It’s been a good week for ... running
Research suggests every hour you run could prolong your life by seven hours. The study, by Iowa State University, means runners live around three years longer than non-runners.
Having done my fair share of running in the past, I’m afraid my joints don’t agree. Unless those extra three years are spent creaking about on a zimmer frame.
It’s been a bad week for ... posh cooking
They are the epitome of middle-class cuisine: homely, rustic-looking and, of course, they cost a fortune. Cake queen Mary Berry is probably the most famous Aga fan, but I suspect ownership of the green welly of cookers goes to the very heart of the British establishment.
Now Aga owners throughout the land – OK, middle England mostly – are shoring up Waitrose micro meals as fear simmers over home security.
A cybersecurity expert claims that an app that lets Aga cooker owners remotely control their ovens could be hijacked by hackers.
Think of the diplomatic instability this threat could cause. After all, I suspect the entire Tory Cabinet goes home to one after a hard day messing up the country.
Security specialist Ken Munro, of Pen Test Partners, has found vulnerabilities in the "iTotal Control" system used to control the newest models. "If you were maliciously motivated, it wouldn't be very difficult to switch off people's Agas remotely," said Munro. And if ovens could be turned on or off by hackers, surely it's only a matter of time before Yorkshire puddings become weapons of mass destruction?
"We take such issues seriously," said an Aga statement, "and have raised them immediately with our service providers so that we can answer in detail the points raised."
Meanwhile, MI5 are doubtless on high alert for fears that an Aga hacker could bring down the British establishment. Number 10 has suspended Brexit negotiations to fiddle with knobs in case the roast beef might spoil. Emergency takeaway provision has been made for Downing Street. But nothing foreign, mind. Soon the local Indian restaurant won’t want to trade with Theresa May anyway. It’s reported that a pie shop is on 24-hour emergency standby.
With top spooks working on the case, the plot is
straight out of an Aga-tha Christie book.
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