Dearest Gentle Reader, this Wednesday delivers a dispatch of such weight that this Author set down her teacup and reached, instead, for something considerably stronger. A great institution issues an apology thirty years in the making, the Royal Exchequer faces the gravest of questions about a young woman it failed, and a notorious figure in the Glasgow underworld received his morning visitors rather earlier than he might have wished - all this, and the heavens have chosen today to make their feelings about it known.

Dearest Gentle Reader, this Monday brings a prime minister who cannot name a date, a heatwave that shows no such indecision, and a seven-year-old Brownie who has, quietly, solved the greatest logistical challenge of modern womanhood. This Author has raised an eyebrow so high it may not return before Wednesday.

Dearest Gentle Reader, this Wednesday has delivered a king addressing foreign legislators, a government scrambling to avoid a most inconvenient inquiry, and a face cream making promises it had absolutely no business making. This Author has opinions on all of it - and perhaps a raised eyebrow or two to spare.