Home Views & Blogs Columnists Valerie Hill

Home sweet home – and clean laundry

HALF-TERM once again brings moans from my sons of “We’re bored”, and irritated retorts from me of “Only boring people are ever bored”. Read

Thong market hits rock bottom

I’VE always regarded thongs in the same way as red underwear. No women in a sane state of mind would actually buy them herself to wear. Read

Food really does grow on trees, you know

EATING food is no longer the norm in the Western World, according to a new book. Read

M&S getting slack in their supporting role

IN THIS age of rampant consumerism, I’m in a not very enviable position. One day, I’ll be able to tell my as yet unborn grandchildren that I can remember when Marks & Spencer never advertised its wares. Read

Sweet dreams are made of this

TO SLEEP, perchance to dream, has always been one of the goals in my life, as opposed to sleep perchance to be woken up by a child with a tummy ache or a snoring husband. Read

Another tradition – dying out post haste

TWO postal deliveries before lunchtime? It seems like a Utopian dream, yet it was a reality for most of the country’s households and businesses until a couple of years ago. Read

Comfort does not come into corsetry

ASKED his opinion of London’s first mainstream nude musical, Hair, the ballet dancer Robert Helpmann famously quipped: “The trouble is, when the music stops, not everything else does.” Read

War of words over epic Russian tome

FOR many people, there is only one epic novel that instantly defines intellectual depth and emotional meaning in an accessible way. Read

Getting married really put the wind up us

WHAT were you doing 20 years ago today (plus a few extra days for good measure)? Pegging out the washing? Eating a pizza? Watching the Street? Read

My word! What a complex language

THEY say that practice makes perfect, but if anything as I get older, my spelling seems like it’s getting worse. And the English language doesn’t help. Read

Voice of the beehive leads the hair stakes

THERE are fashions of by-gone times that seem so peculiar you simply can’t imagine how they caught on in the first place. And there’s only one scenario worse than this, and that is when the same fashion comes around again. Read

Living the dream in a roadside motel

SOME years ago, when the American actress Elaine Stritch was working regularly in British television, she lived at the Savoy Hotel in London. Read

Who will protect us from all our vanities?

I GOT a real shock when I looked in the bathroom mirror the other day and didn’t quite recognise the person staring back. Read

The car’s no star as far as I’m concerned

SUMMER holidays are no longer the time for picnics, trips to the seaside or visits to the local lido. If you have children of a certain age, it simply means extending the taxi service from term-time only to the daylight roster, and not forgetting the out-of-hours schedule. Read

Send more luggage please

IN CHOOSING my wardrobe for my holiday – and I’m not talking flat- pack or mail order here – three words are banned from my vocabulary: capsule, versatile and practical. I never take the minimum amount and don’t understand the concept of “travelling light.” Read

Child’s play can be very hard work

IN SPITE of the weather, the summer holidays are upon us again. Time to switch off, stretch out and settle down with a novel or 10 and a long, cool drink. Read

Young Royals put accent on ordinary

PRINCE WILLIAM and Prince Harry’s excruciating dance displays at the recent memorial concert for their mother showed that they are not, as we say in the North, bred out. Read

Being smart doesn’t make you dumb

AS I TELL my husband repeatedly, little things mean a lot. The scented candle placed thoughtfully by the bath, a hot cup of tea presented promptly each morning, the sight of an empty laundry basket. Read

I like my presenters tied up

THE rush by serious television journalists, such as Jeremy Paxman, right, to prove they can have gravitas and still be fun-loving trendies by not wearing a tie, appears to be catching on. Prince Michael of Kent, left, famous for his fist-sized Windsor tie knots, now thinks it appropriate to appear at his 65th birthday party in a polo-neck sweater. Read

Dreaming of a good night’s sleep?

THOSE asleep at the back need read no further, but please pay attention anyone who is wide awake in bed at 3am, wondering why the rest of the human race is in neverland (no, no, not the Michael Jackson one.) Read