within the old power station a consumer paradise

in the morning horsemouth went off to check out battersea power station (the new tube station on the northern line) and the reopened power station itself. (after having done barking riverside the day before).

within the old power station a consumer paradise (so of little or no interest to horsemouth). there was even peppa the pig. control room b (site of the hipgnosis for the album cover of hawkwind's quark, strangeness and charm) was closed (but horsemouth could see that it was there). 

he then attempted to roll away along the riverside but frequently found his route blocked. massed joggers jogged past being healthy. he diverted off into the new builds and then back to the river. by mi6, on efra quay, a poem on an airvent.

'river efra stubbornly underground, resurrects a coffin sends it bobbing down the thames, the dead will not stay buried in its persistent spring.' 

(artwork: hidden rivers. hidden times, dorothy smartt).

he crossed over to research the second hand shops of pimlico (which he remembered as being quite good). 

in the evening a meet with minty at the sourdough and craft beer place by st. james' railway station. (he was on good form). and then a walk back.

today a meet and then off to sunny high barnet. 

horsemouth: antiquary, traveller, naturalist

well here we are april the first and horsemouth is about to head up out into the woods.

having raided the sally army horsemouth is up a copy of charles lancaster's seeing england: antiquaries, travellers, naturalists (50p). 

yesterday a visit to barking riverside (aka. doomed megalopolis). the elevated overground making a huge swerve out of barking down into it. is it high enough above the (tidal) river to avoid flooding? time will tell. 

having walked around the foreshore and back along the least promising road (passing infrastructure way but missing bastable avenue) at one point horsemouth was sat in a coffee shop. at another he was playing tubular bells in oyster catcher park.  buses from barking arrived and departed. 

horsemouth likes the edgelands where development is incomplete. where ideas are roughly sketched larger than life just to occupy spaces until something else comes along. 

then to dave and claudia's for a catch up.  whence back via the various hostelries on wood street. 

today (as he mentioned) a wander round the woods. in the evening a meet up with minty. 

how much does bob mortimer looks like dave social control

 by the time you will have read this horsemouth will be in the wen.

and he will have found a cheaper way of doing it.

but (such was his enthusiasm after actually managing this) that he forgot to ask for his railcard discount. he is therefor paying about £35 rather than £23. 

still. that's an improvement. 

the rail company he is travelling on is being dissolved soon. their trains smell of garlic (is this a side effect?).

rain fell from a cloudless sky on the small piece of station platform that was in the sunshine, 

he was very tired yesterday (after his travelling). 

in the evening he watched a comedy show where the assembled comedians aren't allowed to laugh (meanwhile horsemouth was treading carefullly round a series of political landmines). he was once again reminded of how much bob mortimer looks like dave social control. 

ok he's up.  he's just seen his bother's eldest off to work. today a wander round the hood in the morning then a catch up with some friends. 

books, films, gigs, events march 2026

 books

- diaries: kilvert mostly and fernando pessoa, the book of disquiet 

- the portable hannah arendt. edited by peter baehr

- $hutdown. adam tooze

- a book on joseph beuys reviewed in art in america

- this is a classic: translators on making writers global. essay on marguerite duras.

- anna dezeuze,  blurring the boundaries between art and life (in the museum?), tate papers, 31/1/2012

-  lewis carroll  eight or nine wise words about letter-writing 

- preview of colby chamberlain's  fluxus administration: george maciunas and the art  of paperwork

-  karl marx, the civil war in france, the third address, may1871

- LA review of books article on alice constance austin's llano del rio cooperative colony

- the dedalus book of dutch fantasy

- clive furness on open newham

- newspaper articles on  the possible re-opening of the hereford-ross-gloucester railway and similarly on reopening bromyard station 

- doris lessing, the golden notebook (fragment)

- the WIRE review of 2024 

- crack magazine review of cosmic music: the life, art and transcendence of alice coltrane by journalist andy beta, the quietus and WIRE (april 2002) articles on her

- nlr sidecar RIP antónio lobo antunes, 

- GDN  tansy gardam piece on old technology

- death of habermas (LRB and nlr)

films

- a celebration of marguerite duras (interview with one of her translators)

-  ghost in the shell (original)

- satan's sword  (an earlier incarnation of the (anti)hero samurai in full-moon swordsman)

- boris johnson's  'you must stay home' speech march 23rd 2020

-  LRB's james butler, peter geoghegan and ethan shone on peter mandelson, also political disagreement 

why haven't 'the best ideas' won?, 

- the 1967 french version of  'the invention of morel'  

- a life without writing (bbc sounds)

- bookpilled/ outlaw bookseller/ 

- the black cat (lucio fulci) part

gigs the wave debb show (online)

events

well we shall have to see. 

his achilles' heel (boots on the ground)

 'at four o'clock the people were already moving about in the churchyard with baskets of flowers, and the children were especially busy in flowering the graves...' 

