Views from the bike shed

Cottage loaf - I can bake too.
If I had to make a call for 'last meal on earth', then I reckon a picnic would come top of my list—with a flask of tea and a blanket to sit on, ideally, in the lee of the Cheviot Hills. Such is my land of lost content......

Last week I visited Newcastle and the North East of England. It's where I grew up, where I lived until my late twenties and where my son is now a few weeks from completing his architecture qualifications. His presence there for eight years has been simultaneously...

Do you ever get one of those earworms that play in your head regardless of mood or moment?
Yesterday, as we walked the ten miles or so of headland on the western edge of Wales, my mind, for once, was not on bigger things: I was with my family, barely feeling the pace, looking for butterflies in the bright spring sun......

There are many reasons to own an original work of art, but among the best are because we love it; because it gives us joy, and because our lives are the better for being in its presence. That the art might also be a financial investment is beside the...