The Spectator’s Notes | 28 July 2012

‘Make hay while the sun shines’ is advice to be taken literally as well as metaphorically, and so, as I walked up from the station after a particularly Olympics-cursed visit to London, I was soothed by the sound and smell of mowing coming from our little fields. Haymaking should have taken place almost two months ago, but the wet made it truly impossible until this week. Should the sudden kindness of the weather and the excitement of the approaching opening ceremony make one get all nice about the Olympics? Well, yes, as far as the hopes of the athletes and the pleasure of the spectators go, it should. It is only when I read that it is ‘easy to carp’ that I get cross. Actually, it is not all that easy. There is considerable moral pressure to talk up the Olympics. One feels like a republican during the Jubilee.