| September is when my thoughts normally turn to the Mediterranean, as it begins to cool there and begins to get gloomy and autumnal here. But yesterday was hotter in Northern Ireland, 27C, than Barcelona is due to be tomorrow, 25C. I write this shortly after 9am in Belfast and it is already another perfect day. What a joy, and to be able to forget where we are in the calendar. Because soon it will be cool again - but at least home heating oil remains cheap. More than a decade ago I was leaving the News Letter's then Portadown office one night, driving to Belfast on the M1. In the distance I saw lights coming in the opposite direction as you do on motorways, and thought: that seems almost on this side of the central barrier. It was. It was wrongly in my Belfast bound outside lane rocketing towards me. I careered over to the hard shoulder then called 999 but it took so long to explain where I was (in the darkness I had to think of the nearest junction) that by the time I was able to phone a colleague whom I knew to be travelling the same route, the rogue car was probably miles down the road. I thought of that moment when reading our front page story today of a pensioner with dementia, killed driving the wrong way down that same M1. I am relieved that the libel case between Van Morrison and Robin Swann is settled. It seemed a silly dispute to me. Hilary Benn seems to be confirming today that the UK will now stand up to Ireland on nothing, not even when it has had the sheer nerve to sue us on legacy. Talking of which, that bona fide human rights activist Jeff Dudgeon has helped get clarity on the undue focus on a thing called Article Two, which is endlessly cited to explain the legacy imbalance against the security forces. This letter writer from Cork would not like my criticisms of Ireland, yet I think he makes a fair point about Brexit being a post 1998 unionist blunder. The education minister Paul Givan on our pages explained his mobile phone school ban, including testing new phone inhibiting technology. His cabinet colleague Naomi Long has queried the idea. Meanwhile, the Alliance leader has been criticised over her approach to the PSNI. Ministerial colleagues attacking each other reflects Stormont dysfunction. I write here about MLAs' failure to so much as debate reform of lavish public sector pensions. Finally, a statue of the late Queen and Duke of Edinburgh has been unveiled in Antrim Castle gardens. Enjoy your reading and your sunny Saturday, Ben | 
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