OPINION: Feeling in need of a cure I took myself off to Hanmer Springs. I wanted waters warmed by the Earth's core to lave me of that perilous stuff that weighs upon the heart, stuff that can overwhelm a man at this time of the year.

OPINION: Monday morning, stonking hangover, howling wind, horizontal rain, a to-do list as long as a novel, and a bureaucracy to deal with.

OPINION: At half six every morning my alarm clock sounds.

On the same day as a giraffe joined the search for a solo sailor it was announced that a couple of Earth-like planets had been spotted in the Milky Way.

OPINION: Much have I travelled in the realms of crud, and many cruddy states and kingdoms seen, but never have I seen such epic heaps of crud as yesterday, when I cleaned out my garage.

How good to see China bullying Brad Pitt.

OPINION: The child was lying on a rug. Its fingers, chubby with puppy fat, were scrolling through images on an iPad.

OPINION: "You're an addict," said the voice. "A hopeless, feeble addict, barren of purpose, curled on the sofa with the curtains drawn."

OPINION: The new Pope seems nice. Apparently he likes to go to work by bus. How good it would be if all leaders did.

OPINION: I'll admit to nerves. When I called last week for the formation of a sugar police, I was afraid I was speaking too soon, that the world was not yet ready for what I had to say. Such is often the fate of prophets.

OPINION: People in power are fond of saying that there is no alternative to what they propose. They are normally wrong.

OPINION: It's summer as summer ought to be, summer as we remember it. And it's the start of the rugby season.

OPINION: An amazing thing happened in Switzerland last weekend during the annual Peace and Light Symposium. This inter-faith conference, renowned for its catering, had attracted leaders from every major belief system.

OPINION: What's the difference between a horse and a cow? No idea? Well, I wouldn't send you to place a bet.

OPINION: This column has many children. We are so philoprogenitive, we can almost spell it. Last year, the Vatican sent us a gold-embossed commendation for our contribution to over-population.

OPINION: How lovely it must be to stride through the crowd at the scene of an accident bellowing, "Make way, I'm a doctor." I long to do it.

OPINION: If the world would stop watching sport there would be no wealth and glory to tempt the likes of Lance Armstrong.

I suspect we all admire the qualities we lack. I admire courage. Because I have none, I thrill to it in others, and I cleave to people who display it.

OPINION: This country is woefully undersurveilled. It's only by good luck that in my 25 years here I have hardly been robbed, mugged, beaten, raped or murdered at all.

OPINION: A mosquito, an infinitesimal scrap of flesh, unnerves me, a beast a billion times its size.