‘I’m not a violent man, Mr Fawlty…’ (Fawlty, having been thumped, and on the floor out of shot behind the reception desk) ‘Oh yes you are’ And yes, that half second shriek of realisation into the faces of th […]

I worked at the Foreign Office for most of the 1990’s and during the First Gulf War in 1991.I’d work the occasional shift in what was known as the Emergency Unit. A few late night finishes meant me, and oth […]

Oh yes, very good indeed. Great haircuts all round and a lot of typing.

Barefoot In The Park Three Days Of The Condor. Great films. Great jackets worn in both.

We watched ‘The Thursday Murder Club’, too. Cliched as all get out. Remarkably, the cast is filled with actors from ‘Mob Land’ None of them called each other c***s in this one.

Agree on ‘The Rest is History’ podcasts. I’ve known of them for some time but only began listening this summer. The Great Northern War. I knew nothing of it until now. What an astonishing conflict. Stay […]

When we used to use our landline I’d get at least one ‘Hello, I’m calling from Microsoft. We’ve spotted a security issue’ scam call every other day. I’m not of the Police but as civil servant with a particula […]

I think I’ve told this one very recently somewhere on here. Nevertheless… A man walks into a chip shop with a haddock under his arm. ‘Have you got any fish cakes?’ he asks. ‘Sorry, no’ ‘T […]

What’s pink and wrinkly and hangs out my Grandad’s pyjamas? My Grandma.

Ah. A suspicion confirmed. This was the late ‘70s/ early ‘80s and the customer base were pensioners. Very much in the tail end of old demob trousers and flat hat era. Tripe must have been a working cla […]

Quite a few Geordies, it seemed. They opened up at about the same time in the morning. The entire shop front was a deep sloping shelf of pale yellow piles and coils, with the married couple proprietors behind it […]

My aunt and uncle owned a poultry farm in Northumberland. They supplied eggs to local catering firms. On Saturday mornings they’d load some surplus into the the back of a long wheelbase Land Rover and rock i […]

Not nominative determinism this one, but I was flicking through an internal staff directory one time and happened across a Tony Arm. Toe Knee Arm. It tickled me at the time.

We had a new bathroom fitted a few years ago. The lad who tiled it was called Tyler.

Yes, I’ve read similar over the years too. My feeling, and the advice I would give as an individual obliged to use the services over the past 30 years is; Bore. The. Fucking. Holes.

Yes. The cameraman. He needs to have got up there first, every time. With all the gear. And he needs to move around the location possibly even more than the presenter to frame everything. Even so that […]

Here it is. London. It’s big and sweaty

London always swelters in summer. It lives under a dome of polluted air covering the whole of the conurbation sprawl that is basically most of the south east of England. It’s a sweaty city. Getting worse t […]

Lime and soda with ice. Or on the increasingly rare occasions I want a cold beer then a bottle of chilled Leffe. I can’t drink more than two of those though. I feel bloated very quickly and will burp like a […]

Remarkably unexpected, isn’t it? I briefly lived in neighbouring Lewisham about 30 years ago in what was then a new-build flat in a block behind the railway station. Not fifty yards away was Leathwell R […]