Barcelona. There was a time, not so long ago, when the capital of Catalonia was not yet known for Freddy Mercury's super-hit of the same name, when the 1992 Summer Olympics had not yet produced gold, when Carlos Ruiz Zafon had not yet got round to romanticizing La Rambla and the mysterious Cemetery of Forgotten Books, when Gaudi's…
Starbucks gets roasted
It is a tribute to the emotional power of poetry that, when I think of "Four Weddings and a Funeral", I remember the single funeral rather than the multiple weddings. "He was my North, my South, my East and West" - Matthew's rendition of WH Auden's Funeral Blues as he eulogized Gareth, lent pathos to one of…
Living off the fat of the land
Flying Cattle Class tends to bring out the worst in me. After being herded through check-in, security and boarding I make a beeline for my aisle seat , generally having boarded early enough to lay claim to the corner of an overhead baggage compartment that is actually over my head. Flying Cattle Class is all about marking territory.…
The Greatest Show on Earth?
Laurence Spiegel was my first political hero. Never heard of him? Don't worry - nor had Google the last time I checked. The one and only time I worked on the campaign team for a British General Election it was for Laurence Spiegel . That was an important election for two reasons: despite polls showing a clear advantage…
Olympic spirit lost
My trip to New York cancelled last week courtesy of Superstorm Sandy, I decided to take advantage of the hour before anyone realized my calendar was empty to clear my desk. Forgetting the utterly ignored disposable cup of coffee nestling under a sheet of foolscap, I watched in helpless horror as it tipped drunkenly on its side and lazily cast forth its…
Blessed are the consumers (part 2)
When former US President Herbert Hoover flew down to Argentina in 1946 it was to request that the newly elected President Juan Peron order a massive grain shipment to Europe aimed at staving off a post-war famine. Following his successful mission, he commented that Peron's young wife, Eva, had the brains of Eleanor Roosevelt and…
Blessed are the consumers (part 1)
One of my first memories as a child is of the working forge across the road from our home where rag-and-bone men and other deniers of the 20th century could take their carthorses to be shod. A couple of days ago I was driving with my son through an ultra-orthodox enclave, where the regular upkeep of roads…
Territorial expansion
M.A.D. has to be the best acronym ever. "Mutual Assured Destruction" is what the world looked like it was heading for 50 years ago this week when the young John F Kennedy faced down Nikita Khrushchev in the Cuban Missile Crisis. October 16, 1962 has gone down in history as the morning National Security Adviser McGeorge Bundy…
Faulty Powers
A month shy of the 40th anniversary of its first broadcast, I was impressed when my teenage son asked me last week whether I had ever seen the Cheese Shop sketch. He was astounded when I started quoting from it and informed him that Monty Python had defined humour for my generation (sorry Yanks, it…
Left luggage
It was during the Bosnian War that the BBC's Martin Bell and his colleagues developed the concept of Journalism of Attachment. While war correspondents stretching back to William Howard Russell a century and a half earlier had reported the good and evil of war, it was this new generation that took sides and, effectively, became unarmed combatants on behalf…
Tax Break 