Another Boris crisis

After breakfast this morning, I completed the on-line check-in for next Tuesday's flight and downloaded the PDF of the boarding card to my phone. Then Clare reminded me of the need to carry a vaccination certificate as well. That was less than straightforward. Initially the NHS app failed me, as it's less than clear at the outset that NHS Wales is not served by the app. You have to look for the NHS Wales website and follow the procedure from there to obtain the vaccination certificate PDF, delivered by a mobile phone text message containing a web-link to the download. It could be more straightforward than it is. Anyway I have all the necessary travel documents now. All I have to do now is sort out travel money, and that's for tomorrow or the day after.

Clare had a dentist's visit mid morning, so I did the weekly grocery shopping trip to the Co-op, and then cooked lunch. I had chaplaincy emails to respond to after lunch. It sounds as if I will be collected from the airport instead of having to take the coach to Estepona. I'm grateful for this as there's likely to be a higher risk of catching covid on a crowded coach than on a 'plane with a much higher standard air conditioning system. One risk is better than two. I just have to stay away from busy crowded places this week. We won't see Jasmine as everyone around her has covid, but not her so far, but the risk she'll catch it and transmit it is still high. It's very sad but inevitable.

We went for a walk around Llandaff Fields and down to Blackweir for a drink at the TukTuk cafeteria, a motor tricycle equipped to sell drinks, which parks the other side of the bridge. The guy running it told us he's an architecture student, and we had an interesting chat, with him telling us as he lives with dyslexia for which he has developed a successful coping strategy.

There was a fascinating programme on Sky Arts this evening about the 20th century artist M C Escher whose extraordinary body of paintings and prints featuring unfathomable geometric patterns with tricks of perspective embedded in them. His art has been influential on designers as well as other artists since the sixties when he came to public attention by designing an album cover for a Rolling Stones LP.

Today's news centres yet again on a crisis around Boris Johnson's leadership and judgement in appointing MP Chris Pincher as Deputy Chief Whip when he was known to have a reputation as a sex pest. He's accused of two sexual assaults last week, and when this came to light he resigned his position and had the Tory Whip withdrawn. During the day Johnson has been openly criticised for lying by a retired senior civil servant, and lost two senior members of his cabinet. He's made excuses for his action in appointing Pincher that were hardly credible, and is coming for criticism from all sides. Opinion is turning against the Prime Minister in conservative media and among the public. There's no sign of Johnson resigning, so it remains to be seen if the Tory Party finds a way to dislodge him.