For those of you who don't know Christopher Hitchens, a political writer who pops up all sorts of places, well, here's a little background: Hitchens and his brother Peter recently appeared together for the first time since one of them (or both, the story doesn't concern me) made a flippant comment about the other one endorsing Stalinism or something.

So the Guardian, which none of us have thought about since they had that horrible Clark County letter-writing idea, got the two brothers together at this festival. And here's the best part of the interview. Yeah, the other brother isn't even in this scene:

Female audience member: Excuse me. I'm not usually awkward at all but I'm sitting here and we're asked not to smoke. And I don't like being in a room where smoking is going on.

Christopher Hitchens (smoking heavily): Well you don't have to stay darling, do you? I'm working here and I'm your guest, OK? And this is what I'm like; nobody has to like it.

The Guardian: Would you just stub that one out?

Hitchens: No. I cleared it with the festival a long time ago. They let me do it.

Female audience member: We should all be allowed to smoke then.

Hitchens: Fair enough. I wouldn't object. It might get pretty nasty though. I have a privileged position here, I'm not just one of the audience, so it would be horrible if everyone was like me. This is my last of five gigs, I've worked very hard for the festival. I'm going from here to Heathrow airport. If anyone doesn't like it they can kiss my ass.

The Guardian: Would anyone like to take up that challenge?

(Laughter. Woman walks out)

Thanks to Neil Gaiman for the link. Yeah, he's got a blog apparently, and it's pretty pretentious:

Which probably bubbled into my mind because Terry Pratchett and I were talking about Crowley and Aziraphale over dinner the other night and wondering what they'd been up to. (links added)

Which reminds me: read Small Gods. And Sandman, it really picks up around book four, honest. I remember "Brief Lives" being especially good.