"Thick and rich"

Do note the quotes around the title. I would hate it to be thought I was describing the fierce-looking gentleman on the right who bears such an uncanny resemblance to Alan 'Zorba' Bates's brigand younger brother.

What a perfect example this is of how I've been brought low by Professore Baddeley of Democracy Street: he sends me a link to the "internet home of Corfu's first internationally available Extra Virgin olive" and up I shove it as if I was one of those gung-ho friendly supportive types, eager to support and nurture each and every local concern.

Faugh! As everyone knows, my default stance on these nouveaux arrivés is to write their name on a hit list and spend all day bad-mouthing them and throwing darts at their appallingly cheerful pics - not that yon Aristotle is exactly falling abaht giggling his knickers orf.

On closer scrutiny, Mr A's granite-jawed steely 1,000-yard stare is my kind of grimace.

Oh what? I bet he doesn't have to ask too often, "You looking at my bird?" (altho' I bet they are).

And quelle cute Katie she is with that peek-a-boo dazzling smile down there.

Do check it out.

His blurb has a ring of sincerity and I will earn brownie points galore from maman for uncovering a "Thick, rich oil that tastes utterly unlike the insipid yellow oil you're used to."

Loipon, Aris [no last name, as I can see, despite Maman's endless questioning] is:

"Taking the biggest gamble of my life. I'm returning to my Greek roots, living the peasant lifestyle ... with my fiancée Katie.

I'll be growing my own food, keeping animals, turning a derelict ancient house into a family home and producing the first ever commercially available Corfiot olive oil.

[My emboldenment]

It's a romantic dream, justified by a kernel of hard business sense: Corfu's 6 million olive trees produce 3% of the world's olive oil, but it's impossible to buy outside of the Ionian.

Well, that's not entirely true. Big producers buy Corfiot oil at rock-bottom rates, and market it as Italian.

That's how Italy exports three times as much oil as it produces, and sells it with Northern European fantasies of happy Tuscan peasants.

We're going to change all that. If you've ever seen Corfiot olive groves, then you've seen our majestic 400-year-old trees, but until now, you may never have had the chance to taste it ..."

Yadda yadda bli blu bli ...

But the chap talks a good game and he sounds exactly the sort of person I would want to read about in the new-look soon-to-return Island magazine [plug toady hint grovel].

I was going to write a glowing anonymous article about that Marjorie Holmes's noble makeover of the Bosketto Durrell Garden but ... well, the description pear-shaped comes to mind.

But back to Aris:

"Thick, rich oil that tastes utterly unlike the insipid yellow oil you're used to. Now, for the first time, we're going to sell it in the UK."

If that doesn't have Island writ large all over it, God didn't make those Little Green Apples and crumpled brown envelopes don't get shuffled to and fro on park benches or passed under desks or slid practisedly into shirt pockets. Loipon.

If I play my cards right, stern madam editrice will allow me to do my usual dispassionate write-up which means I get to meet peeking cutie Katie and fearlessly swoon under her spell in the cause of delivering a hard-hitting journalistic probe.

A tough scribble but someone's got to do it ... anything to keep me off the streets

Well spotted Badders. Extra gold star on the noticeboard for you.