Sainsbury’s
Yesterday, I toddled off to Sainsbury’s and found virtually no queue to get in. Such a queue as there was wasted no time in moving forward and I was able to start shopping within five minutes of my first arrival.

What can we put this down to? Well, although lock down remains in effect, restrictions on movement continue to be eased so that may be one reason.

I suspect, however, that I just got lucky. When I left the store about twenty/twenty-five minutes later, the queue had grown again – although happily only to about the length it was when I joined it last week.

While I am on the topic of Sainsbury’s – the store where I shop has now put up clear plastic partitions between the self check-out machines. As someone behind me said, they made the self check-outs look a bit like voting booths. I don’t like the partitions – even though they are transparent, they feel very confining and vaguely sinister; I don’t know why.

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Home Life
It has been a good-difficult week at home.

Good because everyone remains well; difficult because, especially as the week has gone on, I have found myself with little motivation to do anything creative. I have had ideas but when it comes to writing them down – no. All things considered it’s a little bit of a miracle that I am writing this. Perhaps I am more motivated than I realise.

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A B&B in Dorset
As I was writing the above, I saw a business card sticking out of a book on my desk. I pulled it out and found that it belonged to this B&B cottage in Dorset. I can’t remember which year I stayed at the cottage but I do remember enjoying my stay there. I hope the couple who ran it (David and Jackie Charles) are still there. The cottage is a little way outside of Dorchester; I remember walking along the winding road to get there from the pub in the pitch dark: a bit of a thrill! Fortunately, the thrill never became a nightmare and no cars suddenly appeared from around the bend.

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America
A few days ago a black man named George Floyd died in police custody in the city of Minneapolis. During his arrest, a police officer restrained him by placing his knee on the man’s throat. Floyd’s death is the latest to involve a black man being killed by (white) officers or white people. Rioting has followed his death. I predict that the violent protests will soon fade away. In a few weeks or months from now, another black man will die at a white person’s/police officer’s hands but whatever happens in the immediate aftermath, nothing will change then, either.

America, such an innovative country yet so utterly unable to find an answer to her ills.

Actually, that’s untrue. She knows perfectly well what the answers are but is unable or unwilling to apply them. I’m tempted to say that for as long as Donald Trump is president, she never will, but, here we are after eight years of President Obama. What was he doing? What could he do?

Once upon a time I respected America, looked up to her, even; yes, she had faults but she was a country that was always seemed to be striving forward. The Trump Presidency ended that perception. Under him, the country has chosen to look backwards.

Or has it? Trump lost the popular vote. He became president due to the Electoral College system. And I like to think that the people who voted for him – or most of them, anyway – probably didn’t vote for him because of his character but because politically speaking he offered them something that Hilary Clinton didn’t. This uncertainty means I can’t dislike the country but I’m sad that I can’t view her as once I did: with admiration. The West needs a great America: someone has to be able to stand up to the substantial threats posed by Russia and China. The E.U. should, but won’t. The world needs a great America because in being the best version of herself, she shows the world what it is capable of. I hope one day the U.S.A. finds a president, politicians, police officers who are able to meet that challenge. Make America great again, indeed.

Saving Mr Banks (8/10)
Disney film about how Walt Disney secured the rights to Mary Poppins from its author, P. L. Travers.

1961. P.L. Travers (Emma Thompson) has run out of money. Her agent (played by Ronan Vibert) advises her to sell the rights to Mary Poppins to Walt Disney (Tom Hanks). She refuses. Travers can’t bear to let her dearest creation go. Her situation is so bad, however, that in the end she does agree to go to Los Angeles to discuss Disney’s proposed script for a film. She goes, she criticises, she returns home. But even as Travers makes her way to the airport, Disney realises why Mary Poppins means so much to her. He follows her back to London. At Travers’ home, Disney not only tells Travers what he has discovered but reveals how she and he are both connected far more than they knew. This leads to Travers finally signing on the dotted line and the film being made.

I found all but the last half hour of this film difficult to watch. This was because Travers seems to have no redeeming features. She is all recalcitrance and general horridness. What kept me going were the flashbacks to her childhood. As a girl, Travers was a different person. Her life was not easy, and got worse, but it was for a time better, and so was she. The last half hour of the film is when the truth comes out. It is revelatory and freeing for her and me. The screenwriters did really well, there. I would recommend the picture just for the last section. That’s being a bit unfair! The whole film is good and well worth your time.

Delicacy (8/10)
Audrey Tautou plays Nathalie Kerr, a happily married young woman whose husband dies suddenly. For three years, she mourns him. Then, one day, probably while thinking of her husband, she kisses the office nobody. He is overwhelmed and all of a sudden in love. He bravely asks Nathalie out. She accepts and this being a romantic comedy, love blossoms against the odds.

Delicacy is a funny, sweet, and very French film. For proof of this, see the final scene: the hide and seek game in the garden. I won’t spoil it here but suffice to say it involves philosophy. So French.