Well, the weeks roll by and here we are at the end of the week i.e. Friday again. We have the usual chat with our domestic help and exchange news with each other. I needed to get an urgent form in the post so I popped down to Bromsgrove by car and then got my form into the Post Office which I wanted to send as recorded delivery. Then I collected our newpaper from the newsagent, telling him one of my favourite jokes in the process and then drove home. Then, with a slightly foreshortened journey Meg and I walked down to the park and claimed our usual bench. We had just about finished our coffee when our University of Birmingham friend accomapnies by our Seasoned World Traveller so this made the Bromsgrove Literary and Philosphical Society quorate and we contunued to debate some of our favourtite scenes from films. I have to point out that Seasoned World Trdavellor is an inveterate film watcher and there does not seem to be a significant film in the past 3-4 decades which he has not seen so the rest of us have to work hard to compete with his encyclopaedic knowledge. 

Today has been a day with some culinary successes in it. For a start, prepared our normal-for-a-Friday fish dish where we raided our deep freeze stores of pollock. To make this more tasty, we marinaded it with a Sweet Chilli and Garlic sauce (courtesy of Waitrose) and then cooked it on a bed of capers. The end result was a tasty fish where you would be hard put not to identify the meal as cod and we served this with a good helping of Calabrese (broccoli) – so this as success No. 1. This evening, I decided to make some soup in our soupmaker with some vegetables I had got in the freezer for a week and were well chilled. The main ingredients were basically parsnip and carrot in approximately equal proportions, complemented by a few sticks of celery and one large onion almost caramelised. Then to make the soup especially nice, I added about a third of a tin of coconut milk and about 3 soup spoonfuls of a Balti cooking sauce. The result was a beautiful creamed soup with just a hint of spice to it but I always serve it with a good dollop of Greek yogurt (which helps to cool it down from boiling) and some croutons. This was Sio delicious that I was glad I had only used up one half of it and still the rest ready for a meal with in the next day or so.

Most members of the population need to get braced for a severe blow to their household bidgets from April onwards. Those in work have got rises in NI contributions as well as a non-indexation of income tax brackets which is always the government’s sneaky way of raising income tax without saying so. Those in receipt of Universal Credit will have to accept jobs outside the spheres of employment for which they are qualified. But the real killer is going to be energy prices which will now rise by about 50% for everybody. In order to alleviate the ‘sharp spike’ the Chancellor of the Exchequer has announced that suppliers will be offered taxpayer-backed loans to knock around £200 off the more than £600 expected jump. But this is only a ‘loan’ so each of us will have to pay the £200 back in the next five years so we are, in effect, being bribed with our own money. And inflation may well have risen to 7% by then as well. And  I forgot to mention that there are council tax rises as well. So the overall effect of all of these increases is that Britons will experience the biggest drop in living standards since the present set of records began – probably fifty years ago.

In the political arena, Boris Johnson has lost one maore advider from his policy unit and another MP has sent in a letter expressing his lack of confidence with the Prime Minister. Also the backlash from the disastrous slur sent in the direction of Keir Starmer at Prime Ministers Questions last Wednesday continuing to reverberate with Sajid Javid now distancing himself from Boris Johnson’s remarks. A few cabinet ministers have tried to defend the Boris Johnson lie (Nadine Dorries springs to mind, who made herself looking absolutely ridiculous) but this is going to be like a running sore for the Johnson entourage.  An interesting statistic with which to round off the week – three cabinet ministers are now isolating because they have COVID (Grant Shapps, Nadhim Zahawi and Liz Truss)

Thursday is my shopping day and today I am due to try out a new supermarket store (well, one I have not used for about 4 years) I have decided to give Morrisons an experimental trial after my experience at Aldi last week. Last night, I spent a certain amount of time producing a shopping list of almost everything I could possibly buy. Today, I got up early and made sure that I got to the supermarket at just about 7.00am in the morning. Whilst there, I bumped into the one of our ex-Waitrose coffee shop friends that I FaceTime regularly. When we were having one of our regular chats last night, we said that we would probably bump each other at 7.00am in the morning and so it proved. However, we only had the briefest of chats as we were both intent on getting our respective shopping done and we scurried on our way with lists in hand. Altogether, I spent a good hour and a hlf shopping as I thought I would as I was unfamiliar with the layout and some things are not always where you expect to find them. Nonethless, at the end of the day, I was relatively pleased at the range of goods on offer and the overall size of the shopping bill. However, having shopped in smaller stores for the last year or so, I must say that Morrisons seemed quite large by comparison and although I did not do too much back-tracking (when you forget something), nonetheless I covered a goodly number of yards in my peregrinations. Out of a shopping list of more than 40 items, there was only one that I finished without and that I can probably get from Waitrose on my normal walk for the papers. Next week, though, is a bit of a dilemma. I may well go back to the smaller Aldi store in which I used to shop before its larger big brother opened. In some ways, I quite like a lot of the smaller stores without a vast array of choices and which makes shopping a much more compact experience. So next week, I am minded to try another experimental forage and then I will sit back and think about the balance of advantages and disadvantages associated with each of the local stores. 

