.   I have just received a letter - yes, a proper paper missive in an envelope -  from the government, asking me to complete a 'Community Life Survey'.   This, I am assured, will 'allow your views to be heard on a range of issues affecting your local area'.

   If Rishi Sunak and his henchmen/women are reduced to seeking my help they must be in really deep excrement.

   In return they will send me a £10 shopping voucher 'to thank you for your time.'

   My initial reaction, after discovering there was no useful blank side to recycled into a scrap jotting pad, was to just bin it.

   But I read it anyway, as avid writers and readers tend to do with any text that crosses our range of vision ;-)  I was delighted to see I can request a paper copy if I can't complete it on line.

   I will probably look at it to see just what the government thinks is important in my area.  In terms of 'community' my basic response is like Churchill's on Europe.  I am with it, but not of it.

   Apparently they are willing to accept three views from my household, so it crossed my writer's mind I could also send two more views - written 'in character', from John and Frances.  That could be fun ;-)   Even if I never send them off.

   I can't help wondering what will happen to all the replies if the current government becomes the outgoing government and is replaced by a whole new raft of Noddies who ostensibly lean in the opposite direction. 

   Will all the surveys be piled high in Westminster and ceremonially burned, so as not to help the former opposition?   A true Bonfire Of The Inanities.

   Maybe, after all this rainy day speculation, I shall just bin it anyway ;-)

   Gyppo

I love when people ask me something and then ignore it. Makes me feel special.

I am from the government; I'm here to help
one of the silliest sentences in the English language.