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Emma BeddingtonThe Guardian |
Support for seasonal self-love comes from an unexpected quarter: the French daily Libération has issued a plea for us to embrace our “winter...
How good must it feel to gather up physical manifestations of your anxieties, shove them in a giant papier-mache demon and set fire to them?...
The only time I have ever mentioned my bird-lover’s slight – slight! – ambivalence towards cats in a public forum, it brought me the angriest...
If you’re 34, watch out: Tom Hanks says 35 is the worst age. Why ask Hanks – delightful as he seems – as opposed to, say, the highly qualified...
Rejoice: British class distinctions are finally crumbling. Yes, the gap between rich and poor is as big as ever and I am, inexplicably, unhappily,...
Are middle-aged women absolute horndogs and does that make for good box office? That’s what Grazia wondered recently, asking if the film industry is...
A single female friend is feeling uncomfortably targeted by Netflix. The content categories the streamer is now offering on her homepage include...
Do you ever wonder if the British might be a fundamentally unserious people? I do, though I should stress that I include myself; a thoroughly trivial...
Should you be penalised for having eyes bigger than your belly? A Cornish pub is trying it out: Mark Graham, the landlord of the Star Inn, now charges...
Ah, autumn. Season of mists, mellow fruitfulness, chunky knits, pumpkin spice lattes and cosiness, right? Wrong. In the words of an intense young man...
The kingdom was shaken by another shattering royal revelation last week when Lord West revealed that when he was briefly given custody of the queen...
The news hasn’t been good for people planning to live for ever. First came Dr Saul Newman’s investigative work into supercententarians – those...
Why on earth did I read about a five-week yoga forearm-stand workshop and think: “That sounds like a fun challenge – I should sign up”? I’m...
My hair looks incredible at the moment. I know because people keep telling me – in bakeries, cafes and when I was getting my tattooed eyebrows...
Common sense is not that common: a recent study from the University of Pennsylvania concludes the concept is “somewhat illusory”. Researchers...
I was thinking about breasts as I watched The Substance. Coralie Fargeat’s body-horror fable features Demi Moore as a newly 50, supposedly fading...
‘Texting your teenage son is like texting a guy who has no interest in you” goes a meme that has re-emerged recently, piercing in its accuracy....
You know how sometimes you think you’ve had a brilliant idea, then it bites you in the bum like an athletic but mean jack russell? Suggesting I...
Possibly the least surprising revelation from the Times’s recent Nigella Lawson interview: she loves eating in bed. It’s so on-brand, it reminded...
It is the kind of statistic that makes you do a double-take, because it can’t be right. It is, though: 41% of US parents are so stressed that they...
The recent headline that a “Daily croissant can take a toll on your heart in under a month” was like a dagger to mine, just as my beloved local...
At 49, I’ve just learned I’m in my “late career” era, according to a recent marketing graphic from the job search giant Indeed. That’s what...
“How many of these cookies can I eat?” my older son texts (he is downstairs; I am up). “They’re really good.” My fingertips tingle with...
I haven’t been on holiday this summer, but don’t start tuning the tiny violins. I derive an unusual satisfaction from working when others aren’t...
Are only children selfish, spoiled and lonely? Duh, no, a piece in the New Scientist recently concluded, unpicking all these stereotypes. There are...
An unexpected thing has happened: I, we, have had a baby. A surprise change-of-life baby! That wasn’t part of our empty nest plan, but sometimes...
My son brought his girlfriend home last month and we really wanted to make things nice for her. We started with a shame-fuelled whirlwind clean, but...
‘My biggest issue is that I don’t feel like I’m in my body,” Naomi Osaka wrote this week on Instagram. A year after her daughter was born, the...
Scrolling through “what I eat in a week” diaries instead of working, I found one from the New York fashion designer Somsack Sikhounmuong, and was...
‘I never want to own anything again,” messaged my son, packing up after a year abroad. He was experiencing the self-loathing rite of passage that...
I read yet another roundup of summer trends last week with narrowed eyes and my traditional wasp-chewing expression of disapproval. We are supposed,...
In ancient Greece, Aristotle was big on “noble leisure”, but modern Greece might need a refresher, having just introduced a six-day, 48-hour...
DIY smear tests for women in England may be imminent, after a pilot scheme produced promising results. In London, 27,000 undertested or untested women...
‘Go steady, we’ve got enough history,” reads one of York’s new purple street signs. “Respect your bar staff and taxi drivers, give them...
Should we hype our partners? Elle magazine’s celebration of the “hype boyfriend” has me wondering. These cheerleaders for their other halves are...
‘I really like these angry green women,” a French friend said recently, as the assembly elections approached. It’s a funny phrase, redolent of...
I expected to watch America’s Sweethearts, the Netflix documentary on the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders (“DCC” to initiates) with horrified...
My WhatsApp messages show that I spend a lot of time complaining about capitalism, probably because I want to sound deep and radical, like a Sally...
The New York Times recently explored “the vexing problem of the ‘medium friend’”: people who aren’t your ride or die, but more than mere...
I have just been to the Hebrides, because trudging across tussocks in the rain is my ancestrally transmitted idea of fun. The weather was fine,...
Are elections like buses? For dual French-British citizens like me, we’ve had the European ones and now, in addition to the UK, the snap French...
The sun is out, the football is on, beer gardens are packed and sunset-pink shots of condensation-frosted palomas (the new negroni) are plastered...
If you’re feeling over- or underwhelmed by the election (probably both), have you considered how your pets would vote? This perennial can of worms...
‘I’m looking for a man in finance” goes the viral TikTok song of the summer. And it doesn’t mean my version – standing in the only bank...
Unsurprisingly, numerous species of animal (including a flightless weevil and a parasitic flatworm) are named after David Attenborough – but were...
I’m not having a midlife crisis. Any actuary would tell you I’m well over halfway, plus the years 30-40 were one long, undignified, slightly...
You think teenage boys smell of Lynx Africa, musty trainer and gummy bear vape? In 2024, it might be Tom Ford Neroli Portofino or Acqua di Parma’s...
It’s all so quiet. Just the way I like it: my husband is out; it’s pouring, so no one is mowing (the only thing that ever breaches the peace...
We have entered the season marked in our household by the battle of wits between human and tortoise. All spring, my husband (dexterous, resourceful,...
If you’ve ever wished your dishwasher used more water, or found your fridge too cheap to run, help is at hand. US Republicans have their sights set...