The Beckenham Odeon is a depressing place on a damp January Sunday afternoon. The staff look tired, the lobby is windswept and bare, the pick 'n' mix is simultaneously garish and faded, dusty and grubby with fingerprints from hungry, obese hands. The screening room is dark and gloomy thus hiding the pee stains and sticky … Continue reading Assassin’s Creed

Has there ever been a greater kiss of death for an actor's career than to appear in their first film as 'Introducing...?' Scorsese's film 'introduces' Alfred Lutter as Tommy, the 11 year old son of Ellen Burstyn's Alice, a put upon wife stuck in a loveless marriage with a husband who is killed in a … Continue reading Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore

February Wednesday Why should they have all the money? Life is so unfair. I’ve been here for 20 years and they walk all over me – do this, do that. And they laugh at me, I know it. I know I’m not stylish or pretty like the other girls but I’m not bad-looking. It wouldn’t … Continue reading Diary of an Embezzler

Care workers are employed on zero hours contracts. There has been much criticism of these contracts in recent months and they are regarded as a bad thing, mainly by people who don’t have them. However, it’s important to distinguish between the sort of contract where a shop worker might be told that they are not … Continue reading Home Care – Zero hours contracts

Chris Boardman's autobiography - Triumphs and Turbulence - is a good read. It's well-written, informative, interesting and gives a good overview of his (almost) great career. He comes across as thoughtful, humble (but not too humble), guilty about the time he spent away from his wife and children and respectful of others, including Steve Peters, … Continue reading Chris Boardman – Triumphs and Turbulence

The Passion of Fausto Coppi by William Fotheringham Fascinating biography of probably the first true cycling superstar. Well-researched and written, Fotheringham ably recounts Coppi’s scandalous affair with a married woman which led to his and her excommunication from the Catholic church and his tragic death as the result of an insect bite he received while … Continue reading 9 Cycling books that are worth reading

David Millar is intelligent, articulate, erudite, tall, good looking (a bit like my hero, David Gandy), personable, comfortably middle-class (born in Maidenhead, father an airline pilot who moved to Hong Kong), slim, achingly cool, the face of Maserati (if you can be the face of a car brand) and, oh, a drugs cheat. In a … Continue reading David Millar – I mind

Poor (poor?) Maria Sharapova. A figure to make a Bishop kick a hole in a stained glass window, legs that reach from Wimbledon to Tim Peake and a face that launched a thousand brands; brought down by one (one?) too many doses of hubris and a sea of advisers too frightened or too stupid to … Continue reading Sharadopa

Sonny Parker has a cold. It’s not a cold like you get – sniffles, a sore throat, a little head-ache, feeling sorry for yourself, a mug of Lemsip and please let this get worse so I can call it man-flu and justify a day off work. No, this is a cyclist’s cold; laid up on … Continue reading Sonny Parker has a cold

Wednesday You’ve probably not seen the petition about home care and if you have you probably haven’t signed it. Not many people have. At the last count it had 22861 signatures which is one of the lower totals on the Government website. The highest is about meningitis vaccines for all children which has got over … Continue reading Home Care Diary – Petition