My diary has been filled with dental appointments, reflecting a truism that American dentists pray for British teeth. The tally in this past month is one root canal, three extractions and two bone grafts, which more or less equals the cost of putting one dentist’s child through a year of college. The epic began almost
Following my abrupt departure from Good Morning Britain after declining to apologise for disbelieving Meghan ‘Princess Pinocchio’ Markle, I’ve been riding a rare wave of public popularity, with my anti-woke, pro-free speech book Wake Up becoming a no. 1 bestseller and people stopping me in the street to offer support. A lady named Marion from
In the New York Times, the celebrated journalist Maureen Dowd describes Crieff as ‘a sleepy town in Scotland’. Well. There speaks a woman who has never been in the Quaich on a Friday night when the homemade haggis baws with whisky mayo are on special offer and Duncan has come down from Ochtertyre with ‘the
‘We humour them when they suggest absurd reforms, we placate them with small material comforts, but we heave sighs of relief when they go away and leave us to our jobs.’ I am glad to say that the approach adopted by one of my predecessors, Eric Maclagan, to the visiting public is no longer preferred
What would happen to the Republicans after Donald Trump? That has been one of the pundits’ favourite themes in the past few months. Maybe the GOP could run against Joe Biden’s massive spending and borrowing splurge, some pondered; or go after some low-hanging woke excesses on the left; or exploit the huge influx of illegal
By the time you read this you may know if the Tories triumphed in the Hartlepool by-election — or if, in the end, the party was too badly wounded by all that business about who paid for whose wallpaper. Boris Johnson visited the town more times than he visited Scotland in the campaign, so he
I spent much of the 1980s and 1990s reporting on company chief executives who didn’t understand the distinction between mine and theirs. They enjoyed lavish lifestyles — company flats, art collections, huge expense accounts — without the owners of the company (you and me through our pension funds) having a clue. Then came the corporate
I have just had my second jab and it poses a dilemma. As an assiduous Covid rule-taker, I have been appalled by those — including friends and relatives — who have flouted or sidestepped the regulations and guidelines in the belief that they don’t apply to them. ‘We know we shouldn’t but it’s good for
The files arrived marked ‘STRICT EMBARGO’ and ‘CONFIDENTIAL’ and ‘FORTH BRIDGE REVISED’ and stamped with various crests and insignia. My dog Mot was intrigued and sniffed the stack warily. I have a few days to ingest this mass of information — ceremonial detail, armed forces involvement, order of service, processional arrangements, musical selections, historical precedent,
The last patient I treated was 105 years old. She has lived through two world wars, a depression and at least five pandemics. It’s a real honour to treat centenarians. They teach me much about life: how it is and how it ends. I can also lighten the mood with my 80-year-old patients by telling
When I finally head back to church this weekend, after a year of Covid-avoidance, it is going to feel a little strange. These past 12 months constitute the longest stretch of time I’ve been away since I was born. And I’m not going to lie, part of me liked the sudden plague-long dispensation. I’ve become
Spring Cannot Be Cancelled arrives on the doorstep. It is a gloriously illustrated book by Martin Gayford about his conversations with David Hockney, now living in Normandy, and who I have recently interviewed. It’s a book about many things — Hockney’s love of France and French painting, his reflections on many other artists among them.
Piers Morgan may have been the UK equivalent of a TV shock-jock, but there’s another side to him. I’ve known Piers for more than 30 years — we went to the same journalism college — and he has a large heart. Years ago Judy and I and the kids were holidaying in Florida and, unknown
Safe spaces, diversity quotas, gender-neutral pronouns, culturally relative facts, heteronormative hegemony. Are my right-on credentials right on enough? Am I sufficiently penitent for being white, cis and male? Will I be cancelled or de-platformed by the Pronoun Police? What is my woke-quotient? At least as far as science is concerned, it’s a satisfactory zero. Science
Santa Monica is a soothing place to be locked down. I moved here from New York for four months in November with my two adult kids after I lost my beloved husband, Harry Evans. I couldn’t face the task of finishing a book in our empty country house where for years we’d shown each other
Spring in Somerset — again. If someone had told me last February that I’d spend seven of the next 12 months here, I’d have explained that was impossible: I’ve always been a city boy. Three lockdowns later, and we’ve bought a home here. I love it. Snow, then snowdrops, now daffodils — and the wild
Did Nicola Sturgeon lie to the Scottish parliament? A Holyrood committee into the now infamous Alex Salmond affair has been looking into what she knew and when she knew it. In its possession is Salmond’s explosive written evidence, which contradicts her account. So who is telling the truth? This SNP-chaired inquiry has been in no
We weren’t long into Bruce Castor’s opening speech defending Donald Trump in his impeachment trial before we knew it was going to be special. ‘I don’t want to steal the thunder from the other lawyers’ thunder,’ Castor intoned to a mildly befuddled Senate. ‘But Nebraska, you’re going to hear, is quite a judicial thinking place.’
My great-great-grandmother, born on a Barbadian plantation and transported to what was British Guiana in the 19th century, gave rise to a tribe that has spread across the globe. Weirdly, Covid has brought us together (via Zoom) in a way that used to be reserved for weddings and funerals. My New Yorker nephew found a
I start the week with someone throwing faeces at me. I thought people were supposed to clap for doctors these days, not hurl poo at them? Never mind. Thankfully I’m fast on my feet despite it being the early hours of the morning, and dodge the mess, which hits the wall behind me. I’m working
