A busy weekend, what with Airport‘s lovely Christmas party and much flitting about London. I had a superb lunch with Sonya at The Triangle restaurant in Crouch End—a Moroccan “fusion” place. I remarked that, even in the daytime it looked like the sort of venue where they knew how to party and this review seems to back up that impression.

On public transport I’ve been reading and thinking about Herman Hesse’s Demian. (Thanks Maoi!) I’m not Oliver Kamm so I’ve been doing this in translation, mind. A review will follow. In the meantime here’s some more ephemeral stuff.

Judith sent me a link to the NYTimes [free registration, blah blah] where they cover women having foot surgery in order to wear sexy shoes.

There’s been a lot of interesting stuff in the last two editions of The Spectator, but I’m not renewing my subscription until they fire Taki. There is a piece claiming that the American version of what happened at Samarra was a gross distortion. Some female Spectator readers have written funny replies to this un-PC article about “lazy women”. Also, as a non-TV watcher I smiled in recognition at this account of the methods of the TV licence Thought Police.

Finally, with thanks again to Judith for the first one, two surreal stories: one serious; one not-so-serious. Even though the transvestite artist in the latter wrote a graphic novel called “Cycle of Violence” it’s nothing to do with the kinds of Israeli-Palestinian relations referred to in the former; it’s about a bicycling serial killer.

This round-up was a bit rushed, I know, so I’m sure Leasey will be emailing about typos in a couple of hours. Do your worst, GrammarGirl.