Today, Meg and I took the car down to the park as were running a little late. We did not expect to see any of our regular crew and indeed we did not. We did strike up a conversation with an interesting young lady who was out exercising her labrapoodle. Not being a ‘doggy’ person and therefore not knowing much about this particular cross-breed, I thought I would explore a little and discovered from the web that they are a cross between the nation’s much-loved Labrador and Poodle breeds. Labradoodles, we are told, are kind and affectionate with plenty of energy and a playful nature, making them an ideal family dog. High energy, these active dogs are best suited to families who can take them for long, interesting walks of up to an hour a day. Certainly, this description seems to match up with the labrapoodles that we seem to notice every day in the park so perhaps there is a lot to be said for this admixture of genes. I often ask the owners whether such cross-breeds ‘breed true’ as they say, but they never seem to know.Then Meg and I got home to cook ourselves a vegetarian style lunch with a quiche as its centrepiece and then followed this up with a quick doze. In the late afternoon, there was some vital photocopying that needed to be done and I was reassured that everything concerned with the scanner worked like a treat, I employ a particular piece of software called ‘Vuescan‘ which had its origin in a small family firm in the United States. The founders were appalled at how many scanners were ‘junked’ because the original software had been lost or mislaid – easy to do if you have changed machines and cannot find the software to re-install it. So they set about writing an ‘all purpose’ scanner which will will run practically any basic scanner ever made and I have found it marvellous and easy to use. Not only is it free but regular free updates are also made available to registered users.

The political news this afternoon is centred around continuing feedback from the Boris Johnson personal (and unjustified) attack on Keir Starmer made last Wednesday.  Two of his key aides (his ‘policy chief’ who has been with him for many a long year and his communications director) have both resigned. Apparently, his policy chief pleaded with Johnson to make a genuine apology – but all Johnson could manage was a semi-retraction whereupon the two officials felt they had no option but to resign. As I write, No. 10 has revealed that both Dan Rosenfield, the prime minister’s chief of staff, and Martin Reynolds, Mr Johnson’s principal private secretary, are leaving their roles. Is this a case of rats leaving a sinking ship?

Today was always going to be a slightly foreshortened day because, for better or for worse, Meg and I wanted to be home in town to watch PMQ [Prime Minister’s Questions] at 12.00pm. So we ‘cut our coat according to our cloth’ and just made a lightening visit into town to pick up our newspaper before making sure that we were parked in front of the TV, coffee in hand, wondering what attacks would be made upon Boris Johnson in this post Sue Gray era.  Watching Boris Johnson’s typical blustering performance, I am reminded of the expression used by Charles Falcolner who was Lord Chancellor in Tony Blair’s government. He wrote a memorable newspaper article which was entitled “‘Greased piglet’ Boris Johnson could evade justice due to the Met’s disastrous move”. This headline evidently struch a few chords because there was a brilliant cartoon illustrating just this in last week’s Sunday Times and evidently most of the political class knows what a slippery and evasive customer Boris Johnson is. Dominic Cummings is on record as alleging that Boris Johnson lies to absolutely everybody including his own wife: ‘While it’s true that I think Carrie has been a dreadful influence, and it was incredibly foolish of her to start a briefing war with me and others, it’s also only fair to point out that he lies to her all the time about stuff and she’s often operating on duff information herself. This is obviously an incredibly toxic combination.‘ Today in Parliament, Meg and were watching to see if anybody could land a blow. The most critical point here is to have an account of what happened in the PM’s flat on the night of 13th November. Boris Johnson has consistently denied that a party ever took place but even the BBC’s political correspondent, Laura Kuensberg, is convinced by all of the accounts of the party, including the loud playing of Abba tracks that could be heard elsewhere in Downing Street. Ian Blackford, the SNP’s leader, specifically asked if there was a party held in the 10 Downing Street flat on 13th November 2020 and, of course, got an evasive reply in which Boris Johnson argued that he was working on COVID measures during the month of November (‘Greasy pig’ time again) So a well-directed and crafted question could not be landed. Incidentally, it is a very sad commentary on our Parliamentary life that Ian Blackford was thrown out of the Commons for the day when last week he specifically called the PM a liar. As this is ‘unparliamentary language’ , the Speaker felt he had no option but to suspend the SNP leader for the day. On the other hand, Boris Johnson repeated a lie about Keir Starmer that he was responsible for the non-prosecution of the serial sex offender, Jimmy Savile, whilst Keir Starmer was the Director of Public Prosceutions. This is a ‘meme’ that has been circulating on extreme far-right social media for some time now and had been comprensively refuted. Even Boris Johnson’s advisers told him not to repeat this well-known falsehood against Keir Starmer but evidently Johnson could not resist the jibe. The Speaker was in the position of having to rule that an MP who told the truth but used unparliamentary language (Ian Blackford, the SNP leader) had to be suspended for the day  whilst somebody who told a lie but did not use unparliamentary language (Boris Johnson) could not be sanctioned. Meanwhile, three more Tory MP’s have publicly withdrawn their support for Boris Johnson by submitting letters to the Chairman of the 1922 committee so we are now seeing a steady haemorrhaging of support, one might say ‘drip by drip’.

