(1008) Morning all. Less said the better. Oh dear … elevenses already! (1111)

 

10. Moo corner

9. This was posted by a Reform supporter

Though it was Reform, it might have been Advance or Restore … the point is the heavy slantedness to YouGov. I suspected they were a Tory organ but now I’m thinking … just uniparty.

8. Miss Heathrow

For you countless two or three who’ve glanced through my long book Masquerade and for the three I know who actually read it … you’d be aware of Miss Heathrow being a main protagonist:

He is first bumped into at Heathrow awaiting the Moscow flight, she crashes into our boy in the queue, spills all his cabin bag contents, helps him gather them again. On the flight, he reflects …

Next he gets a phone call at the dacha on the grandfather’s mobile (he’s a high-up at the helicopter factory):

A female voice, Russian, somehow familiar, accented English.

‘Who’s this?’

‘You might remember me from Heathrow – in London.’ He smiled at the ‘in London’. ‘I think I might have dropped my cassette by mistake while I was helping you. Did you find a tape by Linda, by any chance?’

‘I’ll have a look. Linda, you say? We’re not in the city just now. Who are you anyway? What’s your name?’

‘Please put it in an envelope and post it to the address I gave the man I just spoke with.’ There was a pause. ‘Please?’

Hugh handed the mobile to Anya, she closed it and asked the same question, ‘Who is she?’

‘Miss Heathrow.’

Next meeting is in winter and the description is all accurate, inc. the old lady, plus there was a girl too, but not Miss Heathrow, who is a fictional amalgam of real girls I knew there. It was one I knew in RL.

On the last Friday, in Baumana, watching his footing carefully, picking his way along the icy cobblestones, heading for the underpass and the Hotel Shadzhara on the other side where there was a sort of currency exchange, he saw her. Coming up the steps towards him was Miss Heathrow.

As simple as that.

For the most fleeting of moments, their eyes met, she turned on her stiletto heels and as fast as decorum and the necessity to be inconspicuous dictated, hurried away back down the underpass.

Hugh stumbled down the icy steps after Miss Heathrow, trying to stay on his feet, trying to read her all the while.

Possibly late twenties, three quarter length navy coat, coordinated beret, dark hose, maybe 70 den, ankle length boots – she was probably about 162/3 cm in her stockinged feet, athletic.

Underground, there were only the flower, magazine and cassette vendors with their rickety tables on the damp stone, mosaic concourse floor amid lots of look-alike girls of her type, and that’s where he lost her.

He skipped back up the icy steps, down again, gave it up as a lost cause and decided to head home, pausing only to slip a few roubles to one of the old ladies slumped on the steps.

It was going to be a bitter winter for her this year.

He next meets her at the Travelodge off the A2 in London, then there’s a call to his new mobile … in-ter-es-ting … asking to meet him inside the rock museum in Piccadilly. They end up in Robin Hood’s Bay … again, all details accurate, except it’s a different girl, French.

Anyway, that’s not the point of this post item … this is the point 👇🏻

7. Sidelights on Hungary

Steve: Excellent interview on GB News yesterday, Miriam Cates and the Prime Minister of Hungary (52:53mins)

Viktor Orbán exclusive: Hungary PM talks Trump, immigration and the future of Christianity | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CT18a0JdUbk

6. Sidelights on meningitis

I added: “What about general drugtaking by students, widespread sexual contact today, high body counts, often not within their own species, bad food, poor hygiene?”