Matthew Parris: To 'She' Or Not To 'She'

The Times.

In this, Matthew's landmark 400th column for The Times he begins by announcing he is quitting Twitter; 'Life's too short'.

A quick check reveals he had sent a grand total of 53 tweets - often about his llamas - since joining a year ago ie 53 weeks ago.

Must have been quite time-consuming.

Lucky Times readers also learn; 'On Saturday, after nearly 50 years of shaving against the lay of the stubble, I’ve done a U-turn and will henceforward shave with the lay.'

So now you know!

Which neatly brings us onto his grandfather's only sex advice to his father; '"In the RAF”, said Squadron Leader Littler to his son, “you may encounter men who like to dress up as women. Don’t have anything to do with it."'

Shaving! Transvestites! Can you tell where this is going!!???

Beards and cross-dressing bring me to the transvestite winner of last weekend’s Eurovision Song Contest; and for me another first in my life: I actually found Conchita sexy. I’ve never in my life thought men pretending to be women anything but funny; drag can be a hoot, but sexual attraction hasn’t crossed my radar — until this Eurovision.

What a pro!