Budgets, Black Friday and a bowl of soup

Read Martin's column every week in the Western Daily Press

- 

BLACK Friday, indeed! I say those words like some old Presbyterian minister with a large harrumph stuck somewhere in his larynx.

The concept of Black Friday is enough to overwhelm a country hick like me. Global, universal consumerism writ large. Peering through my office window attempting to summon inspiration, I spy a thin blue vapour trail stretching into the great blue yonder. Only jet-fighters or private executive planes at high altitude leave vapour trails that slim and fast-moving, so out of curiosity I reach for the flight-radar app on my phone and discover this particular winged limousine is heading for West Beach in Florida.

Perhaps the people flying 40,000 feet above Exmoor are beneficiaries of Black Friday's whirlwind of profiteering. The cost of hiring a one-way private jet from London to Palm Beach is between £95,000 and £115,000.

Oddly, there are no Black Friday deals on offer when it comes to hiring executive jets.

So that's one rich dude up there and it may well be someone reaping the profits of Black Friday, perhaps a dot com billionaire. Then again, Donald Trump lives in Palm Beach, so perhaps some of his lackeys are on their way back to tell him how they've stitched up the Ukraine and done their master’s bidding. Or should that be Putin’s bidding?