“Did I die? I did, didn’t I? So this must be heaven, or hell, or some kind of horrible purgatory, right?” — You appeared in front of me looking terribly confused. I wasn’t surprised. There was nothing but a building with a sign that read “You are nowhere”. I get how that could seem ominous. And it was a lot different to what you’d be looking at before. Everywhere else around you…

It’s been a century and we’re still taking Russian propaganda as gospel — Grigori Rasputin is an enigma. Since his death he has been shrouded in myth and mystery: more a character and embodiment of the feeling of the time, than a real, living, breathing human being. Even during his life fact and fiction were hard to separate. Few people in history (especially…

My friend is a little overwhelmed right now and would like to buy a motorcycle — When we’re kids we’re idiots. Everyone knows we’re idiots, and they let us off until we’ve existed for a bit longer and should know better. Even after that, when we’re teenagers or in our early twenties and our lives are a mess, people give us the benefit of the doubt…

Or, the husk of Vladivostok and his big score — My plan for many years had been to travel out east and take the Trans-Siberian Express through Russia. Most do it from west to east, Moscow to Vladivostok, but for me, starting at the end of the world and heading back to civilisation seemed far more appealing. Vladivostok is a…

Actually, neither side looks appealing, so maybe I’ll just stay put — There’s the right side of the bed and the wrong side of the bed: a fifty-fifty chance of having a terrible day. I imagine it to be a lot like the light side of the force and the dark side. Simple decisions lead to anger, anger leads to hate, hate…

Make sure your hair is extra messy and start by distracting them like you always do with your bumbling, affable… wait, I don’t think I’m supposed to be reading this part, am I? — Mister Speaker, I want to apologise. I know that millions of people across this country have made extraordinary sacrifices, while I have sacrificed nothing. I know the anguish they have felt, unable to live their lives as they want, while we at Downing Street are living it large.

“What is this? Why am I so terrible? Should I give up?” and all the other terrible questions I ask myself regularly — My creative juices dried up in the last few weeks in December, so I decided to take a little break, to hit the ground running in the New Year. But so far (prior to this thing here you’re reading) I’ve done diddly-squat. Bugger all. Jackshit. Not through a lack of…

Should auld acquaintance be forgot, and never brought to mind? — Growing up, with minutes to midnight on New Year’s Eve, my father would clap his hands, put on his coat and shoes, and go stand in front of the house in the cold. We’d watch him from the bedroom window — watch him stand motionless, looking up at the sky…

The Ballad of Timmy the shin-kicker and a lesson for us all — My wife works in the education system, and she came home from work the other day and told me about a kid kicked who another in the shin, seemingly for no reason at all. When asked why he did this, the kicker, who we’ll call Timmy, replied: “Because he kicked…