3+ week, 2+ day ago  (575+ words) For decades, the bloody mary pretty much had the tomato cocktail on lock. If you wanted something savory, spicy, vegetal " a bloody was your brunchtime go-to. Today, tomato-based drinks span well beyond the bloody " and beyond brunch, too. From legions…...

16+ hour, 20+ min ago  (463+ words) It would have been my mother's 84th birthday on 29 May. I thought about her as I clattered down the corkscrew stairs at Holland Park Underground Station, past the prissy sign warning travellers not to attempt the stairs because there were 93 of…...

1+ day, 22+ min ago  (379+ words) At just over two hours, Martin Scorsese's 1991 remake of Cape Fear was 20 minutes longer than the 1962 original. It also added some moral complexity. Instead of a total psycho (Robert Mitchum) menacing a lawyer's very nice family, we got a total…...

19+ hour, 43+ min ago  (329+ words) Casanova, who was from Venice, claimed in his Histoire de ma Vie to have slept with 122 women. A paltry sum. I beat him hands down, though to my shame cannot remember the names of most of them. Or even their…...

7+ hour, 30+ min ago  (360+ words) Nowhere is the gamble sharper than with cask ale And the World Cup is almost upon us. England are among the favourites to win the tournament, which starts tonight. A warm summer lies ahead, huge crowds ready to gather and…...

20+ hour, 10+ min ago  (303+ words) It would certainly elevate a negroni, but you fear wasting its potential ina cocktail" The vermouth hour was once a custom in most Spanish towns. It's the moment after midday but before lunch, when one can enjoy a break from…...

1+ day, 3+ hour ago  (430+ words) The Spectator Hodder, pp. 288, "16. 99 The comic novelist Andrew Sean Greer won the Pulitzer Prize for Less, a chronicle of the longings and humiliations of modern life. But now, he suspects, we'd all like an escape. "Whatever happened to the charm…...

20+ hour, 33+ min ago  (538+ words) When Aston Villa won the Europa League recently, the focus was less on the football than on the Prince of Wales bawling "Sweet Caroline. And while images of Wills bouncing in his box and cheering his favourite team wouldnt seem…...

20+ hour, 32+ min ago  (579+ words) OR Books, pp. 670, "21. 99 "Let me unequivocally get this out of the way," Ru Marshall writes in the prologue to this astonishing book. There was no Don Juan, no trips to the desert, no psychedelic experiences: They were novels. Phenomenological ghost…...

20+ hour, 38+ min ago  (803+ words) Although the past few footballing weeks have been dominated by the convulsive conclusion to Arsenal's season " and the upcoming few will be dominated by the World Cup " I wonder if some of you might spare a thought for my own…...