Euromyths

In a week where the papers are full of columns warning that the EU is out to pilfer everyone's bank accounts, I thought it topical to look at the world of straight bananas and Sun Newspaper headlines. Turns out there's a word for such Brussels-based brouhaha... A euromyth is the word ... Read More...

Dreams and Liars

Jonathon is amongst the dreaming spires this week, as he considers Oxfordian slang... I was in Oxford yesterday. Waiting for my train home I noticed that the marketing boys and girls have been in and that the old place is now labelled the city of ‘learning and culture’ which is I ... Read More...

Mad Jack Churchill

This week my delve into the weirder side of Wikipedia brought up the story of Jack Churchill - a fearlessly eccentric British warrior. Lieutenant Colonel John Malcolm Thorpe Fleming "Jack" Churchill, DSO, MC & Bar (1906 – 1996), nicknamed Fighting Jack Churchill and Mad Jack Churchill, was a British soldier who ... Read More...

Dabbler Diary – Afflicted by a Pox

My household has this past fortnight been afflicted by a pox. The windows have been boarded up and I’ve been roaming the corridors wafting a carbolic smokeball. Eerie groans echo in fetid chambers. The plants have withered and no visitors come. It is the chicken pox, and both my daughters ... Read More...

Dabbler Diary – Local Heroes

To Mossley, Greater Manchester, a tiny town atop a mountain at the crossroads of Lancashire, Cheshire and the West Ridings. Must we brave the M6, the M52, the M60, where a three hour drive always ends up as five? We must, for a tour of the in-laws. Last week Gaw noted ... Read More...

Dabbler Diary – Three stories about a pineapple

To Portsmouth, birthplace of Charles Dickens, Christopher Hitchens and runner Roger Black. Also Isembard Kingdom Brunel, Peter Sellers and Hollyoaks actor Marcus Patric. Also, me. We moved away from Southsea when I was eleven but naturally roots remain because I was a happy child there. Roaming around my formative haunts ... Read More...

Dabbler Diary – Soap or Sponge

To Leamington Spa, my first visit. When I was at school ‘Leamington Spa’ was – for no real reason other than it happened to catch on in my gang – a comedy name. The words were considered intrinsically funny, as ‘fish’ and ‘shrubbery’ are in Monty Python, and so the ... Read More...

Dabbler Diary – Rhymes for Orange

The British class system seems to be all the rage at the moment. I like good period dramas about toffs, which is why I can't bring myself to watch Downton Abbey. I did enjoy Parade's End, primarily for the performance of Rebecca Hall, who managed to be alluring yet repulsive, ... Read More...