The big political announcement in tnhe Commons today was Michael Gove’s 300 page document promising the ‘levelling up’ of the UK. After a great deal of verbiage it was revealed that the whole of this agenda was to be accompanied by no new money. As Lisa Nandy was driven in exasperation to note at the of the the Michael Gove presentation ‘Is that it?’ One is tempted to retort that we don’t need any 300 page documents full of flim-flam – rather, all that it takes is a one line Excel formula in a spreadsheet which reverses (and compensates) all of the local authorities that had a disproportionate cut in the Rate Support Grant (or whatever it is called these days) during the years of ‘austerity’.

Tomorrow, I am going to try a new pattern in my weekly shopping. After a few years of pre-pandemic shopping at Aldi (followed by post-pandemic at Waitrose) I am going to try Morrisons supermarket in which I used to shop a few years ago. To prepare myself, I composed a computerised shopping list of all the items I might possibly need (some to be deleted as the need arises week by week) as to all intents and purposes I will be shopping in a ‘brand new’ (to me) supermarket.  So I intend to be there at 7.00am and we will see what happens.

Well, it is always nice to get rid of one of the ‘winter months’ and here we are in February with having had a pretty good winter so far. The last week or so has been dominated by a high pressure system which has generally meant blue skies, coolish mornings and the absence of snow, hail and rain which is often our lot at this time of year.  I am sure that the water companies will not be particularly happy as they rely upon precipitation in the winter months to fill up the underground aquifers and their profits will be adversely effect if they have to build or maintain overground reservoirs or if we have a long, hot summer that restricts demand. On Pilates days such as today, we tend to take the car into town as much to save time as anything else. So we collected our newspaper, made a lightning tour of Waitrose for some supplies and then treated ourselves to only a 15 minute stay on our normal bench. Then it was a case of scampering home and having a quick turn around before I walk down for my Pilates class.  I needed to sear off some chichen thighs before I adjudged that they could go on cooking slowly in the oven in the remains of the sauce from yesterday.

Last night, when I was up in the middle of the night and consulting my emails, I did receive one that was a pleasant surprise. Regular readers of this blog will know of the battles I have been having with the bank that looks after the communal affairs of our residents’ association to comply with their safeguarding procedures. Well, the email I got sort of indicated that we are now in the clear but they do not say as much. All that we do know is their admission that  ‘We recently contacted to you to ask for further information as part of your Safeguard review, however we have all we need. Thank you if you already responded to our initial request, any information provided will be added to your profile, but for now, there’s nothing else you need to do.‘  I suppose this is a roundabout way of saying that we have complied with their procedures but it seems a bit like a weasly worded email, particularly as later on they say they might jump upon me at any time for more information. The next thing will be an augument with them over fees as they now have started to charge us for each item which is a change to how the ‘free’ account has operated for the last 8 years or so.

