Life

High life

Why New Yorkers are fleeing the city in droves

New York Back when people used to read newspapers, they called it a ‘human interest’ story. Now it appears as just another statistic. The know-nothings on social media, who express utter drivel on a daily basis, will have pretty much ignored it, but a dreaded pro-Biden sheet actually published the full story. A young Japanese

Low life

The joy of red wine

Everything is happening so fast. First we were put under a night curfew. A few days later M. Macron announced another lockdown. Then, pretty much overnight, I developed a taste for red wine. The Damascene conversion was a bottle of Clos de l’Ours, a local vineyard. It was pricey admittedly, even when bought direct from

Real life

No sacred cows

What I’ll miss most in Lockdown II

A second lockdown won’t cause me much suffering. I don’t have a shop selling ‘non-essential’ goods (e.g. books) that will go out of business. As a freelance journalist, I’m not at risk of losing my job. I don’t have a life-threatening disease so I’m not going to die because my local hospital won’t admit me.

Spectator Sport

Sporting spectacles to look forward to in lockdown

‘At least there’s sport,’ said the woman in the supermarket queue. True enough, and in a welcome sop to an embattled world elite sport has largely been saved from the wreckage of second lockdowns around the globe, leaving a great deal to look forward to and argue about. 1. The much-delayed US Masters — will

Dear Mary

Food

Winning a knife fight with a fish: Newlyn Fresh Fish reviewed

It’s a good day to stab something and tear out its heart. Elaine Lorys is the only female master fishmonger in Britain. She stands in an apron in the Stevenson fish shop in Newlyn amid the brightness of the autumn sun and signage offering mussels, oysters and clams; bass, bream and red mullet; crab and

Mind your language

Alas, ‘alas’ is losing its irony

Boris Johnson looked unhappy, as well he might, standing at his indoor lectern last Saturday to announce the new lockdown: ‘In this country, alas, as across much of Europe, the virus is spreading.’ He said alas a couple more times during the conference. Normally such a word belongs to the sprinkling of slightly absurd phrases