WASHED AND READY TO EAT

This is a family blog, so it's with some trepidation that I turn to an ad on page 67 of the Metro newspaper, which promises men 'longer lasting' love-making. To take advantage of the incredible oral spray being promoted, I need to phone for a free consultation with a specialist doctor. It's a little difficult to imagine how this conversation might go, but the customer testimonials seem to give us a clue as to its likely frank nature. Mr MH of Luton tells us that he... wakes up somewhat... err... aroused, shall we say, in the mornings now. Indeed, he proclaims, the very thought of this arousal alone is enough to get him going all over again. Ray Phillips of Redcliffe is so happy at being able to last 20 minutes, he's prepared to give us his full name. Mr H of Bedford, meanwhile, is very precise in his time measurements. He's clocking up 12-15 minutes extra every time he hits the sack. Too much information already, gents. Mr PW of London has lasted a full 17...

The London 2012 torch procession has been great entertainment. It seems that if you want to carry the thing, your best bet is to claim that you're a stalwart of that much-admired community organisation The B-List Actors' Guild. Unless, of course, you've been picked by a corporate sponsor or transported from overseas like that unfortunate American lady whose tattoo artist couldn't spell Olympic. Yesterday, after a brief intervention by uber-luvvie Patrick Stewart - 'Make it Glow, Number One' - we were transported to the fictional world of Walford, where real-life cops were paid to protect make-believe Eastenders characters from a potential attack by a deranged extra. 'Tell 'em to hurry up, guv. We got to be up west in three quarters of an hour...' In many ways, this blurring of truth and untruth could be a metaphor for the whole Olympic adventure. Real-world stadia protected by imaginary G4S security guards. The opening ceremony is rumoured to b...

Of all the dubious statistics thrown around in relation to the London Olympics, the claim that there are '47 tube journeys in central London that can easily be walked' is surely one of the most misleading. I suspect it is based on the relative proximity of one station to an adjacent one. Embankment is walking distance from Temple. Charing Cross is a stone's throw from Leicester Square. But what exactly is a 'tube journey'? As I've understood it - and I'm only going on three decades' experience of using the network - it is a journey that takes you from any one place with a tube station to another. My journey from Leicester Square might take me to Charing Cross, but it might also lead me up the line to Camden Town or down south to Morden. In fact, from any one tube station - thanks to the wonders of interconnections - there are dozens, maybe hundreds, of options available to me. Now, I don't claim to have a PhD in mathematics, but the number of p...