‘Lett us’ rejoice, donuts reign.

Then we know whose fault it was for bringing doughnuts to the office. You should have been a lettuce merchant. Then we’d have a slimmer Cabinet.

As a male short arse, I think I am more than qualified to chip in here.

Leaving aside the aesthetics, being short is a disadvantage in many ways. Your stride is shorter, so you have to make more steps to cover the same distance. You struggle to carry a backpack because you’ve got a shorter back. You struggle to walk uphill because you’ve got shorter legs. If everything else is in proportion, you’ll weigh less so you cannot carry as much weight. You have shorter arms so you’ll struggle at anything involving arm movement (rowing, racket sports, swimming, martial arts).

Since you’re small, you have a larger surface area to volume ratio so you struggle in colder climates.

There are no sports where being short is an advantage. When you’re short, you know you’ll do perform worse than everyone else.

The only advantage is that you present a smaller target so there’s less chance of getting shot.

In fact, I do not think he is the EU’s pygmy mascot.

It is his whole shape and looks that are so pathetically funny.

He looks like an advert for Cow and Gate (forty years later).

Talked to him once at a consultants gathering. Came up to my chest. Figured he was still a growing young pup. Got that wrong.

Short genes.

“[Daphne – Height does not affect men’s ability but it affects their perception of themselves, and that in turn affects events and those around them. Women tend not to be similarly afflicted.]”

In fact they should mentally zero that perceived handicap because others, not ever stigmatised by it, are always struck at how it effects the short set in a very specific way: as though the climatic conditions really are from two different hemispheres.

It is only because it happens repeatedly that we are able to see that being short is a really big deal to those who are short. One would expect a sense of humour to take over at some point. Instead, sadly, it is often – but not always – envy that takes its place.

For this self-conscious short sort, proportion of perspective materialises into a reality gap.

In as far as tall goes, one would then need to further qualify into tall (for Malta) and elegant, which Alex Sceberras Trigona isn’t, for example.

When I read this piece I immediately thought: one of the AM Cassar Torreggianis would fit the look perfectly, as would one of the darker-haired Tabones. (I’ll mention these because they have a certain amount of political exposure).

Otherwise tall and slightly stocky would garner a couple of more candidates, but very few in the pool that would fit the bill remarkably.

That’s if we’re sticking to male candidates only.

I sat next to him on a flight. Quiet as a mouse, he was.

A PM maybe not, but we had no shortage of overweight cabinet ministers.