OK folx, so Webberley has not said ONE WORD about our debate, posted a clip, or link - nuffink! So do me a favour and share the link far and wide please! My article on the experience is in the first reply, and here is the YouTube of the whole horror:
https://t.co/ka2yZBMBwt
Liz Nice, aka @scarlettmacbeth, will be a very hard act to follow..(among a CV list bristling with achievements, Liz has been the first woman editor of the East Anglian Daily Times)
Rest in peace, Patricia Routledge 🙏🏻
In memory of her, I encourage everyone to read these words of hers from February last year.
Whether young or old, you're bound to get something out of it.
*****
"I’ll be turning 95 this coming Monday. In my younger years, I was often filled with worry — worry that I wasn’t quite good enough, that no one would cast me again, that I wouldn’t live up to my mother’s hopes. But these days begin in peace, and end in gratitude.
My life didn’t quite take shape until my forties. I had worked steadily — on provincial stages, in radio plays, in West End productions — but I often felt adrift, as though I was searching for a home within myself that I hadn’t quite found.
At 50, I accepted a television role that many would later associate me with — Hyacinth Bucket, of Keeping Up Appearances. I thought it would be a small part in a little series. I never imagined that it would take me into people’s living rooms and hearts around the world. And truthfully, that role taught me to accept my own quirks. It healed something in me.
At 60, I began learning Italian — not for work, but so I could sing opera in its native language. I also learned how to live alone without feeling lonely. I read poetry aloud each evening, not to perfect my diction, but to quiet my soul.
At 70, I returned to the Shakespearean stage — something I once believed I had aged out of. But this time, I had nothing to prove. I stood on those boards with stillness, and audiences felt that. I was no longer performing. I was simply being.
At 80, I took up watercolour painting. I painted flowers from my garden, old hats from my youth, and faces I remembered from the London Underground. Each painting was a quiet memory made visible.
Now, at 95, I write letters by hand. I’m learning to bake rye bread. I still breathe deeply every morning. I still adore laughter — though I no longer try to make anyone laugh. I love the quiet more than ever.
I’m writing this to tell you something simple:
Growing older is not the closing act. It can be the most exquisite chapter — if you let yourself bloom again.
Let these years ahead be your TREASURE YEARS.
You don’t need to be famous. You don’t need to be flawless.
You only need to show up — fully — for the life that is still yours.
With love and gentleness,
Patricia Routledge
*****
Once more, rest in peace. 🤍
Edward’s medals are just symbols of privilege, not service. The Royal Victorian Order? Given for being born, not earned.
📢 Repost if you agree—honours should be earned, not handed out. #AbolishTheCorruptMonarchy
Pope Francis chose his papal name after St. Francis of Assisi, bc he admired the friar's love for the poor, & life of simplicity and peace
i like to imagine that they're meeting now<3
#GoodMorning, Britain! 🌅 While King Charles' private wealth sits at £2 billion and he pays no inheritance tax, our taxes are set to increase his grant from £86m to £125m. Yet, there’s never enough for nurses, teachers, or doctors.
We’re delighted to announce that Professor Sara Spear has been appointed as the new Provost and Chief Academic Officer.
Prof Spear joined St Mary’s in 2022 as Executive Dean of the Faculty of Business and Law.
Read more at https://t.co/bAniqlcDdy
A little-discussed aspect of the Leadbeater bill is Clause 25, which gives doctors and others total immunity from civil suits, even when they botch the assisted suicide procedure. This shows how much confidence the bill's promoters have in their assisted suicide process.
I was honoured to be able to greet His Holiness Pope Francis at the Vatican this morning.
Pope Francis has shown great leadership on addressing the global issues of our time and building bridges of dialogue among faiths.
@SW_Help travel every week on your service to Strawberry Hill. It’s a weekly lottery of signal failures, delays, cancellations, swans on line, problem at depot. Lovely staff. Crap service.
💥 How embarrassing, I bet #PrinceWilliam is absolutely furious this has been leaked, right through the middle of his "end homelessness" PR stunt!
PS, repost if you agree that #ThatFamily must go!
#AbolishTheMonarchy#Dispatches
Speaking as someone who is descended from immigrants myself, I must say that these people are the absolute worst. They’ve re-racialised social life under the guise of progressivism.
Most people watch a football match and couldn’t care less where the players are historically from. These people, meanwhile, watch it with a laser-focus on race, skin colour, heritage…they’re the mirror image of the far right they claim to hate.
They take every possible opportunity to inject their divisive, midwit-style politics into all areas of our lives. But their logic is at the level you’d expect from a (pretty dumb) 8 year old. It runs: if the team win, we must celebrate and obsessively hype up their immigrant backgrounds, but if they lose and anyone points out their immigrant backgrounds then, THOSE people are deeply racist (not that 99% of people would even have noticed). It’s so deeply anti-intellectual and dishonest.
Also, on a purely rational level, it’s obviously entirely possible to make the argument that the problems brought about by mass migration outweigh the benefits of, say, winning a football game…personally I’d rather not think about it, but these people force it on us through their sheer, virtue-signalling, racially divisive idiocy.
England won the World Cup in 1966 with an entirely white team. Based on the principles these liberals are now promoting, that must somehow prove that we should cut back on immigration…
I can’t believe I even have to write about this stuff. Grown adults, including top politicians, engaging in absolute twattery.
Key chart to keep in mind as the Conservatives suffer their worst ever defeat:
The Tories didn’t lose this election because they were too right wing on some issues or too left wing on others.
They lost because voters of all stripes judged them to be incompetent and dishonest.
I just can’t get past Labour winning 65% of seats off 34% of the vote.
Absolutely wild mismatch between the headline result and, well, everything else.
Britain is now a multi-party system, and first-past-the-post can’t cope.
Spain’s squad announcement for the Euros is simply incredible:
1) Getting one of the greatest Spanish athletes of all time (Rafael Nadal) to narrate it
2) Getting each of the players’ family members to announce their selections
10/10, no notes.