Technical issues aside, I enjoyed talking about football with Mark Littlewood on UK Live’s World Cuppa yesterday.

It helped that the main topic of our conversation was Dundee United’s very brief foray into US soccer almost 60 years ago because it meant I avoided having to talk about team selection and/or tactics ahead of England’s match against Panama tonight.

Never in my wildest dreams did I think I’d be asked to appear on a World Cup football show.

UK Live is a new YouTube channel launched a couple of weeks ago by former Talk presenter Mike Graham, and one of the other presenters (during the World Cup at least) is former IEA boss Mark Littlewood.

I went to the dentist last week for my biannual check-up, something I only started doing when I went private a few years ago.

On this occasion I was in-and-out quite quickly but I didn’t get off scot-free because I was given a bit of a telling off for allowing plaque to develop on some of my lower teeth.

Despite the quivering lip as he announced he would be standing down as prime minister, Keir Starmer will get no sympathy from me.

However, I won’t go into all my grievances against Sir Keir because this post is not about him but his heir apparent, Andy Burnham.

Quick update on the World Cup which is now into the second round of the group stage.

If I gave the impression in a previous post that I’m far less invested in the tournament than I was when I was younger, that’s still true but I am following it, although the number of games I’ve watched from start to finish can be counted on one hand.

Following today’s news that Jeremy Clarkson was diagnosed with prostate cancer last year, I thought I’d update you on my own medical situation.

Spoiler: nothing to be alarmed about.

‘Smoking is a private, not a public issue. If the state can be induced to take its hands off smokers, iconic artist David Hockney will deserve much of the credit.’

Guest post by John Staddon, professor emeritus at Duke University and author of Unlucky Strike: Private Health and the Science, Law and Politics of Smoking, with illustrations by David Hockney.

Sad to hear that David Hockney has died, aged 88. One of Britain’s finest artists, he was a guest at several Forest events, including a private dinner at Boisdale and a reception at the House of Commons.

My favourite memory, however, was the day he travelled to Brighton to speak at a fringe meeting organised by Forest at the 2005 Labour Party conference where we were protesting against the proposed smoking ban. More on that below.