My photo album reminds me it’s exactly a decade since I last took up running, intent on moving from Couch to 5K. Amusing, because I just bought myself a new pair of running shoes, intent on trying again. Ten years on, I think I’ll be more sensible this time, and restrict myself to jogging on …
It is very difficult to be fair. Often our own perceptions and prejudices get in the way of us being fair to others. Yesterday, I was listening to a Muslim convert speaking about his experience moving within established British Muslim communities. Not for the first time, he described feeling like an outcast amongst those raised …
Happy, smiley people. That’s how others appear to me. Encountering them, I wish I was a happy, smiley person too. I wish I shared their confidence and positivity. If only I wasn’t so melancholy and dour. Let me put on my smiley face.
Just as my heart begins to incline towards yet another expensive gadget I can’t really justify, messages arrive from two families in dire need, pleading for support to escape with their lives. I should thank God for this answer to the inner murmurs causing me to evaluate the pros and cons of different slabs of …
People often comment how youthful I look. I definitely don’t look like a bloke approaching fifty, nor do I feel like it. They ask me what my secret is. Of course, the fact I don’t drink or smoke keeps me from looking haggard. That’s not really it, though. If, at this stage, I could pass …
I wonder if I am too trusting. Too trusting to my own detriment.
We’re all suffering from serious amnesia. Commentators keep saying, “Israel needs to show restraint like America did after 9/11.” What? America literally led a coalition into invading two nations nations that had nothing to do with the terrorist attrocites of 2001. If all that shock and awe was restraint, we’re in serious trouble. This amnesia …
Oh well, that ‘repair’ lasted twenty-four hours. Who knew a storm was due after such fantastic weekend weather? I give up.
Does anyone recall how the United States responded to the bombing of its embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam in 1998? Yes, they launched Operation Infinite Reach, striking targets in Sudan and Afghanistan with multiple cruise missiles. Famously, their attack on Sudan destroyed Khartoum’s largest pharmaceutical plant, until then a major regional medicines manufacturer. …
Most of the people who had the most influence on our lives — for better or worse — will never know it. Paths crossed momentarily, but then we drifted apart forever, never to encounter one another again. Only thoughts and prayers remain.
Although I go for a walk weekly with a chap who is quite religious, I’ve noticed that when the topic turns to religion or politics with other guests, I usually take that as my cue to get up to do the washing up.
The nature of this life is that it’s a testing realm. There’s no escaping this. Everyone will be tested. People say to me that they intend to migrate in order to escape the perceived trials of raising children in Britain. What do they think they will find in their new home? Some kind of utopia, …
I’m not even trying at this point. A temporary fix until a professional replaces the lot.
