Tony Naylor assures us (Fish fingers taste test, 17 November) that no one was a foodie in 1986. However, Google confirms my memory that the word appeared in print at least as early as 1980, and was in common enough use by 1984 for Ann Barr and Paul Levy to publish The Official Foodie Handbook. Many “recent” ideas go back a lot further than we commonly suppose.
Donald Mackinnon
Newport, Gwent
• So an attractive school photograph is possible (School portrait wins award for Claudio Rasano, 16 November). At my school (nearly 50 years ago) we dreaded the results. My friend Graham came out a colour that Donald Trump would take decades to achieve.
Tim Grollman
London
• Maybe the only hope for a Democratic female president (‘She didn’t fail us, we failed her’, 12 November) is to identify a girl at birth, like a Dalai Lama, and bring her up in such rarified surroundings that she cannot be accused of any wrongdoing while at the same time teaching her everything she needs to know to be president.
Gillian Paczynski
Sunderland
• I am the same age as Alan Payling but my calculations of the ratio of LP to wages (Letters, 17 November) is nearer 10% than 25%.
12s 6d = 62.5p, £6 10s 6d = £6.52.
Ah, the benefits of decimalisation!
Duncan Grimmond
Harrogate
• Robert Vaughn’s flycatching in The Magnificent Seven (Letters, 17 November) wasn’t such a supreme moment: there were several flies and as he gazed at his sole captive he drawled: “There was a time when I’d’a caught all three.”
Margaret Philip
Diss, Norfolk
