President Kennedy went to the brink, as the saying invariably goes, over Cuba. I shall never forget where I was standing and what I was doing on the day he nearly killed me. (It was on the touchline, being forced to watch a rugby game, that I overheard some older boys discussing the likelihood of our annihilation.) … We were left to wonder how the adult world could be ready to gamble itself, and the life of all the subsequent and for that matter preceding generations, on a sordid squabble over a banana republic … I have changed my mind on a number of things since, including almost everything to do with Cuba, but the idea that we should be grateful for having been spared, and should shower our gratitude upon the supposed Galahad of Camelot for his gracious lenience in opting not to commit genocide and suicide, seemed a bit creepy. When Kennedy was shot the following year, I knew myself somewhat apart from this supposedly generational trauma in that I felt no particular sense of loss at the passing of such a high-risk narcissist. If I registered any distinct emotion, it was that of mild relief. The reception was a distinct success, if somehow quaint in its almost antique Englishness. I have often noticed that nationalism is at its strongest at the periphery [ahem]… but the loyalist atmosphere on the lawn that night, with a Navy band playing and ancient settler families inquiring after one another’s descendants, was of an unquestioning and profound and rooted kind that one almost never encountered in the rest of a declining and anxious Britain. It was a bit much even for Commander Hitchens, who privately thought the islands slightly absurd and probably undefendable [see?]. When the time came when his old Royal Navy was sinking and shattering the Argentine fleet, the cadet school of which was a training camp for torture and rape, I was one of the very few socialists to support Mrs. Thatcher and he was one of the very few Tories to doubt the wisdom of the enterprise. So it goes.

A Hitch in time | A S H Smyth | The Critic Magazine A Hitch in time | A S H Smyth | The Critic Magazine

Andy Smart is an English comedian, actor, and TV panel show participant. Andy has been performing as a guest with The Comedy Store Players for 13 years and has been a permanent member since 1995. Before joining the Players he was one half of the Vicious Boys with Angelo Abela. He has performed at 40 consecutive Edinburgh festivals and is a regular guest on TalkSport Radio. More details That on the very day I walked down to look at Stanley’s Battle Day monument— commemorating the Royal Navy’s 1914 sinking of Admiral Graf von Spee’s marauding Scharnhorst et al. — I heard Hitch’s dulcet tones narrate how, on Boxing Day 1943, his father, Commander Eric Hitchens RN, “proudly participat[ed] as the Jamaica pressed home for the kill and fired torpedoes through the hull of one of Hitler’s most dangerous warships, the Scharnhorst [a later and equally ill-fated namesake, obviously]… a better day’s work than I have ever done”.Living on his wits, sleeping rough and accepting lifts that get him into bizarre and often dangerous situations, Andy’s six years spent on the road stand as a unique record of life as it was in the late 1970s and early 80s. In this hilarious memoir, they are juxtaposed with a host of earlier memories, resulting in a unique collection of dazzling funny stories that have been told and retold in countless bars and comedy clubs as well as on his regular guest spot on TalkSport Radio, but are collected together here for the first time in written form. A peek inside Yes, he (& Bobby) were out to get rid of Castro. But JFK seemed to be in two minds about this, for he also sent secret emissaries to Castro seeking a modus vivendi. In an old castle, an unconventional professor is experimenting a new time-machine, but it continuously does not go correct. He requests two kids to become his helpers and they get some inquisitive and unanticipated conclusions. Iraq is neither ethnically nor politically homogenous. If its infrastructure and psyche are badly torn, it has the recognised potential of becoming another Lebanon, with Sunni, Shia and Kurd making up for lost time. As with Lebanon also, neighbouring countries might interest themselves in the turmoil…Iran would be unlikely to resist the chance to break the stalemate of 1988. Michael McVey and Pheona McLellan both give good performances in their respective roles as Paul and Fiona, the two children who, after getting the professor out of the machine which he has invented, have to be careful with themselves when they go on an adventure.

