The Daily Mail and Alun Michael might well have been right to think that Lycra louts were important to the public, but that does not make it an issue of high politics.

The present writer is inclined to think that cat-fear is analogous to snake-fear.

Sam came out carrying a plastic bag of trash. He scanned the sky. “Guess what? Your favorite color is about to appear.” “What color?” Maddie glanced up. The sun was sliding behind the woods. He sat down beside her. “Sky-blue pink, what else?” Maddie pursed her lips. “That color is not on any of my chalks or crayons. Or these paint papers. It's not real.” “This color is better than any color you've ever seen. I promise. Just watch.” Puffy sheep clouds floated across the blue-sky field.

The interesting thing about these ceremonies is that they must have originated in a period when the Romans were using true lunar months based on the observation of the crescent moon. The Kalends then would have been the day after the evening on which the crescent had been first sighted, the Nones would have been the first day when the moon was at the first quarter... In the calendar of the late Republic the lunar months have disappeared and the days have been fixed into a rigid pattern.