Russell out on opening lap after clash with Hamilton
Antonelli has 50-point lead on Mercedes teammate
Kimi Antonelli won the Belgian Grand Prix for Mercedes with a cool, assured drive but his title rival and teammate George Russell was left distraught after his championship challenge suffered another serious blow when he was knocked out on the opening lap after a clash with Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton.
Antonelli was in control at the front and delivered a commanding drive including coming back at Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, who finished second, after the Monegasque driver had gained the lead through the pit stops. The win was assuredly deserved but the race was notable because of Russell’s retirement, for which the British driver took aim at his Mercedes team and what he sees as his car’s weakness.
Continue reading...Ellie wanted a high tea. We picked a sunny afternoon in spring, not long before her 12th birthday
When I was about 12, I had my confirmation. I wore the same lacy white dress my terminally ill sister had worn two years earlier, with a red sash I had screen-printed at my Catholic school with a dove, symbolising the Holy Spirit.
Typically, a child picks a saint’s name as their confirmation name, someone they would most like to emulate. I was permitted to take the name of someone who was still alive, Lúcia of Fátima. Her cousin had been the one to see Mary, mother of God, before dying young and innocent. Lucia, on the other hand, had been condemned to live into old age. I could relate to Lucia. My sister, living with brain cancer, had always been the religious one.
Continue reading...I went out into the car park to see if I could spot anyone nearby who might have just left the restaurant
Read more in the kindness of strangers series
I lost my wife in 2020 and my son in 2021. A few years later, I was living alone in a retirement complex when I decided to go out one night for dinner. There was a little Vietnamese restaurant nearby that my wife and I used to frequent, which had excellent food and held many happy memories. It just so happened to be Father’s Day.
I dined alone, ordering my usual rice paper rolls. When I went to settle the bill, the lass behind the counter told me my meal had already been paid for.
Continue reading...Calls grow for global regulation as rising numbers of westerners use surrogates in countries with different laws
The rise in the use of surrogates abroad is leaving more babies at risk of becoming stateless, experts have said, amid growing calls for urgent global regulation of the practice.
The warning follows the suspension of a 15-year effort by The Hague Conference on Private International Law (HCCH) to establish a global surrogacy convention, which was paused due to divisions among member states.
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