Every 15 seconds a vaguely right-wing, slightly aggressive email plops into my inbox, exhorting a return to the good old days - before emails or inboxes. The letter claims to be from a wise, apple pie baking grandparent, a Vietnam Vet, Bill Cosby and/or Morgan Freeman. Now and then Bill...

I'm hanging 90 feet above the ground, suspended by a piece of string little thicker than a rope of liquorice. My abseiling couture for this evening's drop was evidently pieced together by a chaffing-immune, aesthetically-challenged sadist: gym bag canvas, bolts and velcro in what I can only hope are all...

Last week seems to have been the week of the Armstrongs. If they weren't being stripped of cycling medals they were passing away and being eulogised around the clock by the great and/or good. I'm not going to comment on the latter case: enough tributes have already been paid to...

There's been a lot said the last few days about Trenton Oldfield's Mid-Thames paddle at the Oxford Cambridge boat race last weekend. Well I say there's been a lot said; really very little has been said, but it's been repeated with slightly different words under a number of different banners.

I thought I would have nothing important to moan about from the weekend; evidently I thought wrong.

Mid afternoon Saturday I stepped out for a jog; nothing enormous - half an hour at a medium al dente largo. It was drizzling slightly but nothing biblical; only that light indecisive...

Every Christmas, as well as every Easter, Valentines, Mother's, Father's and Arbour day I'm assaulted by the same tiresome complaint from whichever people I happen to be around at the time. This is the bi/tri/oct-annual moan about how commercialized these sacred days have become...except for Arbour day which isn't nearly...

As long as humans and animals have been arguing, one debate in particular has dominated our discourse. The subject of this is 'what separates us?' Why is it that we humanoids rule the world's roost while those living in an actual roost are just killing what little time they have...

The 13th world athletics championships have recently finished. As anyone who was watching August now knows the biggest talking point was the run that never happened - Usain Bolt leaving slightly early in order to collect his 100m gold medal. In the end, a few seconds later, another, slightly less...

Before I set foot on English tarmac I would have said that a 'Chugger' was a fast drinker - someone who regularly engaged in 'chugging'. If my alcohol-impaired memory serves me correctly, chugging is the act of gulping down a large quantity of fluid, usually alcoholic, and even more usually...

How is class defined in England today? Is it still all about who your parents are or were, which clubs you belong to, your education and table manners or are those rumours that social mobility has arrived really true?

Along with cheese in a can and giant foam hands...

'Cheer up mate, might never happen!' said the cheerful tramp walking alongside me.

'It just did' I replied (being told 'it might never happen' has long been a dreadful phobia, surpassed only by all too regular post-sneeze benedictions).

Before he could cover me with another ale and pastie...