Unhappy Family

This week Mr Slang discusses family values... I have noticed, may I assume that I am not alone, a new linguistic abomination that must now be listed among the many repellent inventions that have come with the Olympics. For this neologism we can presumably thank the PR company that coined the ... Read More...

A pub inside a tree

On the next stage of his meandering journey, Jonathan Law discovers some unlikely treehouses... If there’s anything more hobbit-like than a tree inside a pub, I suppose it would have to be a pub inside a tree. The Big Baobab [above] is a pub in the hollow trunk of a 72-foot ... Read More...

The things of Norbiton

Norbiton may have found its perfect twin town - the city of Paterson, NJ. But how to describe it? I have been reading Paterson by William Carlos Williams, and in consequence stand accused in the assizes of my own head of writing only (in Ezra Pound’s phrase, referring to the sort ... Read More...

My new love

Becky Milligan, Radio 4 reporter, returns - and she's been smitten by a tall, pale stranger. A small adjustment can often solve a much bigger problem and bring in much joy.  But the catch is that often you have no clue what this small adjustment is, until you have done the ... Read More...

Nul Points

After last night's Europop shenanigans, Mahler presents The Dabbler's Alternative Eurovision Song Contest, as it might have looked 100 years ago... With live animals banned from the Eurodreck last night it was unlikely that Pudsey, the adorable lovechild of a bichon-frise and a border collie's one-night stand, would rock-up to entrance ... Read More...