Well, it’s been confirmed that the election was real. This week we have seen the new cohort of MPs swearing into parliament; the first sitting of this government’s cabinet; and, today, the Queen’s speech (her second in two months).

Here are some of the highlights lowlights of the state opening of parliament. And I truly do mean state.

Photograph: Paul Edwards/Poo/AFP via Getty

If I got to the age of 93 and wasn’t allowed to retire, and part of my job was to read out the promises of governments that were rarely fulfilled, I don’t think I’d be a happy pup. And yet here Liz is, once again, going through this rigmarole. I hope the royal household has a good therapist and masseuse on staff.

I note that Her Majesty is not in ceremonial garb. The reason given is that there wasn’t enough time before Christmas. Although Christmas is a week away and it must take all of five minutes to put the robe on, given that it is essentially just a heavy kaftan. I maintain this is a slight.

Photograph: Jessica Taylor Handout/EPA

At first you think this is Boris Johnson holding the Bible on which to take his parliamentary oath, and it may well be. But how can we be sure he isn’t holding a copy of his biography of Winston Churchill, possibly the only one that isn’t on a charity shop shelf? “Boris’s sweeping claims vanish in a cloud of inconvenient facts,” a New Statesman reviewer wrote of the book back in 2014 (surely not!), and is full of “cringe-making metaphors” (doesn’t sound like him!). Johnson has also written a novel, titled Seventy-Two Virgins. The less said about it the better, and, fortunately, not much has ever been said about it.

Photograph: Jessica Taylor/UK Parliament

Meanwhile, here is Theresa May taking her oath in the manner in which you read a menu, taking ages to decide, before a waiter comes along and all but forces you to make a choice. You then moan about it for the entire meal and pick from a friend’s plate while they quietly seethe.

Photograph: WPA Pool/Getty Images

Despite appearances, this is not, in fact, the mass training day for Selfridges’ Santa’s grotto but the state opening of the House of Lords. The reason they are packed in like sardines is because we have 50,000 new peers, an entirely sustainable and not at all over-the-top number. We already had 19,000 peers and then we added 30,000 and that is why we have 50,000 more, you see.

Photograph: Jessica Taylor Handout/EPA

We welcome back to the Commons Caroline Lucas, who will hold the seat of Brighton Pavilion until it is prised from her hands. Which will probably in about five years given that’s when the world is scheduled to implode. Because apparently nobody cares about the environment. Well done, everybody!

Photograph: Matt Dunham/AP

Here we have Matt Hancock arriving at the first cabinet meeting since the election, looking to the heavens and revelling in the fact he has, somehow, retained his place. This despite once responding to Johnson’s “fuck business” comment with “fuck ‘fuck business’” when running against him for leader, and spending the past few weeks getting out of a car, in the dark, in the middle of a country road to film a piece-to-iPhone-camera before getting back into a car on country road, in the dark.

Photograph: Kirsty Wigglesworth/Pool/AFP via Getty

British politics once again having a normal one. In this case, the Commons Speaker, Lindsay Hoyle, walking through the lobby. The vibe here is very much spilling out of Wetherspoons with the girls and not having realised it has been raining heavily and you have to ask a pal to lift the train on your new dress as you step over a puddle on the way out. It will get wet anyway and you’ll never be able to wear it again.

Photograph: Matt Dunham/AP

Ah, here is Nicky Morgan, who said she would “not serve in a Johnson cabinet” striding towards her retained place in a Johnson cabinet, in which she has served for the past six months. She has also been elevated to the Lords (which is why she can stay in the cabinet) after stepping down as an MP. Truly, the underachiever’s overachiever.

Photograph: Anadolu Agency via Getty

I can’t tell you how consistently sorry I feel for Larry the Downing Street cat. Larry is a civil servant, so he stays put regardless of changes at the top. He has a permanent expression of being utterly fed up, which one might say is true of all cats, but there’s fed up and then there’s hiding under a Christmas tree, just absolutely wishing everything would go away. To further add to Larry’s woes, No 10 has added the admittedly adorable addition of Dilyn the rescue dog. You may remember Dilyn from such scenes as unsuccessfully wrestling away from Johnson as he carried him into a polling booth last week.

Photograph: Hannah McKay/PA

If this was a Rorschach test, I think my answer would be: absolutely unbearable tension of mutual hatred. With a side dash of Etonian smug from the guy on, ironically, the left.

Photograph: Leon Neal/PA

I have no idea why Johnson behaving like the conductor of an orchestra here, except for the fact that he must be the focus of attention at all times. The only thing remotely promising in this photograph is the green velvet suit worn by Dehenna Davison, the new MP for Bishop Auckland, who informed me via Twitter that it is from Dorothy Perkins. And that, my friends, is almost certainly the single thing I will get out of this Tory government. Merry Christmas everyone!