Today turned out to be rather more interesting than I expected. As usual these days, I almost instantly flew into a rage when I turned the news on this morning. What happened at the White House yesterday really was repugnant, enough to make me feel I had to do something.

I looked up the route to the American embassy. Quite what I would do once I got there I had no idea, but I could sort that out in due course: Part of me just felt compelled to go and somehow insist that they immediately replace Donald Trump with someone who isn’t a gut-wrenching disgrace to human civilisation. The route seemed simple enough: jubilee line to London Bridge, and then the northern line to Battersea Power Station.

That’s how, at about one this afternoon, I found myself at the American embassy on the south bank of the Thames. Unfortunately, fool that I am, I hadn’t considered the fact that the embassy would be shut for the weekend and nobody would be there. The trip was not completely in vain though, as I got to explore a part of London I hadn’t been to before, full of dazzling new buildings.

I was just beginning to think about my route home though, when I noticed a group of protesters across the road. They were campaigning about Palestine, and were holding some kind of meeting. Mostly out of curiosity, and wanting to do something interesting with my Saturday afternoon, I thought I would cross the road and say hi. What is currently happening in Israel is a thorny, complex issue of course, which is why I try to veer away from it here; but on the whole I have a lot of sympathy with the Palestinian cause.

Frankly, what followed was rather curious. The group I had come across was made of good, kind people, clearly very concerned about what they not unjustly termed an Aphartied. I doubt any intelligent, well informed person could be anything but sickened by what Is currently happening in the Middle East. It might be simply because I rewatched The Life Of Brian last night though, but I couldn’t help being reminded of the famous scene about the Judean Peoples Front: that is to say, there was a lot of talking going on, but I fear that it will ultimately achieve nothing. It obviously helped the people there feel like they were doing something, but at the end of the day, how could a small meeting of Londoner on the banks of the Thames possibly influence such a complex, horrific conflict?