Of Flaring Pains and Old Flames...

So 2018 has gotten off to rather a pesky start, chez nous...

Birthday Girl: The Dame

Insofar as a force of nature can have a birthday, Dame Shirley Bassey is doing so even as we speak - 81 going on eternal.

New Year's, Baby

Just look at the red cheeks on that bellboy...

Fast Away...

Another one, already. Where, as the song says, has the time all gone to?

Where the Music is Bright

I suppose one occasionally does miss things not watching (non-Arabic) television, so I'm grateful that the YouTube gods conjured up this lovely profile in my Recommendations this morning.

Redux: Heavenly Peace

Another year! How quickly they pass. This is a damp, gray Christmas Eve just outside Our Nation's Capital, but here at home it's warm and still. 

Shameless Saturday Camp Explosion: Christmas Eve She Lit the Candles....

Well, not technically a holiday number, I suppose, but it's candy-colored enough to pass for one, and it does remind us of the importance of fire safety whilst celebrating...

A Pain in the Ice

Two formidable ladies join forces, and the result is... curious.

Meanwhile, on Pennsylvania Avenue

Just so you don't think I've gone too soft-hearted about this whole Holiday season...

(Courtesy of the ever-startling Deven Green; if you've not yet been Welcomed to Her Home, well.. you're in for an experience.)

Cloud and Majesty and Awe

Perhaps, just a little, I'm getting a sense of the season. As is so often the case, art helps; in this case, the ineffable and magisterial art of Miss Leontyne Price.

Go the F*ck to Sleep (in Heavenly Peace)

I'm having trouble getting into the holiday spirit this year; somehow, this little gem sums up it all up nicely.

Seen in the Souq

A pile of ottomans in Ottoman old Cairo...

Cities of the Living and the Dead

At some point it stops being travel and starts being just living...

Fife and Dame

And now for something completely different...

Hey, Old Friend...

It can be a tricky thing to revisit an old haunt, but sometimes it works out.

Hundred-Gated Thebes

Just a quick note from a little trip-within-the-trip.

Notes from the Road

We're here. Well, not there, actually, in the sense of this snap - our own cosy flat is distinctly more modest - but in dear old Cairo.

Rendez-vous sur le Nil

The weather's gotten cold and dank; the general scene is equally dismal. Mr. Muscato and I are escaping.

One Year

Walking out of the office that cool Tuesday afternoon, this is something I saw. Heading home, it seemed like such a good omen.

That Girl, Those Clothes

(Warning: this post is kind of a GIF-fest)

You know what we need right now?  I would never have guessed it myself, but having stumbled on it, I now know what just might be the greatest panacea for tired nerves one can imagine.