There are many mysteries in old age but the greatest, surely, is this: in those adverts for walk-in bathtubs, why doesn't all the water gush out when you get in?

10.30 Newsnight: What Are The Chances Of World War Three Breaking Out After You Have Gone To Bed?

Can anything match that first fine discovery of the telephone and all it stood for? That first realization that, contained within ten simple digits, lay the infinitely possible? Out there ... lay six billion ears, all the people in the world available for contact and mystery and insult, unable to resist the beckoning of one small and villainous forefinger.

To have a grievance is to have a purpose in life.

Being a personality is not the same thing as having a personality.

The Act of God designation on all insurance policies; which means, roughly, that you cannot be insured for the accidents that are most likely to happen to you.

The role of humour is to make people fall down and writhe on the Axminster, and that is the top and bottom of it.