The Sunday Ishmael: 12/04/2026

A couple I know want to move house. They really do want to move house, because they have secured a generous offer on their own house... Every day they drive out to properties, where the home owners, also desperate to move house, have cleaned, polished and vacuumed in readiness for the viewing, roasting coffee beans and displaying fresh flowers. Maybe lighting a scented candle. After each viewing, the couple, we'll call them Mr. and Mrs. Discerning (talk about nominative determinism), compare notes in a slightly defeated, but valiant way. 

The neighbouring gardens looked scruffy - they are probably drug dealers. 

There's social housing on that estate. 

I could hear the TV from next door. 

There's a river in the back garden. 

There's no parking. 

That's a really busy road. 

Worn down by house hunting, but still determined to move house before they actually have to move into Very Sheltered Accommodation for their waiting in Heaven's lobby years, Mr. and Mrs. Discerning decided to buy a new build direct from the builder. They put down a deposit of £2000 to secure it. They chose a kitchen. Then doubts assailed them.

"Oh, mrs ishmael, we were talking to someone in the Co-op who bought a house on that estate and they said there were nothing but problems. Scalding water out of the cold tap. Doors not fitting properly."

"I think the builder has to put all that right - there's a 10 year warranty on new builds."

"Maybe so, but I've heard it isn't that easy to get the snags sorted. And everyone says there's Dust."

"Dust?"

"Yes, Dust. New Builds have Dust and you know our George's asthma. We can't be doing with Dust."

So they've backed out of the contract and lost their deposit and they are back to driving around the county, looking for perfection.

If you let it, Dust can be a bit of a problem. Quentin Crisp, on the other hand, would simply have lit a cigarette, surveyed the  building site with mild disdain, and reminded Mr and Mrs Discernment  that “after the first four years the Dust doesn’t get any worse.”

In Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials, Dust is what authoritarian systems fear most. Dust is the truth — inconvenient, messy, unavoidable, whereas politicians prefer a clean, Dust‑free narrative. But the world is full of Dust, and always has been. The more they try to sweep it away, the more it settles on everything.

 It’s been a week where the world has once again reminded us that satire is redundant. The President of the Unites States posted on Truth Social: 

 ‘Remember when I gave Iran ten days to MAKE A DEAL or OPEN UP THE HORMUZ STRAIT. Time is running out – 48 hours before all Hell will reign down on them. Glory be to GOD! President DONALD J. TRUMP.’

‘Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. ‘There will be nothing like it!!! Open the Fucking Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell – JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah. President DONALD J. TRUMP’.

How refreshing. D'you think he's quite all there? Marbles all present and correct? Enough sandwiches for a picnic?

Even more amusing were the commentators, putting on Serious Face, who couldn't bring themselves to report the  words and instead referred to President Trump "dropping the F bomb." As if it was a particularly meaty fart. Statements have been issued with the solemnity of prophecy but the accuracy of gossip. Everybody claimed to have won, except us, of course, paying more for petrol than any other nation on Earth, but that's ok because it will make us buy more electric cars. And, of course, the Dragon Ship which finally made it to the Med, 

 is now tied up, having experienced a "minor technical issue".

The negotiators have all gone home, having utterly failed to make a deal. Only Israel has stuck to its guns (see what I did, there?) and has been bombing the fuck out of Lebanon. 
Have you seen Jonathon Glazer's 2000 film, Sexy Beast? Purporting to be a heist movie, it is allegorical and mythological, using water to signify thresholds between worlds, dressing demons in human skins. Don Logan, magnificently  portrayed by Ben Kingsley, is a violent, shouty, sweary, amoral sociopath. 

Why am I thinking of Don Logan as President Trump declares: ‘I have also instructed our Navy to seek and interdict every vessel in International Waters that has paid a toll to Iran. No one who pays an illegal toll will have safe passage on the high seas. We will also begin destroying the mines that the Iranians laid in the Straits. Any Iranian who fires at us, or at peaceful vessels, will be BLOWN TO HELL!’

Or possibly Malcolm Tucker?

