The English were notoriously unenthusiastic about burning witches. I suppose ours were too soggy.

They looked at one another in incomprehension, two minds driving opposite ways up a narrow street and waiting for the other man to reverse first.

If you try to to take my bananas from me, I will reclaim them from your cold dead hands.

And, while it was regarded as pretty good evidence of criminality to be living in a slum, for some reason owning a whole street of them merely got you invited to the very best social occasions.

The Chain Letter to the Ephebians. Forget Your Gods. Be Subjugated. Learn to Fear. Do not break the chain -- the last people who did woke up one morning to find fifty thousand armed men on their lawn.

It was written in some holy book, apparently, so that made it okay, and probably compulsory.

A good banana daiquiri is hard to come by. I've only ever found one place in this country that makes a proper one, and that's in Leeds.