In the wake of the Sue Gray ‘partygate’ (truncated) report to the PM and to Parliament, yesterday there have been two ‘U’ turns emanating from No 10 Downing Street today. The first one was an admission (after an initial refusal) that Sue Gray’s report will be published in its entirety once the investigations conducted by the Met have been concluded. The second ‘U’ turn is a reluctant admission that if the PM is subject to a fixed penalty fine for transgressing COVID regulations, that this fact will be released to the public rather being kept as a ‘secret’ with Downing Street. However as the names of members of the public who  have been fined are not released by the police into the public domain, then the same would apply to Downing Street – despite the overwhelming public interest. So a policy of secrecy and non-disclosure – anything but transparency – will extend to all of the law-breaking personnel in Downing Street which may extend to some very senior figures indeed. The promised ‘new regime’ at Downing Street, promised yesterday by Boris `Johnson, has yet to be take place but certainly the ‘old guard’  are doing all they can to protect themselves. Mind you, it will be quite possible that leaks might take place emanating from some disgruntled staff. In the meanwhile, another Conservative MP has indicated that he has sent in his letter to the Chairman of the 1922 (backbencher’s committee) but we knew this already. Another Tory MP who is a suppoirter of Boris Johnson has indicated that the report needs to be published in full and immediately and that some of the interventions by Boris Johnson’s allies had been ‘so cack-handed that the best way they could be of assistance to the prime minister would be to disable all their social media platforms and cease carrying out media interviews‘. Another clip has resurfaced in which Boris Johnson categorically assured Parliament that no party took place on his flat on 13th November, 2002 – now that this has been documented in the Sue Gray report and is being investigated by the Met, we can assume that the Met are not investigating something that did not take place? So do we have here ‘prima facie’ evidence that Boris Johnson lied to the House of Commons and this one fact, be itself, is enough for him to be removed?

Today it was announced fairly on that Sue Gray had delivered her interim ‘update’ (rather than a report) to the Prime Minister. So to a large extent, the rest of the day was a holding operation until the heavily redacted summary of the report is published, Boris Johnson has appeared in Parliament and the reaction of the Tory MPs in Westminster can be gauged. Meg and I took a hard look at the weather forecast and decided that we would walk down to collect our newspaper and then to pop into Waitrose to get some supplies. This we did and then we made our way to our normal bench  in the park where the weather was generally fine but it was somewhat on the cold side. We were just preparing to leave when we were recognised by a member of the congregation at our local church so we lingered for quite a lengthy chat about her dog which seemed incredibly enthusiastic and friendly not to only to us but to every similar dog of a similar heritage (broadly  a variety of poodle cross) We walked home and realised that we did not enough time to have a proper cooked lunch in view of the fact that we knew that Boris Johnson was about to make a statement to the House of Commons at 3.30. Whilst we having our ‘quickie’ lunch (a microwaveable beetroot risotto supplented by a tin of tuna and some petit pois), the Sue Gray interim report was published and we had a quick journalistic summary of some of its findings. From what we could tell, there were some pretty damning things even in the interim report whilst we must still await for the 12 most serious incidents of parties which were investigated for criminality by the Met investigation.

After we had lunched, we prepared to go down the road for a little ‘tea party’ in the house of our French friend where we were also to be joined by some of our Catholic friends who are near neighbours. We spent over two and a half hours of really interesting chat  whilst we consumed our tea and biscuits. All in all, we spent a wonderful afternoon and then raced home to be seated before the TV in order to get the full political news. It seems that Boris Johnson is under serious political threat even though the available published evidence is lightweight in volume. But what is published is damning in the extreme and tonight Boris Johnson is to have a meeting with all of his MPs and it will be fascinating to see what some members are prepared to reveal of this meeting once it has concluded.

Some of the key findings even in the abridged Gray  report are show below:

– 16 events in 2020 and 2021 were investigated – the Met Police are looking into 12 of them
– Some of the behaviour surrounding these gatherings is difficult to justify
– A number of the gatherings should not have been allowed to take place or to develop in the way that they did
– At least some gatherings represent a serious failure to observe not just the high standards – expected of government but also of the standards expected of the entire population
– There were failures of leadership and judgment by different parts of No 10 and the Cabinet Office
– The garden at 10 Downing Street was also used for gatherings without clear authorisation or oversight. This was not appropriate
– Some staff wanted to raise concerns about behaviours they witnessed at work but at times felt unable to do so
– Steps must be taken to ensure every government department has a “clear and robust” policy over excessive alcohol consumption in the workplace – which is ‘not appropriate’

Of these observations, possibly the most damning of all is the statement concerning ‘failures of leadership and government’, whilst a close second is ‘a number of gatherings should not have been allowed to take place’ In the House of Commons, Teresa May asked some devastating questions saying “So either my right honourable friend had not read the rules or didn’t understand what they meant and others around him, or they didn’t think the rules applied to Number 10. Which was it?” This drew only a fluffed reply from Boris Johnson. Some more revelations from the report are that Sue Gray has several more (damning) findings that have to be kept under locak and key until after the Met investigation is completed. In addition some 500 pieces of paper and 300 photographs have been handed over in evidence. One view that is emerging in a fast moving situation is that there may be enough MPs to send in letters demanding confidence vote in the PM but there is a serious division about tactics. There are two schools of thought one of which is to strike now before the issue ‘fades’ whilst the other is to wait for an event such as the May elections which may ultimately prove to provide the fatal blow.

