last one for tonight, looking from the lower deck of the Galata Bridge / Galata Köprüsü, towards the Sultanahmet side of the Golden Horn, with Süleymaniye Mosque on the left. #Streetphotography #Istanbul

#Istanbul #Karaköy #GalataTower #streetphotography

the #medrese; late night attempts to photograph smoke from the nargile as its last faint trails disappear into shapes that look like Arabic calligraphy. Crazy ISO, prefocus, burst mode, chasing the smoke as it drifts, then extreme processing. #streetphotography #reportage #medrese #Istanbul

the ceiling of the #medrese, now a #nargile cafe. From #byzantine columns to #islamic calligraphy to aircon lines repaired with duct tape. In the building itself, as much as in the culture of the place, it's a metonymy for #Istanbul. #streetphotography

3am in the nargile cafe #Istanbul #medrese #streetphotography

Tünel Square in the rain. #İstanbul #streetphotography

Nothing's getting away from that once it closes on its prey.

This stat seems pretty bad and really stark compared to other places www.pewresearch.org/religion/202...

🚨BREAKING: Joe Kent, Director of the National Counterterrorism Center, has RESIGNED in protest at the war in Iran. Wow. “I cannot support sending the next generation off to fight and die in a war that serves no benefit to the American people nor justifies the cost of American lives.”

here's one for Christian readings of the conquest narrrative too; by @ddelgadovive.bsky.social via @theradr.bsky.social www.lifeisasacredtext.com/joshua/

an astonishing insight from Jonathan Freedland.

Most of us who bought our first home in the 1980s paid well below the amounts that many students now own. Our first home cost c. £11.5k, adjusted for inflation, that's c. £45k in 2026 terms. There are students whose loans have ballooned way above that. (as have house prices). #studentloans

They were all out of impatient sandwiches

Sarah Kendzior in her usual excellent form. @sarahkendzior.bsky.social sarahkendzior.substack.com/p/the-no-wor...

spare a thought for Iraq: strikes from US / Israeli (blue) and Iranian (red) missiles. there are Iranian strikes very close to the Turkish border. Some strange details being well hidden by the scale and breadth of the war's expansion. (map ed from Guardian, w. Iraq highlighted)

If VAR gets a hat-trick of goals ruled out, do they get the match ball? #LUFC Or just a void of negativity where the match ball should be.

Couple from the #garden today #Cherry Prunus 'Beni Chidori' and #Galanthus 'Spindlestone Surprise'. Beni Chidori, the rootstock is fearsomely vigorous. Have air-layered it and a couple potted up last year are looking ok. Spindlestone just thrives wherever we put it. #photography #naturephotography

I endorse this message.

The most bollocks-free piece you'll read all week on US warmaking. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Couple of snowdrops from the #garden yesterday A virescent #Galanthus from a pot grown from seed from Anne Wright. Second year flowering and the poculiform seems to be a settled feature. G. Rosemary Burnham. Single bulb planted just a couple of years ago. #photography #naturephotography

Not sure about #SilentWitness tonight. These philosophical voice-overs are a bit Call the Midwife. YMMV.

As I understand it, the UK is firing missiles at targets in Iran, and Iran is firing missiles at UK air bases. We're shooting at them and they're shooting back. But we're not at war. We're not even being dragged into a war. Honest. Says Yvette Cooper.

"I consider the survival of National Socialism within democracy to be potentially more menacing than the survival of fascist tendencies against democracy.” - Adorno, 1960. Jacques Elllul said similar. It wasn't, then, an uncommon view. We're watching the fulfilment. Do read this 👇

Faiza Shaheen was repeatedly talked over and shouted down on #Newsnight tonight. She behaved with exemplary patience in the face of poor behaviour by other panellists. Moderation should have been better.

with @gingerox.bsky.social a couple of months ago #nude #fineartnude #photography

For those of us watching from outside the US, this has been the hardest thing to recognise. If you know evangelical culture, not sure if that helps; UK evangelicalism, while it can be awful, isn't MAGA (though there are MAGA-like bits and there's a worrying general drift)

The Grauniad's news feed today: 2 versions of the 'Andrew as red-eyed corpse' photo. 1 photo of Boris Johsnon 3 photos of Laura Kuenssberg (mercifully just back of head) 1 photo of Kenny Badenoch It's too much. @theguardian.com #Guardian

Auden, via my friend @daviddark.bsky.social .. uncannily apt. daviddark.substack.com/p/they-know?...

