The fanfares, the ermine robes, the tiaras. She's seen it all before. Her Majesty has delivered the Queen's Speech no fewer than 56 times but never has there been a day quite like this - a day when the monarch didn't just open Parliament - she was visiting the scene of an alleged crime.
This year - as every year - MPs slammed the door in the face of Black Rod - the man sent to summon them. It's a historic symbol that no-one tells our elected representatives what to do.
"Hats off strangers" is the cry when the Speaker's procession goes through the Commons. It's appropriate given today's revelation that the Serjeant at Arms - a senior Commons official - and the Speaker himself appear to have simply doffed their hats when the police came to raid an MP's office, to seize his computer, his phones and private correspondence.
It is now clear that the police have some very serious questions to answer about the way they behaved. So too the Speaker and his officials. So too ministers who were involved in launching the inquiry.
Let us not forget, also, the question that was put again and again to David Cameron about whether he as prime minister would feel comfortable with the systematic leaking over a period of two years.
There will be more than a whiff of nostalgia in the Commons today and not just because of the ermine robes, the tiaras and the bizarre ancient names (the keeper of the third stick and so on).
No, today's outline of the government's legislative priorities will be a reminder, a nostalgic reminder, of what ministers thought their priorities would be before the recession kicked in. Most of the bills that will be unveiled we will have heard of before in the draft Queen's Speech and even earlier than that when Gordon Brown first talked of his priorities as prime minister. There's a new NHS constitution for example, and a new regime for tackling failing schools.
The PM is aware that this Queen's Speech risks being overshadowed not just by Speaker Martin's statement but by virtually anything else. He will, I'm sure, have a rabbit in the hat to unveil, an immediate policy to tackle the recession and designed to be a cherry on top of the Queen's Speech cake.
What then of Speaker Martin? Well, let me risk sharing my hunch. Love him or loathe him, he cannot be deaf to the pleas for him to grant a debate. I suspect he'll do that and take an emollient tone today. There is only really the nuclear option for MPs who want to criticise him. In other words, attempt to have him removed from office, and I regard that as very unlikely indeed.
The only question is whether, rather like the little boy in the story of the emperor's new clothes, there is a lone figure in the Commons who isn't aware of what they're supposed to do and decides to defy the mood of the day. Will someone speak out challenging the Speaker despite the rules and conventions of the Commons? There will be a nervous wait, not just for Speaker Martin, but for all those who work with him.
