Anyway, normal service has been resumed, though be warned that more swords'n'sorcery fakery is in the pipeline.
Behind the scenes at Mottisfont Abbey
Bluebells near Timsbury
Red Skip through Green Screen BarrierI am adjusting to the idea of a ruling Conservative / Lib Dem coalition, and also to the idea of being governed by people (actually, almost entirely men) who are rather younger than me. This may take a while. Regardless of the scale of the ensuing, world-historical disappointment (and, for some, betrayal) that was New Labour, I will never forget the exhilaration of 2nd May 1997. I had to drive to a photographic workshop at Duckspool on that sunny day, and the smile never left my face.
The bemusement of the last week, I am sure, will also be memorable, but it doesn't hold any of the promise of change for the better that 1997 did. A measure of the changes since -- in the world, and in me -- is that now I find Michael Portillo a fairly sympathetic fellow, whereas then I, too, exulted in his downfall and humiliation. How many Tories are thirsting for revenge in their turn and how far the Lib Dems will be able to displace or restrain them, will probably be the story of the next few years.
That, and massive, massive cuts in public service spending, carried out with the moral authority endowed by the scale of the goverment's borrowing, and with higher education standing first in line for a spanking. After all, nobody likes a smart-arse...
9 comments:
Well
I have enjoyed the reports from the dark ages, just don't feel qualified to comment, Anglo Saxon doesn't crop up much in shipbuilding.
The new prime ministers are about my age (I know they're younger than average) it's another one of the gates you pass through, first its the popstars are younger than you, then the footballers, now the prime ministers.
Portillo seemed to drop a mask when he left power, the rightwing views seemed almost like a role in a play. (I could never really square them with his background.) I wonder if thats what Cameron and Clegg have done
I also liked the ring horde - if you can't find your own treasure hoard - make one!
Gavin
Enjoying your photos as much as your writing!
THe Aglo-Saxon departure has been fun and interesting.
It's a period that interstes me quite a lot - the more I read, the more I think it's been the most important period in history in defining the national character that is "British".
Blog for your own pleasure, not for that of others. My wife calls me the Nobby-No-Mates of the internet. I rejoice that am safe from defriending and the angst thereof.
Millwall had a song about that....
You've out-bleaked me there, Struan! Obviously, most of what I do, photographically, is motivated by my own curious pleasures, but I see the blog (and especially the written part of it) as a shared activity, rather than as a window onto the Beckettian echoing void that is my soul...
(I see Nick Clegg declared Sam B. as his "mentor", which is utterly baffling. The other two cunningly but evasively declared their wives...)
Yes, Gavin, Portillo seemed to change utterly -- the rumours of his gay-ness must have been very undermining in Tory circles at the time, so maybe he overcompensated ("S-A-S!!"). How politicians survive their life of dissembling I cannot imagine.
Doonster, I agree, but I think you'll find "English" is the word you're looking for, rather than "British", or else you'll find Celtic wrath descending on you...
Mike
Get this chilly feeling when Clegg reminds me of Blair with his hand movements as he talks
You don't mean ...? It's true Blair hasn't been seen in public much recently. Hmmm... They've done a very good job on the ears though.
Mike
My biggest worry is that if you look at pictures side-by-side (as I have done - another boring lesson) of Cameron and Orville the Duck, one can only assume that they were separated at birth.
It was Clegg's resemblance to Ant and/or Dec that struck me in the debates. Someone said that David Cameron looks like C-3PO made out of ham which is very amusing.
Mike
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