Dearest Gentle Reader, this Sunday brings mountains that have claimed the irreplaceable, an undertaker whose betrayal of the bereaved beggars belief, and a ballot paper so long it has made the very polling tables inadequate - and that is before we reach the national park that has sold its own name for the price of an electric motor car. Your lorgnette will be quite exhausted by the end.

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 Friday brings a monarch baring his tax bill to the nation, a government minister telling his superior to 'stay classy' from the digital salons, and forty hospital staff whose curiosity has proved rather more dangerous than their patient's reptilian assailant. This Author's lorgnette has been working quite the overtime - read on, if you dare.