Not wanting to be alone in late middle age isn't much to base a marriage on. She had a thing for him over 30 years ago which came to nothing as he wasn't interested and she seems to have based her present view of him on a fantasy from the past.

I've heard a few rumours over the years... And there have been a number of strange episode.

Like the time "she" was taken to court by the band Cockney Rebel for keep writing that her brother played with the group when actually they'd never heard of him.

There was never any retraction, "she" just stopped writing about it.

And of course the supposed "Rock Star" boyfriend who is famous enough to go on world tours but not one single picture of "him" and Liz ever appeared in a magazine or newspaper anywhere... Maybe they were just very discreet... But really??? Is it plausible that they could have kept their "relationship" entirely out of the papers all that time?

Clearly we know there IS a person called Liz Jones and we know she writes for The Mail... But as to everything else... Believe nothing...

It was Cockney Rebel and I'm not sure it went to court, but it was a total lie.

Well believing nothing is fine but unfortunately the people she is hurting are real. I am. David certainly is. The rock star - I have no idea but I personally doubt he ever existed except in her fantasies.

I am getting seriously pissed off with the amount of times this skanky witch appears in the sunday mail, she seems to write the most outrageous tripe just to get peoples backs up. I don't think I've ever read a columnist who's as utterley nasty as she is. If she didn't get on with her sister, she should have just not written anything, but no, not that bitch, she will use anything just to get a column. Plus the fact that the paper has gone up to £1.60. I'm considering changing to another paper.

The 'boyfriend' - 'fiance', (whatever) who I used to think must be fictional, because what bloke in their right mind could stand to be slaughtered in print every week, wants his head examined, either that or he's got no pride at all.

Thanks. Have edited. I heard there was certainly threats of litigation. In the mad, secretive world of "LJ" we never really know what's happening...

You have my deepest sympathies.

I think you should follow the advice of other's on here and go to a rival newspaper with your story.

It sounds like this woman is destroying your life... Time to fight back.

The piece (I cannot bring myself to use the word "eulogy") about her sister was one of the most unpleasant things I have ever read. I am unable to imagine the hurt it will have caused LJ's family. So soon after her sister's death, LJ produces a self-absorbed horror which comes across as nothing more than a distasteful cobbling together of words for the sake of it. Shameful, really.

This week's diary...inter alia, another example of not giving a toss about inflicting collateral damage to Real People.

And then nasty little digs at Tennis Wives, aka the jealousy klaxon.

Cloud. Cuckoo. Land. I feel sorry for anyone whose life is within touch of her skewed radar.

I've decided it's not doing my blood pressure any good reading this diatribe every week, so I'm going to be changing papers as from this week.

Oh, just found the drivel about tennis wives in yesterday's Wail on Sunday.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/ar...LIZ-JONES.html

Honestly, what is the woman ON? As for the stuff at the end, about publishing the registration plates of motorists who've annoyed her .... ha ha ... I live in Islington and have seen her out and about from time to time. Go on, dare me ...!

See, if she didn't write the Dreary, in which she rants on about making demands of the Baker and complaining about his engagement ring being too small and cheap for her, and complaining if he doesn't come along to support her when SHE'S working and/or not taking her typing job seriously,then her sneers at women who wear giant rocks, threaten to withhold sex if they don't get new houses, and sit like concubines while their husbands play ping-pong would possibly hold a little more weight. They'd still be silly and obviously troll-baiting, but they wouldn't come across as hypocrisy.

Nor would her bleating about someone who swore at her when she wasn't driving fast enough, because she was blind with unshed family-loss tears, seem quite as offensive if she didn't constantly sneer and snip at the failings of strangers working in shops. Whose own lives might be a bit horrid that day.

Would the person (man?) who sent me a death threat recently, saying I have a plastic face, please make themselves known?

Fair enough.

I would also like the male driver of a white van who swore obscenely at me, his face a rictus of hatred, at 7.45pm last Sunday on Radwinter Road in Saffron Walden, to come forward before I contact his employer. I had just been to visit my parents’ grave, was in tears, and so a bit slow at a junction, but I didn’t really deserve his outpouring.
And finally, to the blonde woman in a 4x4 on Putney Bridge at lunchtime on June 26 who, when I indicated to pull over, swore at me out of her open window, and actually threw an object. Would she like to come forward, too, as I might well publish her number plate next week…


Honey, those people are not giving you hell because there is a picture of you above your column in the paper/online and they don't like what you write. They don't even know who you are. They just see some random woman in a car failing to fit in with their driving styles. You're an irritating nobody to them, just like shopgirls and junior reporters and all sorts of people are to you.

God, if you were to mention all the irritating things that happen when you are driving, you would fill up an entire newspaper very quickly. She gets fixated on minutiae.

I could hardly believe that piece about her sister - how hateful it was. The poor woman is scarcely cold, and Liz (her own sister) weighs in with her character assassination. There was no love, or sorrow expressed (except self-pity for Liz herself, of course), or even respect - if not for her sister, at least for her sons and more decent siblings. Just bitterness and jealousy.

Liz's family must absolutely hate her - not least because they know what to expect when they finally die. If one of my family did something like this, I'd never speak to them again.

Can Liz really be as unpleasant and lacking in self-awareness as she portrays herself?

The latest Dreary is possibly even more incomprehensible than usual, and the putative cliffhanger is, well, confusing.

The PS of her other article - about her sister's passing - however, is utterly vile and self-centered".

The Dreary seems to bear out the theory on here that there was more to the 'stalker' story than Liz was telling us. How on earth did the neighbour get hold of Nic's mother's phone number unless there was considerably more closeness than we were led to believe.

And why has Michael suddenly become Sam after all these years? I thought she said her nephew renamed him soon after the cat-scragging sheep-worrier joined the family? But she's referred to him as Michael for all these years

I'm annoyed with myself for continuing to read this drivel! I totally agree that the piece about her sister was just vile.

