What a week! I've hardly been able to tear myself away from BBC World news to keep up with Eastenders. The financial crisis, the US elections, the Callum-Stacey-Bradley love triangle .... the embroidery has been cast aside as I need both hands to operate the remote with one and refill my small sherry glass with t'other.
When in doubt, do nothing is my motto. I have been doing nothing with a vengeance this week. Both my Belgian banks were nationalized within 24 hours of each other, before I even knew they were in trouble. It happened so quickly I didn't have time to worry about my life insurance pension p
lan invested in the one and my mortgage borrowed from the other. When it comes to money, I'm a bit of a Doris Day: Que sera sera, whatever will be will be. The best laid plans of mice and men, etc. Insh'allah. Après moi, le déluge! (particularly apposite here in Belgium). I have hardened myself to the shocking images of City bank workers shaking with shock over their £3.50 cappuccinos in Café Ripoff and wondering if they might have to trade down the BMW for a Ford Focus. It's every man for himself now.
Talking of Doris Day, girl next door Sarah Palin is going to give Barack Obama a run for his money isn't she? Mr McCain had better employ only middle-aged interns, a Monika Lewinsky at his age could be fatal. Remember The Amazing Mrs Pritchard, that story about the housewife who becomes Prime Minister by accident? Except I think Mrs Pritchard could read newspapers.
The current US election campaign is teaching us more about American politics than we ever thought we'd need to know, when I'm still trying to understand how Brussels works. How they expect to solve the Middle East situation when they have a pork barrel in the Senate I really don't know. Most insensitive. It's nice to know that they will start cutting back on weaponry, if the clause about wooden arrows is an indicator. They would certainly be cheaper than all the military hardware they're chucking about in Iraq and Afghanistan. And Pakistan, now.
Another bombshell struck at the end of the week: Mandy is pulling out of Brussels and rejoining the government. There is wailing and tearing of angora sweaters in certain nightspots here flying the rainbow flag. I heard them singing "I never realized how happy you made me, oh Mandy, you came and you gave without taking ..." as I walked past the Boys Boudoir last night. I'm sure his arrival at Downing Street sporting a pullover in episcopal purple was not accidental. I bet his socks were made by Wolsey. I never did get him to one of my candlelight suppers, he was too far down the waiting list. Too bad, he'll never get to taste my zuppa inglese now.
When in doubt, do nothing is my motto. I have been doing nothing with a vengeance this week. Both my Belgian banks were nationalized within 24 hours of each other, before I even knew they were in trouble. It happened so quickly I didn't have time to worry about my life insurance pension p
lan invested in the one and my mortgage borrowed from the other. When it comes to money, I'm a bit of a Doris Day: Que sera sera, whatever will be will be. The best laid plans of mice and men, etc. Insh'allah. Après moi, le déluge! (particularly apposite here in Belgium). I have hardened myself to the shocking images of City bank workers shaking with shock over their £3.50 cappuccinos in Café Ripoff and wondering if they might have to trade down the BMW for a Ford Focus. It's every man for himself now. 
Talking of Doris Day, girl next door Sarah Palin is going to give Barack Obama a run for his money isn't she? Mr McCain had better employ only middle-aged interns, a Monika Lewinsky at his age could be fatal. Remember The Amazing Mrs Pritchard, that story about the housewife who becomes Prime Minister by accident? Except I think Mrs Pritchard could read newspapers.The current US election campaign is teaching us more about American politics than we ever thought we'd need to know, when I'm still trying to understand how Brussels works. How they expect to solve the Middle East situation when they have a pork barrel in the Senate I really don't know. Most insensitive. It's nice to know that they will start cutting back on weaponry, if the clause about wooden arrows is an indicator. They would certainly be cheaper than all the military hardware they're chucking about in Iraq and Afghanistan. And Pakistan, now.
Another bombshell struck at the end of the week: Mandy is pulling out of Brussels and rejoining the government. There is wailing and tearing of angora sweaters in certain nightspots here flying the rainbow flag. I heard them singing "I never realized how happy you made me, oh Mandy, you came and you gave without taking ..." as I walked past the Boys Boudoir last night. I'm sure his arrival at Downing Street sporting a pullover in episcopal purple was not accidental. I bet his socks were made by Wolsey. I never did get him to one of my candlelight suppers, he was too far down the waiting list. Too bad, he'll never get to taste my zuppa inglese now.
