Good afternoon, and I hope you are enjoying your status as bank owners, mortgage brokers and the rest of your new-found roles following Mr Brown's purchase, with your dosh, of much of our banking industry. You can expect a call, shortly, from the 2012 Olympic lot who have run out of cash for the village. You may feel you've already done quite enough in your status as council and income taxpayers but, hey, these days it's funny money that rules the roost and nothing makes much sense anymore. Harris, who is always most cautious with money, is keeping his PIN number a state secret, but has been trying to find out how much they are asking Mr Darling for and how much Mr Darling may then ask you for. Then it's up to you.
Frankly, I find the electric bill bad enough let alone several blocks of flats in the Lee Valley but that's just me. Or is it?
"Dr. Death's" suicide clinic. We told you about it last week, now it's come to town. It includes a Betty video which, instead of showing you how to decorate a cake or grow geraniums indoors, explains how you can top yourself. I think it is all rather unsavoury but LVJ met a couple, in the rudest of health, who think it is simply an act of intelligent forward-planning... Anyway, Lewis is the Fifth Horseman of the Apocalypse tonight.
From "death, where is thy sting?" - to "life's rich tapestry" : we've a double transplant recipient who went on to become a mum ; and a remarkable young man who left the real threat of death in Zimbabwe to make a new life in Blighty, only to fall foul of the rules and regulations brigade. I wonder how many Jews, fleeing Nazi Germany, had the right papers and how many democrats, getting out of the old Soviet Union, had passport, work permit and driving licence about their persons? But Brother Jobsworth has scored maximum points in making this young man's bid for freedom pretty rough. His story with lovely Lucy.
Faye (leopard skin slippers with a pink bow, huge sleeved black top and.. well, you know I fear the threat of varicose veins and I have warned her) went to the World Break-Dancing Championships last night in Brixton.
She reported, in what would never pass for the Queen's English, of one person who'd "Got good skills, man"; "one dude" did something I didn't quite catch and there was a surprise in a rucksack. I can't do it justice but even I was persuaded I really wanted to see it, so I think you might find it eye-opening, mind-expanding and electrically exciting. But don't let your language slip, please.
She may have been auditioning for Womanhood which must surely follow Kidulthood and Adulthood. We have the director on the sofa so she can ask him for a part in the film. My middle son saw Adulthood and started talking just like Faye; they know each other - is this linguistic contagion?
Talking, finally, of contagion, all our homes are occasionally in need of a "spring clean", such is the build up of micro-dust, nook-and-cranny cobwebs and grime that even Flash finds a bit of a challenge to shift from those hidden recesses of the kitchen. But tonight we report on the Mother of All Spring-Cleans - summer, autumn and winter cleans. To say they left not a stone unturned is to understate it. They left nothing. All will be laid bare by Phil, our Aggy and Kim, rolled into one.
By the way, in the break-dancing we did rather well against the Koreans but, in the end, the Russians won. Rather like the new world order or, at least, Stamford Bridge..what say you?
Robin asked if the break-dancing was disc or shoe and caliper. No, not me either.
He'll have a forecast and we will have the papers I expect.
Salma has just made me a cup of tea - kind - and then ran off. I listen for a timing device only to remember it is not Friday. There must be another plot afoot. I'll report back later if I survive the afternoon.
Alastair & Salma.