- kilvert's diary, easter eve, march 30th 1872.

in theory (by the time you read this) horsemouth will (probably) be on his way to the wen. he's trying to get his plans together for while he is there, so if you want to see him get in touch. 

remind him not to drink too much (his achilles' heel). 

at the moment he is sitting around waiting to travel with itchy feet (he's been for several walks already). 

will trump put boots on the ground in iran?

and if he does how many will die? 

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

the dream some kind of sales fair - towards the end horsemouth went for a korean icecream. in anotehr dream a domestic living situation, horsemouth had recently moved and not tidied up. horsemouth found several recording devices that howard had given him earlier and that he had forgotten about. 

more or less autobiographical ( the sweet bells of clyro)

'all my books are more or less autobiographical - a rather abstract form of autobiography, I admit.'  - e.m. cioran 

horsemouth has started on the temptation to exist (from whence this quote). he has read susan sontag's introduction and is most of the way through thinking against oneself.  he either bought it in skoob for £3 (this is his recollection) or it was denise's (according to the signature inside the front cover) and horsemouth has 'acquired it' somehow. 

in kilvert-land (on this day in 1872) he is concerned about the bells. 

'for the first time I heard today the sweet bells of clyro chiming down the valley just before I reached the chapel, I could even hear the three bells chime change for the single bell. the west wind brought the sound of the bells up the hill so clearly that it arrested me even while I was walking.'

'clyro church has a splendid bells' reads a local guide. 

'two date back to the medieval church and three were cast in 1887 and first rung to celebrate queen victoria’s golden jubilee. to complete the set, a sixth one was commissioned in 2024...' 

the guide has kilvert buying his first notebook (in which to keep his diaries)  in hay but this seems to horsemouth not so. 

horsemouth has the three volume plommer selection and a single volume selection  (jonathan cape paperback edition) somewhere (or perhaps he has redistributed it away via the powerscroft road book box). kilvert's niece destroyed most of his other writing - 3 journal notebooks survive because they were given away, horsemouth does not know if they contain additional material. 

it's a good job horsemouth didn't spend any time on watering yesterday (it started raining). 

this morning. he has made the transition across the british summer time line. in the morning a dream about hanging out with dj hype (horsemouth was doing his best to be cool). 

horsemouth diagnoses a lack of get up and go

on this day in 1872 kilvert is importuned by a man begging. 

tomorrow he will be waxing lyrical about the bells.

'for the first time I heard today the sweet bells of clyro

chiming down the valley...' 

you find horsemouth recovering from a lack of inspiration (it is the usual post drinking slump). yesterday he was in a fluey/ hangovery kind of state and lacked any get up and go.

this morning a bright spring morning (horsemouth has just been out to feed the chickens). in the greenhouse the runner bean plants are coming up nicely. not much sign of anything else yet. in the garden no sign of the broad beans yet (maybe it is not warm enough for them yet). 

a fake and misleading online review

so it's the morning and here he is typing away. 

yesterday on the radio a short comedy show about what it would mean if humans could no longer write and read (it would become much more difficult to collaborate on and achieve anything). 

having just watched a project die (or at least emerge diminished) from the swamps of spreadsheets and email horsemouth feels some doubt about this. he can't help feel that if people could have been gathered on site and have met and talked face-to-face then it would have survived, or perhaps even thrived and prospered. 

this is the kind of thought horsemouth often entertains. 

later some scripted fluff on emil cioran (said choran horsemouth is now informed). cioran is surely the least likely philosopher/ writer to get the scripted fluff treatment (even if you can get over his fascist period). 

ok in his later years he fed the stray cats in the park (heart warming detail) before succumbing to dementia (personal tragedy). himself and his wife, who worked as a teacher to support him, lived in a tiny top floor flat in  paris (heart warming detail). he knew samuel beckett. 

after writing his first few books in romanian he changed to writing in french - the video argued this was to slow himself down and to see the details and articulations of his thoughts better, to avoid easy metaphors and constructions. 

or maybe like the czech milan kundera he just wanted to be read (and not just in poor quality translations, often translations of translations kundera jokes). 

this inspired horsemouth to get out his cioran - he has three, no four; anathemas and admirations, a short history of decay, the temptation to exist, history and utopia (though he's not sure where his copy of this last one is - no he tells a lie, he's just found it). 

some, in the comments, were alleging the video was entirely AI slop 

written by, and read by, AI, which probably chose the graphics as well. doubt contaminates everything. 

as AI gets better. how can you be sure it's not AI? 

if it's not very good and amateurish. if it is poorly scripted (if at all) and delivered. 

here we have a mechanism by which writing can be ended. if it is no longer a communication between humans but merely a set of requirements from a machine. 

ok today a walk to simulate activity. he's just done it. two rabbits bounded up to greet him (and then bounded away). he hurried back because it looked like rain but then the sun cut through the clouds. 

perhaps zoom beers with howard later.