Ritzy's Weekly Eye, Part II

Turning pages backwards you’ll pass the sports and the horoscopes until you find the recipe for Lemon curd ice-cream - it has a by-line so it must be special. Next stop: two relevant stories about environment - relevant, not captioning. Nr. 611 in the series “A Diwan of Contemporary Life” which uses a full page every week to look at the not contemporary life. It had readers, I was told, before the series approached its Nr. 100 issue. I suspect this is the re-run.

Better up is a much awaited piece on the newly renovated Lady Nafisa’s sabil. Fascinating, as most pieces on the Heritage page is, this time archaeologist Agnieszka Dobrowolska is the guest writer.

Culture and Listings… Opinion pages… no, forget it. Just note that Abdel Moneim Said continues to lecture us about the roots of terrorism. Well, it is rather the Muslim Brotherhood he is asking to take notes. So what about us, the readers?

Internationally, “Guilty by association,” is the report on the first person ever brought to court for charges related to 9/11 – guilty on one charge, in Germany. Why do we need a conspiracy theory? Next: “A Woman of Courage” – Mo Mowlam!! Arrgh! Didn’t any person of importance to Egypt’s international affairs die last week? Or would that have required a trip down the stairs to the archive? Mo deserves the honor but what did she do for Egypt? Set a good example in peace brokering? Is the editor trying to tell the English speaking world something? Naughty! Go to the opinons pages, that is where you belong!

Another Chiller: “The Power of the Ordinary:” “Cindy Sheehan ... adds an important voice to the ... anti-war moment.” Read it for fun. It could have passed unnoticed on the opinion page where it belongs: that is usually where personal feelings and heart-gripping adjectives go.

Actually, I liked the Weekly better when Arafat was alive -- at least you knew who they would praise.