Dearest Gentle Reader, this Tuesday has arrived bearing gifts of the most unwelcome variety - petrol thieves in Porsches, a beloved Queen remembered on what would have been her centenary, and news from the forecourts that would make even the most composed among us grip their reticule rather tightly. This Author has witnessed much, but today's dispatches have truly tested the nerves.

Dearest Gentle Reader, this Monday brings a dismissal so abrupt the departed gentleman had already promised to return, a financial reckoning seventeen years in the making, and diplomatic unpleasantness between old adversaries that grows more tedious by the expulsion. This Author has studied the day's affairs most carefully - and finds, as ever, that the truth is more diverting than any fiction.

Dearest Gentle Reader, This Author's pen has been most busy this day, for the realm offers a banquet of follies - a Chancellor insisting all is well whilst the wheels fall from the carriage, a Secretary declaring war upon the very rollercoaster he rides, and a most intriguing audience at the Palace that has set tongues wagging on both sides of the Atlantic. One would hate for you to be the only person at tonight's supper without the particulars.