What is it about ducks? The other morning, Chris Patten, the former EU Commissioner for External Affairs (and now Chancellor of Oxford University), described the EU Constitution as a “dead duck” after the Dutch referendum result. This morning I heard another politician on the radio describing Jacques Chirac in the following terms: “He may be a lame duck president, but he’s a lame duck with a bite”. And who has ever seen a lame duck anyway?

Update: My daughter reminds me that she was once bitten by a duck. But that was because he coveted the bit of chocolate cake she was holding at the time.