I have grown used to flying back from Greece three or four times a year with half a dozen litres of gin clanking in my hand luggage. This is absurd, I know no, not the fact of my bringing it (entirely understandable since it costs about a third of the price there, all duty paid) but the fact that I am allowed to. Apart from the waste of fuel involved in lugging the stuff from the UK (where it's made) to Greece and back, there is the matter of security: a heavy glass bottle, smashed, is a more potent weapon, surely, than almost everything the airlines do ban, from corkscrews to crochet hooks. Clearly, large amounts of money depend on this absurdity being allowed to continue.

Now I have taken to carrying Greek lemons to go with my gin. This is not because they're cheaper there (though they are) but because I have started to grow them myself. Actually, this is something of an exaggeration. The trees were a gift from dear friends some years ago and were put into the earth by Rosemarie. My contribution has been the occasional squirt of water (there are no hosepipe bans in Naxos, since they know how to gather and conserve the precious commodity of water and it's cheaper than it is here). "Watering and slaughtering", as I define it the second being my annual battle against the superslugs of Osney has always been my only contribution to horticulture. Oh, and harvesting I like that bit.

The harvest at Easter amounted to just five fruits, from one of the two trees we have. They have been a long time in coming: winds in the Cyclades are not kind to unprotected trees and ours were exposed to the Meltemi over six or seven summers during which I began to doubt if they were ever going to sprout blossom. Then construction of a higher wall brought a better shield from the wind, after which the trees soared upwards and outwards. Next year, perhaps we shall be able to make marmalade, or even Citron, Naxos's celebrated lemon liqueur, if someone will give me the recipe.

This year, we have just been using them sliced into our gin and tonics. Now some gin drinkers, I know, will regard this as a serious error. Gordon's once placed an advertisement in various magazines and newspapers telling us that we should not add citrus fruits to G&T because their powerful flavour ruins the delicate taste achieved by a finely judged balancing of the botanicals used during manufacture. Well, phooey to Gordon's, a company for which I entertain little respect following its cynical decision to slash the strength of its gin itself an important contributor to flavour from 40 per cent proof, to 37.5. It claimed this was done to satisfy consumer demand for a lighter drink; the annual saving of millions of pounds of duty naturally had nothing to do with the decision.

Since last month, my favourite gin has been Martin Miller's Westbourne Strength, to which I was introduced through a generous gift from the company responsible for its public relations. Hopeless provincial that I am, I had not seen the product on the shelves of its principal London stockists, Harvey Nichols, Selfridges and Harrods. You can also buy it at Oddbins, though its price a penny less than thirty quid might prove off-putting. At 45.2 per cent proof, it is one of the strongest gins on the market. Its makers, the Reformed Spirits Company, founded as recently as 1999, also produce a gin at 40 per cent. This is easier on the wallet, at £21.50. Both products are claimed (accurately) to provide a soft, clean flavour. This arises in part from the choice of botanicals that go into them including nutmeg, Florentine orris, coriander and cinnamon bark and in part from an unusual production process that includes a trip to Iceland, where lava-filtered water of exceptional purity is added to the concentrated spirit produced back home in the distillery. This "well-travelled gin" as the makers style it seemed an ideal accompaniment to my well-travelled lemons. (And, yes, I realise that all lemons are well-travelled. It's just that these ones travelled with me.) It was especially appropriate since Martin Miller's are not snooty about the addition of lemon to their product, but actually encourage it. They also suggest Fevertree premium tonic water added at a 4:1 ratio. But as I hadn't any of that, we had to make do with Sainsbury's. The result was exquisite.

Readers wishing to share the taste should note that there is to be a Martin Miller's gin bar at this year's Henley Regatta, between June 29 and July 2. It will be sited next to the Upper Thames Rowing Club, an excellent vantage point from which to enjoy world-class rowing over some cocktails created by leading "mixologist" that's a new one on me Alex Kammerling.

I wonder if I can take my own lemon?

My rash assumption that the Bishop of Oxford was against euthanasia on religious grounds or, at any rate, the religious grounds I guessed at has been contradicted in more than one letter to the Editor of The Oxford Times. Now Bishop Harries has himself written to me, explaining with his usual cogency what are his powerful motives for opposing the Joffe Bill.

I certainly see some merit in his arguments. He says: "Many old people, beginning to feel a burden on others, would feel an inward pressure to ask for drugs to kill themselves, even if their relatives went on assuring them that they weren't a burden. Furthermore, we can't always assume that relatives would be as pure as pure as far as their motives are concerned." Well yes. But in both cases, surely, others would be able to act to prevent wrong being done.

The courteous tone of Bishop Harries's letter is such as to make me regret my disobliging reference to "superstitious tosh" when discussing Christian belief. Even so, I am not prepared to be ticked off my him or anybody else for suggesting that he would consider self-destruction a mortal sin. Is not the sanctity of life a central tenet of Christian belief? Certainly it always seemed to be when I was being laboriously indoctrinated with it in my youth?

Anyway, this column wishes Bishop Harries well in his retirement. He will be much missed throughout the diocese.