As I walked down for my newspaper this morning, the sky was clear and bright blue but it was still quite chilly without some rainwear. I collected our newspaper, checking that it contained the ‘Culture’ section which details all of the TV and radio programmes for the week ahead. Then it was a quick breakfast whilst watching the new ‘Sunday Morning‘ hosted now by Sophie Raworth who has replaced Andrew Marr since the latter’s retirement. I must confess that after getting up and then two vigorous walks (there and back) I sometimes tend to doze – but knowing that it Liz Truss being interviewed, there was nothing much to keep me awake. On the subject of Sunday politics shows, Channel 4 are hosting a new evening show by Andrew Neil who could only stand GB News for a fortnight before falling out with them. On his new show, he is expected to reflect on the day’s news, interview heavyweight guests and look ahead to the coming week. Neil has agreed to present a Channel 4 documentary examining the prime minister’s leadership crisis: Boris Johnson: Has He Run Out of Road? is to be screened tonight. It will explore a string of scandals on the leader’s watch, including the Owen Paterson lobbying row and the continuing Downing Street party saga. Meg and I walked down to the park where we met (by prior arrangement) our University of Birmingham friend and then we were, in fact, joined by some other mutual friends who, like us, are regular park walkers. We discussed politics (of course) and eventually finished up talking about the causes and consequences of the 1958 Munich air disaster in which 50% of the aircraft’s passengers, including members of the Manchester United football  team, perished. It was later established that the crash was caused by the slush on the runway, which slowed the plane too much to enable take-off. The pilot was initially blamed for which he was very bitter (I knew his brother) He was cleared in 1968, ten years after the incident. Then it was a walk home before a somewhat delayed Sunday lunch (chicken thighs)

I have been feeling moderately pleased with myself, having got a file manager to work which had suddenly stopped working. On occasions, you may want  web page which is nothing more than a vehicle for a lot of clickable links. Although this can be done in HTML, if you have a file manager (with clickable links) then all you have to do is to put a .php program in each folder. I have had one such directory lister as they are called but for some reason it has suddenly just ceased working, presenting the user with just a blank page. I do not have the technical skills to wade through 400 lines of PHP code to discover what is the source of the problem – it might be quite a simple thing but the best thing to do is to abandon that directory lister and to find another. After a few judicious searchings on the web, I found a script which works quite well but does not quite give the neat, compact tabled results that my old program gave me. Anyway, I managed to ‘tweak’ the script so that each link became a clickable rather than a downloadable link and also got rid of a huge chunk of code whose function was obscure but not essential. I managed to get the program down to one quarter of its original length and it works fine for the purposes for which I want it. When I look at the ‘permissions’ associated with the script, provided one keeps the copyright notice in place, one is given the legal right to alter, modify and even sell the program as the spirit takes you. It is always very satisfying to find a computing solution that works, once you have run into a roadblock.

The COVID news is somewhat more positive this morning. The number of new infections has dropped to the lowest since 14th December (six weeks ago) and this appears to show that the fight against the Omicron variant is starting to show some positive results. To counter this, though, the infection rate in schools is increasing so rapidly that some staff are not implementing the latest ‘liberalisation’ rules announced in the middle of last week. My own observations are that individuals are still observing mask-wearing and hand-sanitising procedures both in the shops that still request these and even when walking in the open street where presumably, the virus is less extant. However, I still feel that an undue complacency may set in and I would not be surprised if another variant or even a sub-variant were to arise and bite us when we are least expecting it. The scientists seem to be uncovering the explanation of why lung function is affected in Long-Covid cases. Whether this lung damage is permanent or not, I do not know but if recovery is possible, it is likely to be very slow.

