Distressed

This eating house round not too many corners from the Dower House reminds me so much of a bistro in some less salubrious quartier of a French town -I think it must be the shape of the windows adorned with these half net curtains.

Edinburgh seems to be a connection of building projects at the moment. The latest is a remodelling of Chamber Street which houses the Sheriff Court and the Museum. The road is closed to traffic while extra pedestrian areas are instigated outside the latter and the whole roadway is resurfaced.

However, there is no extra pavement space possible outside the Court House, so that the miscreants jostle with passers by for space. In general, they are a frightening looking lot as they hang about in tattooed groups pulling on cigarettes with mobile phones clamped to their ears. Very often there is the presence of a solitary black cloaked court official relieving the stress of it all with his cigarette and keeping a relatively low profile.

All this civic pedestrian area tinkering is all very well, but the potholes and general decline of road surfacing seems to be being ignored, such that cycling around town becomes an extreme sport and travel on buses takes on the thrill of a stint on a fairground roller coaster.