An officer and a spy

I was really lucky at Christmas because I was very spoilt, being given some lovely books - plus a book token which enabled me to buy even more.  I started my convalescence by finishing the newest Jo Nesbo novel 'Police' which was excellent.  Equally good was the book which I have just finished, Robert Harris' latest novel 'An officer and a spy'.  I finished that last night and it was terrific - and, being a tale about justice, it set me up nicely to move on to today's task, reading the Racing Post's summary of Lord Hutton's report, which seems to have been published yesterday.

I haven't yet found anything about whether he did or didn't find any Weapons of Mass Destruction, but then that's by the by as I've always suspected that whether they are or aren't found rather depends on what will suit the person who has commissioned the report.  But what did interest me was the overview of smuggling drugs into the country, as this could end up being very important for me, for reasons which I'll explain.

If the training continues to go from bad to worse and I find myself having to jack it in, I'd struggle to think of anything else I'd be qualified to do.  In fact, the only occupation which springs to mind is a drugs mule, simply because, if you believe half of what you read, the two professions seem each to be as ethically demanding as the other.  Anyway, the good news is that if and when I get pulled into a little room at Heathrow to find a man in white rubber gloves bearing down upon me, I'll be able to put his mind off at rest by explaining that I appear merely to have displayed a sense of complacency towards existing rules concerning the transportation of medical supplies.  And I'll refer him to a former Metropolitan Police Commissioner if he thinks that a bit thin.

Further good news is that the weather was really rather springlike today, as these photographs show.  We are still getting off very lightly compared to the rest of the country.  Yesterday's big storm only raged for an hour or so here, while it lasted longer and raged considerably harder elsewhere; and we have no flooding worries, unlike so many other poor people.  So yesterday wasn't as bad as it might have been - and today was lovely.  Tomorrow, though, is likely to be very unpleasant, but we'll worry about that tomorrow.  And we can face the day knowing that Exeter Road remains a good source of winners, with Willie Musson having saddled a double yesterday, which was really good.  All we need now is to be able to make some contribution to the local tally of success ourselves
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