Our programme tonight is a festival of news, entertainment and officious officials.
On the news front, there's less than 24 hours of PM Blair left - and, which ever way you swing politically, it is a moment of some importance on the national and, perhaps, international stage of politics. So what does our Tony do? To prove even he still has things to learn he goes back to school. And who does he take with him on the day before he says "Goodbye" for the last time? The man who made famous the saying "I'll be back", wasn't and became Governor of California instead.
I just love the irony of it all. So did the kids at the school they both showed up at - as you'll see with Simon.
It is wrong not to pay your Council Tax. But if you are 77 years old and refuse to pay £31.16 of it because that is how much you think goes on the Olympics and you don't support the Olympics and don't think you'll be alive in 2012 to see them anyway, then.... well, I'm sorry but it is still wrong.
Whether or not Council Officials should pursue you to the courts for the tax and the costs may be a matter of some debate, however. We'll have that debate tonight, with Phil providing the impartial facts.
Now, imagine everything written by Noel Coward and Somerset Maugham, add in Mrs Robinson in the Graduate and conclude with Long Days Journey Into Night (Ist WW, trenches, last-fags-before-going-over-the-top time...) Now imagine the plays with no ciggies because of the ban on smoking in enclosed spaces. It could happen and it won't be the heirs of Ken Tynan or any other brilliant theatre critic who decides: another officious official from Health and Safety will determine if the puff of the carcinogenics is essential to the plot! Full details at 6.
Rod Stewart has been signing guitars at City Hall and you can win a bumper package of goodies including tickets for his Twickenham show and a personal introduction to the master! Tall blondes beware: he may be married to Penny but, on past form... what a rocker!
Bad Girls was an appalling TV series which pulled in staggeringly big audiences because it was so appalling. (His view, not mine! Editor) Anyway, they are putting it on the West End stage. Call me dumb but, with that big gap at the front, once the curtains up won't they all be able to escape? Only a thought.
Chrissie is in Hampton Court with some of the most beautiful flower displays ever, in one of the most beautiful settings, ever.
And I, along with Romilly, warmly invite you to become informed, annoyed and entertained by all or, at least, most of it.
Alastair.
