Courting and dodging

Travels make me an elusive figure at work social events such as this post-office game of dodgeball on a netball court somewhere inside the maze of grounds of Cambridge Uni.

Dodgeball is fun for flinging balls and ducking and diving, though only as long as you do enough shoulder stretches to avoid a week of follow-up soreness. We learnt our lesson last year.

For those who care, the country today is courting some very nervous times. Because of moving and travel I am devastated not to be on the electoral roll until next week, missing out on voting in the local elections. Cambridge is left-wing but the wider mayoral jurisdiction less so. The result in this election isn't guaranteed.

Over the last year some right-wing politicians and media bods have done a stunningly successful job to associate all of the UK's problems with EU membership and/or immigrants. They don't even need to bother arguing their usual that austerity is good for the country or blame the previous government for an overspend. Rest assured their underlying policies that no one's bothering to scrutinise will involve a tougher life for many who are already struggling. It's patently clear that large swaths of the electorate couldn't give a flying fiddle about that. We are less socially minded as a society than I hoped we were.