Today was always going to be a quiet day and so it proved. Meg and I got up a little late and by the time we had done a few jobs, we were a little delayed.  I had busied myself this morning making a little wallet for the business cards of which I have just received a new supply. Fortunately, I have a supply of postcards and when I take one and fold it in half it is the perfect size. All I have to do then is to apply some coloured tape (of which I happen to have a good quantity) and now I have a supply of cards ready for use. One wallet I am going to keep permanently in my rucksack so that if all else fails, I always have a supply. We took the car down to town to save time and then called in to collect our newspaper and some milk from Waitrose. Then we progressed to our favourite bench in the park and were soon observed by our Seasoned World Traveller friend who had availed himself of a coffee, spotted us and then proceeded up the hill for a chat. We had little fragments of conversation with several other of the park regulars – their dogs tend to bound over to us thinking there might be some food in the offing and their owners trail behind, always apologetically. When I reflect upon the dogs I see in the park, many are yoiung and chase enthusiastically after balls thrown for them with the aid of a ‘ball launcher’ but others are much more sedate whilst yet. others (according to their owners) are affflicted with the diseases of old age such as diabetes, osteo-orthritis, obesity and in one sad case dementia.We discussed the latest political situation with our friend (what else) and were trying to discern what combination of conspiracy theories, Machiavellian doings and incompetence on behalf of the Met we chose to believe. Last night, I saw an extraordinary little interview on ‘Newsnight’ when Dawn Abbott (leftward leaning from the Labour Party), a right wing Tory MP and Lord Sumner (ex High Court) were all in total agreement that there was no legal impediment why the Gray rwport should not be published in its entirety – in their consensus view, the Met was really ‘trying it on’ where  according to Lord Sumner it was quite common for fact-finding enquiries to be conducted first and more serious criminal charges pursued later. He cited Hillsborough as the prime example where this had happened. Of course playing for time always works to the advantage of the power centres in society – a fairly common view is that Cressida Dick (head of the Met) has practically handed Boris a ‘get out of gaol’ card for free. It is very interesting that both political left and right are asking for the Gray report to be published in full. The verdict of the Sunday newspapers tomorrow morning is going to be interesting. I suspect that the report will hit us some time on Monday morning. I have just read a rather disturbing account from a journalistic expedition to Grimsby, which is a former Labour seat (‘red wall’) which turned Tory in the last election. There it was reported that he sense of expectation exuded by Westminster ahead of the Sue Gray report is hard to find in Lincolnshire – where one voter said the outcome wouldn’t affect their business, and another said ‘keeping the country running’ is more important than ‘what slice of cake’ the prime minister had. I also listened to the Radio 4 programme, Any Answers in which listeners phone to air their opinions after the Any Questions panel discussion that precedes it. I must say that an overwhelming view of those who phoned in (Conservative as well as Labour) was that the Gray report should be published in full and unredacted. But, perhaps as an indication of the views of a silent majority, was the view that Boris Johnson and the Downing Street crew were only doing what the rest of us(!) had been doing all along by bending or not observing the law. In a garden not an incredibly long way from our house in which a bar had built in the corner of the erstwhile garden, a party was held in which some 16 adults and children were drinking and cavorting at the height of the pandemic. These parties stopped very abruptly and I suspect that a neighbour (not me!) had complained to the police who probably came along and felt a few collars.

When we got home, it was time to prepare lunch – in this case a curry. I put together the normal ingredients (onion, peppers, left-over cubes of meat, sultanas, some peas and gravy) before adding the Chinese curry paste, serving on a bed of  sweet potato rice  and topping off with some yogurt. Then we had a fairly lazy afternoon, not doing anything very much knowing that we would leave the house to go to church in the late afternoon. 

So another week is drawing to a close and, with it, the month of January is nearly over as well. After our normal catching up on the week’s news with our domestic help, Meg and I made our way, somewhat belatedly, down to the park. The weather was bright but a little on the chilly side but we reached our normal bench without much ado. No sooner had  we finished supping our coffee but our University of Birmingham friend spotted us from afar and came to join us, cup of coffee in his hand. As we didn’t see him (much) last weekend, we had quite a lot to catch up on and after we had chatted for a bit, I made my rapidly to the newsagent to pick up our daily ration and then on to Waitrose which is almost like a corner shop for us now. Then I made my way back to the park and we carried on with our chat. But by now, it was getting a little on the cool side so our friend very kindly gave us both a lift back which was especially welcome as it saved us some time and we needed to cook some lunch for Meg and I and our domestic help who was joining us. Lunch today was going to be some pollock, made a bit more flavoursome with a sweet chilli and garlic sauce which I had seen on a YouTube video was a good way to enhance this fish which,whilst being nutritious, is somewhat bland in flavour.  I approached my cooking venture with a degree of trepidation as I cooking with some fish that was not completely thawed so I had to pre-cook a little before applying the marinade. However, all worked well and I served the fish on a bed of lettuce and a glass of really dry white South African wine. I am pleased to say that all of these ingredients blended really well with each other and feel quite confident about repeating this on further Fridays. On my son’s advice, I was pretty sparing in the use of the sauce/marinade so as not to overdo the amount of salt to which I might otherwise be exposed but it is always good to prepare a meal which is nutritious as well as being low in calories, salt and the ubiquitous sugar.

