The Queen went casual & we went ...nowhere

I did think about a trip to Oxford Circus. I vaguely recollect there's a shop there, in an old Tudor building, where the staff are friendly, helpful and guaranteed to wrap your purchases in tissue paper before popping them in a fabulous purple bag. Even if all you've bought is a birthday card.

Here it is look.

As it was, I just couldn't be bothered. Can't be bothered to book a restaurant, plan a holiday, do anything, really, that would take me more than half a mile from my house. I've become like the elephant tied to a tiny little stick who just assumes there is no escape and so doesn't even try to break free. That's me right there, in my pink cardigan. A year in what seems like a never-ending lockdown has finally destroyed any sense I have had of free will. Or maybe it's the weather.

Blame the Weather .... or Failing that Blame the Parents

I'll stick with blaming the weather. They may not be perfect but my parents tried their best and as any parent will tell you, we're all just muddling through. No-one is perfect.

Unlike Harry. Who has clearly been watching far too much TV.

Someone should have told him that The Crown is a little bit made up. He's lapped it all up as if it's a documentary and this week chose to go on Global TV to blame his own terrible hardships on the fact that his granny and grandad made poor choices about where to send his dad to school.

Aside from the fact that his grandpa died only about 5 minutes ago, and his 95 year old granny could possibly still be a bit upset, it's not very compassionate to go telling the rest of the world how rubbish they were as parents, is it? It's also very very unwise to go on record telling everyone what a fabulous parent you are when one child is about 2 and the other isn't yet born.

Trust me, there's a long road ahead and quite a lot can go wrong. Best keep schtum until they're at least 18. And even then, maybe, let actions speak for themselves. Raise some lovely, well adjusted, kind, polite kids and watch the world marvel at what a good job you've done. No-one likes a show off. And pushing your granny under a bus is definitely NOT something to be proud of.

Speaking of Buses

You may have missed this, but buses were all the rage this week, especially for the Labour Party.

First of all, Andy Burnham, who was pretty cross that his victory in the race for Mayor of Manchester was overshadowed by Kier mucking up his reshuffle, went on the airwaves to explain his success. Buses. Before Andy took charge, public transport was a mess. Now, Manchester can boast a network to rival that of London.

Not that Andy has ANY designs on a return to Westminster. Nope. None. He's happy where he is thank you very much.

As is Angela. Or Angie as she is known to her friends. Who is now the proud holder of the longest job title in the country

Angela Rayner Member of Parliament for Ashton-under-Lyne , Shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, Shadow Secretary of State for the Future of Work, Shadow First Secretary of State, Deputy Leader of the Opposition and Deputy Leader of the Labour Party.

She also went on TV, this time to say that the problem Labour faced during the elections was that no-one knew what Kier Starmer stood for. And that she was behind him 100%.

(Presumably as she pushed him under one of those oncoming London buses).

Crikey it's a jungle out there. I think I'll stay tethered to my stick.

Queen Leads by Example

No. That's not good enough. We can't all stay here in limbo. Whatever happens with this new variant, we have to find ways to keep moving forward. Ot at least to keep moving.

(In the olden days, Deb and I often had meetings up in London. We frequently took the underground. Mostly the central line. This was often a problem since central line trains are notorious for being full to bursting and being quite small in stature, we're not especially well equipped for pushing our way on.

Anyway, Deb had this theory that as long as we were moving, we were "on the way". Even if that meant going East towards Stratford in exactly the opposite direction to our destination, or taking the Hammersmith & City line which moves at a snails pace towards the wrong part of town.

"There we are" she'd say as we both settled down into the free seats in the half empty carriage hurtling towards Essex, "on the way!")

There we are, on the way. That time we were travelling by milk float. Feels a lifetime away.

Anyway, back to the Queen. Where she leads, we follow. She was back to work this week, off to Westminster to deliver her speech but this time in CASUAL dress. Gone were the robes and ermine, replaced by a nice frock and matching hat. The funniest thing, though, was that she couldn't quite ditch the crown.

Perhaps she thought that without it she could be mistaken for anyone's old granny and no-one would listen to her speech. Whatever the reason, the crown still accompanied her, but rather than travelling on her head, it was carried by a chap who was definitely NOT dressed in business casual and had a little cushion all of its own.

What will be on your cushion when you go back to the office? I'm thinking of finding a man with a cushion to carry my handbag for me since it's so long since I went out with one.

UEFA Sees Sense

With infection rates rising rapidly in Turkey, UEFA saw sense and switched the location of the Champions League Final, between two English teams, to .... Portugal. At which point the Portuguese Government placed England on a red list. Or something like that. Why? Well, it turns out the EU has a ban on non-essential travel to the EU from countries outside the block.

At which point, the Portuguese obviously decided that, on this occasion, they won't be listening to the folks in Brussels because they have a tourist season to save. I suspect the Spanish and Greeks may do something similar. Not that it will help us very much because there seems to be no prospect of those countries making our green list.

Unlike Australia and New Zealand (the slight problem being they won't let you in when you get there), Israel (you don't need me to point out the slight problem here), or Tristan Da Cunha (no problem at all, except that it's not on Easyjet's flight schedule).

This is Tristan Da Cunha. I believe it's somewhere in the South Atlantic. The Argentines didn't bother invading this one for some reason.

My Career as a TV Critic

Over before it began. Note to self: watch the thing before you pontificate on whether it will be any good or not.

Last week I predicted with totally unfounded confidence that The Pursuit of Love would be rubbish. It wasn't rubbish. Still don't like Lily James & I'm not sure what the point of it all is, but it was cleverly shot and the music was fun. It was frothy.

Whereas The Underground Railroad was, apparently, harrowing. I'm just not in the mood to be harrowed at the moment so I gave it a miss, having told everyone else they had to watch it. Sorry.

In defence of my cultural faculties, I was right about The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett. Read it within the week. Loved it. Deserves its place on the Women's Prize for Fiction shortlist.

Back to Work

In the absence of anything else to do this week, I'm back to work. Stephanie and I breathed a huge sigh of relief on Friday as we submitted a gratifyingly large number of CVs to our insurance company clients for consideration on our new returner programme. Only to realise that real work is still ahead of us as people are (hopefully) called for interview.

We may even manage a lunch. Face to face. If I can be bothered to book.

That's it folks. Don't let the weather, the Indian variant, the likelihood of a full-blown war in the Middle East, the politicians, the press or anyone else for that matter get you down. I'll leave the last word to Maya.