Before Lizzie Cernik puts everybody off online dating (Dating burnout: meet the people who ditched the apps – and found love offline, 18 January), let me suggest you reinstate Guardian Soulmates, which was by far the most reliable dating site. I met interesting and gracious men, who were invariably socialists too, which was always my top priority. I’m now 83 and in a loving and equal relationship. I was lucky to be able to use Soulmates.
Jude McGowan
London
• One morning, in the 1980s, I phoned BT directory enquiries and asked the operator if she knew a recipe for bread sauce, as I was cooking a Christmas lunch for the first time (Letters, 16 January). She kindly helped me out, and later that evening phoned me back to ask how it went.
Colin Davies
London
• Did the Tories get an early bite at the ChatGPT chatbot (Report, 13 January)? Writing to my MP on diverse subjects, I get back closely typed, two-page replies that resemble each other but are empty of content. Just wondering.
Jenny Tillyard
Seaford, East Sussex
• In reply to Ian Grieve’s question (Letters, 20 January), tortoises most certainly can’t swim. As a child my husband demonstrated this by putting Torty in a bucket of water, which sank. Fortunately, Torty lived to tell the tale, dying fairly recently aged about a hundred. My son announced his passing by proclaiming: “The oldest member of the family has died.”
Ros Clayton
York
• I think what Ian Grieve needs is a turtle.
Fiona Collins
Carrog, Denbighshire
