A dreary, wet Monday in Northern Ireland and on the steps of Stormont castle, hundreds of Unison NI union members have gathered to tell their elected Assembly to get real. "Do your duty, form a Government - the people can't wait," say the banners.
It's three-and-a-half years since the legislative Assembly last met, never mind did any legislating. For most of that time, they've been on full pay and privileges. In the shadow of Lord Carson's monument - erected by the grateful "Loyalists of Ulster", depicting the long dead leader mid-rant - Ulster is saying grow up or get off the stage.
This morning, the squabbling children haven't even made it through the front door and Bob McCartney (sole member of the UK Unionist Party) has made it known that he objects to the seating arrangements. A deputy speaker from the DUP refuses to be interviewed inside the BBC radio van with his Sinn Féin counterpart, opting to stand in the rain instead. Inside the chamber, the ex-DUP member, Paul Berry, sits in isolation at the back, not for fomenting hatred, but for having allegations about his private life aired in a Sunday tabloid.
Meanwhile, word is out that David Ervine (sole member of the PUP, the party closely linked with the UVF), is joining the UUP group for numerical purposes which might deprive Sinn Féin of a ministry. The DUP is said to be raging.
The UUP insists that it's not about keeping Sinn Féin out of government, "it's about getting the balance right".
Nothing actually happens, of course. The most exciting slip comes from the speaker, Eileen Bell, who turns the word "secretary" into "sectarian" and raises a few sheepish grins.
Prayers aren't specified on the order paper so they settle for a minute's "reflection" on the tragic death of 15-year-old Michael McIlveen. The DUP's Jim Shannon does his reflection, hand on heart, for good measure. Then the teams sign up. The DUP promptly rises to object to them being allowed to register as groups rather than parties, and Ms Bell agrees to get legal counsel and come back tomorrow. Then they all adjourn to the great hall to rehash the old script for the media. On the radio, listeners are complaining about the "most expensive pantomime in the world". The most positive comment is that "at least all 108 of them turned up".
A few hours later, in classic Northern Ireland fashion, several of the same players - two Paisleys, Jeffrey Donaldson, David Trimble and Mark Durkan among them - turn up at the sodden royal garden party at Hillsborough Castle, hosted by Charles and Camilla, with the slick theme, "The Health Sector including the Complementary Health Sector". Around 2,500 guests turn up, half of them (the female half, sadly) dressed in clothes that would have them certified as deranged in any objective judgment. One vision in green had travelled to Paris to buy the outfit.
Summoned to appear 90 minutes before the royal arrival, they crushed into a glass-fronted marquee, gazing out like sad, bewildered refugees from a smartish retirement home, their only comfort the tea, the "little orange buns" as one guest described them, and sandwiches. Ushered out to the lashing rain for the imminent meet and greet, their overwhelmingly pink, floaty dresses hung sodden over goose-pimpled skin while open, high-heeled sandals threatened to sink bore-holes in the quagmire. The bands and the children's choir played an array of old favourites, some with a distinctly southern flavour such as Molly Malone and Galway Bay, as hair styled expensively to within an inch of its life threatened to frizz and summer linens crumpled disastrously.
But they bravely smiled for the royal pair - Camilla in sensible navy, wedge-style shoes and armed with a transparent umbrella, asking couples how they met, agonising about the possibly tragic fate of the little pine tree, newly planted by Charles, and whether guests had been "waiting long in the rain".