This secondary school problem doesn’t add up

We had just been handed a two-page form to fill in, accompanied by a 131-page booklet from the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea on how to do it.

Like thousands of other parents of year six pupils, we have until October 31 to make our choices. The council generously allows for six, in order of preference. The joke is there are only five in the borough and unless you believe there to be a Father who art in heaven, you will be lucky to name more than two.

We are the inbetweeners of the secondary system, that growing group of London parents living beyond the catchment of the nearest good (secular) state school yet unable to climb the financial rock-face of private education — especially with three children.

Until now our great hope had been Holland Park. John Humphrys, interviewed about his TV documentary Unequal Opportunities, which aired last night, said a head should "be able to terrify and enthuse the kids". Holland Park's Colin Hall does both and he's earned the school a place in the Good Schools Guide as a result.

We had been naively confident — until we consulted the fearsome booklet. Last year 939 applied for 240 places; 37 appeals were heard, only one being successful. The school offers 60 places each to four ability bands, starting with those who live nearest, measured to within four decimal places.

We logged onto Google maps and figured we were at least 1.25 miles away. The bright kids were all offered places up to 1.2 miles — only the academically challenged of band D got in from as far out as us. In short, there was a real possibility George wouldn't get in.
We then made the mistake of going to Latymer, a co-ed private school in Hammersmith. The facilities were astounding, the children seemingly all bilingual and brilliant. We felt guilty that as privately educated parents, we couldn't give our children this. We felt worse when we saw the sample test paper, which included questions such as "Find two values of a for which a ^ a = 9".

And even if our 10-year-old was tutored through the three-hour exam and we cashed in every asset we had, I'll never forget the words of a former tennis partner, a woman in her sixties, who said the financial burden of private education destroyed her family life "and we're still paying for it now".

In short, we've got six weeks to either move 0.05 miles due south or come up with a tidy sum plus transform our child into a maths genius. Since I've got as much chance of winning the National Lottery, I might as well try my luck. What were my numbers again? Ah yes, the kids' ages, mum's birthday, our old house number ...

Happy souls at MI5 leave me cold

To paraphrase John Lennon, life is what happens to you while you're busy not watching Spooks. All previous eight series — 72 episodes — since 2002 seem to have passed me by, though I know people who are absolutely addicted to it. As series nine began last night, I thought I'd tune in to see what all the fuss was about.

They're a happy lot, these MI5 spies. Poor Ros is dead, only six people have come to her funeral and Harry, head of counter terrorism, seized the moment to propose marriage to some other haggard-looking spook in the graveyard. It's not terrible — just quite earnest, humourless, violent and predictable. (Guess what, the Houses of Parliament don't get blown up!) The Wire, it ain't. At one stage, the self-obsessed Harry laments: "Ever feel that you can't go on?"
I'm with you there, Harry.

Even I don't wrap myself as warm as Wenger

The autumnal equinox falls tomorrow, after which it's increasingly more night than day.

My fear of the cold means that despite the Indian summer, I've already had the heating on and the 40 deniers out. But as cheimaphobics go, I've met my match in Arsène Wenger. Sitting directly above him at the Braga match last week, I was less interested in Arsenal's crushing 6-0 win than Wenger's wardrobe.

Even before halftime, on a balmy night, the thinnest man in football had donned a fabulous calf-length, hooded, padded coat. Forget shearling flying jackets and teddy fur — this season's must-have is the Wenger Puffa.

Another lost weekend on the Tube

To Spitalfields Market at the weekend for the Japanese festival, a mere 12 stops on the Central line direct to Liverpool Street station. It should have taken no more than 25 minutes. Wrong.

Trust me to have chosen the weekend in which 10 tracks were closed to maintenance. Is that a record? By the time we travelled via Westbourne Park to Baker Street, down the warren of tunnels and stairs to Bond Street on the Jubilee line and then picked up what was left of the working Central line to Liverpool Street, I was practically dragging the five-year-old, who was howling: "My legs don't work any more." TfL? More like Transport for Latecomers.