Time was, musicals used to be jolly and colourful, a populist take on comic opera. Jaunty lyrics. Pretty dresses. Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. State Fair. My Fair Lady. Then something terrible happened. They started taking themselves seriously. The rot set in insidiously, with West Side Story, happy little songs about teenagers stabbing each other to death. Then Les Misérables dropped like one of Trump's meaty farts. I read the book several decades ago. God, its awful. Unrelentingly bleak, structurally sprawling,  a world where joy is a brief visitor and suffering is the permanent tenant. Turning that into a musical was like deciding to adapt Crime and Punishment as a tap‑dance Cabaret.

So I thought - if  Boublil and Schönberg could turn misery into sing-along money, then lets have Tehran -The Musical. We'll take the  vast, baggy Middle Eastern conflict and orchestrate it.

Here's the show stopping, full‑blooded, swelling‑strings, fist‑to-the-sky number from Tehran – The Musical.

Think Valjean meets Javert meets a diplomatic summit that’s gone wildly off‑piste.

 “THE DUST WILL SETTLE (BUT NOT TODAY)”

Act I, Finale — sung by Mr and Mrs Discerning, the Envoys, and a lone bureaucrat with a large feather duster.

Mr and Mrs D. (anguished, trembling):

We only wanted somewhere clean,

A place where plasterboard won’t lean,

A house without the builder’s curse,

But every viewing’s getting worse…

They say the dust is in the walls,

It creeps through vents and down the halls,

We tried to run, we tried to pray —

And  the dust still settles…

But not today.

ENVOYS (entering in a swirl of paperwork):

Sanctions rise and sanctions fall,

We sign our names, we stall, we brawl,

We promise peace, we draft, we sway —

And the dust will settle…

But not today.

President DON LOGAN (exploding):

NO! NO! NO!

You think you know?

You’ve never seen a maddened FOE!

You want détente? You want a plan?

I'll Bomb the Fuck out of Tehran!

CHORUS (everyone, including the feather‑duster wielding bureaucrat):

Raise your pens and raise your voice,

History gives us little choice,

We march through chaos come what may —

And the dust will settle…

But not today.

Mr and Mrs D. (soft reprise):

We only wanted somewhere new…

A home to breathe, a brighter view…

But fate has swept our hopes away —

And the dust will settle…

But not today.

FULL COMPANY

Though bombs may fly and nations sway,

Though builders flee and envoys fray,

We’ll stand our ground, we’ll find our way —

And the dust will settle…

BUT NOT TODAY!

If Quentin Crisp were alive today, he’d look at the Middle East, look at the statements of ‘grave concern,’ look at the swirling Dust of rumour and retaliation, and say: ‘Leave it. It won’t get any worse.’ And I hope he’d  be right.

There are four splendid anthologies of the writings of stanislav and mr ishmael, compiled by his friend, mr verge, the house filthster. You can buy them from Amazon or Lulu. Here's how:

Honest Not Invent, Vent Stack, Ishmael’s Blues, and the latest, Flush Test (with a nice picture of the late, much lamented, Mr Harris of Lanarkshire taking a piss on a totem pole) are available from Lulu and Amazon. If you buy from Amazon, it would be nice if you could give a review on their website.

IIshmaelites wishing to buy a copy from lulu should follow these steps 

please register an account first, at lulu.com. This is advisable because otherwise paypal seems to think it's ok to charge in dollars, and they then apply their own conversion rate, which might put the price up slightly for a UK buyer. Once the new account is set up, follow one of the links below (to either paperback or hardback) or type "Ishmael’s Blues" into the Lulu Bookstore search box. Click on the “show explicit content” tab, give the age verification box a date of birth such as 1 January 1960, and proceed.

Link for Hardcover : https://tinyurl.com/je7nddfr

Link for Paperback : https://tinyurl.com/3jurrzux

https://www.lulu.com/shop/ishmael-smith/flush-test/paperback/product-9yjvn7.html?q=Flush+Test&page=1&pageSize=4

At checkout, try WELCOME15 in the coupon box, which (for the moment) takes 15% off the price before postage. If this code has expired by the time you reach this point, try a google search for "Lulu.com voucher code" and see what comes up.

With the 15% voucher, PB (including delivery to a UK address) should be £16.84; HB £27.04.