New York New York, New York, once a wonderful town/ The people are crap and the mayor’s a clown/ The only safe space is a hole in the ground… I could go on, but why be so negative? Arriving from bucolic Switzerland, Newark, one of America’s ‘murder capitals’, feels like Katanga circa 1960. If this
‘Yes, I will have a coffee,’ said the van driver. He’d driven down to the south of France from Devon. I motioned him to take a pew at the kitchen table and asked him about himself. Ron was ex-army. Aged 17, he was faced with a stark choice: the building site or the army. Because
‘I can’t put it off any longer. She’s dying and I don’t think I can ignore the inevitable. We’ve got to let her go. I’m scared. Will you come? Please? I really need you.’ I sent the text and waited. After a few minutes, the man I depend on more than any other texted back.
These are dark days indeed and, with nobody seemingly in control, we’re pretty much back where we started, with lockdown beckoning once more with its bony finger. Well sod that. With a long, lonely winter ahead, I’m stocking up like fury. No, not with bog rolls and baked beans, you fool, with vino! I don’t
You probably haven’t heard of the Great Barrington Declaration. This is a petition started by three scientists on 4 October calling for governments to adopt a policy of ‘focused protection’ when it comes to Covid-19. They believe those most at risk should be offered protection — although it shouldn’t be mandatory — and those not
Q. A year ago we sent out 150 save-the-date notices for our wedding this December. We are still going ahead, even though we can now invite only 15 people. My problem is the wedding list. Do I still send one out? We feel some people may want to give us a present even though they
I had known Perry Worsthorne for several years before I went to work for him in 1986 (horrifying how time passes). Then again, everybody knew Perry. He was one of the most colourful figures in London. Elegant, silver-haired, always amusing, regularly original and frequently provocative, he was a triumphant refutation of the idea that conservatism
‘Everyone’s been very kind to my husband and I,’ said someone behind me in a (spaced) queue. That is the classic genteelism. We are taught when young not to say ‘Me and my friend went swimming’ and end up talking nonsense. We’d never say ‘very kind to I’, but the genteel yoking cannot be shaken
The Covid problem lies as much in the delayed action of the virus as in the virus itself. Since symptoms emerge only days after infection, testing often comes too late to reveal how transmission occurs, and often too late to prevent onward transmission, since many people may be most contagious before symptoms appear. This delay
Fortunately for me and the politicians we entertained over my years covering the darkest profession, Mrs Oakley didn’t do a Sasha Swire and keep a gloriously indiscreet diary. Indeed her rule was that politicians who came to our house and talked only about themselves didn’t get invited a second time, a test that was frequently
