Best of Peter Rhodes - March 6

The best of this week's Peter Rhodes column from the Express & Star.

MY RECENT piece on I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue (Radio 4) reminds me of my occasional daydream of an American couple visiting Britain for the first time. As they settle into their hotel room these innocents abroad switch on the radio and listen, with rising alarm, to I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue. Why are these Brits singing Abide with Me to the tune of Yankee Doodle? Why is the lovely Samantha such a filthy girl? And where the hell is Mornington Crescent? Dammit, Zelda, this whole goddam country is loony-tunes. They barricade the door and take the next flight home.

AT LAST, a cure for cancer. I have been a hack for nearly 40 years and I have never known a time when some "magic bullet" cure was not just around the corner. Now, at last the World Cancer Fund has unveiled the secret of how to prevent 40 per cent of the cancers reported in the UK. It is:

* Eat sensibly

* Drink less

* Exercise more

Didn't you just know there would be some catch?

OUR changing language, both from daytime television:

* "I can't understand all this catastrophising" (American woman on Britain in the snow)

* "My mother stepped in to do the dependencying" (Young mother explaining babysitting)

TONY Blair has set up a new company to provide guidance for politicians all over the world on how to run a country. It will not come cheaply. Blair has made an estimated £15 million since he left office. So here's a free preview of the great man's guiding principles for successful premiership:

1. Inherit a booming economy

2. Spend, spend spend.

3. Clear off just before the manure hits the Vent-Axia

MEANWHILE, the Blessed Cherie Blair says the recession is a great opportunity for women to prove their worth in the workplace. She really is on another planet.

PRAISE the Lord, we are saved. It is reported that Whitehall is preparing a national emergency plan to help us deal with summer heatwaves (fat chance). So far the civil servants and ministers have come up with ideas such as staying in the shade, swapping suits for lighter clothing and using windows and fans to keep the temperature down. Astonishing. However would we manage without them?

WHAT they say: We will use every legal means to make the disgraced Sir Fred Goodwin give up part of his £700,000-a-year pension.

What they mean: We will make a bit of a fuss until it drops out of the headlines.

HEALTH update:

* One glass of wine per day increases the risk of breast cancer (last week)

* One glass of wine per day reduces the risk of gullet cancer (this week)

POLICE are reportedly bracing themselves for a "summer of rage" when the irate, jobless middle classes start rioting on the streets. I have a cunning plan to defuse it by keeping Middle England safely indoors: a repeat of Cranford.

HAMAS says it should have a leading role in the rebuilding of Gaza. Damn right. After all, it was Hamas who invited the demolition men in.

A CORRESPONDENT reminds me of the hairdresser who, out of the goodness of his heart, offered free trims as a service to the community. The first day he gave a florist a haircut; the following day he found 12 red roses on his doorstep. Then he gave a pub landlord a free haircut; the following day he found 12 bottles of beer on his doorstep. Then he gave an MP a free haircut; the following day he found 12 MPs on his doorstep, all wanting a free haircut.

I HAVE become a minority. The UN estimates this week that more than half the people in the world now have a mobile phone. And jolly good luck to them. Mobiles take over your lives, despoil the countryside, empty your wallets, diminish self-reliance, turn crises into dramas, wreck relationships and have destroyed forever the wonderful old human right known as getting away from it all. God rot them.

FROM the Home Counties comes a growing number of reports of folk inviting foxes into their gardens and even their homes. These urban foxes are a sort of substitute pet for people too busy to own proper pets. And how wonderfully chic it must seem to hand-feed a fox. Until you get a nasty, itchy rash and your doctor tells you it's mange. Not so chic.

A FORECASTER warned us yesterday to expect "a coherent area of cloud." To be followed, no doubt, by some understandable rain with the possibility of introspective sleet and a little mildly irrational snow.