Melissa Kite

Melissa Kite writes The Spectator's Real life column.

My Volvo has turned into a monster

12 April 2014 9:00 am

The Volvo has turned into a monster. It always did have a mind of its own. Fellow owners warned me…

'I assembled a counter full of sharp objects, and went at it like Rambo in First Blood'

5 April 2014 9:00 am

All the way around a cross country course I went, then I got back, tied the horse up at a…

I accidentally bought a racehorse. Would you like to join a syndicate?

29 March 2014 9:00 am

This horse-rearing business is not for the faint-hearted. I don’t know what I was thinking when I bought an eight-month-old…

The girl who hadn't heard of the Berlin Wall

22 March 2014 9:00 am

‘Question 2. In which year did the Berlin Wall come down?’ shouted the quizmaster. And then he repeated this with…

Help! My gay best friend is cheating on me

15 March 2014 9:00 am

My gay best friend is cheating on me with another woman. I saw him with her the other day and…

David Cameron is sending me begging letters

8 March 2014 9:00 am

A letter arrives from David Cameron, asking me to vote by post in the European elections. Presumably he means vote…

My friend Denise doesn't know where London ends – just when it ends

1 March 2014 9:00 am

The look on her face said it all. I can always tell my friend Denise is upset about something when…

The Environment Agency cares more about wildlife than people

22 February 2014 9:00 am

The Environment Agency may not be much use to humans, but it does great things for the depressed river mussel

Why is campaigning so thankless? 

22 February 2014 9:00 am

‘Quick, let’s slip one in the menu,’ said the builder, taking a leaflet from my handbag after we had paid…

Let's make Andre Rieu the leader of the world 

15 February 2014 9:00 am

‘Please, I beg of you, take me to see André,’ was my mother’s heartfelt plea. And so it was that…

Finding a job for my cocker spaniel

8 February 2014 9:00 am

Seeing a poodle on the London Underground wearing a red vest with the words ‘Diabetes Medical Dog’ has given me…

My Chinese water torture

1 February 2014 9:00 am

Drip, drip, drip. The noise of my downstairs London conversion flat, where the plumbing was fitted by turn-of-the-century sadists who…

I truly loved you, BT Broadband. I should never have reached for Sky

25 January 2014 9:00 am

Don’t do it. Do not, whatever you do, even think about doing it. I was happy not doing it. And…

My iPhone, iPad and Blackberry are conspiring against me

18 January 2014 9:00 am

‘How often do you de-frag this?’ said the Good Geek in the phone shop. I had gone in finally to…

Melissa Kite: Why is it easier to go mad than get a refund from a utility company? 

11 January 2014 9:00 am

‘Hello, I’d like my money back, please,’ I said to the nice lady on the other end of the line.…

Melissa Kite: No more boyfriends for me

4 January 2014 9:00 am

Just the three resolutions for me. I am keeping it simple. Number one: no more boyfriends. The definition of insanity…

Melissa Kite: My attempt to parody myself as a scrawny neurotic didn’t tickle Mrs Inglis pink

14 December 2013 9:00 am

A very cross letter arrives from someone who wants to tell me I’m a ‘silly woman’. ‘You are a silly…

Melissa Kite’s inventory of life (the ex-boyfriends’ possessions they left behind)

7 December 2013 9:00 am

Emmylou Harris and the McGarrigle sisters wrote a song called ‘All I left Behind’. My version is called ‘All They…

Melissa Kite: My journey to despair with Lambeth's bin men

30 November 2013 9:00 am

Everything is a journey now, especially if it involves failure. The X Factor rejects, people having disasters as they build…

Melissa Kite: I can no longer find knickers small enough to fit me

23 November 2013 9:00 am

It’s becoming impossible to find knickers in my size

Melissa Kite: I really didn't mean what I said to my boyfriend while he was in the bath

23 November 2013 9:00 am

The builder boyfriend and I have had a terrible row. In the heat of the moment, I said something truly…

Melissa Kite: I don't mean to make the transport secretary run across the Savoy ballroom, really I don't

16 November 2013 9:00 am

‘Do you know…?’ said the Tory MP I was sitting next to, as he tried to introduce me to the…

Melissa Kite: aliens have landed in Warwickshire — I’ve seen their spaceship

9 November 2013 9:00 am

Like the heroine in Stephen King’s The Tommyknockers, I stood in front of it with my mouth open in awe.…

David Cameron has lost the countryside

2 November 2013 9:00 am

The shires feel deeply abandoned by Cameron and the Conservatives

Melissa Kite’s fraught relationship with printers

2 November 2013 9:00 am

Blind panic grips me at the thought that all over Britain there are people sitting in cosy home offices operating…