The psychodrama in Washington grows ever more bizarre.

A family member recently emailed the following after a weekend here: "Thanks for a lovely weekend, great company, great food, great excursions. Wanganui. Top town."

Back when I had a television and video player and the lads were in their early teens, we used to watch movies.

Last week I got a little bit fired up by some ill-judged comments about Wanganui Collegiate which made the front page of this fine paper.

"Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me" - so the British Parliament decided it didn't want to be shamed by following another prime minister into another unwinnable war on the basis, yet again, of shoddy intelligence.

I used to admire John Key. Even when I disagreed with his policies I found his political savvy impressive. Anyone who could co-opt and manage both John Banks and Tariana Turia on his team, had to be reckoned with.

Much approval ensued from my column where I criticised watching TV, playing, and doing everything else but talking while eating dinner - instead of sitting up at the table and conversing with each other.

Conservation Week (September 8-15) is a great opportunity for us to show support for our local environment.

Over the past two weeks we have seen the following computer system crashes: A three-hour network shutdown on August 22 that paralysed the Nasdaq stock exchange.

The question of Collegiate must be a vexed one for any Labour candidate or supporter in Wanganui, especially after Chris Hipkins' spray in Parliament.

The title for this column - Waiting For Heaven - is taken from a song I wrote a few years ago after performing at hospice.

As Grandparents, parents, caregivers, teachers and politicians we often debate what we should be doing individually and collectively to improve Maori achievement in the education system.

All right, so it's not the All Blacks versus Australia for the Bledisloe Cup. That comes later tonight. It's not even Super 15 (though it can be "super"). But it is the Heartland Championship - and that's what counts in rugby circles around these parts.

I have been enjoying a book by Bill Bryson called The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid in which he tells of his life as a child of the 1950s in Des Moines, US, capturing the giddy era of the post-war boom in America.

No one enjoys watching the All Blacks beat the Wallabies probably more than me, although over the years it has gotten to the stage that I am starting to have sympathy for our long-suffering rivals.

Today sees the launch of our new-look Wanganui Chronicle website - an exciting development in our online coverage.