It's very hard to imagine the phrase "consumer society" used so cheerfully, and interpreted so enthusiastically, in England.

Women, more often than not, do things which aren't remotely relaxing but are all about preening, which is just another sort of work.

And call me a pig, but isn't it brilliantly refreshing how early the Dutch eat dinner? When they're still laying out the cutlery in achingly hip Barcelona, they're hanging the Closed sign on the restaurant doors of old Amsterdam.

The truth of the matter is, beauty is a specific thing, rare and fleeting. Some of us have it in our teens, 20s and 30s and then lose it; most of us have it not at all. And that's perfectly okay. But lying to yourself that you have it when you don't seems to me simple-minded at best and psychotic at worst.

Punk was over in two years. That was the only damn good thing about it.

It seems that one moment I was this little kid only caring about animals and flowers and stuff, and then the next minute I was this raging stew of hormones. I don't know if you've ever been a raging stew of anything, but I wouldn't particularly recommend it.

It may be a cliché, but it's true - the build-up to Christmas is so much more pleasurable than the actual day itself.