Cam what May

This row of terraced university houses next to Jesus Green always feels very Cambridge-y to me. I don't imagine the glazing is well equipped to cope with the arrival of winter, which seems to be the weather's decision today. I reached for my gloves and there's no turning back (until I emigrate to where gloves are seldom used).

Quite a useful day in the office, signing my Mozambique contract at last, doing fairly well against the to-do list, finally responding to colleagues' pleas to complete an expenses claim from Liberia in March, eating flapjack on the roof (suntrap), giving friends riveting updates on packing boxes and mulling over dancing options for a leaving do on Friday.

In the evening a lovely Italian meal out with my neighbours, who are excellent company. We usually get very vocally anti-Brexit and anti the current government and I wondered whether anyone nearby with differing political views wanted to shut us up with a piece of our own garlic bread.

Covering recent news, we wondered why Theresa May attempted that traditional dancing in Africa because someone so high profile and ungainly is clearly going to be plastered over the internet as a meme. In general I feel sorry for Theresa. She's having to lead the country through Brexit negotiations despite favouring Remain herself. She seems like a natural introvert and is forced into defending a whole government's position when others would do it with more media flair. In particularly bad press conferences where she's looked knackered and exposed it's clear that inside she is battling a natural fight or flight instinct.

I remember the relief that she assumed the leadership in 2016 when it could have been a number of unsavoury characters. She's still a better choice and a more faithful public servant than many within her party, and doesn't have Cameron's over-privileged smugness; a man whose main activity in government was to bait the opposition, riling up his backbenchers with more pomp than the average politician. I hope he sees the Brexit chaos that has ensued his premiership and permits himself a modicum of guilt. He's perhaps right to have slunk off to the shadows, keeping a low profile for a few years.