to wonder if those going to Ascot actually looked out of the window before dressing?

[TandB]

On my way in this morning I passed a lot of women clearly off to Ascot. It chucked it down for a fair part of the morning and has been drizzling persistently ever since. It does not look as though there is much prospect of anything but more rain. It is also quite chilly.

So why have all these women decided that it would be nice to wear floaty, strapless dresses with no coat, teeny high-heel shoes and fluffy hats? Surely you look out of the window and think "oh, rain. I might wear a coat. Or perhaps travel in my trainers and change my shoes when I get there".

All the floaty dresses are now soaking wet and clinging to the wearers' legs, or being scrunched up in a desperate attempt to keep them out of puddles. All the strappy shoe-wearers are limping along looking as though their feet are one big mass of water-induced blisters, and the fluffy hats and fascinators have lost all their fluff and fascination and are draped over their wearers' heads like drowned spiders.

Seriously, drowned rat is not a good look.

Because a manky old kagoule might not look so.......Ascot?

But they aren't at Ascot. They are wandering about South London on their way to Clapham Junction and will, at some point in the next couple of hours, be at Ascot. So why not wear the manky old kagoule?

I go to Henley Regatta every year and it pisses it down at least one year in three. People wear wellies and waterproofs over their dresses. People travel in sensible shoes and take their strappy sandals in their bags. People carry coats. Well, people who have been before do. There is always a reasonable contingent of strappy-shoed, soggy-hatted, limping debutantes around.

Are the water-sports crowd more sensible than the horse-racing crowd? Or just less hardy?