Recently there was a partial eclipse of the sun in the UK. Which is a little different to a total eclipse of the heart.

That was a song made famous by the late Bonnie Tyler. I don’t know what a total eclipse of the heart is. But every now and then I fall apart.

I need a hero.

No, different song.

Same singer though.

Anyway, there was a partial eclipse, which was the most significant one in the UK since 1999. Which I remember, actually.

Which is quite impressive because I was mostly drunk in 1999.

In 1999 I literally partied like it was 1999.

But I’ve grown out of that now.

Much like all major events that capture the public’s imagination, I was largely indifferent to the solar eclipse until it happened.

Then I took a vague interest.

I had a similar attitude in 1999.

In fairness, I was probably hungover in 1999.

But I did go out into the back garden of the shared house I lived in and paid attention to the solar eclipse briefly.

Then I shrugged my shoulders and probably went inside and drank a can of poor-quality lager, which at the time I thought was good-quality lager, because I was an idiot.

What I didn’t have in 1999 was a Little Proclaims, though. Little Proclaims was inspired by the solar eclipse.

Little Proclaims is inspired by a lot of things and, frankly, her enthusiasm is infectious.

So much so that when Mrs Proclaims took the kids out to the local park (which is conveniently across the road from Proclaims Towers) to experience the solar eclipse, I found myself accompanying them even though I had previously had no intention of doing so.

We didn’t have the special glasses.

Little Proclaims asked me to buy the special glasses, but she asked me exactly one day before the solar eclipse was due to happen, and the only special glasses I could find would have been delivered exactly 24 hours after the solar eclipse. Which seemed less than ideal.

So we went to the park with a colander.

A broken colander, as it turns out, but one which largely still functions as a colander. It colands pretty well.

It also served quite well as a way of sort of experiencing the eclipse, if you didn’t mind feeling like the poor relations in a field full of people who had purchased special glasses in sufficient time to experience the solar eclipse.

A kindly gentleman took pity on us and lent us his special glasses briefly.

I’ll concede that experiencing a bit of a partial solar eclipse through the special glasses was pretty cool.

Experiencing it through a colander, while facing away from the sun, was slightly less cool.

Mini Proclaims enjoyed the whole affair but had no idea what was going on.

It was quite cool when the world got a bit dark, but it was around quarter-past seven in the evening, so my inner cynic kept interjecting and claiming that it was only getting dark because it was the evening.

The partial eclipse of 1999 was earlier in the day and therefore more obviously an eclipse.

I tried to silence my inner cynic because Little Proclaims was clearly inspired by the whole event.

And it did get lighter again afterwards, so my inner cynic was wrong.

Every now and then I get a little bit tired of listening to the sound of my inner cynic.

Little Proclaims has also expressed an interest in seeing the much-heralded meteor shower.

But that was at night.

And really, we all needed to sleep.

So I wasn’t sure what to do.

So I referenced Bonnie Tyler again.

And she very clearly sang:

Forever’s gonna start tonight

Forever didn’t start that night, but Little Proclaims and I went out the following night and we saw the meteor shower too.