Return to the city

Today was our return. In the morning, after breakfast, we took another short walk, in a different direction, but this was mostly over roads katcha and pakka. Along the way we chatted about the potential downfall of global capitalism as sparked by the top football clubs in Europe deciding to form a mini-league of their […]

What I noticed

1. Pandering to the furious right in Pakistan 2. Coronavirus raging in India, Turkey, Pakistan 3. US troops are to be withdrawn from Afghanistan 4. Dodgy dealings in Whitehall 5. Trial for the murder of George Floyd 6. Blood clots, vaccines and the pill 7. Volcano in St Vincent 8. Buildup on the Ukrainian border […]

Exposure

The comic formerly on this website has appeared, in bowdlerised form and under another title, in the magazine. I daresay the original version will appear in my postmortem collected works, a slim volume but one offering great delight. I was rather on edge about this comic. I objected to having to tone it down, as […]

What I noticed

1. Unavoidably, Prince Philip died 2. Imran Khan digs in on jackassery 3. North Ireland, unsurprisingly, is not a happy place post-Brexit 4. More heartbreaking blasphemy accusations in Pakistan 5. Vaccine movements restricted 6. Myanmar ambassador locked out of his embassy 7. Infrastructure week happened in America again, but I was not really paying attention […]

Good neighbours

The (hopefully) final blast of winter is here, cold, grey and wet. Hopefully just till tomorrow and then the forecast says temperatures should climb and the sun should emerge. The relative has rallied a little. He has been conscious throughout, and it must be terrifying to be in that high oxygen room surrounded by PPE. […]

Waiting

This morning news came that the relative by marriage is not doing well. His organs are shutting down. His child sent me a heartbreaking voice message asking me to recite a prayer for him, holding his face and name in my mind. It is the prayer of Jonah in the belly of the whale, a […]

Scattered head

I’m back to work today, and am certainly struggling. It doesn’t help that after a couple of days off, the work is both considerable and immensely tedious. My head feels scattered, and I am unable to concentrate on anything much. The relative by marriage in Pakistan is not doing well at all. It’s even odds, […]

Lights

Our day’s excursion was to the lighting shops. We went to a place which makes bronze and copper lights, including to any design you specify, and seemed to have good quality and workmanship. Later, we found a few sites with stylish lights, and have a much better sense of what we might eventually use in […]

What I noticed

1. Vaccine passports 2. Attack in Mozambique 3. Jordanian thises and thats 4. A man, his plan: a very long canal 5. The reason for rape according to Imran Khan (skimpy attire) 6. Myanmar deaths 7. More talk of vaccine nationalism 8. Train crash in Taiwan 9. Deaths among the tribesmen 10. Coronavirus horrors in […]