Salisbury and Amesbury are not, of course, in Dorset, let alone West Dorset. But they are near enough to us to make the ghastly Novichok poisonings seem pretty close to home.

After the long, hot days of June and July that turned so much of our countryside and our gardens an unaccustomed brown, the more variable weather (and indeed the rain) of August has been in many ways a relief.

In the last few days, following all the end of session dramas of Parliament, I have found myself opening a number of new tourist facilities in West Dorset. 

The last few weeks have been full of news. So the readers of this column could be forgiven for having missed the news that West Dorset has taken another step into the digital future with the provision of free wifi in the centre of Dorchester. 

I recently overheard someone who was evidently a local explaining to someone who was clearly a tourist, that this was a very unusual summer because the sun was shining and England were doing rather well in the football.

I see that plans are afoot for a significant further development of housing next to the Granby Industrial Estate in Chickerell.

In my last column, I remarked on the degree to which only bad news is news - and the extent to which this has the effect of removing good news from most of the media most of the time. 

Have you ever had the feeling, when reading national newspapers or listening to the radio or watching the TV - or, indeed, receiving news through websites or social media - the world is composed entirely of bad news?

Inevitably, during the last few weeks, Parliament has been much preoccupied with the various Brexit Bills and negotiations. 

Mercifully, I have never found myself short of water when crossing a desert - and I have not therefore, had the experience of seeing a pool of water that turned out on closer inspection to be nothing more than a mirage.