Friends, I know today has turned into one of the major news days of 2024 so far, but I hope you'll forgive me if I concentrate first and foremost on a story close to the hearts of me and my long-suffering wife Lois - oh dear!
You see, when I wake up this morning in our new-build home in Malvern, I happen to look at the emails on my smartphone, and I get the most stupendous shock, to put it mildly, when I see that I've already received three emails from "Severn Seas", the moving and relocation specialists.
And the explanation is that yes, already, our dear daughter Sarah, who lives 25 miles to the east of us, in Alcester, is "putting out feelers" to shipping companies willing to take her and her family's "stuff" back to Australia again. Yikes !!!!!
And it's barely a year since Sarah was getting Seven Seas to move her family's stuff - furniture and belongings etc - back home to the UK after their 7 year residence "down under", in Western Australia, from 2015 to 2023.
Now Sarah's little family is going to be moving back "down under" again! Their much-heralded "return to Blighty" hasn't really been a success - Sarah's husband Francis hasn't really "settled" here, and Sarah herself has found her current accountancy job in Evesham unbearably stressful, so they're all going back to Australia again. What a madness, isn't it !!!!!
Do you remember last year's saga, when Sarah and family had arrived back in the UK safely, but the bulk of their furniture and belongings were still on the high seas, in the Indian Ocean, coming back to the UK "the short way", via the Suez Canal. And do you remember Sarah's agony trying to keep track of her stuff along the way, all with the help of the internet?
To jog your memory, let me take you back to May 27th 2023, and Sarah's despair when she realised that all the family's stuff - furniture and belongings, had got no further than the Bay of Biscay, and was still 300 miles away from "Blighty".
What a madness it all was, wasn't it !!!!
You see, Lois's first story today concerns political dinosaur Jacob Rees-Mogg (the Conservative ex-MP). He may have been thrown out of the House of Commons by voters in the recent General Election, but we're still going to see a lot of him on TV, Lois says. And it's because Rees-Mogg and his family are soon going to be starring in a 5-part "fly-on-the-wall" documentary on the Discovery+ channel, which the network claims will "lift the lid on the man behind the public image".
"What's sexist about that story?", I hear you cry. [Not me, I don't care! - Ed]
Well, seeing as how you ask (!), Amanda Platell, writing in the Daily Mail, has been advising Rees-Mogg to exercise caution in any venture he takes up with the UK media.
Going back a few years, when Australian-born Platell was features editor of the now defunct "Today" newspaper, she was asked to appear in a film about successful women in Fleet Street. And she seized the opportunity, she said, because she was imagining how proud of her her parents back in Australia would be. She said she had only got off the boat from Australia a year previously.
"Whilst doing the filming", Platell wrote in the Daily Mail, "[the programme's researchers] repeatedly asked me to lean forward over my desk, and I wondered why. And then, when the programme was broadcast, I discovered that it mainly featured shots of my breasts, and of my legs in stilettos, and the programme had been given a new title - "Killer Bimbos on Fleet Street".
What a crazy world we live in !!!!! [That's enough craziness for today! - Ed]
But by the time Lois and I get as far as the long grass this morning, Lois is already (!) on her second "bombshell" story of the week (!). [That's enough exclamation marks in brackets (!) - Ed]
Apparently, Lois says, British voters have just elected the most irreligious Parliament in history, according to a triumphant announcement by the "Humanists UK" people. About 40% of MPs have apparently chosen to make a secular affirmation of loyalty to the Crown rather than take a religious oath, on being sworn into the Commons this month, up from a figure of only 24% in 2019.
"No wonder those MPs make so many crackpot decisions!", comments Lois, and I agree that that could be one possible explanation (!). [Just watch it, Colin! - Ed]
Lois's third item is a bit of good news, however, which is nice.
Yes, the good news is that the far right in European politics has been described as a "busted flush" by David Carretta in Il Foglio in Rome.
Hungary's crazy PM, Viktor Orbán has been trying to put together a new far-right grouping "Patriots for Europe" in the European Parliament. If Orbán had succeeded in his ambitions he'd have created a bloc of 200 of the 720 MEPs, which would have been "a historic shock", Carretta says. But Orbán didn't manage it, because a lot of these far-right parties cordially hate each other.
Who knew?!!!
"Alternative for Germany" (AID) has been given the cold shoulder by Marine Le Pen, leader of the French "RN" (National Rally), because she can't stomach the pro-Nazi outbursts by some of the AID leaders. And Poland's "Law and Justice" Party, and the "Brothers of Italy" have decided to stick with the mainstream European Conservative Group.
And while Spain's "Vox" and Portugal's "Chega" have both joined Orbán's "Patriots for Europe " Group, they're both strongly pro-Ukraine , which won't please Orbán, who famously is "Putin's friend in the EU".
Nice try, though, Viktor!!!!
And finally, Lois comes out with the week's real top story, the one about the hippos - you must have seen that one!
Yes, it's like this, you see. Hippos, even though they are large and bulky and weigh over 3 tons, can become airborne i.e. with all 4 feet off the ground at the same time, for as much as a third of a second - other mammals can do it but not for a third of a second. The research, done by scientists at the Royal Veterinary College, despite being dubbed "really boring" work by lead researcher Prof. John Hutchinson, was based on video footage of hippos filmed running at the Flamingo Land resort in Yorkshire, and other clips found online.
Of the hippos' main rivals for the title, elephants never move faster than a walking gait and never fully leave the ground, while rhinos walk, trot, and then break into a gallop.
And there you have it - blimey! What a week it's been for news - no doubt about that!
No comments:
Post a Comment