The Old Sunday School...

Anger management...

Time magazine’s person of the year is Greta Thunberg: a worthy recipient, I reckon. For a 16-year-old girl on the autistic spectrum, thrust into the limelight, she has handled herself with great dignity. She implores people to listen: not to her, but to the scientific consensus building up around the issue of climate change. She speaks up… then disappears back into the crowd.

She’s certainly piqued Donald Trump, whose sarcastic tweets serve only to demean the office of president. After her speech to the UN General Assembly, he tweeted: “She seems like a very happy young girl looking forward to a bright and wonderful future. So nice to see!” After she had received the honour from Time - an honour which Trump no doubt expected to come his way - he tweeted: “Greta must work on her Anger Management problem, then go to a good old fashioned movie with a friend! Chill Greta, Chill!”

On both occasions Greta simply changed her Twitter ‘handle’, which currently reads: “A teenager working on her anger management problem. Currently chilling and watching a good old fashioned movie with a friend.” I’m not sure why the most powerful man in the world feels obliged to mock a young girl; I just know that her responses are pitch-perfect. Go, Greta, go!…

No miracle...

A fitful night, drifting in and out of sleep, as I listened to the election results. I’m not sure why I bothered. As soon as I switched on the radio, at 10pm, I heard that the exit polls predicted a Tory landslide… which was a bit like picking up an Agatha Christie who-dunnit, only to find, on page one, that “the butler did it”. Thousands of pollsters had stood in the rain outside polling stations, asking people how they had voted… for the sole purpose of letting us know the result about twelve hours before we were going to know it anyway. That doesn’t seem like a very good use of resources and so many people’s time.

As anticipated, my vote didn’t count for much in Haltemprice and Howden, where David Davies held onto his seat with an increased majority. He won 62% of the vote, the Labour candidate just 21% (in 2017 the figures were 61% and 31% respectively).

Licensed today: the Unicorn, once a coaching inn and now a Wetherspoon pub, in the marketplace, Ripon...

Election Eve...

The Guardian has been publishing a ‘poll of polls’, giving equal weight to a dozen different polls. Though the Tory lead is narrowing, there is still a significant gap between the most pessimistic figure for the Tories and the most optimistic figure for Labour. So I’m not anticipating any electoral miracle tomorrow; in terms of what is possible or likely, I’m not even sure what a good result would look like.

I will cast my vote tomorrow, at a farm in the village. Though my respect for our democratic traditions is undimmed, I wish we had better choices. The current crop of politicians doesn’t inspire much confidence; any competent leader of the Labour party would surely be able to take on the Tories and win.

Licensed today: a street in Woodbridge, Suffolk...

Quiet times...

Things are a bit quiet, so I’m off into Goole to get a facial tattoo. It’s not every day you get to fulfil a lifetime’s ambition.

A shot of Ironbridge, licensed today...

Voting...

With only three days to go before the election, I’m mildly surprised that no one has yet knocked on the door of the Old Sunday School to ask if they can count on my vote. It may just be a ‘done deal’, with party activists choosing instead to target more marginal constituencies. David Davies held the seat of Haltemprice and Howden for the Tories in 2017, with 61% of the vote (Labour coming a distant second on 31%). My vote may not count for much.

Licensed today: a sunken lane near the village of East Coker in Somerset...

Home deliveries...

Now that we no longer shop in the high street, and have our stuff delivered instead, there seems to be a ready market for pix like this, licensed yesterday...