I have no doubt children believe in James Bond as well as Father Christmas and who can blame them when the head of MI6 referenced Bond and Q in a recent speech.
On Tuesday Storm Barra brought heavy rain to London; wearing shoes with thin leather soles I got wet feet. When I worked on Water Street, an apt name, in downtown Manhattan almost forty years ago I got wet feet while my colleagues wore galoshes. If I may digress, not only do they keep feet dry; they preserve life. Mr Jeremy Fisher (a fictional frog), like Jonah, got swallowed, not by a whale, but by a trout. The trout spat him out, only eating his galoshes; an adventure worthy of a James Bond (a fictional spy) film.
I hope you know where this is going – if so, show me the way. I was lunching with the Baronets at Buck’s and we kicked off with lashings of Buck’s Fizz, invented at the club; known in America as a Mimosa. After a traditional Christmas lunch Barra was still chucking it and I took a short cut through the Burlington Arcade. This venerable old lady (1818) has always been adaptable. In the 19th century the rooms above the shops were brothels but it has moved up-market, no doubt to the regret of some St James’s flâneurs. At least one thing has not changed. Hancock’s, in the arcade, have made the Victoria Cross since the Order was instituted after the Crimean War.
The gates at either end of the arcade look as if they have been there for ever. Actually they were installed in the 1960s after a jewellery heist. The latest innovation is a Bond theme to mark the 60th anniversary of the first Bond film: Dr No.
Warning: this video is rated T, for tacky.