Dearest Gentle Reader, this Tuesday has furnished your devoted correspondent with a Chancellor who will not be moved, a Prime Minister who has declared war upon car park extortion, and a banking outage that left eighty million customers collectively patting their empty pockets. The details, one promises, are even more diverting than they sound - not least the matter of a Newport school bus that set out this morning with a roof and arrived without one.

Dearest Gentle Reader, This Author's tea grows cold this morning, for tragedy darkens Canterbury's doors while a certain lodging house discovers that handing strangers a lady's room key carries consequences. Add to this a most peculiar tale involving houmous, pampered hounds, and the nation's purse strings, and you have a day that demands your immediate attention.