I don’t think Paul Tickner ever figured that people went to the Flower Pots for Loopy’s beer rather than for his lacklustre service. As kids we used to pedal up to Cheriton to drink three pints of cider in the pre-renovation saloon bar and then vomit in the hedge, but I wouldn’t vomit there now…
Here‘s a lovely little thing by Jacques Prévert. Some of the best Dutch kleinkunst in the 60s was built according to French models, and brief Parisian romances with Annemaries were the order of the day. I once spent an evening listening to the splendid voice of one of Sonneveld’s writers, and I wish I could…
The last time I went down Ridley Road market, this geezer (nature of usage: advisèd) was selling a sheep that looked as if he’d slaughtered it himself while on acid in the back of his Mondeo. Things are changing, notes the wonderful Hackney Gazette, via April Angell@KissMyPanties.com, via Albert Pantygirdle, who is back on the…
Erik Dams has been czeching old French ladies who insist on being called “mademoiselle”, but it seems that moves are underway to end the official distinction between “madame” and “mademoiselle”. I’ve never understood why titles have to figure on forms anyway: I’ve filled in “Mrs” for years; no harm has ever come to me as…
I’ve got a soft spot for Denis MacShane, who never really fitted the New Labour mould. Here‘s a piece by him on France. The sentence that will probably annoy most: “Pour un Britannique, la France est comme un remake des années 70 au Royaume-Uni” (my emphasis).