Hitch in Time, A (1978) BFI Screenonline: Hitch in Time, A (1978)

In a traditional Indian wedding, the rituals not only unite two individuals, but establishes the bond between two families and their culture. The bay of Elefsina, the modern name for ancient Eleusis, is a graveyard for ships named after gods and nymphs. I’m not allowed to say which ones,... Familiar bêtes noires – Kennedy, Nixon, Kissinger, Clinton – rub shoulders with lesser-known preoccupations: P.G. Wodehouse, Princess Margaret and, magisterially, Isaiah Berlin. Here is Hitchens on the (first) Gulf War and the ‘Salman Rushdie Acid Test’, on being spanked by Mrs Thatcher in the House of Lords and taking his son to the Oscars, on America’s homegrown Nazis and ‘Acts of Violence in Grosvenor Square’ in 1968.That I had embarked on Hitch-22 for altogether un-Falklands-related purposes, having remembered nothing in it (from the time of the book’s original release) with regard to the Islands. She said she’d thought that it was excellent, and then went on to tell me just how galling she had found it that Jacobo’s son, Héctor (exile and US citizen, journalist and founder of the Americas half of Human Rights Watch) had in later life become Argentina’s Minister of Foreign Affairs in the Kirchner government. From 2010 –15 he made a major point of reigniting the hitherto fractionally quieter sovereignty argument over the Falkland Islands, announcing that they would “be under [Argentinian] control within 20 years”. If you are in Australia or New Zealand (DVD Region 4), note that almost all DVDs distributed in the UK by the BBC and 2entertain are encoded for both Region 2 and Region 4. The UK and Australasia are in the same Blu-ray region (B). The gentleman proceeded to give high praise to my speech. He underlined the fascistic nature of the junta and went on to call attention to its aggressive design on the Falkland Islands, where lived an ancient community of British farmers and fishermen. In 1978 this didn’t seem to be a geopolitical detail of any consuming interest, but I do remember agreeing with him that when challenged about its own depredations, the Argentine Right invariably tried to change the subject to the injustice of British possession of the Falklands. But there is also a passage that might have served as dire council to the George W. camp in 2002, whose words Hitchens ought to have shouted into a few ears, while he had them:

A Hitch in Time · LRB 22 November 2021 Sam Kinchin-Smith | A Hitch in Time · LRB 22 November 2021

In my album of things that seem to make life pointful and worthwhile, and that even occasionally suggest… that there could be a long arc in the moral universe that slowly, eventually bends towards justice, this would constitute an exceptional entry.” He proceeds to remind the reader of the “talismanic” name of Jacobo Timerman, one-time editor of Argentina’s La Opinion newspaper (“a vivid example of the great tradition of secular Jewish dissent”). He also points out Timerman’s own memoir, Prisoner Without a Name, Cell Without a Number, which “clothed in living, hurting flesh” the disgusting reputation of the junta regime, a sub-species of “radical evil, that spanned a whole subcontinent” and defiled the highest offices of a supposedly modern and civilised state.Have a low budget for your wedding? There's nothing wrong with that. If you're cutting costs like having the wedding at home or at a park, you can really dress up the event by incorporating a carriage. It's an inexpensive way to add to your event.

A Hitch in Time (1978) - IMDb

Arriving in a Horse & Carriage on your wedding day is without doubt the most romantic experience you could wish for. If you’re looking for a beautiful horse, understatedly elegant carriages and a highly professional, gold medal service, look no further. Its your Special day…..Our service to you is as individual as your wedding day plans! We love being a part of your celebrations and tailor our services to your requirements with complete flexibility in the services we provide. Whether it be delivering the Bride or Groom to the church/venue, taking newlyweds to the reception, even for a short drive with the perfect opportunity for photographs ~ its your day!Ms. Linda, I can't thank you enough for your part in making my daughters wedding day so magical ! I received numerous positive comments from friends and family about how surprised they were to see Bingo and you rounding the corner with our beautiful bride! You and Bingo were impeccable!