YesBut that was the last week in May

Finish the work in 48 weeks, that's a laugh, he’s been trying to open that umbrella for nearly five months.

Monday was Spring Bank Holiday, as I explained in Monday's blog the London Tourist industry employs shamans to do a rain dance to ensure the weather is so ghastly that it forces tourists, in order to get out of the rain, to dig deep in their pockets and pay to get into cinemas, theatres and other tourist traps (sorry I mean attractions). Just for the fun of it, last Monday the shamans while dancing also did a gusty wind chant!

Somehow amongst the rain England managed to beat the West Indies at cricket. For the benefit of USA readers, cricket is a sport played between two teams each with 11 men dressed in white. They hang around for five days while another two men dressed in white coats decide whether the “light” is good enough to play. If “bad light” is declared both teams go into a pavilion to play cards, watch TV, listen to MP3 players, and play practical jokes on each other. If the “light” is declared good, one team throws a ball at two of the other team members, until “bad light” is declared again. A “Test Match” played between two countries is even more effective than a rain dance at ensuring bad weather.

I’ve nothing to say about Tuesday and Wednesday, I’m not sure if this is because nothing of note happened; or I was so cold on Monday I got hyperthermia and slept through the next two days.

Thursday morning I decided to stick my head out from under the bed covers. It looked dark and grim, ducked back under the bedclothes, turned over and went back to sleep. It was only when Mrs YesBut forced me out of bed on Thursday afternoon that I realised the woollen cap I had been wearing to keep my head warm in bed, had slipped over my eyes, and the sun was shinning outside.

On Thursday schools in England were given the legal right to search pupils who are suspected of carrying knives. That news surprised me, I thought they had always had the right - evidently not, it seems if a teacher thought a pupil had a knife they would have to notify the police who would come to the school to search the suspect. Mind that might not have been a bad idea, I wouldn’t like to be a teacher searching one of these young thugs for a knife - “so you want my knife, here have it” right in your heart!! What went wrong? Where are the long lost days when the only dubious object in a schoolboy’s pocket was a length of string, a whistle, a packet of itching powder and a frog?

So President George W Bush has just discovered Global Warming, and is urging countries to agree on long-term goals for greenhouse gas emissions. The mans a genius. That’s why he beat Al Gore - poor Al could never get his head around problems affecting the environment Next thing he’ll discover Saddam Hussein didn’t have weapons of mass destruction.

Next Wednesday I will be posting the first blog in a series on memorials and public sculptures. Yesterday Westminster Council said they were going to place restrictions on further statues being placed in central London. That shouldn’t place too much of a restriction on the blog, there’s already +350 in Westminster, then there’s the rest of London, UK and the World.

It was forty years ago yesterday that the “Fab Four” Beatle’s iconic LP “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band" was released. It remained in the number 1 position of the Billboard 200 for 15 weeks, it topped the UK Albums Chart for 27 weeks and the Australian Albums Chart for 30 weeks. This year the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame awarded it the “Most Definitive Rock and Roll Album”. They just don’t make records like that anymore.

I thought at least last night Brazil would brighten up the week for me by beating England at football (soccer). The Scots, Irish and Welsh just love it when England lose. But they only managed a draw. But at least Brazil scored in the last minute, just when England had thought they had won.

The British artist has set a $100 million price tag on his “For the Love of God” diamond encrusted platinum skull. It is the highest price asked for a work of art put on sale by a living artist. The piece cost $30 million to make, the purchase of 8,601 diamonds weighing a total of 1,106.18 carats accounted for a large proportion of the cost. But if a scull is worth £50 million what is YesBut’s Images worth?

Why not participate; click here and leave your suggestion of a caption for today’s YesBut’s Image.