Scaring the Neighbors

Bismillah arrahman irraheem

yesterday in the lift with an elderly neighbor, Zeno started talking about Rumsfeld's resignation and gave her the benefit of his opinion on Dubya. When she hesitantly agreed with him, Zeno went into more detail and it was altogether an uncomfortable ride down 5 floors. As soon as the doors opened she was off like a greyhound out of the starting box.

I am trying to wean myself off the news in the morning (BBC Breakfast), more for Zeno's sake but insha'Allah there will be benefits for myself as well. There's always the papers. No, hang on - english language Al Jazeera is starting in a few days, I will surely have to check that out.

On the subject of neighbors, the ones I share a floor with are mostly elderly. and very pleasant. In fact, one Polish lady is a sort of adopted granny to the kids, she comes out of her door immediately she hears us passing and makes a fuss of them, especially Boudie. She gives us presents too, posh M&S biscuits and chocolates, and fruit, even a jacket for Zeno. However the man down the end has started ignoring me and I'm not sure why. He seems to be more frail than before (he uses a stick and moves quite slowly) and it may be something to do with that, or it may be that he told Zeno off a while ago - in fact wrongly accused him of disturbing his pot plants - and Zeno argued back. I really don't know what to do about that boy's argumentative nature. Would banning the News & political programmes/discussions help?