Peter Rhodes: Another smacker, Nigel?

I BET there is not a woman in the land who does not understand why Diane James has stood down as the leader of Ukip only 18 days after being elected. It is an impossible position. If you fail, you will be denounced and vilified. If you succeed, you'll have to have another kiss from Nigel Farage.

FINE speech, Mrs May. Attlee would have been proud of it.

THANKS for your suggestions for a collective noun for the young offspring of China's favourite mammal. Best by far is an aaaaaaaaah of baby pandas.

ALL the political parties are pledged to build more homes. So where will they go? I drove across to Cambridge this week and then back via Bedford. It was like one vast new housing estate. I lost count of the number of part-built streets, gobbling up meadows which have been farmed for a thousand years.

THE irony is that having destroyed all vestiges of Saxon farming, developers choose names such as Saxon Way.

AS Theresa May embraces Brexit, dark mutterings can be heard from Brussels where some seething Eurocrats are plotting all sorts of revenge for when Britain triggers Article 50. Here's a brilliant idea to catch them off-guard. Let's trigger Article 49 instead and see what happens.

IN Thought for the Day (Radio 4) one Francis Campbell, described as one of Britain's most influential Roman Catholics, informed the nation that: "I believe Jesus is clear about what will happen at the last judgment and how those to be saved will be chosen." The last judgment? Ye Gods and little fishes. We are living in the 21st century and someone on prime-time state radio is seriously spouting the sort of mediaeval gibberish about heaven and hell that kept Middle Ages peasants in line. I do not pay my licence fee for this.

YOU can dress everyone in authentic 19th century costumes. You can commission a ride on the excellent replica of Stevenson's locomotive, Planet. You can even bend the historical facts and put Queen Victoria on Planet and send her through the English countryside as loyal peasants wave from the fields. What you cannot do is remove the signs of 21st century agriculture. In this week's Victoria (ITV) did you spot the tell-tale tracks of the cropsprayer?

THAT apart, the steam-loco sequence in Victoria (ITV), accompanied by some splendid music, was one of the most stirring scenes on telly for a long time. Made one feel quite positive about railways. With the obvious exception of HS2.

WHOPPER of the week: "Yahoo! Will be right back. Our engineers are working quickly to resolve the issue." Depends how you define "quickly," doesn't it?