We have the character of an island nation: independent forthright passionate in defence of our sovereignty. We can no more change this British sensibility than we can drain the English Channel. And because of this sensibility we come to the European Union with a frame of mind that is more practical than emotional.

By the time the children go to bed I am as drained as any mother who has spent her day working car pooling building Lego castles and shopping for the precisely correct soccer cleat.

People drain me even the closest of friends and I find loneliness to be the best state in the union to live in.

The culture of independent film criticism has totally gone down the drain and this seems to come with the territory of the consumer age that we are now living in.