Ephraim Hardcastle
PRINCE Philip’s retirement prevented him attending this week’s Chelsea Flower Show, much to the disappointment of those who invariably sold him the latest gadget or gizmo. In 2006 he was inspired by a Chelsea exhibit to buy £5,000 worth of truffle-impregnated trees for Sandringham. Despite using specially trained dogs to check on their progress, it appears, so far, to have been a fruitless exercise. Truffles refuse to be hurried and it could be 2021 before the family no longer has to buy them in – just in time for Philip’s centenary lunch.
SARAH, Duchess of York, had an awkward royal wedding, placed on the bride’s side of the aisle, facing the glares of the massed ranks of the Windsors with whom she’s not too popular. She’s hoping that, as mother of the bride at daughter Eugenie’s wedding to Jack Brooksbank in October, she’ll get top billing next to ex-husband Andrew. Maybe not. Whereas weddings usually put the bride’s family on the left and the groom’s on the right, the Royal Family always sits on the right. So Fergie might be sitting opposite them again. Unless the Queen makes her an honorary royal for the day...
RECALLING the excitable royal wedding preacher, Bishop Michael Curry, 65, pictured, Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg, reveals: ‘We played “sermon cricket” during the homily. My son worked out there were 39 runs and four wickets.’ Devout Catholic ReesMogg explains: ‘Sermon cricket is something you can play when clerics are effusive with their hand movements. When they wag their finger, that’s a wicket. When they extend their arms high and wide, that’s a six. You go through the umpire’s hand signals.’ What japes!
KENNETH Baker, 83, during lunch with his close friend Michael Heseltine, 85, (they were both in Margaret Thatcher’s Cabinet) asked him what he’d like to be remembered for. ‘My arboretum,’ replied Lord Heseltine. Not for stabbing Mrs Thatcher in the back or choking his mother’s dog with his bare hands?
PAYING tribute to pal Dame Joan Collins, who turned 85 yesterday, broadcaster Gyles Brandreth recalls asking her Sigmund Freud’s famous question: What does a woman want? Joanie swiftly replied: ‘I’ll tell you what this woman wants, Gyles: cucumber sandwiches on white, smoked salmon sandwiches on brown and tea with milk and lots of sugar!’
WITH Speaker John Bercow under renewed pressure to quit there’s been a revival of jokes about his diminutive size, including David Cameron’s gag about an unnamed minister’s driver reversing into the Speaker’s car. When Bercow declared: ‘I’m not happy!’ the driver replied: ‘Well, which one [of the seven dwarfs] are you?’
AUTHOR Kathy Lette, 59, now back on the dating scene since splitting from her husband, fears that men may see her as ‘past her sell-by date’. She adds: ‘Tesco has stopped having the use-by date on fruit and veg – can’t someone offer the same courtesy to women?’