Undiluted Greatness – Poor Little Rich Gays Throb at the Core of Our Nation’s Life

Thursday 6th March 2014

Lord Arrowby texted. He’s my former part-time love interest. What’s more he’s agreed to come to Glyndebourniana in May! Anyway he texted on Monday morning. You won’t believe from whence. Somehow I was reminded of how Edmund Gosse and another were looking at unsuitable postcards in the back row of Browning’s funeral.

Do you know where? Where was that funeral held? What ecclesiastical building has shuddered through the history of our Nation? Why was Lord Arrowby sat next to not one but two former Prime Ministers? In fact his seat should have been occupied by Tony Blair who is apparently nolonger a former Prime Minister.

And who was sitting next to the second of the former Prime Ministers? In a special stall? And why were they singing ‘Guide me Oh Thou Great Redeemer’.

Scarcely breathing, I can reveal that on Monday morning Lord Arrowby was texting under the desk as it were – from the choir stalls at the Abbey. Yes, the Abbey! He was taking massive precedence at the Memorial for Nelson Mandela. Only two stops now from Prince Harry lui-même.

I snapped on the telly at once. Three times Lord Arrowby was shown, rolled in with the permitted glimpses of Prince Harry of Wales, who was pretty but frockage oh so square. Then two greys, John Majeur and Gordon Brown, looking a lot better after his prolonged illness. Finally in the corner, designer specs, bronzed, a figure from another planet, your actual Lord Arrowby, a kind of starburst although fully visible, self-illuminating like the Baby Jesus at Christmas in a painting.

Once I saw by chance Princess Margaret visiting privately a performance of The Winter’s Tale at the Barbican. I thought then that even if you’d landed from another planet you’d have seen at once that she was not as others. Her hair, fabrics, jewels and manner would have shrieked imperial even to one furnished with no model of Royalty.

So with Lord Arrowby in the Abbey. If the Queen should ever give up, it’s more than plain who the next Sovereign should be. Lord Arrowby for King!

His level now is such that a car came the second the service was over and he was back at his desk in two minutes. Gordon Brown, he said, only mumbled the hymns, whereas, he, Lord Arrowby, belted them out, to the alarm of the former PM.

When not struck down by His Lordship, I was greatly moved by the Service. Nelson Mandela was not really a Poor Little Rich Gay. Had he been he could have brought an entire nation to its knees. But Goodbye Dadda! The long years of The Struggle! During the singing of the South African National Anthem in their language I was in floods.

Finally on Wednesday, Robert Nevil was seen by Rufus Pitman conducting a very difficult meeting of the inner Committee of the Pony Club. Members are seething and internecine to the maximum after the recent floods. Their paddocks are knee-deep, their ponies are damp. Gymkana Grounds are in a wretched state. Doris Body blamed Iris Connie in no uncertain terms. ‘I was trying to promote a more water-proof hoof years ago but you had your refined objections.’ Iris Connie was all glowing and philosophical with goodness up to the point where she decided to give Doris Body a black eye. The meeting broke up in chaos.

 

Posted Friday, March 7, 2014 under Adrian Edge day by day.

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