Oh dear....

...the public inquiry into the Grenfell Tower fire has scarcely got off the ground before the suitability of the retired Judge chosen to head it has come into question. The families of the victims (or some of them) are asking whether he is the right man to provide "justice" - which of course is code for "will provide the answer we want". I hope we're not going to get into another child sex abuse-style mess.

Words, words...

If I'd ever really thought about it, I had assumed that the word "flibbertigibbet" (there are various spellings) was a relatively modern invention.  Meaning a flighty or gossipy person, I had this vague idea that it originated in the 1920s - perhaps associating it with "flapper", so it came as a bit of a shock to find that it goes back to the 15th century and was used by Shakespeare in King Lear.  Just where it comes from nobody knows, but it has been suggested that it may be an onomatopoeic word which sounds like idle chatter.

Get real.

"Queen gets £6m pay rise" screams the press.  But we've been here before (see 29/6/13) - no she doesn't, she is simply being allowed to keep £6m more of her own money,

Yes but...

Over budget and well behind schedule, but we now once again have an aircraft carrier - well, hooray! Unfortunately, we have no aircraft for it yet!!

Sod off!!

I'm getting rather annoyed with these constant reports of people who live in these tower blocks in Camden who are staying put despite the council's advice that they should evacuate while remedial work is carried out. The reports say that they are "refusing" to leave.  No, they're not - they are choosing not to.  A very different thing.

Patriotic??

Andrea Leadsom - leader of the House of Commons - is being criticised for suggesting that BBC interviewers could be "a bit patriotic"  when dealing with interviews on the question of Brexit.  I can see where she's coming from - it seems to be the norm these days for interviewers to be confrontational and badger and talk over their interviewees and consciously take an aggressively opposing stance to them.  But this is a chicken-and-egg situation, isn't it?  Politicians and indeed public figures generally have become really adept at simply avoiding any question they don't want to answer. I remember my first experience of this was Arthur Scargill, who had this strategy of responding to any question he didn't fancy by saying "The real question is..." and then going on to say whatever it was he wanted to say.  So which is the cause, and which the effect?

How much in old money?

Don't know why, but the question arose on telly the other day as to how much 100 guineas was.  Well the answer is £105.00.  The guinea has a long history and for much of it was pegged to the value of gold, and thus its monetary worth varied as the price of gold went up and down, but it eventually settled at 21s - that is one pound, one shilling.  Professional men like doctors and lawyers, and upper-class merchants like art dealers or high-class tailors and the like, would employ a clerk to do their book-work for them and would charge for their services in guineas - the idea being - one pound for me and a shilling for my clerk.

Ha ha

To the optimist, the glass is half full.  To the pessimist, the glass is half empty.  To the accountant, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

The Lazy Cook

Tomahawk steak?  Oh, come on - it's just an oversized chop!!  Giving something a fancy name - and charging a fancy price for it - may fool some people, but not this mother's son.

That place in Wiltshire...

It's the longest day, and as ever, Stonehenge has been overrun by strange people in strange get-ups ostensibly celebrating - what?  Difficult to say really - celebrating the longest day is a bit like celebrating the fact that 2+2=4.  It is so, with or without your intervention.  Some claim to have druidic connections, but as we've said before, such associations are dubious at best.  So it's just an excuse for a day out?