Of pests and pestilence

A creature of habit, I take my daily meal in the evening at a restaurant where I feel welcome, somewhat at home (since it is convincingly French) and where I enjoy the benefit of a loyalty card entitling me to a 20% reduction on the bill (which more or less balances out the 'tourism tax' which laughably applies also to permanent residents of the Sandlands).

However I was advised on Monday evening that on Tuesday I would be obliged to sally forth and seek my sustenance elsewhere on account of an annual binge of "General Cleaning & Sanitation" and "Pest Control".

Now if pest control applies to circumferentially challenged British females who, as a table of six, braying, cackle and shriek so loudly that the threshold of pain is approached on each of their visits I'm all for it.

Anyway, dinner last night was not too bad. It was at a restaurant which labours under the delusion that the correct table height is at the level of this diner's breast pocket (top of same, not bottom) and it was inevitably 50% more expensive, including the taxi fare home. (The establishment permits only premium tariff taxis to collect guests.)

Back to normal tonight, insh'allah!



Normal, by the way for August, which means gasping as I negotiate the quarter-mile from bistro to chez moi breathing air which offers nothing fresh, invigorating or pleasant to breathe. It is hot, tired, exhausted, fetid, debilitated beaten-within-an-inch of its life air. The average low overnight temperature this month is 32.5 degrees. Pestilence hovers in my mind.

As I cross Hamdan Street and make for Khalifa Street I pace myself by humming a Scottish slow march. If ever you stumble across a tall, gaunt figure collapsed in the Al Markhaziya neighbourhood, if he's breathlessly intoning The Flowers Of The Forest, that's me.