harvest moon (a kind of heartwarming visit to minor injuries)

 harvest moon

to the east my brothers to the east

good for friday, saturday, sunday

now seeing it just depends on the cloud cover. 

saturday looks plausible.

we roll towards the end of the month (and the beginning of OMtober - an honourary ember). 

why is the suppressed climate national security report not significant?

'the report was supposed to be published in full last october, before the cop30 climate summit in held in belém... but downing street officials intervened at the last moment to prevent its publication.'

it is interesting that the government have finally got around to investigating the effects of climate change but this will not alter the effects of climate change nor government policy (nor that unicorn public opinion). other factors - employment, prosperity, the cost of living crisis will be held to be more important. 

it may be that the government does not want to scare the horses but, also, nor does it want to be accused of a project fear. 

it matters little. the changes are on their way. 

more fucking shit with the local GP practice

so they left a message saying the appointment was cancelled on the answerphone?

it would seem not.

and (now) horsemouth and his mum are off into town for A&E on a friday night. 

well tbh minor injuries on a friday afternoon and it wasn't so bad, in fact it was kind of heartwarming. mum got into at least two good chats with people. all the staff were wonderful. the only fly in the ointment was horsemouth getting impatient at the end and making his mum walk all the way to main reception to try and phone for a cab (which turned out to have closed when they got there). he loaded his mum into a wheelchair and took her back to A&E and found a freephone for the cabs (thank you assistance man - he'll know that in future). 

his mum has stubbed her toes but seemingly no fractures or broken bones in the metatarsals etc. (so that's a relief). 

now he is back home. phew corblimmey. 

he's up. it's the morning. something he has written has proved controversial. so he has pulled it while he has a think about the best way forward. 

'empires crumble, my friend, republics founder and fools survive'

'bravo m. segalot, ca c'est du meuble.' 

why does horsemouth think there's no fucking point?

ugh! horsemouth just got drawn into answering some ziobot (one claiming to be a recovering progressive and to be offering some fun facts about the egyptian occupation of palestine beginning in 1948).

as horsemouth recently wrote to TG (regarding horsemouth's relative silence on the israeli genocide in gaza) what's the fucking point?

there are the facts ... and then there are what those 'fun facts' seem to be implying about the motivations of the participants. 

the egyptian occupation of palestine

the egyptian occupation of the gaza strip begins under the all palestine protectorate following the 1948 arab-israeli war which followed on from the 1947-48 civil war in mandatory palestine which (to quote wikipedia) 'began as a civil war between the arab and jewish communities following the united nations partition plan'. 

roughly 700,000 palestinians fled as refugees. 

the basic thrust of the first paragraph is 'look egypt occupied gaza too' (implication: so the israeli occupation is not so bad). to provide some justification for the egyptian occupation you would have to view it as a defensive occupation to prevent israeli occupation and ethnic cleansing (a later term horsemouth admits) of the palestinians.

and that's how horsemouth would view it. 

well that's the first paragraph's distortions dealt with anyway.  

as a parting thought perhaps the west should 'take responsibility' for israel (as the egyptians are accused of not taking responsibility for the palestinians er, despite occupying them at one point). 

on second thoughts horsemouth just deleted his comment because what's the fucking point?

so why does horsemouth think there's no fucking point?

forces exterior to israel

has the gaza genocide been successfuly halted before (even if only temporarily)? 

yes. by donald j. trump.

why? so that he could be hailed as a peacemaker during his inauguration perhaps. 

but more recently? less so.

at a minimum the rest of the world has sat on its hands and let it happen (when not actively arming or aiding or defending the israeli state). 

excepting? the brave and principled people of palestine action and european dockers etc. and anyone who has campaigned over it (horsemouth supposes). 

but again he thinks there's no fucking point because the peoples of the world simply cannot influence their governments in a timely enough fashion - only a boycott, disinvest, block trade campaign of direct action by as many people as possible will act in a timely enough fashion. 

look at donald j. trump. his ability to bully the israeli government into withdrawing is on the wane. the replacement president who might have a mandate to do such a thing is two years away. the right-wingers in israel essentially have a free hand for two years.  andy burnham (in the UK), while an improvement on sir keir starmer who actively called for war crimes by the israeli state, is only in for two years and then he's gone, his focus is on domestic policy not foreign policy. the EU is similarly beset by internal contradictions and so on round the entire globe. 

what about forces within israel? 

legislative elections are due to be held october 27th 2026. 

for a number of reasons this is unlikely to make any real difference. horsemouth may be surprised but even if it were to effect a sea change in israeli politics it would not undo the harms of the last three years (nor the last 78). 

ok time to put an end to it. see you tomorrow. 

tomorrow

it's a misty morning.  horsemouth has done the thing with the milk and the chickens. he has also written an additional chapter for the far future village band that rob seems pleased with. 

tonight harvest moon. 

how are the intellectuals doing? (long time passing)

so how are the intellectuals doing? (long time passing)

'the time to live some kind of 'life of the mind' has been gradually shrinking...' 

well the intellectuals inside of academia (particularly in the uk) are fucked and most of the young ones are leaving so say william davies joins james butler over at the LRB (and so say the few of horsemouth's friends left in academia). 