There is quite some turmoil going on behind the scenes which seems to delay the publication of the Sue Gray report – originally thought to be last Wednesday/Thursday. It looks as though the Metropolitan police have asked that the Gray report not reveal any information which might prejudice their own enquiry – which itself might take weeks or even months. The Met’s request indicates Ms Gray will either have to make significant changes to her report before publication or delay it until after the force’s inquiry. This places a tremendous burden upon Sue Gray. She has the option of delaying her report until the police investigation is complete (which may be months) or publishing an incomplete/severely redacted version in the next few days which has all of the appearance of a ‘cover up’. Indeed, some lawyers are even now starting to wonder out loud whether the police have the legal right to request that the internal Gray report be amended or delayed. In the meanwhile, Boris Johnson must be laughing his socks off as with each day that passes, he has the ability through the power of delay to minimise its impact. It is already being said that various ‘trade-offs’ are being negotiated as I write to the effect that backbencher support might be sought for the proce of delaying the much disliked National Insurance rate increases due shortly. In practice, Boris Johnson through the delay and whilst playing for time may emerge not badly damaged from all of this but only time will tell. Some late breaking news on Sky is to the effect that the Met are denying that they are delaying the report and Commander Catherine Roper (in charge of the investigation) has indicated that ‘We have not delayed this report and the timing of its release is a matter for the Cabinet Office inquiry team.’

Today is the day when I generally get up early and get off to Waitrose in Droitwich to do my shopping, aiming to get there the minute that the store opens its doors to minimise my exposure to other shoppers. But today, I am due to revert to my erstwhile shopping habits by frequenting Aldi but availing myself this time of their ‘Click and Collect’ facilities. The ordering procedure and updating it seemed pretty straightforward and the instructions then told me to get to the Aldi car park, park in a ‘Click and Collect’ zone and then reply to the text that they had previously sent me including my name and the number of the bay where I was parked. I waited about 5 minutes and then my order arrived, loaded into large plastic bags just about strong enough to get the load they contained into the boot of the car. I thought that the load seemed a little on the ‘concise’ side but I didn’t give it much of a second thought until I got it home and started to unpack it. Then I realised  that several critical items (e.g. milk and yogurt supplies for the week) as well as half a dozen other items were missing. It seemed to me as though the whole of a plastic container load had not been loaded onto the trolley ready for lifting into the car. So I immediately shot back to Aldi where I explained (eventually) to a young manager that I had been a regular customer of Aldi, was now returning and this was my first experience of ‘Click and Collect’ The young manager apologised and set about picking up the deficit items himself, making a mistake in the process. He explained that an inexperienced young worker had been charged with compiling the load and, not to put too fine a point on it, he had absolutely made a ‘pig’s ear’ of the whole thing. But the young manager rewarded me with a bottle of Prosecco for my patience and forbearance, so this was gratefully accepted. But then we realised that the young packer had not made some crucial substitutions e.g. by substituting smaller cartons of yogurt when the jumbo sized ones were unavailable. So I needed to get back inside the store and buy these items afresh as they would have been marked as unavailable previously and therefore I wouldn’t be charged for them. Eventually, I got home and unpacked the shopping and all I can say at this point is that it was considerably cheaper but quite a palaver. I think that next week, I shall probably forego the ‘Click and Collect’ option and get straight to the store at opening time as I used to do at Waitrose.

When we went to Droitwich, we went to our favourite coffee bar which serves a nice hot cappuchino and an enormous teacake which, once toasted, is easily enough for the two of us. Then we had a turn around ‘Wilko’ our favourite hardware store. Whilst Meg peruses the cosmetics, toiletries and household cleaning, I make a beeline for the stationery section followed by kitchen implements. Between us, we bought a staisfying array of things and then made our way to our favourite little ‘non-nonsense’ cafe which does a magnificent roast each Thursday (lamb today) at a ridiculously cheap price of £8. This little cafe and coffee shop has a very loyal following for its roasts which it puts on once a week and for which you have to book up a couple of days in advance to get a seat. Whilst there, we got into conversation with a fellow diner who turned out to be a local councillor. She overheard the conversation I had with the waitress which was to ask her whether she knew why mint sauce was typically served with lamb. The answer goes back to Elizabethan times in which once it was recognised that sheep could provide mutton as well as really valuable wool which then was the source of England’s prosperity. As the wool trade was threatened, Elisabeth 1 passed a decree that sheep meat could only be eating if eaten with a ‘bitter herb’  In those days, mint was plentiful but sugar had not made it across from the New World and the rest is history. Anyway, we had a really pleasant conversation and our our whole meal and conversation lasted for an hour and a half.

