The only genuine flash of insecurity comes halfway through the interview when I remember to congratulate him on his performance in Shame. But embarra… - Camilla Long

I'm quite relieved that Nigel Farage MEP has only one testicle. When the former leader of the UK Independence party (UKIP) had the other removed in 1987 because of cancer, the doctors offered him an artificial replacement to give him "greater social confidence". But to watch him screaming at Herman Van Rompuy as he did last month, saying the European council president had the "charisma of a damp rag", tearing around with a loudhailer on his campaign to oust John Bercow, the Commons Speaker, from his Buckingham seat, working "100-hour weeks", inhaling whole packs of Rothmans and choffing down hundreds and hundreds of pints, I dread to think what he would be like with ... two.

Perhaps the nastiest attack is reserved for someone outside the family: a description of a one-legged landlady who fails to provide Cusk with hot and cold running lattes on a riding holiday in Devon.

Actually, I'm feeling a little exhausted by the constant badinage — chatting with [Piers] Morgan is like endlessly throwing a stick for a demented borzoi, back and forth, back and forth, to the extent that after one particularly long and tiring session, I finally call him a tosser. He is thrilled: "Ha, ha, she cracks!" he says.