meanwhile in the free-range intellectual world unleashed by social media it is not clear that people truly are intellectuals because they are not autonomous of their audience - if you depend on clicks and likes to put food on your table you may find yourself beginning to self-censor and manufacture clickbait etc. 

mind you, these kinds of pressures are not unknown in academia. 

it's a day of farewell

'the season of long shadows on early walks is here...' - chloe edwards substack.

last night horsemouth wrote that he wished there was more of practicalities - and there is! there is colette. horsemouth flicked towards the end of the book when she was living in the palais royale. she absteniously feeds her fire. she takes up cross-stitch. 

there was the moon out of the window. 

today bin recovery and possibly a trip into the village to pick up the hereford times and a few loaves of bread etc. 

tomorrow the dave webb show. 

EQUINOX (the sun crosses the celestial equator)

at 1.06am this morning we autumn equinoxed.

horsemouth is very bad on what the detail of this is (and has been mocked for it on previous occasions). of course we have to wait for friday/ saturday for the day and night to be closest to being equal length (the equilux).

thereafter long dark tunnel through to the spring equinox (20th march 2027). 

along the way there will be day of peak darkness (the winter solstice - monday 21st december) and two celtic quarter days samhain  and imbolc). 

horsemouth could watch the second episode of 70up early (but where's the fun in that). 

--------------------------------

it is the morning. chickens done. 

horsemouth watched the final episode of 70up. despite the protestations of the posh it basically did prove the old arguments about class but that said all boats were lifted by the post-war boom. really what was revealed was the conventional wisdom about family. people have started to die (most notably the director michael apted - but presumably some of the production staff and technicians also).

will they really be able to resist the temptations of 77 and 84?

as one person said their lives have been blessed because they have been seen. others feel cursed by it. others have felt the need to escape it. 

horsemouth found the guitar tuner again (it had fallen under the bedside table). he tuned the hohner 6 string back up to an accurate open G and enjoyed the improved sound. 

normally horsemouth posts up the orbital track equinox to celebrate the equinox. this year he has decided to go with joy by john coltrane. 

recorded on this day (sun and rain tomorrow)

'his brother has just been. horsemouth has sent him off  with a ton of books (probably not literally but it felt like it)'

a year ago horsemouth was completing the great clear out of his room in the wen preparatory to his final move to the wilds. many of the books are still in the garage but some have been migrated inside the house.  

he's showing you joy by john coltrane thinking it was recorded on this day by the classic quartet at the van gelder studio in 1964 (with additional material overdubbed by alice coltrane and others in 1972). 

'marguerite duras and jerome beaujour were discussing the authors she reads - musil, segalen, and the painter matisse.'

horsemouth can (now that he needs it) no longer find this quote in practicalities.

but he does have some segalen (paintings in a quartet encounters edition). he was just reading a little of the introduction (and this may tempt him to read more). 

outside a greyish morning. horsemouth was up early (6.30ish). the rabbits seem to be happy. bbc weather says grey all day (but sun and rain tomorrow).

tonight 70up on tv. last ever episode (allegedly).  

he forgot to mention his dream. he was in a bar. cunningfolk was the barman. he was showing horsemouth some olives as barsnacks. 

horsemouth dreamt about exhibiting art

yesterday evening (in 1981) 

marguerite duras and jerome beaujour were discussing the authors she reads - musil, segalen, and the painter matisse. 

the matisse sounds good. horsemouth has some musil and some segalen.

this morning horsemouth dreamt about exhibiting art. 

specifically howard's art at st. paul's cathedral. it seemed to be a great video display piece. later the curator of it all came over and talked to horsemouth (which was a bit difficult because it wasn't horsemouth's work of art) and then they went to see other pieces of art being exhibited. 

one of these was a giant whirlpool being exhibited in a swimming pool sized tank. the grey water sloshed around at tremendous speeds. 

while he was down in the wen one of horsemouth's favourite things he did was sing a backing vocal on denise's singing of molly malone (cockles and mussels a-live, alive oh!). she also sang she moved through the fair. 

horsemouth is back in the wilds. he has unleashed the chickens and fed them. the nasturtiums are doing well (very well). 

he woke up with a headache (but that seems to have cleared). 

while he was in hereford waiting for the bus  horsemouth had a falafel wrap.  

on his way back from his visit to the wen

 as we speak (as it were) horsemouth is on his way back from his visit to the wen.

there he saw denise and jonny and lethal and wayne and dave and claudia and graham and howard and enza and michelangelo. he also saw the inside of lidl and a great deal of transport infrastructure.

people of the world you are beautiful. 

he has to admit that (courtesy of his bank) the journey did not get off to the best of starts. fortunately his brother saved him and (fortified by a pint in wetherspoons) he made it onto the train. 

and now, somewhat tired and bruised by beer, he is on his way back. 

one interesting thing on the journey was that he could get a bus back from hereford on a sunday to pontrilas (which is two miles away). previously the nearest he has been able to get on a sunday was madley - 5 miles away). 

that just left the two mile walk from pontrilas which was truly beautiful in the sun.