There's no law that decrees when not to whinge, but you reach a certain age - 80 seems about right - when you're expected to manifest querulousness - the coffee's too hot, the boiled egg's too soft.

If anyone tells me I'm fat, I say, - That's because every time I make love to your wife, she gives me a biscuit

I find it hard to say, because when I was there it seemed to be shut.

About one thing the Englishman has a particularly strict code. If a bird says Cluk bik bik bik bik and caw you may kill it, eat it or ask Fortnums to pickle it in Napoleon brandy with wild strawberries. If it says tweet it is a dear and precious friend and you'd better lay off it if you want to remain a member of Boodles.

I think our police are excellent, probably because I have not done anything that has occasioned being beaten up by these good men.

If you resolve to give up smoking, drinking and loving, you don't actually live longer; it just seems longer.

In moments of considerable strain, I tend to take to bread-and-butter pudding. There is something about the blandness of soggy bread, the crispness of the golden outer crust and the unadulterated pleasure of a lightly set custard that makes the world seem a better place to live.