The French have a saying: plus ça change. It’s short for plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose. It means, ‘the more things change, the more they seem to stay the same’. Translated into jigsaw-speak, it means that, no matter what puzzle you’re doing, if it has a lot of sky it’s going to be a right old nuisance to finish.

Carol Dyer’s ‘Market days on Fulton Street’ (a 1500-piece epic) had a lot of sky; not as much as some puzzles but more than we were comfortable with — which is why it took us (or rather, Shana, who has a keen eye for shades of blue) the best part of a week to finish the last few inches.

Never again!

This picture of Fulton Street, part of Brooklyn’s seafront area, is set in the late 19th century, and unlike the sky, certainly hasn’t stayed the same. In fact, parts of it are almost unrecognizable these days. Fulton Street mall is much more commercialised, with no sign of a horse and cart anywhere; parts of Fulton Street have been renamed; some areas of Fulton Street, have, apparently, ‘looked like a ghost town for years’; and Schermerhorn Row (on the right hand side of the picture) has been restored.

Here, thanks to Google maps, is how the Fulton Street area looks today. It’s almost like being there, isn’t it? Take care crossing the road, won’t you?

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