Today I'm in a rage about the fact that her dog is so lacking in training that she has to cart it around the house with her as it can't be left on its own. Yes of course puppies do chew but I'm sure this particular dog is old enough to have been trained properly by now.

As a caring and responsible dog owner of many years standing it makes my blood boil that Liz Jones appears to make no effort whatsoever to train her pets. It is simply not enough to feed them and give them shelter. Good, appropriate training is the absolute key to having a happy, healthy dog. It's the way that she comes across as so smug in a 'look at me I have naughty dogs and I can't help it' kind of way that winds me up so much.

FFS Liz do not take in any more mutts to add to your out of control pack until you learn to teach them how to behave!!!!

I do apologise for my rant fellow forum users - but I feel so strongly about the welfare of dogs this sort of owner-behaviour really makes my blood boil.

This is the one she's dubbed "Gracie the nervous collie." (In addition to the late "Lizzie the nervous racehorse" and several other pets she calls "nervous.") Now, I understand that she takes in a lot of rescue animals, some of which come with psychological problems ... but it does strike me that something must be a bit wrong if so many of your pets are constantly "nervous"?

And it seem's she's gone ballistic at the Cook for the fact her dog is uncontrolable!

I'd tell her a $%^& off and look after her own pet's!

Ok, I know I've only got cats, but I've rehomed 5 over the last 6 years, and cats come with issues too - and, just as with dogs, you have to take the time to understand your animal(s) and their (various) needs and adapt your ownership accordingly.

Both dogs and cats respond very well to 'clicker training' - I have, only this week and in only 4 days, trained one of my rehomed cats (who came to us as a terrible furniture-scratcher) to scratch his sisal mats and scratching posts instead of the sofas and chairs. Four days. A cat.

Ok, not as impressive as a dog, which would be able to be retrained over a much larger range of behaviours over a more sustanined time, but the principle is the same. How did I do it? By researching clicker training for cats (seeing as you can't take them to classes like you can dogs!) and even Liz will have dog training classes somewhere close to her rural idyll! Yes, it's bl**dy hard work when you're constantly and consistently reinforcing the behaviour you want (and you get through a lot of cat/dog treats - I keep finding them in pockets!) but it really works.

There's no excuse, Liz.

(Mind you, the other cats - the ones who don't have scratching issues - have quickly cottoned on to what's going on too, and there're all scratching the sisal mats madly too to join in with the treats!. )

But, I forgot, it's always someone else's fault that Liz's dogs are untrained, isn't it - not hers. I mean, how are we to expect her to have the time to embark on something as fundamental as basic behaviour training for her assorted dogs, let alone stick to it consistently until that behaviour changes? Silly us. And poor Gracie for being left without the guidance she desperately needs (not to mention all the other animals - and especially the poor mauled cat from a few months back. )

I agree with the person upthread who said it's not enough to just adopt/rehome an animal and feed them twice a day. They need the rest of it too - the consistent approach to what is acceptable behaviour to humans and other animals (if they live in a multi-pet household). Anything else is just not fair on the animal.

Wasn't she, in the Dreary only a few weeks ago complaining that when she went to check out a country hotel as a possible wedding venue, the owners' collies were perfectly behaved whereas hers are smelly and disobedient? Hey, here's a radical idea: Maybe it's because SHE DOESN'T BLOODY WELL BOTHER TO TRAIN OR DISCIPLINE THEM?

This whole "my nephew renamed him Sam decades ago so we actually call him Sam not Michael" thing is very suspicious. Since Liz Only Writes The Truth, there is no reason why we should think that she has spared Sam's feelings by referring to him as his official but unused name in her columns until now. when presumably he has given her permission. Because he is a dog. And also, because she certainly hasn't spared the feelings of Nirps or Daaavid by giving them pretend names, and the FRS is probably not actually a real person so he doesn't count.

Why David is supposed to understand that a dog has to be babysat 24 hours a day rather than, you know, put outside like a normal pet, is beyond me.

Quite apart from all the animal nonsense - and I wonder if "Sam" in the "cliffhanger" is in fact Michael the murderous sheepdog or we're supposed to believe that Daaaavid has sent a text meant for SOMEONE ELSE OMG - I can't get over this, and various previous permutations thereof:

Any normal person would have stopped off at Sainsbury’s and bought food, made dinner, and picked up the burst carrier bags of rubbish in his garden as he had a guest coming! But not David. He had gone to bed.

Liz, you are not a guest. You're engaged to marry this man, which will at some point involve living together. You are FAMILY. Family get to see each other warts, garden rubbish, empty fridge and all.

If you can't see yourself or him as anything other than guests in each others' lives you should never have accepted his proposal.

http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/sleb_twa...-Star-identity

The sudden retrospective renaming of a dog is bizarre, even by the standards of LJ's bizarredom. Every dog in my life, either mine/my parents/friends, has had Their Name. It might become a diminutive (e.g. Lily became Lils) but the basic sound of the name remains the same: Lily did not become Snowdrop.

Crazy, anyway, to have a dog (Grace, who might - for all we know - actually be called Agatha) who can't be left alone at any time.

The whole fandango gets more weird with every word. The relationship twixt LJ and The Baker goes from a bit peculiar to just plain odd. Column fodder, with more than a small pinch of nastiness to anybody in LJ's flight path through life.

It's not Jim Kerr.

IIRC he had a a solicitor take out a 'cease and desist' order against her for constantly insinuating it was him in her columns. If her b/f had been that famous they'd have been photographed together at sometime in their relationship, and they never were. IMO 'the 'Rock Star' was just a mix of every famous bloke she ever had a crush on.

It is definitely not Jim Kerr.