Spot The Difference (3)

Former presenter of the BBC's One Show. After gurning her way to stardom, she left the programme because of artistic differences.










Ape. Tipped to receive a prominent part in the television documentary Footballers' Wives.

Red Arrows

Earlier today I was beavering away at London Acres, drafting a feature. Every so often I heard aircraft overhead, which I like; maybe the search and rescue Sea King from Culdrose, the Trinity House helicopter, Cornwall's Air Ambulance. Occasionally too, the whistle of an Adour turbojet; a Hawk from FRADU. But suddenly I was enveloped by a huge roar, quite beyond the familiar background sounds. As part of the Fal River Festival, the Red Arrows have come to town.

I joined some neighbours with a glass of wine, and we watched the display over the river. As ever, marvellous aerobatics, stomach-churning close passes, evil pilots fading out of proceedings, then appearing from nowhere to startle the crowds below.

Not a bad view from the back door.

Public House of Horrors

Around ten years ago I met up with some people who lived in Penryn, just outside Falmouth. Their pub of choice was the Cross Keys, run by a lovely couple named John and Rose. Great beer and food, clean, and of course strict Cornish adherence to the licensing laws.

But John and Rose left to travel the world beyond Penryn. The Cross Keys went downhill, became dirty and poorly-run, changed hands often. On a Sunday lunchtime, instead of huge, well-cooked roast dinners we were treated to pilled-up kids, plus the returning scumbags and derelicts who'd been barred by John and Rose. We took our business elsewhere, and the Cross Keys continued to sink into Penryn's wider mire; finally, it shut.

Boarded up, the Keys stayed on the market for many months; I passed it the other week, neglected and grimy. But I hear that finally it has a new owner, outside the licensed trade. The building will be used to provide a residential centre for people with behavioural difficulties.

Business as usual then.