Life
Electric dreams
A couple of years ago I thought seriously about buying an electric car. Not a hybrid, but the full monty.…
Wild life
The Farm, Laikipia I realised the worst drought of this generation was at last over this morning when two Samburu…
Real life
If we cram any more doctors into our spare rooms we can put a sign outside advertising NHS accommodation. We…
Aussie life
The Melbourne Comedy Festival’s continuing refusal to apologise for not closing this year’s festival with a tribute to its co-founder…
Language
The word ‘gender’ has been part of the English language since at least 1390. It appears to have started at…
Bitter truths
England. Despite being a Scotsman, partly brought up in Ulster, I have taken so much Englishness for granted over so…
The case against koalas
There was a reason 18th-century rulers were eager for their subjects to grow and eat potatoes: the miraculous tuber offered…
Life is a rollercoaster
I was in Canada last week, travelling across British Columbia on a luxury train called the Rocky Mountaineer. It was…
The turf
John Trotwood Moore, one-time State Librarian of Tennessee, was a racist and defender of the Ku Klux Klan. But in…
Low life
Marketa stands on one side of me, Catriona on the other. Marketa is Czech and my carer. Catriona is my…
Aussie life
One of the few survivors of Gough Whitlam’s Camelot, that legendary cultural icon and eminent Australian diplomat, Sir Les Patterson,…
Language
The word ‘mulligan’ is new to me – but golfers everywhere will find it familiar. In golf a ‘mulligan’ is…
