Life
Eaten by a bear
I don’t like losing at chess. It feels bad in the moment, whether my position subsides like a failed pudding,…
One for the ode
In Competition No. 3221, you were invited to submit an ode on the Marble Arch Mound. The 25 metre-high artificial…
Solution to 2526: Everybody out!
The unclued lights are preceded by ALL (with the title suggesting that ALL is to be omitted). The paired lights…
High life
New York ‘The City of London is hiding the world’s stolen money’, screams a Bagel Times headline, as bogus…
Real life
We had gone to visit a friend at a stable yard on a country estate on a crisp autumn Sunday.…
2529: Formerly
The unclued lights (five of two words which include three apostrophes) can be preceded by the same word, all confirmed…
Low Life
From our hypothetical drone-mounted camera let us look down into a secluded valley in the same series of valleys as…
A bottle with the battle
Four hundred and fifty years ago this month, a great victory helped to safeguard European civilisation. The battle of Lepanto…
Dear Mary: Your problems solved
Q. During lockdown I made good friends with a neighbour who I would never have met otherwise. This man lives…
Virtue signalling is really status signalling
A £19,000-a-year London day school was in the news this week because it has started instructing its pupils about ‘white…
The Battle for Britain
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What will you buy that others won’t?
In 1966, the legendary adman David Ogilvy set out to buy a home in France. He boarded a transatlantic liner…
Prolific
The BBC made a documentary about a man sent to prison for being the ‘most prolific rapist in British legal…
Aussie Life
The political career of Christian Porter has been destroyed by the ABC. This is someone who was the Commonwealth Attorney-General…
Aussie Language
A Speccie reader has emailed asking me for an explanation of the word ‘climatarian’. We know what Presbyterians are, she…
Real life
The horse lorry arrived and lowered its ramp — and I stood in front of it knowing that my thoroughbred…
Low life
Catriona and I were late for lunch at Vernon’s because I couldn’t get out of bed. The four of them…
Bridge
The Gold Cup is the most prestigious Open Teams event in Britain, and has been ever since Colonel ‘Pops’ Beasley…
The turf
I know what Keats was on about with his mists and mellow fruitfulness, but autumn is less of a joy…
High life
They have stepped into the pop-culture spotlight via the HBO hit Succession, a hatchet job on the very rich and…
This grotesque failure to market rugby
Could rugby union get any better? The entertainment in the Premiership is breathtaking and the overall product as good as…
Mind your language
There’s a rude gesture in Pickwick that I don’t quite understand. Mr Jackson, a young lawyer’s clerk in conversation with…
Dear Mary
Q. On a train journey the other day I sat opposite someone I found immensely attractive. We struck up a…
Totally bats
There is a Batman restaurant in London, or rather there was: Savini at the Criterion on Piccadilly Circus. Savini was…
The Battle for Britain
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