Sunday

For once in a while yesterday, it being Sunday, we bought a 'Sunday Times', one of the two family staples of my childhood. In the days of such minor celebrities as Katherine Whitehorn, with that particular one writing for that other staple, the 'Observer'. People who could knock out a weekly page of broadsheet for the edification and entertainment of the chattering classes. More principled than, and probably less egoistical versions of, today's Boris Johnsons. Maybe more like Simon Jenkins. Although that said, I seem to recall that my mother sometimes found Whitehorn a bit clever clogs, a bit too clever for her own good - but then she went to Newnham, rather than the more red brick Girton, up the road from where we were living.

The reason we do not buy Sunday newspapers is that they are essentially a rerun of Saturday newspapers, full of all the same stuff about food, holidays, property, getting rich and all that sort of thing. So a plus point for this 'Sunday Times' was that the front bit, the only bit I read, did contain a fair number of news stories, far more than the front bit of the Saturday issue of the 'Telegraph', of the day before.

But the minus point was that the whole tone of the thing was loud, strident and very right wing. Truly a stable mate of the 'Sun', having shared the same owner for many years now.

So the bottom line was a reminder of why I no longer buy the 'Times'.