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Sunset Boulevard

Norma Desmond Strikes Again

As TNC regulars know, I often visit and write about Crete, where I was lucky/  foresighted enough to buy a tiny traditional village house over twenty years ago, for the (then) price of a new car. Staying there for weeks at a time (EU permitting), I always digitally detox. Occasionally in the evenings, however, I

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Delivery bikes

The Delivery Bike Takeover

What do Hull in East Yorkshire and Maribor in Slovenia have in common? Hull is a crumbling entrepôt on one bank of the murky Humber River and the other straddles the lovely Drava River in the Slovenian mountains. So, picturesqueness they don’t have in common. House prices are reasonable in both places, but that’s not what I’m driving at. Remarkably, the football teams in both

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School children learning the alphabet

What the F-word is the P-word?

A peculiar thing happened the other day on Times Radio with Andrew Neil. The legendary broadcaster was discussing the intricacies of the Henry Nowak murder with The Times’ Southwest and Countryside correspondent, Will Humphries. While recounting the 999 call made after the stabbing, Humphries dropped this gem into the conversation: “It’s repeatedly pressed by the

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Angry British people

Do Look Back in Anger 

What can be added to the narrative that has ensued the horrible death of Henry Nowak. Our courageous editor has been on the case since the outset, the Prime Minister has spoken, the Leader of the Opposition has spoken, Nigel Farage has spoken (over booing and jeering) and an endless stream of journalists have filled columns. Is there anything

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Man in hospital bed

The Sense of An Ending 

It started in a wine-shop one November, one of those where, come lunchtime, they find some tables, rustle up some charcuterie and charge you corkage. The sort of place where you pair the food with the wine, not vice versa. My host had bought a decent bottle. I think. I couldn’t drink it. Even the

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Country pub

The Glories of the Pub

In towns and cities up and down the country, pubs are increasingly a refuge from the ‘vibrant’ newly installed communities that stalk the streets. They are little pockets of Britishness. They have always been brilliant, now they are better than ever. What a tragedy that two close every day, it’s claimed. Is that true though?

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Youth unemployment

The Social Contract 

Neither of my parents were exactly space buffs but if, back in the heady days of Armstrong and co., you had asked them when their offspring would first see man in the general vicinity of the Moon, they probably wouldn’t have picked the early years of his sixth decade. Back then, there was a general

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Office

Work Is a Four-Letter Word

As regular readers will know, last year I was dismissed from my job in media by sad little ideologues, and proceeded to life on the dole, with a short period at the Royal Mail. I’ve recently started a new job, which I will talk about more in posts to come, but I’d like to tell you now about the

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AI

Eulogy for the Lost Plot 

In the grand, screaming history of bad-faith complaints, a new artefact has been unearthed. Behold, the digital Rosetta Stone of our era’s intellectual rot: a user review of a pornographic AI, specifically one designed for ‘tranny’ (a slur, but let’s not pretend decorum is the issue here), rage-posting that the AI is… too liberal. (Many thanks to Roger Watson for locating and

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