Gripping stuff

SO the Ukraine problem is solved. All we have to do is trust the Russians. Doesn't come easy, does it?

"FIRST-World Problems" is the term used to describe issues that concern people who are too rich and comfortable to have anything serious to worry about. I noticed two reports this week. The first is about a sharp drop in the sales of soup spoons. The second is among Daily Telegraph correspondents, fretting that the fatness of modern toothbrush handles makes them too big to fit in toothbrush racks. Similar items gratefully received.

A FRIEND took a party of two adults and two kids to the brilliant-but-pricey Harry Potter studios in Hertfordshire. With fuel, tickets, meals and some video souvenirs, the day out came to a shade under £200. He says the strange thing is that it made him appreciate what great value his car tax disc is - £200 for a day with Harry Potter compares to £120 for 365 days' use of the entire UK road network.

WHEN I learned to drive I was taught to park the vehicle in gear to save stretching the handbrake cable. Forty years on, I have just been landed with a big bill as the under-used handbrake on my old Volvo seized, wrecking the drum and callipers. "We get a lot of these," sympathised the lad at the garage. "Handbrakes are meant to be used." Apparently the same goes for air-conditioning. If you don't use it a few times every week it will probably pack up. You think you're being economical but you're simply storing up trouble for the future. Use 'em or lose 'em.

"CAN we stop our daughters obsessing about their looks?" was the subject of a feature in one of the Sunday glossy magazines This is a serious issue. What is it about modern life that makes girls so fixated on surface perfection? The feature in question was sandwiched between full-page adverts for Ralph Lauren, Net-a-Porter, L'Oreal, Revlon, Garnier, Boots, Matalan, Head &Shoulders, Max Factor and Laura Ashley, plus a double-page spread on that all-important "cosmetic spring-clean." Why are girls obsessed with their looks? A mystery, innit?

WHY all the surprise at claims that some Islamic schools may be kicking out infidel teachers, separating girls from boys and preaching an extremist version of the Muslim faith? The easy-going majority of Muslims are happy for their children to attend good British state schools. So the Muslims who are desperate to set up their own schools are unlikely to be the easygoing sort. They are more likely to be the sort who believe women are the property of men, adulterers should be stoned to death and all non-Muslims are goats, pigs and monkeys. But the real blame lies with our brainless leaders in Whitehall who thought a new generation of "faith-based academies" was a good idea . Have they never heard of Northern Ireland, a place where separate education is hard-wired into the system? Over there, kids from the Protestant and Catholic tribes not only don't understand each other but never even talk to each other.

AN expert on the radio was telling us that lead is a significant factor in crime. And just when you're thinking: "Well, of course it is. The blighters nick it off church roofs," you listen closer and realise she's talking about lead particles in the atmosphere. The theory is that removing lead from British petrol, thus cleaning exhaust gases, has led to a drop in crime. Another explanation is that the cops are fiddling the figures.

A READER asks: "If I wear a money belt on holiday, will I be strapped for cash?"