Roof Tiles

The ceramicist down the road –grey haired, bushy beared– has his own way of firing his wares. Every morning he drapes some cloth over the roof of his blue mini van and simply lays his tiles on top to dry. By the time he closes shop at night they’re done. Oven? Who needs an oven?

Brushes

Our toothbrushes are closer than we are. This morning I found them face to face, their bristles touching…

Duele

These guys are driving me crazy. It’s been months now and they’re still here, torturing the neighbourhood. Though the foundations are no longer shaking, they’ve replaced the earshattering noise of drills and what-have-you with the worst noise pollution there is: the radio. Every morning at eight on the dot the boombox comes on and, for the ten hours that follow, the whole vicinity is stuck with the same hits being played over and over and over again. They’re all about pain, duele, and the builders wail along with gusto: ‘Amor es una tortura’, ‘amor me duele tanto’, ‘que duele-e-e’…. While I don’t necessarily disagree with the sentiment, I don’t need to be reminded of it on a daily and constant basis. Bloody hell! I wish they’d hurry up and finish the job. And they wonder why people are always happy to see the backs of them…

Storm Cloud

Bad quality cell phone picture, but that cloud was damn impressive…nighttime in my hometown.

Daddy Escalator

Reading this –funny, btw, and so true– reminded me of a similar incident. I was leaving Mediamarkt, an electrical appliance and, more importantly, CD and DVD shop in Brussels, a few weeks ago. At the top of the escalator going down, a young African dad was blocking the way. He had a tiny baby in a tiny stroller and was struggling to put them both onto the escalator. It can be done, of course, especially with such a tiny stroller (and if you do it right, O-man, there should still be plenty of room for JST people to pass ^-). But the man obviously had no idea of what he was doing, and whatever it was he was trying to do looked dangerous. All at once four women (me included) jumped at him.

-No no no!
-Really?
-YES!!
-Oh.
…
-She’s four days old.
-Ahh.
-Her mother’s over there.
-Whew…