19 comments:
I sense a Sun headline in the first sentence of your last paragraph....
Can Mandy leave Brussels just like that? Doesn't he have a contract to honour? And who will console all the weeping hairdressers and transvestite waitresses?
'Lycus, I didn't work at Wapping for nothing you know. I think it was £10 an hour at the time.
GB, Mandy isn't the first to make a premature withdrawal. Berlusconi recalled Frattini back to be foreign minister earlier this year, and the new (Communist) govt in Cyprus yanked their boy out sharpish (stop sniggering Lycus). Commissioners are not that essential anyway, it's the lesser known Directors-General who are the real powers behind the thrones. Irishman David O'Sullivan is the trade supremo while Mandy just flies around being gorgeous.
En attendant on en est de 3 milliards de notre poche !!
Wanted !!! The France has intention to buy back The Walloon area of Belgium ?
For three billion there is more nothing !!!
One will have to eat chips ??
Ah! ça ira, ça ira, ça ira Les aristocrates à la " Leterme " ...
I don't know why I am heaping this on you, I feel so cruel but here goes.
The Ambridge waste food digester is on the skids too. Christ sorry Daphne.
You know the economy's in trouble when your CEO is down to his last Lear jet. Stiff upper lip etc!
Ms. Palin knows a lot about Russia, because one can actually see Russia from one of the islands off the coast of the state she is the governor of, I hear. So, she obviously knows a lot about 'foreign' policy.
:D
Ah, I like it, Peter Mandelson = Cardinal Wolsey. This idea could run and run.
(Is Neil Kinnock still something in Brussels, by the way?)
Relieved I'm not the only one Endering! Isn't Max perfectly hateful and he really should do something about his speech impediment.
There have been many financial crises in my life and I find it is simplest and best to do nothing. Not thrilled to have Mandy back except it may be the last straw to break New Labour or even old labour's back.
Crabtree, je vais finir avec la BNP malgré moi, je l'ai quittée il y a presque 20 ans, mais elle m'a retrouvée!
Doc, is that something related to the Large Hadron Collider?
Farty, when LearJet go out of business we'll know there's really a crisis.
Sid, I suspect she doesn't know diddly squat about hockey either. But she's entertaining, I'll give her that.
Gadjo, Mandy is more like Cardinal Sin. Kinnock left Brussels in 2004, and is now head of the British Council I believe.
Pat, touché! You minx, that's not a speech impediment, it's a cockerney accent. Let's keep politics out of this and stick to cheap jokes about Mandy's proclivities.
Mandy's choice of purple pullover was interesting wasn't it? He's obviously leaving his slutty dress for a more important occasion.
Sx
Il y a vingt ans !!!!
Tu n'étais qu'une jeune fille ! :)
Scarls, I love Mandy, too, but I'm the only one who can rock a slutty dress in these parts. I was so pleased to see him back where he belongs I nearly cried, really I did. And imagine how awful I felt tonight hearing about his kidney stones!
Nobody understands my adoration; but then again, I loved Tone 'n Cherrers.
And Daphne, how lucky are you to have Crabtree! Honeyed words; all I get is Abram Lyle's Golden Syrup. CLdeM Pxxxx
Third time lucky for Mandy?
Shame he's already sold his Hartlepool pad otherwise I'd be cooking him a homecoming dinner!
Scarlet, I fear Mandy's slutty dress might involve chains and vinyl.
Monsieur Crabtree, you are flirting with me! Mais oui, c'est vrai, ne n'étais qu'une gosse.
Mrs P, Mandy was the subject of a post on this blog a couple of years ago, and a number of women confessed to fancying him. Something about gay men isn't there. Perhaps longing for the unattainable. That Christian is the best thing in East Enders since Alfie Moon. Are you saying Mandy lives in READING??? I think not.
Krimo, wait till Labour crash out next year, he'll be at your back door (ooh er vicar!) begging for a bowl of soup.
Christian, from Eastenders, is the only reason I'm still watching it!
Sx
I can see Mandy in vinyl and chains . . .
Yes !! In a platonic way :)
If I get myself fired can I have a fancy job in Brussels? So what did Many actually do? anything?
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