In a week when suddenly, hurrah, we're waking up to the raw reality of women's bodies - the double mastectomies (a la Jolie), the episiotomies (a la Garai), the general bulges and scarring that afflict the vast majority of womankind rather than the airbrushed, buffed, pneumatic perfection the commercial world...

Just when you thought it was all over, the newsstands are heaving with souvenir editions of our beloved Olympics and I can feel the love again.

Journalists are still gushing happy and glorious and all fingerwagging about legacy and ROI have abated, albeit momentarily.

Aside from the frequent blubbing and...

Ramadam may be over, but maybe it's time we all gave fasting a try.

I gave it a go this week. As did quite a few of my contemporaries. Prompted not by religion, or by impending surgery, but by mainstream telly. Michael Mosley's Horizon programme 'Eat, Fast and Live...

This is a long story, but needs telling for personal therapeutic reasons and, I believe, altruistic ones. There are others that may learn from my mistakes.

Doubtless a symptom of middle age, a while back I decided to embrace spontaneity. After all life, even with seemingly infinite life expectancies...

Have been following with interest The Times' highly worthy campaign to make cycling safer in our cities. I used to cycle regularly across London to work.

Cycling? In London? Are you mad? The more I read the more I've asked myself the same question. I was lucky. In the three...

Courtesy, like etiquette, a lovely word, but you don't hear much of it these days. In any case, what does it mean in the 21st century? In an age where we do most of our communicating via digitalia, even when sitting three desks from one another.

It's all very well...

It's taken me a while to get round to this (Philip Gould died on the 6 November 2011) mainly because I've toyed with whether or not I was qualified to write a eulogy to the man. After all, I'm not an ex-prime minister, eminent spin doctor, relative, or good friend....

Saw One Man, Two Guvnors last night, on screen, at The Picturehouse. Genius. On many levels. Not only is it an ingenious idea of National Theatre Live to beam live theatre through cinema screens nationwide - correction, worldwide, the production that they chose to kick off this initiative with was...

Boris has been popping up a lot in the news lately with all the excitement mounting around the Olympics.

It's all looking good, spectacular, in fact. Building of the 2012 stadium is on time, within budget, and eye-poppingly impressive. There have been eyebrows raised amongst those of little faith. Well,...