23rd April:

So, the second round of elections in France will be contested between Shorty and Smiley.

Ignoring the irony of a left-wing Socialist candidate being called 'Royal' (and being tailored by Chanel), you have to at least give credit to our continental cousins for taking their democracy seriously this time and voting en masse. Over 80% turned out yesterday - a figure unheard of in the UK or US. An indication of the strength of desire for change or a reaction against the last set of Presendential elections when first-round collective apathy (or should that be bof-fery?) allowed Jean-Marie Le Pen to sneak through into the secound round? Who can say...

One positive thing to take from the mass of interviews and vox-pops over the weekend is that the French do still have great faith in the power of democracy to change their country for the better. Heady stuff for those of us living in countries where you can barely get a cigarette paper between the parties on the left and right of the political spectrum. Ironic, though, that both candidates in France, Smiley on the left and Shorty on the right, will now have to court those voters in the centre ground in order to be victorious.

20th April:

On a bad day, you feel that you are no more than a piece of meat and all your possessions are just bits of plastic and metal.

17th April:

British Defence Secretary Des Browne: "The buck stops with me".
The British public: "Resign".
Des Browne: "I bear ultimate responsibility and am sorry".
The British public: "Resign".
Des Browne: "No".

Oh the irony...

16th April:

There is something strangely compelling about the sight of blood across the chest of a very crisp and very expensive white shirt.

11th April:

The milk of human kindness may not yet have got totally off, but there is a distinctly curious whiff emanating from the fridge door.

Football fans are a funny lot. The more successful your team happens to be, the greater the likelihood that a section of your support will be baiting the opposition fans from behind police lines and then trying to kick the shit out of them in the car park after the match.

The travelling fans of those teams who recently played in Rome and Seville were quick to blame the local police for charging into sections of the stadia, batons drawn, at the first sign of things 'kicking off'. However, you do have to question the mentality of those same fans who then hung around to see what was going to happen next. Personally, at the sign of the first chair whizzing over my head i'd be up and off. Call me chicken if you want to, but I have enough sense to realise that flying chairs are not generally a good thing and may well serve as a prelude to other, more elaborate expressions of discontent. I'm not suggesting that anyone in the terraces deserved to have their have their heads cracked open, but every good schoolboy knows that you shouldn't really storm towards the barriers where the opposition fans are, nor should you start throwing the furniture around when the police forcibly suggest to you that your actions were less then desirable to them. Ah, the Englishers abroad, eh?

Wouldn't happen during a game of Rugby.

9th April:

International diplomacy is a tricky old business. These two very words conjure up visions of official notes beng passed in clandestine fashion between embassies in the dead of night, of coded langauge and hidden agendas, of politicians with one eye keenly on their domestic approval ratings, of sabre-rattling and public posturing, of last-minute brinkmanship and under-the-table compromise. Unless you are Bush, of course, in which case you just invade the filthy fuckers.

Recent events in the gulf suggest that any old Abdul can wear a tea-towel on his head and wave an AK-47 in your face, but it takes real audacity and bluff to create a good old-fashioned international incident. The Iranian government clearly has a developed sense of the theatrical. If your common-garden variety of Jihadists came across 15 British sailors in 'disputed' waters they would, one wagers, put bullets in them all and then run away claiming a great moral victory for Allah against the tyrranical occupying forces of decadent pork-scoffing whitey Westerner. Not so the canny political machine that is Iran, though. Oh no. Better to arrest them, put them on the telly and use them as political pawns to illustrate Iranian strength and defiance against Western agression. Yes, well done Iran. What a prize. 15 sailors barely out of short-trousers and Clearasil and a rubber dinghy. Cue the inevitable huffing and puffing of British officialdom and associated cartoon tabloid outrage.

Thankfully, the ending is a happy one and we can only assume that both parties got in some way or another what they wanted. More unsettling is the agreement to allow the captured sailors to sell their stories to the press for profit. A strange move and one, we can only guess, which was sanctioned by the government to ensure that Iran is indelibly painted as the baddy in all of this. Cue the inevitable cringeworthy and leading "Just how awful was your treatment?" and "Did you think you would ever seen your family again?" interview questions.

In some ways, this whole incident and the actions of President I'm-A-Dinner-Jacket hark back to a time when Foreign Office diplomats really earned their corn. Modern International terrorism tends to shoot first and negotiate later, so it's pleasing to see that evolution still has a place for these mercurial political creatures.

It's a comfort to those of us who pay our taxes in the UK to know that when we're tucked up in bed there will still be an anxious light on in a Whitehall office because a British back-packer has taken his socks off whilst facing a portrait of the King on a public holiday in Phu-Yuk, thereby sparking rioting between rival tribal factions.

Get me the Ambassador. Oh, and while you're at it, pass the Ferrero Rocher.

6th April:

According to the BBC news on Wednesday of this week, more and more cities in the UK are planning to introduce "talking" CCTV cameras that will reprimand people seen behaving in an anti-social manner. Because people who drop litter in the street and urinate in doorways clearly have a highly-developed sense of shame that can be tapped into, for the benefit of society as a whole. Ignoring for a moment the clear Orwellian direction that this kind of stuff takes us in (what next? "We interrupt your programme, Mrs. Miggins at number 14, to bring you an important message. Your cat has just defecated on number 22's front doorstep. A fixed penalty notice will be issued within 3 working days") there is the more important issue of society's ability to self-regulate.

Ask your grandparents about this and they will come over all misty-eyed (or it might just be the cataracts) and tell you tales of the days when you could go down to the pub and leave your front door unlocked without fear of robbery. The local bobby was perfectly within his rights to give any lippy young miscreants a good clip round the ear and could do so without fear of being stabbed or happy-slapped by a gang of 10 year old crack fiends shouting "bovvvvered". And the world was a better place for it. Social commentators will stroke their beards, admire their sanadals and pontificate that the breakdown of the traditional family unit has left people with little extended family and therefore with less of a feeling of social integration and belonging. And if you don't identify with something, why should it matter to you?

Your congenial host is clean-shaven and does not own sandals and cannot therefore add much to this debate. One thing is for sure, however. Shouting through a PA system at some munter who has just dropped her chip-wrapper on the pavement is more likely to result in a two-fingered gesture than a cleaner and politer society. If you can't get 'em when they are still in short trousers, it's too late for us all.