Monday

So much of the news is depressing these days. The ongoing wars in Iran, Lebanon and Ukraine. The cost of living crisis. At times it feels the world has tipped into the surreal. Donald Trump posting photos of himself on his Truth Social account as the Risen Christ. A step too far even for Nigel Farage. To round it off we have the US president picking a fight with the pope. Leo is a terrible man apparently for not endorsing war. Trump has yet to work out that, on the whole, popes are not in favour of illegal wars.

So we should make the best of one of those rare days when we have some news that is unequivocally good. Celebrate the defeat of the authoritarian, hard-right government of Viktor Orbán in Hungary. Well, some of us can at any rate. I’m not sure that many in Reform are feeling so chipper: Farage used to shower Orban with praise at every opportunity.

Mind you, these things need to be kept in perspective. The new prime minister, Péter Magyar, is not a centre-left liberal. He’s firmly on the centre-right. But baby steps and all that. And it did take 16 years to get rid of Orbán. But even so, there is much to enjoy. The €90bn loan from the EU to Ukraine will no longer be blocked. The innermost workings of the European Council will no longer be leaked to Vladimir Putin in real time. And Hungarians will be getting their country back.

Now call me shallow, but one of the things that gave me the most pleasure when the result was declared was that JD Vance had unwittingly contributed to Magyar’s landslide victory. Just days before the election, the US vice-president had travelled to Hungary to persuade the voters to back Orbán. Almost immediately, the opinion polls suggested Vance’s intervention had had the opposite effect and that Orban had begun to haemorrhage support. Voters don’t like outside intervention in their elections. So, a day to savour. It may not be the end of global rightwing populism. But a step in the right direction nonetheless.

Tuesday

Nigel Farage’s efforts to prove that Reform is not a one man band have not been altogether successful. Although increasingly he appears at press conferences with another person, he can never somehow escape the impression that it is still the Nigel Farage show with an almost silent plus one. It is the Tory defector Robert Jenrick who is most frequently allowed out to be seen with his party leader. Though sadly for Honest Bob, his role is to be the Debbie McGee to Nige’s Paul Daniels.

Just last week, Farage and Jenrick were to be found in Wigan where Reform was ‘surprising’ the winner of its competition to have their entire street’s fuel bills paid for a year. Nige tapped on the door and was as shocked as we all were to find that the winner was someone he had already met years ago in the Brexit party days. Honest Bob’s role was to stand, smiling sweetly, holding an oversized cardboard cheque.

Just occasionally, the deputy leader Richard Tice is also allowed out. His role is to be Farage’s punchbag. When Nige needs a rottweiler he summons up Zia Yusuf. Zia is always permanently angry about something and hates immigrants even more than Farage. He can be trusted to make Nige look the nice guy. Safe to say that Matt Godwin has been dropped from the A team ever since he lost the Gorton and Denton byelection. Suella Braverman has yet to make an appearance with Nige. Almost as if he has a problem with women. Though maybe she will be blessed soon. On Monday, Farage announced plans for a show trial for all Tories involved in the Boriswave. But good news for Suella. Even though she was home secretary at the time, she has already been declared innocent by Reform.

Wednesday

It’s been just over a year since our dog, Herbie, died. He passed away in our arms on a gloriously hot Sunday afternoon in April. I cried for weeks afterwards. Still do from time to time. Our relationship with him was one of the simplest I have ever experienced. We loved him and he loved us. That was all there was to it. No complications of trying to find the best and most tactful way of saying things. For months after he died, I would occasionally catch glimpses of what I thought was him only to realise there was nothing there. The house felt unbearably empty without him.

I keep his ashes, along with a few strands of his fur and a paw print up in my study and talk to them from time to time. We have talked of scattering his ashes in some of his favourite places in the garden and on Tooting Common but we somehow can’t bring ourselves to do it. We need to hold him tight. For much of the year we couldn’t even think about having another dog. It would have felt disrespectful to Herbie’s memory and we couldn’t ever imagine loving another dog as much. Not to mention trying to negotiate Jill’s cancer surgery and chemo. But in the past few weeks, we’ve begun to think seriously about getting a puppy. That we did have enough love to spare. That there would never be a perfect time to welcome a new dog, that we would never know for sure what our lives would look like in a year’s time.

But there are so many decisions still to be made. Whether to get another male dog. Herbie fitted in so well with our family. So much so he was an integral part of it. Or whether to get a girl dog to prevent us comparing the new puppy to Herbie. Or whether to just see what happens. Herbie chose us every bit as much as we chose him. On first sight he came running up to us, rolled on to his back and demanded to have his tummy rubbed. He would do that for the rest of his life. Whether to get the same breed or something else entirely. So far, we have decided on another cockapoo. The next step is to see if the breeder in Essex from whom we got Herbie is still around. So far we can’t quite bring ourselves to make that leap. But we will. We will.

Thursday

The news cycle moves so quickly these days that it’s easy for things to slip off the radar. But we need to keep track. Not just for our own sanity but to hold the powerful to account. It’s now a week since Melania Trump gave her unexpected press conference and no one seems to be talking about it any more. But, if anything, it seems even weirder now than it did then as we are even further from understanding why she did it.

There were conflicting statements from the White House as to whether the president had any idea his wife was going to appear live on TV. There was the statement itself that Melania read as if she was seeing it for the first time. The hesitations. It had the feel of being written by someone else entirely. Though no one had a clue who had done it. The best sense that anyone could make of it was that Melania had got wind that some media outlet was about to run a story of her involvement with Jeffrey Epstein and was trying to get her denial in first.

Only a week on, there has been no new story about Melania and Epstein. So the whole thing seems even more inexplicable. Not least because the press statement only gave the media free rein to reprint several photos of Melania up close with Epstein. It seems with Melania, the more you see of her, the less you know her. She is an enigma. A blank canvas. Does she hate her husband? Does she even think about him? Doesn’t she even care when The Donald visibly loses it and picks a fight with the pope? AI has more depth than Melania.

Friday

It’s even got a name. It’s called the Timothée Chalamet effect. You may remember that a month or so ago the Oscar nominated actor declared that no one cared about opera or ballet any more. They were so last century. Dying on their feet. Only it turns out that when Tim speaks, everyone does the opposite. Opera and ballet have never been so popular. Seattle Opera were one of the first in on the act. They offered some discounted tickets to their performance of Carmen with a special access code ‘TIMOTHEE’ and couldn’t meet the demand.

Now it’s the Royal Ballet and Opera in Covent Garden who are cashing in on the promotional opportunities. This week Alex Beard, head honcho at the RBO, told The Times, “I thought it important that we didn’t issue a kind of hoity-toity response to Chalamet. We simply said, ‘Take a look at what we’re doing, mate.’ For instance, the fact that the largest portion of our audience by age is 20 to 30-year-olds. And you know what? Our post got two-and-a-half million engagements and half a million shares, just on Instagram. And our ticket sales got an immediate boost. So cheers, Timmy!”

As a regular opera goer, I have to admit to having mixed feelings about anything that makes it harder to get tickets but I am enjoying Chalamet’s hubris. So perhaps I also can use it to my advantage. There are still a few tickets left for my show at the Salisbury Playhouse next Saturday. So, if by some slim chance you’re reading this, Tim, I would be very grateful if you could tweet that having a laugh and political satire are dead in the water. We might even get a full house.