The debonair Basil Marigold's

One light is better than no light, I suppose. The M69 is an unlit motorway. It has a few lights at the start where it links into the M6/A46 and towards the end when it branches into the M1 or you continue into Leicester. The big junctions are covered. The rest, 17 miles or so is dark. In an ideal world, you would need headlights on. Or in fact, a legally compliant world you should have headlights. By the by, as I was travelling home last night I did notice a car in the middle lan, as dusk began to fall, that looked pretty dark. Ah, no headlight, says I. The fool, put your lights on it'll be too dark soon. On closer focusing in the side mirrors I begin to realise that he has no headlights on. Seems a tad unsafe and surely illegal. It is, isn't? I should check the Highway Code. But it just didn't quite seem right as something could my eye and as he approached to overtake me – I was in the inside lane, pottering along – it then dawned on me what was so incongruous.

I had pottered around a local supermarket this lunchtime. Just to pick up some bits and get a decent walk in. Killing two birds with the one stone, so to speak. I had finished my shop and began to head back to work. I had literally just left the shop and begun to walk through the car park towards the exit. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a white van driving quite slowly. Strange, thought I. That is very slow and this is a relatively busy car park. My initial assumption was that I was going to be asked for directions. This in itself would prove hilarious as I do not live where I work and unless he was about to ask for the place where I worked then the conversation would not be a productive conversation for him. I meandered over holding my shopping bag to the drivers window. As i drew up alongside the driver, he leaned out of the window and began to talk in a remarkably low volume, and he said; ‘Do you want to buy a TV?’ Now. Never having bought a TV from

I’ve finally realised why Christmas is no longer Christmas for me. It is instant gratification. I was thinking about it a few days ago. I was skimming through the TV times showing what films and movies was available to watch over the festive period. It was hugely uninspiring. I seemed to remember that when I was younger there was far more anticipation about Christmas. And as I looked at my children watching ‘Frozen’, it came to me. It is all related to instant gratification. This phenomenon has changed society more than anything else I would argue. Perhaps only the invention of the internet surpasses it. However, the difference between me at 7 and my children, now at 7 is the following; They have access to far more choices than I ever had. It is not their fault, obviously. It was the result of the drive towards instant gratification and the proliferation of choice. With an expanded choice you can watch what you want, when you want. There were only 3 television channels available, w

Torquay. It is a seaside resort on the south coast of Devon. It is a town I know reasonably well. I spent two years doing my A levels at South Devon College on Newton Road. They were a good two years. They may have been my favourite two years of existence. I remember them fondly. I lived not more than 9 miles from Torquay until the age of 25. Yeah, I was familiar with the town. We spent a day over in Torquay today just perusing, browsing. The children had been taken to the cinema by their Nanny. We had free time and so we headed to Torquay. Torquay in my day was a very vibrant place. It was an ambitious and growing town. Having spent the day in the place today I can see that this, perhaps, is no longer the case. When I was younger, Brixham was very much the poorer relation to Torquay (and for that matter, Paignton). There wasn’t much in the way of shops or things to do. Anything like that involved a trip to Torquay. Brixham did have a Woolworths. This was pretty mu