11 September 2004

Q. Some time ago I introduced a friend of mine to a very distinguished journalist. Their friendship has clearly blossomed, because in a recent article the journalist glowingly described him as ‘the Essex historian and thinker’. My friend, for all his qualities, is a Toad of Toad Hall-like figure, both physically and mentally. The only

‘In my opinion,’ said Doris Eades, 74, ‘the council has so much money it doesn’t know what to do with it and comes up with hair-brained schemes like this.’ So said a newspaper report on a scheme by Wolverhampton to get people to use bicycles. But was it hair-brained or hare-brained? The hare once played