Week 17, 2026: Last one guessing
It continues to get hotter and sunnier here in the Persian Gulf. This week, it’s the kind of hot that stings bare skin and turns knees gooey, the kind of sunny that overheats phone screens into darkness. It hasn’t felt like this since the time I walked to the post office in the hot of September to send letters to London and Texas.
What makes the hot of April miles and miles better than September’s is that it comes with melons and mangoes. I’m not going to think about June. I’m not going to think about June. I’m not going to think about June. Just melons and mangoes.
I picked up a melon at the fancy supermarket on Thursday, along with a few other items. My cart looked like this:
- 1 Omani sweet melon
- 3 Spanish beef tomatoes
- 200g of labneh from the deli counter
- Sourdough crackers
- Pre-workout caffeine gel
Considering that I’m a little spatially challenged, it’s surprising how much I’ve been enjoying GeoGuessr since JK got me into it. My general dislike of competitive gaming doesn't stand in the way of my love for making educated guesses.
I’m still reading Mahfouz’s Palace Walk. Now that I’ve accepted his stinginess with full stops and found humour in half-page paragraphs, I’m starting to get his genius. He's really good at fly-on-the-wall writing: fez hats and fat prostitutes and prayers for the Germans to win so the English finally leave the Arabs alone.
I’ve been on a TV kick since I was recommended the show Last One Laughing (UK) and watched all of it in one day. It was very enjoyable and I’d like to pass the recommendation forward. Finishing it nudged me into giving HBO Girls a proper watch. I'm glad it did, as I’m already through the first season and halfway through the second. The soundtrack is excellent and the writing is so funny and honest.
I can’t decide on which girl I am. I’ve been compared to Hannah by someone who said I also reminded her of Costanza. I’m hoping she’s the only person who sees in me a resemblance to Jewish characters who are spiritually short and annoying. Once, while watching Community, I turned to her and said I definitely used to be an Annie when I was in high school and, without taking her eyes off the screen, she replied you’re still Annie, honey.
On the weekend, I completed my first-ever 5K while listening to the Red Scare gals review Lena Dunham’s new memoir. I really can’t wait to get my hands on it.
I’ve been kind of sad but not in any interesting way, just in a melons and TV way.