blog

Wet, wet day

It’s been a very wet May in the UK (with an average daily temperature of around 7, brr), I hear, and we got a little taste of it in Istanbul today as it rained and rained and rained. Our contractor’s son popped by to collect a payment, over an hour late as the Metro was […]

Out into the world

I made my first real trip out into the world today, as I had a doctor’s appointment at a hospital near Taksim Square. I took the Metro which was, happily, not too crowded (though on the escalator at Taksim someone kept crowding against me, and I felt too feeble to walk up to begin with, […]

Adult eyes

The GF is reading Middlemarch and I started reading it too. I last read it when I was quite young, I think around 12 or 13, and I remember really not enjoying it. Of course I was too young, but I remember being irritated by Dorothea’s foolishness early in the book and the horror and […]

FOMO

I have just received an email from HMRC, subject line: ‘Join the trend of submitting your SA return earlier this year’. Dear customer, We’ve seen a growing trend in customers submitting their Self Assessment returns early. In the last five years the number of customers choosing to file their return on the first day of […]

Hard at work

The flat across the road is a source of constant entertainment. Right now a very hardworking influencer is filming herself (or being filmed by her boyfriend), walking towards the camera, the Bosphorus in the background, pause, ruffle hair, fling to side, extend 1 leg from little black dress, lean forward, turn, walk. And repeat. And […]

Fire and fury

The situation in Palestine is hard to look away from. So ugly, and so clear what the major source of ugliness is. Funny how some outrage or other occupies me these days, intensely, and then disappears as though it’s too tiring to sustain. When there is so much horror and injustice, it takes someone with […]

Restless

Lockdown comes to an end quite soon – tomorrow is the final day, and the government has said it will announce what comes next on Monday. So I daresay Monday itself will be a sort of free for all. The GF is quite restless and fed up. I’m fed up too, but also I feel […]

On duty

A brief excursion today, to the chemist on duty about 15 minutes away. The chemists here take turns to remain open on weekends and public holidays, a rather good system as you can always find out where to go. Of course it was a little crowded and there was a queue, and once inside I […]