turn of actors Mila Kunis and Ashton Kutcher over the weekend. In the minute-long video, they half-apologise for their statements of support for their erstwhile That 70s Show co-star Danny Masterson, who has been sentenced to 30 years in prison after being convicted of raping two women. These eulogies to Masterson’s character – which were supplied to the Los Angeles judge who nevertheless gave him the maximum permissible sentence – saw Kutcher

Monday

Michael Freeman

Confessions of a sperm donor

I first became aware of the London Sperm Bank after seeing an advert on Instagram. ‘Help someone achieve their dream of a family. Become a sper­m donor and get compensated up to £420 a month’. Why not get paid to do something that I was going to do anyway in my spare time? In the past, I’ve donated blood and have looked into giving bone marrow, so sperm donation just seemed like another form of biological socialism: from each according to his ability, to each according to her need. But I also felt I might be hedging an existential bet. If the name of the game is to multiply, then

Mary Dejevsky

The trouble with supermarket self checkouts

Finishing my latest mini-shop at my closest mini-supermarket, I witnessed something I hadn’t seen before. A couple who had used the self-checkouts were stopped at the exit by a staff member who asked to see inside their (store-branded) plastic bag. The customers obliged without demur and a half-smile sent them on their way. But it could have been different. Recent reports suggest strongly that aggression towards staff at supermarkets is on the rise.  Whatever the reason for the check, I have to confess – as an observer – to a tiny frisson of satisfaction. This was partly that someone was checking; I have seen people quite brazenly leave past the

Mark Mason

A beginner’s guide to buying a guitar

Thinking of adding another six strings to your bow? You wouldn’t be alone – lockdown inspired plenty of people to learn the guitar. The trend may have lessened as people return to the office, but it has still meant UK and European sales for the guitar maker Fender are £5 million higher than before Covid. The company say that almost half of its guitars are sold to people playing the instrument for the first time. Should you follow their example? The short answer is ‘yes’. The same instinct that gets you holding a tennis racket in front of the mirror means that when you progress to the real thing, the

Friday

Penworthy

An ante-post wager for the Cambridgeshire

My beloved late father, who was responsible for my love of horse racing, made an annual attempt to land the so-called ‘autumn double’: the two big Newmarket’s handicaps run towards the tail-end of the Flat season. For the best part of half a century, I have followed his lead with a fair degree of success in both contests but never landing the double at the same time. The duo of races involved are the Cambridgeshire, a ‘cavalry charge’ run over a mile and one furlong on Newmarket’s straight course, and the Cesarewitch, run over twice that distance at the same track. Because of their large fields, both races are usually

John Mac Ghlionn

Why children shouldn’t go vegan

In an attempt to sell vegan diets to parents and children, Team GB, recently partnered with Birds Eye’s vegan food brand Green Cuisine. The programme will be delivered in primary schools across the UK. Now, the Guardian is reporting that hundreds of academics are urging British universities ‘to commit to 100 per cent plant-based catering’. Why? You guessed right: ‘to fight the climate crisis’.  Some reports suggest that as many as one in 12 British parents are now raising their children vegan Research shows that veganism is intimately associated with nutritional deficiencies. A vegan diet negatively affects a developing brain, whether child or late adolescent. In Italy, after a number

Francis Young

We need an English folk revival

The cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason recently expressed a preference for ‘folk tunes’ at the Last Night of the Proms over the singing of Rule Britannia! – and, whatever one may think of jettisoning Thomas Arne’s celebrated anthem of British liberty, Kanneh-Mason’s suggestion raises the question of what exactly English folk music is. England is not the first country that springs to mind when we think of a nation for whom traditional music is central to identity. The importance of folk music to the self-understanding of many countries in Eastern Europe is so prominent that we encounter their traditional melodies and instruments annually in more or less embarrassing entries to the Eurovision

David Willis

Is this the end of Burning Man?

In the summer of 1986, two men, Larry Harvey and Jerry James, built an eight-foot-tall wooden effigy of a man and set fire to it on a beach in San Francisco. The event – an impromptu bonfire attended by several dozen of their closest friends – spawned what has since become a cultural phenomenon: an event seen by some as the ultimate rejection of capitalism, and by others as a giant drug-fuelled knees-up in the desert.  I’ve noticed the changes in the six years that I have been going to Burning Man Thirty-seven years on, Burning Man still culminates in the razing of a wooden sculpture, but since then both

Wednesday