Chippenham & Beyond original

This is how Sylvia Plath put it, hard and clear, in her last poem, "Edge": "The woman is perfected./ Her dead/ Body wears the smile of accomplishment,/ The illusion of a Greek necessity/ Flows in the scrolls of her toga,/ Her bare/ Feet seem to be saying:/ We have come so far, it is over.." Dead indeed. The bare feet suggest the slab, which makes "toga" only a fine word for a morgue shroud. And knowing what we do, about what the poet herself was about to do, we can't help reading these lines as an imaginary, anticipatory self-portrait, post mortem. The cause of death and of "the smile of accomplishment" is suicide.

A bright yellow holdall was yesterday stealthily being stowed on 60 feet of pink racing machine ahead of a 12-day, 3,000-mile dash across the Atlantic.

British crews opened their Olympic campaign by scooping up five gold and two silver medals and topping the overall points at the first round of the rowing world cup. Ghosts were laid and opportunities realised, not least by the men's four who, robbed of trying out their new line-up when newcomer Tom James went out with a rib injury, outshone their event with young Tom Lucy as substitute.

As sunshine streams through the windows of his Covent Garden office, Trevor Beattie picks up a DVD and presses play. Up on his television screen, pictures appear of the most recognisable man in British advertising, strapped into a chair and wired up like Gordo, the squirrel monkey who was launched into space in a Jupiter rocket at Cape Canaveral half a century ago.

As last week seemed to herald the beginning of the English summer, so this Thursday - the opening day of the first Test at Lord's - brings the start of "the Season", the loosely grouped chain of events in which sport, opera and gardening have traditionally met social snobbery, hidebound dress codes and British and international royalty.

What have you done today that was difficult? The truth is that most people probably won't have pushed themselves as hard as they could. Why? Because difficult means burning the midnight oil. Difficult takes all the grit and determination you can muster. But for Honda, this philosophy lies at the heart of everything it does.

Dean Windass is 39 years old and Nick Barmby is 34 and both were born in Hull. The pair might not feature much if the Tigers reach the Premier League next season but they picked their moment here at Vicarage Road, a goal apiece making almost certain that they will continue to shape the club's destiny in the short-term at least.

Serbs have voted for close ties with Europe in parliamentary elections seen by many as crucial to the country's future.

The multinational drugs company GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) downplayed an early warning about the rising number of people who have suffered heart attacks after using one of its drugs, abacavir. An anti-Aids medication, abacavir is taken by tens of thousands of people worldwide.

Antidepressant drugs may help the immune system fight serious illness, research suggests. They enhance the activity of natural killer cells, key elements of the immune system, and could help the body combat infections such as HIV, and even cancer

Soaring temperatures which made the weekend feel more like high summer than mid-May sent thousands of people dashing for the coast. Saturday was marginally warmer - Herstmonceaux, East Sussex, was the hottest place in the country at 27.3C, the Met Office said - but temperatures yesterday still hit 26C in Exeter, London and Manchester.

Dean Windass is 39 years old and Nick Barmby is 34 and both were born in Hull. The pair might not feature much if the Tigers reach the Premier League next season but they picked their moment here at Vicarage Road, a goal apiece making almost certain that they will continue to shape the club's destiny in the short-term at least.

The big days tend to bring out the giddiness in Sir Alex Ferguson. Witness the jig he essayed down the touchline at the JJB Stadium in the style of a tipsy grandfather at a wedding; the hearty singalong with his club's fans and, finally, the bold statement. Yesterday, as Ferguson savoured his 10th Premier League title, the Manchester United manager said that his team, and not Chelsea, had the momentum to win the Champions League.

Millions of pounds worth of soft fruit and vegetables are likely to be left to rot in fields this summer because of a shortage of foreign pickers caused by the falling value of the pound and new restrictions on the number of seasonal labourers allowed to enter Britain, farmers' leaders have warned.

In the bizarre mind-set of Thaksin Shinawatra, this demolition of Manchester City will have been vindication of his plans to dismiss Sven Goran Eriksson and the Swede was last night seeking immediate talks with the former Thai prime-minister.

Crystal Palace's manager Neil Warnock wrote in these pages on Saturday that his most enjoyable journey home this season followed a superb rearguard action at Stoke and that the worst was after conceding a late equalising goal at Bristol City in February. The trip back along the M4 following tomorrow night's second leg of the Championship semi-final play-off is likely to set a new high or low, depending on whether his team can overcome the advantage that City established on Saturday with David Noble's superb 30-yard shot in the third minute of added time.

As it turned out, Everton's victory yesterday ensured Villa could not claim automatic Uefa Cup qualification, and Tottenham's defeat meant West Ham would finish in the top half of the Premier League table whatever. But two sides who were surely aware of the relevant results before they left the pitch nevertheless produced the kind of open, eventful match for which Upton Park has become celebrated over the years.

Kevin Keegan might be resigned to a fate among the also-rans but Everton alone have given the Premier League aristocrats a run for their money this season and they were rewarded for that yesterday with the Uefa Cup place that Aston Villa had threaten to steal.

While Ebbsfleet United are now owned by shareholders sourced through the internet and have a sponsor who can whisk them away to France at a moment's notice, the man who scored their winner on Saturday is altogether less exotic.