IS it not hard to believe that it is only five weeks since that momentous EU Referendum? Just think what has happened (and what has not happened) since then. Political bodies lie everywhere – Cameron, Osborne, Gove. Others have rather surprisingly (and perhaps very cleverly on the part of Theresa May) survived – Boris, I think, is a particularly brilliant appointment; and Andrea Leadsom has made it into the Cabinet for the first time. Others – David Davis, Liam Fox, Sir Alan Duncan and Damian Green have revived long-lost careers.

Some have sore heads and disappointment; others (like me) have kept steady and quiet. We seek no ministerial promotion, believing that a Parliamentary career is an honourable profession without any need to serve in Government. In particular that frees us up to speak our minds and better to represent our constituents; and it allows us to focus on our own particular interests – the military, foreign affairs, the countryside, constitutional matters and Parliament and the polar regions in my case.

What has not happened has been the predicted collapse of the Stock Exchange (trading at higher levels than before the referendum), recession, emergency budgets and the plague of frogs which the Remain camp so ruthlessly predicted for their own ends. The fact is that for now we are in precisely the same position as we were before – full members of the EU. Nothing will change for at least two years, so the naysayers and gloom-mongers should stop talking Britain down and inject a bit of positive enthusiasm into their view of Britain in the world.

Life is steady for me. As the world whirls around me, I have focused on constituency life including a meeting with the Local Enterprise Partnership to discuss Government funding; a group from Lyneham Defence Academy going round the Palace of Westminster; the delightful Crudwell Primary School leavers’ service; surgeries in Calne and Royal Wootton Bassett, dinner in Kington Langley and lunch in Sherston; judging 18 lovely gardens for the Royal Wootton Bassett in Bloom competition; and generally unwinding and sorting life out after one of the most hectic periods anyone can remember in parliamentary and political life.

I am pretty much staying in Wiltshire for the recess. If you live somewhere as lovely as this, why go elsewhere? But I will take a few days here and there to relieve Philippa from the cooking. I have two days visiting the Normandy beaches, a weekend in Menorca, and perhaps a quick trip to visit the High Sheriff, David Hempleman-Adams on his boat as he tries to circumnavigate the North Pole.

But mainly it will be constituency events, eating and drinking and sleeping, a bit of reading and perhaps some writing (I am battling to finish a book which has been on the stocks for a couple of years). I have to admit that I cannot wait for the month or so of relative peace and quiet which beckons in August.