Divine intervention over gay-marriage law? That explains our sunny summer. . .

I MADE the point a few days ago that before the discovery of sexual intercourse in 1963, babies were found under gooseberry bushes. A reader insists that his wife was "hatched on the Wrekin" in 1955. Who am I to argue?

MYSTERIES of gardening. You start with a pile of garden rubbish and an empty skip. You end up with a full skip and an even bigger pile of garden rubbish. How?

RUN for the hills. According to weekend reports, Ed Miliband wants "half-a-dozen big, radical policies" on which to fight the 2015 General Election. So far we've seen two. First he announced he would freeze energy prices. Within days, electricity and gas prices shot up. Next, he unveiled plans for "challenger banks" to compete with existing banks, an idea which promptly wiped half a billion pounds off the banks' value. These are not "big, radical policies." They are more like biblical plagues.

WHICH leads on inevitably to the Ukip councillor David Silvester who says the recent floods are divine vengeance for Britain abandoning God's law and passing the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act. Hang on. If I recall the Old Testament correctly, the penalty for sodomy is not inundation. It is destruction by fire and brimstone, plus turning wives into pillars of salt if they dare look back. Flooding is reserved for old blokes capable of building Arks, and for Egyptian armies pursuing fleeing Israelites across the Red Sea. Anyway, if the Lord wishes to unleash floods to punish gays, why has he spared Brighton? And why did he wait six months? The worst floods didn't start until December yet the gay-marriage law was passed in July and was quickly followed by one of the best summers we've had for years. If, like the party-embarrassment David Silvester, you seriously believe there's divine intervention in the weather, the logical conclusion is that God not only approves of gay marriages but wants them to take place on lovely, sunny days. There may be rare occasions when a pillar of salt is appropriate but a pinch of salt is always useful.

YES, I realise that if the Secret Service suspected Dr Sanders of being involved in a plot to kill the US president, they would by now be following her and would certainly be tapping her mobile phone. Hostages (C4) is like Sherlock (BBC1). The plot has more holes than a colander and is an insult to our intelligence. I can't wait to be insulted again next Saturday.

YOU will probably look at Toni Collette, the svelte and chiselled Dr Sanders in Hostages, and think, blimey, she's lost some weight since she played the lumpenly dysfunctional title role in Muriel's Wedding. It's the other way around. Collette is naturally slim. Back in 1994 she piled on 40lbs in just a couple of months to play Muriel.

I SUGGESTED some weeks ago that a major landslip on the south coast was long overdue. Sure enough, the cliffs of the Jurassic Coast near Lyme Regis have been collapsing. But it's not all bad news. Already one giant ichthyosaur fossil has been revealed and experts say this is a "prime time" to find other fossils. It's an ill wind, etc.

THE good news is that, despite much financial scrutiny, Auntie still has enough small change rattling in her petty-cash box to pay Michael McIntyre £500,000 for six chat shows. That's £83,000 per show in order that one wealthy star can help other wealthy stars (aka "guests") advertise their new songs, movies or books - at our expense.