Mark Mason talks about trivia via books, articles, guided walks and the pub.
This month our trivia-inspired tour of London’s postcode areas reaches NW, where Tim Burton snored, Madness caused an earthquake and Desmond Tutu asked policemen for directions even though he knew where he was going…
Ferrets at Buckingham Palace, swearing at Wimbledon and the real-life incident that inspired Del Boy’s fall through the bar – it can only mean that our trivia tour of London’s postcode areas has reached SW…
Golden pineapples, hotel rooms named after spies and the only curved piece of glass in the Gherkin – yes, it’s EC, the second in our series looking at the quirky history of London postcode areas. Step this way for some Square Mile trivia…
Farewell, Truss’s twisty lectern. Last week in Downing Street Rishi Sunak used one with a straight column. If he follows recent Tory tradition, he’ll have one made to his own design, paid for by the party (£2,000-£4,000 a pop) and loaned to the government. Each lectern (from the Latin legere, ‘to read’) has sent a message.
The J.D. does indeed come from J.D. ‘Boss’ Hogg in The Dukes of Hazzard. But Tim Martin’s reason for ‘Wetherspoon’ is slightly different from the commonly told version. Yes, it was the surname of one of his schoolteachers in New Zealand. But Mr Wetherspoon didn’t tell Martin he would never amount to anything – rather
It’s the area that unites James Bond, Rick Wakeman and both Queen Elizabeths. In the first of our series looking at the quirky history and fascinating trivia of London’s postcode areas, we explore the delights to be found in W (West) – everything from fake houses to shaky newsreaders to dukes who are women… Answer:
The spot where Forrest Gump gets offered a seat is pretty well where the shower is now. I’m spending the night at a campsite in Suffolk, sleeping aboard ‘Texas’, the first converted vehicle offered by American School Bus Glamping. Until this time last year the bus was transporting students to and from school in the
Whatever the problems faced by England’s Test cricketers on the field lately – and they are legion – the players know that one thing at least will go right in this week’s match against New Zealand at Lord’s: the food. The fare at the home of cricket is legendary. Ex-England and Middlesex batsman Mark Ramprakash
During last year’s European Championship, England football fans switched, for some reason, from ‘Three Lions’ to ‘Sweet Caroline’ by Neil Diamond (‘so good, so good, so good’). If anything can make them switch back it’s the Football Association, who this week said they were thinking of dropping the Baddiel and Skinner anthem as England’s official
‘When you have lost your inns, drown your empty selves, for you will have lost the last of England.’ So said Hilaire Belloc. Thankfully there’s little sign of England, or indeed Britain, being down to its last pub – but which was its first? As ever with these debates, a definitive answer is hard to
Britain’s legendary red phone boxes are in the news again. Of course they’re a symbol of the country’s past (about 2000 of them are officially listed buildings) – but what makes them really great is their capacity for reinvention. The story this week was about Ofcom preventing BT from closing down many of the nation’s
And so to Whistling Straits, a venue with a name so ridiculous it could only be something to do with golf. The Ryder Cup is on us again, that biennial experiment to discover which overweight American is loudest at shouting ‘get in the hole!’ Golf shouldn’t be about artificial passion. Don’t get me wrong, the
25 min listen
On this week’s episode, Fraser Nelson starts by reading the leader. Britain has a labour shortage and our immigration system is a mess – why not have an amnesty for migrants without legal status? (01:00) Michela Wrong is on next. She found herself in the sights of Rwandan President Paul Kagame after she wrote a
Life’s great joys are usually its little ones, and one of the greatest is ordering at the bar in a pub. The custom — as opposed to sitting at a table and being served by a waiter — was one of the things I missed most during lockdown. The period when pubs reopened but could
‘Pub with rooms’ used to mean ‘backpackers’ hostel’, the sort of place with three bunk beds to a dorm and a pound deposit on your towel. But recently the capital’s pubs have realised that by raising their game, they could steal a decent chunk of the London hotel market. In a city where £400 a
39 min listen
On this week’s episode, we’ll be taking a look at the fortress that Australia has built around itself, and ask – when will its Zero Covid policy end (01:00)? Also on the podcast: is it racist to point out Britain’s changing demographics (14:35)? And is trivia just another way for men to compete (27:00)? With
It was halfway through lunch that something reminded my friend Marcus about Ray Charles and his plane. ‘Did you know he used to fly it himself?’ he asked the rest of us. ‘When it reached cruising altitude he’d insist on taking the controls. Obviously his passengers were terrified. They thought a blind man playing chess
Since 1924, ‘Swifter, Higher, Stronger’ has been the motto of which international organisation? – The International Olympic Committee On the day Prince Philip died, the historian Guy Walters tweeted: ‘If anybody else on this planet has met both Winston Churchill and Tom Cruise, apart from the Queen, then I’ll eat my hat.’ He received replies
Have you ever wanted to fly? For me the urge comes whenever I see a bird hovering directly over a hedge, flying into the wind so it can maintain a position and spot prey. It’s not the prey I’m interested in, just the sensation. Wouldn’t it be fantastic to defeat gravity? Like many of us,
