This from Rafael Behr.  Rafael’s words are so precise & polished, real and unaffected. If you can’t face it all – just absorb the first few paras, you won’t be disappointed!

Boris Johnson’s bluster on Brexit is about to face reality https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/mar/03/boris-johnson-brexit-eu-trade-talks?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_WordPress

It should have been a great decade for the European left – what happened?

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/dec/31/decade-european-left-syriza-austerity-europe-progressive?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_WordPress

Carrot mania: shoppers in a frenzy over Aldi’s plush toy Kevin

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2019/nov/29/carrot-mania-shoppers-in-a-frenzy-over-aldi-plush-toy-kevin?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_WordPress

Pathological consumption has become so normalised that we scarcely notice it. By George Monbiot, published in the Guardian 11th December 2012 There’s nothing they need, nothing they don’t own already, …

Source: The Gift of Death

York shop bans cheesy Christmas music for sake of staff

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/nov/10/york-shop-bans-cheesy-christmas-music-for-sake-of-staff-gin?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_WordPress

I think it was this time last year I was ranting about Slade’s Christmas hit, and how I found it terminally depressing as it paraded itself across our ears for (what? The next seven weeks?) – seems I wasn’t alone.