So it is possible that the banks are getting close to having properly recognised the scale of pain they face on this category of their lending.

BBC: Will Spain suffer an Irish bust?

We are sitting in the chipper one day, waiting for Billy to get off the phone to his mother she is in for maybe her third chemo session, and he is outside the plate-glass window trying to get good reception and his face looks so difficult, so old and childish at the same time, that the sight of him is like a pain for each of us.

NEWYORKER: Natalie