Dearest Gentle Reader, today's dispatches bring cheaper chocolate, a hot microphone that has embarrassed the Cabinet, and a thirteen-year-old prince photographed in a suit with his hands in his pockets - which is either a sign of great composure or a very good tailor. This Author has opinions on all of it, and decorum will restrain only some of them.

Dearest Gentle Reader, this Tuesday brings a dispatch so weighted with fire, terror, and sorrow that This Author barely knows whether to reach for her lorgnette or her smelling salts - and she has, upon reflection, reached for both. Counter-terrorism officers have entered the investigation into a most terrible death, nineteen wildfires rage across the Kingdom, and a beach in Hartlepool reminds us what true courage looks like - at the very highest cost. Steel yourself, and read on.

Dearest Gentle Reader, this Thursday brings a state apology decades in the making, a convicted people smuggler discovered living most comfortably in Leicestershire, and a defence spending plan with a rather conspicuous hole in its pocket. This Author has notes - and, for once, not all of them are amusing.