Published: 16/05/2010 07:00 -
Updated: 14/05/2010 15:50
I am driving to the M1 in bright early morning sunshine.
At around 7.45am, as I approach Chicheley, on the A421, an enormous owl flies (right) straight in front of my windscreen. I nearly veer off the road, such is the amazement at the sight of this huge, beautiful creature. It is a cream colour and I assume is a Barn owl and I just wonder if any other drivers saw it or whether it was a figment of my imagination . . .
I am talking to a friend about the election and for whom they voted, as they had declared themselves undecided.
He tells me that he and a partner had finally decided to vote Conservative. However, on entering the booth, he noticed that Richard Fuller’s middle name was Quentin.
“I could not vote for anyone with that name, so voted Labour instead,” he said. “Funnily when I went out and told my partner, she had done exactly the same.’ So TV debates, speeches, leaflets, ad boards come and go but in reality it is all in the name.
I WAS always told by my parents there are some things in life that you never ask people about – how much they earn, for example. Another is which political party you vote for.
Happily, despite being verbally pinned in the corner by the Tory MP Nadine Dorries over the question, BoS editor Chris Gill was delighted to escape with his secret intact.
ONE of our readers, Frank Vallance, erupts over an advert in the National Trust magazine offering short breaks to ‘incredible Iceland’ using aerial sight-seeing and helicopter excursions. Of course, the small print says trips are subject to availability and intensity of the volcanic eruption, pointing out it is currently live! “It’s rubbing our noses in it,” says Frank. I am more amused wondering how they will get you there in the first place.