The Sue Gray report being temporarily parked, the media attention has turned to the fact that Boris Johnson appears to have authorised, or at least sanctioned, a mercy flight for animals rather than for people when Kabul, Afghanistan was abandoned when the Taliban took over. Boris appears to have been caught lying again even though there is an email trail which appears to show an authorisation of this private animal rescue flight. Boris Johnson is calling the ensuing row  ‘rhubarb’ (but is meant to be a denial or not?)

Today was going to be the day when the long awaited Sue Gray report could perhaps be published but more of that later. As it was, Meg felt a little poorly this morning so decided to stay for an extra hour or so in bed to recover (which she did). In the meantime, I went into town on my own to collect the newspaper and to pop into our local Waitrose which I now use as though it were a corner shop. Then it was a question of rapidly rapidly home in order to be parked in front of the TV for Prime Minister’s Questions which normally starts promptly on Wednesdays at 12.00 midday. The burning question today is to whether the Sue Gray report will be handed to Parliament (and the world) in its entirety or will it be delayed, redacted, edited, provided in only summary form of the findings alone or whatever permutation. Boris Johnson under intense questionning from Keir Starmer agreed that the report said ‘Of course, I will do what I said‘. This rather Delphic reply has left many of us scratching our heads and thinking  what it is said that he has said on this subject to which he was referring. There is a view that the PM has left himself a bit of ‘wriggle room’ in case he wants to let out a version of the report that just happens to be the least damaging to him.  The whole of PMQ was a fairly typical scenario in which the lawyer-like approach of direct questions from Keir Starmer was met with bluster and half evasions by Boris Johnson who, needless to say, would not directly answer any of the questions put to him. In the meantime, the whole country is awaiting for publication of the Sue Gray report which seems to be held up by being passed through the hands of government lawyers. GIven that Friday is the day when many MP’s leave Westminster in order to devote themselves to constituency business, it could well be that the whole report will be delayed now until next Monday.

This afternoon, I had just settled down to reply yet again to the bank who looks after our communal affairs with yet another request to fill in parts of a doument which I have submitted to them four times already. I have the feeling that there is a computer algorithm rather than a ‘human’ assessing the form because every time I speak to a member of the safeguarding team, they can never tell me what information the system requires that they do not already have. But just before this task, I consulted my emails and one of my University of Winchester ‘buddies’ had suggested that we have a Skype session at 4.00pm this afternoon.  So faced with a bank session or a videochat with old friends, it was no contest really and I readily succumbed to the pleasure of chatting, albeit at long range. Time flew by and we spent an hour and a half before we realised that we did need to prepare tea and get other things done this afternoon.

Another scandal has emerged today and, interestingly enough, nothing to do with parties held in Downing Street in contravention of the COVID-19 regulations. This was a story in which the PM’s wife, Carrie Johnson, may well now have a measure of responsibility. The story relates to the rapid evacuation of the embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan, in which there were heart-rending pictures of people who helped the British (interpreters and the like) and their families not being able to get on an evacuation flight. All of this was redolent of the images we remember of the fall of Saigon when the Americans withdrew ignominiously from Vietnam. There was a charity, run by somebody with evident connections with the military, concerned with the evacuation of sick and wounded animals from Afghanistan. Of course, this was being done as a ‘private’ operation and the UK government have consistently maintained that it had no part in the evacuation operation. However, a Foreign Office memo has now arisen in which Boris Johnson is said to have ‘authorised’ the flight which evacuated the sick animals. So the fundamental political question which arises is this: did the authorisation and emergency evacuation of sick animals take priority over the evacuation of human personnel? This is quite a murky story, as one might imagine, compounded by the fact that the Foreign Office have always denied that evacuation of animals impeded the evacuation of humans. But a memo has now emerged in which the PM did authorise such a flight – and it quite easy to construct a narrative, all too believable in the case of the British, in which animal life took precedence over, or least impeded, the evacuation of human life. The fact that the story has emerged today only adds to the picture of a government mired in duplicity and evasion.