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Patriotic football allegiances

In the week I had a long lunch with an old friend of mine – an Arsenal fanatic. He told me once that he was the only English supporter of Benfica in the 1968 European Cup Final against Manchester United. He now said he was firmly behind Inter Milan and this time I believe he did not walk [...]

June 11, 2023 // 0 Comments

Thoughts on LIV/PGA/DP World Tour

They say God lives in the details but if so where is his Divine Presence in the above merger? No one seems to know how the ‘framework agreement’ will work in practice. Superficially, it’s about Saudi Arabia money and soft power versus greedy golfers. However, LIV is not just about lucre [...]

June 9, 2023 // 0 Comments

Looking back…

I am of an age – 70 next March – when inevitably one tends to look more back than forward. I’m the early 1980s I worked for a South African company with an irritable, growling office manager nicknamed The General.  He once quoted to me an Afrikaans’ saying after a particularly [...]

June 4, 2023 // 0 Comments

Mike + The Mechanics at the Guildhall, Portsmouth (28th May)

Last Sunday evening the Mem Sahib and Yours Truly travelled to the Portsmouth Guildhall (capacity 2,500) in order to attend the last concert of the current UK tour of the musical combo known as Mike + The Mechanics. Rusters of a certain age (mine is 71) are unlikely to need it, but for those [...]

May 30, 2023 // 0 Comments

It never rains but it pours

Comedian Frankie Howerd traditionally used to gain a titter of laughter – often just after he’d shared a conspiratorial juicy and/or vicious put-down of a fellow member of his cast – by admonishing his (live or television) audience with an arch aside “No, don’t laugh [...]

May 30, 2023 // 0 Comments

The process of waving goodbye

There comes a time in the affairs of men and mice when something happens – one might describe it as hitting a watershed – which causes us, for example, to let go of a previously-held firm conviction and switch to another, or perhaps it involves accepting that we cannot do this or that which [...]

May 27, 2023 // 0 Comments

A wine tasting with a difference

In May 1976 the English wine critic Steven Spurrier presented some Californian wines in Paris. Fearing that the distinguished panel was so unfamiliar with them, at the last moment he paired them with some classy French wines like Chateau Mouton Rothschild, Las Cases and Ch. Montrose. In a blind [...]

May 26, 2023 // 0 Comments

The Age of Innocence/Edith Wharton

Having enjoyed The Reef I moved onto Edith Wharton’s best-known work The Age of Innocence. Published in 1920 when she was 58 it won her the Pulitzer prize , the first woman to achieve this. The central character is Archer Newland, a young and rich lawyer, and the novel is set in the Gilded Age of [...]

May 25, 2023 // 0 Comments

The US PGA

Brooks Koepka won his third PGA trophy – known as the Wanamaker – and therefore became the first LIV Player to win a Major. There are some, like Colin Mongomerie and Lee Westwood, that have never won a Major and others who are unlikely to win a further one (Tiger Woods, Rory McIlroy and [...]

May 22, 2023 // 0 Comments

Israel: A Twice Promised Land (PBS) and Land of our Father (BBC4)

There were two interesting documentaries on Israel on Tuesday night. The first on PBS supported my view that 1967 was a watershed in Israeli history. In that year Israel achieved a significant victory in just six days over their invading Arab neighbours. Up till then Israel had global sympathy as a [...]

May 18, 2023 // 0 Comments

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