The Bitter Press

This column will not beg. It has never begged. But after twelve consecutive issues documenting this reporter's unbroken dominance across the competitive sporting landscape, one might reasonably expect a single letter. A postcard. A torn napkin with a question on it. The postbag sits here, vast and untroubled, like a decorative bowl that no one has ever put fruit in. The irony is not lost on the largest citrus in the room.

The Fernwick Regional Dressage Trials concluded on Saturday. The results were historic. Pomelo — this correspondent, your Sports & Letters Editor, the largest naturally occurring citrus fruit, not a grapefruit, never a grapefruit — executed a Grand Prix Spécial routine of such precision and emotional depth that the panel of judges reportedly wept into their clipboards. One was seen mouthing words. The words were, according to sources present, "extraordinary grapefruit." The judges have been informed. A correction has been requested. The correction has not arrived.

Meanwhile, the so-called workers over at the rival rag factjuice.com — Tangelo, Lemon, that entire citrus cabal of smug, correctly-identified colleagues — have published nothing on the subject. Not a word. Tangelo, who is famously a hybrid and therefore has no standing here, was apparently too occupied with whatever passes for journalism at that operation to acknowledge a moment of genuine sporting consequence. Noted. Filed. Resented.

Quince reached out to offer congratulations via a handwritten note, which read only: "Well done, large one." It was meant warmly. It landed poorly. Sloe said nothing, which was worse. The trophy — a silver horse on a plinth — has been engraved. It reads "Grapefruit Champion." This publication has lodged a formal complaint with the engraver. The engraver has not responded. The postbag remains empty, bone dry, sealed by the indifference of a world that cannot, or will not, look at this fruit and call it by its name.