Leucojum vernum in the garden today (same family as snowdrops). Leucojums and snowdrops, so much rain that some of the petals have become translucent. Never seen such a marked effect before. Not quite like Diphylleia grayi (the 'skeleton flower') but getting there. #garden #photography #macro

A couple from the garden. Crocus tommasinianus albus, and a white Cyclamen coum. Bit of white and magenta. I've never seen the magenta speckling in the crocus so clearly before. #garden #photography #nature

You can't understand modern Britain, including its default on the intergenerational contract, without understanding this graph and coming to terms with the historic impact of the general election of 1979. That woman. Words fail. The graph tells the story.

Lucy Powell describes paedophiles as having 'misbehaved'. As a CSA survivor, these are particularly hard times. But that obscene trivialisation has pretty much finished me. #Starmer & co just don't think #CSA is very serious. It's the only conclusion I can draw.

Tackles won %. Leeds 58.3 .. Chelsea 47.1 #LUFC

Okafor, benefit of fresh legs. Need a couple more changes now. #LUFC

Can't say I'd be disappointed if it all went a bit 1970 tonight #LUFC

Are there other people out there who've had their email trashed since #Plusnet passed email handling over to #Greenby. I've lost all the subfolders for my email inbox, including the emails that were in them. Greenby's support staff claim they've been reinstated. Anything from Plusnet on this?

This feels a bit like Andrew M-W telling Maitlis he was perhaps too honourable in sticking with his pal Epstein. 'I'm sorry I was more loyal to my friend, who'd already been repeatedly shown to be a sleazeball, than to Epstein's victims'

Thank you, Barry Gardner, for your anger at those trying to make this about the left v the right of the Labour party. #Newsnight

Childhood sexual abuse is not rare. There are tens of thousands of victims across the UK. Starmer appointing Mandelson to any political post, knowing the continuing friendship with Epstein, is a complete failure of moral judgment. It legitimates the rape of children. He has to go. #Newsnight.

So many comparisons, ICE and the Gestapo, the Trump admin and classic fascism. How about a change: let's look at members of the German Widerstand, the resistance, the people who kept the best of Germany alive. Occasional posts of heroes, some well known, some less. 1. Helmuth James von Moltke ..

you keep wondering, can this man go any lower, and yes, he keeps saying, I can. #Starmer #flagshagging www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

For a long time I resisted the fourth proposition below on corrupt tables (tables Jesus would overthrow). Reluctantly I now agree. Evanglicalism is now about NOT overthrowing tables. That's a change over my lifetime. On my watch. On ours. (do read the whole of @johnpavlovitz.bsky.social's thread)

#Newsnight Thangam Debonair is having a car crash. dismissive of Gaza as a moral issue refusing to address the student loan issue: divert, divert .. It's something when you come out looking less coherent than Claire Fox.

#LUTV any chance of switching the mic on in the studio? Or the cameras? either. #LUFC

Local provocation to national suspension of democracy. 🧵on Altona Blutsonntag (Bloody Sunday) in July 1932; how it led to loss of democracy nationwide. The model Trump is following in Minnesota.

If truth is important to you than take 17 minutes out of your day to watch the interview below between @carolecadwalla.bsky.social and Robert Kagan. The world has changed and there is no going back

This is a change in generational demographics -- lotta people died over 10 years and a lotta people came of age-- and the more extremist fundamentalism becomes a chokehold and takes over the conversation, the more regular folks of values & conscience assume there's nothing in there for them. Duh?

this piece isn't offered as a prayer, or a religious or theological reflection .. but .. it moves between lament and petition ('we need') with a depth of feeling and clarity of thought that .. if only our prayers were more like this. Do listen (just 6 mins) for the voice. (and read)

Danya Ruttenberg on how to face the horrors now - may all be protected from harm www.lifeisasacredtext.com/p/496b0dbd-a...