I have just returned to Dublin by the way.
What an interlude indeed!
And now I must start writing again so as to quickly finish my projects and get them out of the way.
These projects were created by me and are solely for my own benefit by the way. More later.

*********
Honestly, reading this news clip a minute ago, I didn't know if to laugh or cry.

The Hindustani Times reports that times have changed in Kashmir and that the business of death is suffering badly.
The tombstone maker, the elderly gravedigger and the post-mortem man are all complaining.

Military level violence is fading out, they cry. The level of violence has dropped drastically and er... there are very few bullet-riddled bodies to bury at the moment.
At one time, mourns Sheikh, a bankrupt gravedigger in 2008. There were so many bodies to bury that a new layer of soil had to be fastidiously laid out with a new set of graves roughly carpeted on top of the old.

Now there is a twist of the most bizarre kind and the post-mortem man is dealt with cases related to Kashmir's new realities instead.... suicides by drownings, poisons and hangings, thanks to the tragic fates of jilted lovers and the jobless. Not enough, not enough, business is still bad, lament the tombstone maker, the elderly gravedigger and the post-mortem man.

You can read it all here.