Days
when you weren’t anyone. Days gone undercover. Days half-dead in half-light, days under the covers. Days hoping for a dawn…
1 Samuel 18:7
David Howell is on a roll. At the halfway stage of the British Championship he looks set to retain his…
No. 373
White to play. This is a variation from Williams-Howell, British Championship, Warwick 2015. Howell won this game but the puzzle…
Taking the Michael
In Competition No. 2909 you were invited to follow in the footsteps of Michael Gove, who has urged civil servants…
Your problems solved
Q. While renting in Rock last week, I ran into an acquaintance who invited me to join her large house…
Something fishy
Selfridges is skilled at making things that are not hideous (women) look hideous (women dressed as Bungle from Rainbow or…
Ted talk
There was a grim inevitability that the name Edward Heath would one day be trawled up in connection with allegations…
High life
Nestled under the Acropolis, snug and safe among the ancient ruins of a long-ago grandeur, Plaka is the only remaining…
Long life
Most people, when asked if they would rather be deaf or blind, say they would rather be deaf. I would…
Long life
Most people, when asked if they would rather be deaf or blind, say they would rather be deaf. I would…
Low life
On Saturday my boy had a mini-stroke at home, aged only 26. ‘You’ll have to give up smoking and do…
Low life
On Saturday my boy had a mini-stroke at home, aged only 26. ‘You’ll have to give up smoking and do…
Big ask
‘That’s unnecessarily crude,’ said my husband, turning momentarily from the television and improving the shining minute by setting the whisky…
Real life
The vet bill has been sitting on my desk for three weeks. All vet bills are cruel and unusual but…
Champions of absurdity
Jumping the shark isn’t yet an Olympic sport, but if it were the International Olympic Committee would be a shoo-in…
Even the Chinese can’t teach Kevin the Teenager
Watching a group of unruly children make mincemeat out of a well-meaning teacher has become a television staple and Are…
Even the Chinese can’t teach Kevin the Teenager
Watching a group of unruly children make mincemeat out of a well-meaning teacher has become a television staple and Are…
Racing loses its Voice
Reviewing a biography of Arkle, Peter O’Sullevan wrote, ‘He had an obit to die for.’ So did The Voice himself.…
Party-naming with Plato
In order to make a sensible choice of new leader, the Labour party is trying to work out what its…
Barometer
Rogue traders Former UBS trader Tom Hayes was jailed for 14 years for rigging the Libor market. How long could…
One year on
From ‘The End of the First Year’, The Spectator, 7 August 1915: Terrible as have been the sufferings caused by the…
Portrait of the week
Home Tom Hayes, aged 35, a former City trader who rigged the Libor rates daily for nearly four years while…
The Trump doctrine
Were you ever not very nice at school? A bit of a tosspot to others, perhaps. Ever so slightly a…
Cuban comet
By chance, my first night in Havana in 1987 was the night the clubs went dark to mark the death…
