I must apologise to readers for the distinct lack of recent posts. I have been preoccupied with a number of matters which have left me, bafflingly, bereft of fresh insights into the world o’ Hooting Yard. I expect my pea-sized yet pulsating brain will soon generate further reports from that fool’s paradise, but in the meantime readers may like to send in suggestions for areas of investigation.

Although I have not been writing, I have been reading, and it seems only polite to share with you just a few of the things I have learned during the past couple of weeks.

One of the Heaven’s Gate suicides, the followers of Marshall Herff Applewhite (“Do”) and Bonnie Lu Nettles (“Ti”) who hoped to join a spaceship trailing in the wake of the Hale-Bopp comet in 1997, was the brother of Nichelle Nicholls, who played Lieutenant Uhura in the original Star Trek series.

Stalin and Trotsky first met each other on Whitechapel Road, on the site which is now occupied by a McDonald’s.

Unlike the guinea pig, which is neither from Guinea nor a pig, the Bath Oliver biscuit is not misleadingly named. It was invented in the town of Bath by Dr William Oliver in the eighteenth century.

Mao Tse-Tung never brushed his teeth nor took a bath or shower. A factotum was employed to rub him down with hot towels when he became grubby.

More soon…