There's more to life - and, just occasionally, this blog - than the credit crunch and the recession. There's the rebranding of Norwich Union, for example.

You've undoubtedly seen the advertising posters. (They're very yellow, for one thing.) There's a series of them, listing various people, things and places that have renamed themselves over the years. The Quarrymen became The Beatles, William Cody became Buffalo Bill, Peak XV became Mt Everest and, with a nod to the shipping forecast, Finisterre became Fitzroy.

We were tickled by one example in the posters, though: "Leningrad to St Petersburg". If you remember your Russian history you'll recall that St Petersburg used to be called..... St Petersburg. It changed to Petrograd in 1914 before taking on Vladimir Ilyich's surname shortly after his death in 1924. The city reverted to its original moniker in 1991.

Which gives us the opportunity to resurrect an old Soviet-era joke:

A peasant is being interrogated by the KGB. "Where were you born?" the officer asks.

"St Petersburg," the peasant replies.

"Where did you go to school?" barks the KGB man.

"Petrograd," says the wretch.

"Where do you live now?"

"Leningrad," he wimpers.

"And where," asks the officer in his most menacing tones, "would you most like to live?"

The peasant straightens up, looks the goon in the eye and says, "St Petersburg!"

So how long until Aviva becomes Norwich Union again???

* Sticking with the branding theme, we're reminded of a cowboy who runs a half-million acre ranch in Wyoming called the "Bar L Half Moon 66 Circle Q Wavy River".

"And how many head of cattle do you have on yer spread," the new sherriff asks the cowboy.

"Just three," he replies.

"Three?" says the sherriff, astonished. "Half a million acres and you have just three cattle?"

"Tell you the truth," blushes the cowboy, "not many of them survive the branding."

We hope Aviva does.