ask and you shall receive

today an entirely written in the morning blogpost

yesterday zoom beer with howard (and a dream where horsemouth failed to keep up when they were running for a train). howard woke up remembering a hymn (ask and you shall receive). horsemouth said it reminded him of chapter 24 by pink floyd. 

yesterday (and doubtless today) more reading of prospero's cave (lawrence durrell). the old count lawrence and his wife have taken to visiting has a theory that shakespeare visited corfu and that corfu is indeed prospero's island. it's almost certainly bollocks. they will not meet until the 21st of september 1937. right now (in 1937) lawrence is wrestling with his friend's zarian's historical accounts of the island.

yesterday the anniversary of the release of levitation by hawkwind in 1980.

tim blake, ginger baker, huw lloyd-langton, harvey bainbridge 

(completely by accident dave brock has assembled a competent band). 

the album is excellently recorded. 

huw in particular is playing his heart out.

horsemouth saw them on this tour (only his second ever gig). 

today a wander up the hill to deliver some eggs. 

an account of a puppet show (and the music)

in lawrence durrell's prospero's cave (p.47 onwards) there is an account of a puppet show with kharaghiosis and his sidekick hadjiavatis. 

it was a shadow-puppet show. it is possible the shadow puppet show originated in indonesia and was brought to the ottoman turks by the trade routes (and thus to the greek islands).

'two violins and a drum keep up a squalling sort of overture, punctuated by the giggles of children and the pop of ginger beer bottles...

our seats are right at the front, where the orchestra can scrape away right under our noses... thus equipped we prepare for the spectacle of kharaghiosis, whose greek is sure to baffle us however much his antics amuse... 

presently the acetylene lamps on the hedge are extinguished... but the orchestra is still driving on with the awkward monotony of a squeaking shoe... the familiar noise of sticks being rattled together sounds from behind the screen. this is a sign for the play to begin...'

kharaghiosis (black eye) is a hunchback with one outsized prehensile arm. he and hadjiavatis are always poor and engaged on some ridiculous get rich quick scheme. in this case a getting elected to public office.

'the drama reaches its peak with a faked election, in which kharaghiosis, in order to win, manages to resurrect all the corpses in the local cemeteries, who pass in grizzly single file across the stage to the polling booth to vote for our hero.' 

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yesterday a visit to town

accessions diary

- orlando (virginia woolf) - one squid hospice shop in a pretty vintage classics edition. this contains a baileyshome.com bookmark (a shop near bridstow near ross-on-wye).

- travels into bokhara (alexander burns - cousin of robbie burns, victorian explorer and spy) - one squid hospice shop  in an eLand edition. 

this copy contains an off-peak day return rail ticket from wivenhoe to london terminals (£26.70) as well as a dedication happy birthday mary. phil. (probably this mary loosemore horsemouth worked out with the aid of another inscription)

supplementary expenses 

£3 each way on the bus, £3.20 sandwich, £1.30 bus down the valley. walk back. 

whilst he was there he saw sproatly smith but didn't manage to speak to him because he wasn't convinced it was him. (but they chatted briefly online later).

it is the morning. it is a cold morning. horsemouth has been out to see the chickens who seem remarkably unbothered. 

the best thing that can be said of it is that it is over

horsemouth is self-medicating with beer. 

the situation horsemouth hates is to be stuck between two people. he has got himself out of the way and hopefully done enough so that it all worked out.

remind him to never do that again (he says now).

the best thing that can be said of it is that it is over. 

all he has to do now is let it go.

what is tomorrow like? ah rainy all night then decent over the weekend. maybe horsemouth can do a run into town and indulge in some retail therapy (books mostly). 

in the morning 

he's up. he forgot to lock up the chickens last night (blue bloody bastard bollocks). fortunately no deaths.

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my mix playlist

joy - john coltrane (the classic quartet version first meditations 1965)

john is up and cooking. elvin too. mccoy tyner horsemouth can hear it is good but it's a bit too chordy for him. it's jimmy garrison on bass but as usual you can barely hear him (until right at the end). 

next up marion brown bismillahi rrahmani rrahim (by harold budd from off vista 1975). reggie workman on bass this time. great piano. 

earth is no resting place jesse may hill (1927-1933). earth is not home you say. 

more john coltrane stellar regions (1967) the great rashied ali on drums. named by alice coltrane when she rediscovered the tapes but named by coltrane dream chant at the time and venus a week later on the interstellar space session. 

song john fahey.

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last night another song from rob in far off riogordo - thursday sailor's song - and very good it is too. very wickermany. 

when the hard frosts come

in the day a walk upon the common and some photos.

 shadows and tall trees

ok so another holiday plan has manifested (now to get on with it). 

half terms

it might be too soon. people might still be knackered/ busy etc. horsemouth won't know until he checks. 

where are we? one hundred years of faust. 

(also in black and white (and sepia tinge) lest we forget).

this the best photo of the bunch (horsemouth feels)

a misty morning (for sure) and possibly a frosty one (if not actually frosty it is certainly near). a lot of the remaining growing depends on delaying the frosts. last night horsemouth had some of the runner bean beans (and good they were too).  the weather forecast says the frosts will hold off for the next two weeks at least. 

when the hard frosts come and the nasturtiums die back horsemouth will dig out the bed where they are and dump the soil elsewhere (so that the nasturtiums will be successful elsewhere). at the moment their riotous growth mocks his vegetable growing efforts (only the runner beans vaguely compete). 

he will uproot the giant overgrown spinach plants also. 

there are still a few potatoes and some parsnips in there. horsemouth will lift these. the sprouts and the cabbage he will wait to see how these do. 

how does horsemouth write?

he doesn't have a desk. he writes propped up in bed with the laptop in his lap. (he was just reading a piece on writers' desks, the view out of their window, their hours of work, lunch etc.). he writes a bit (or a lot) and then goes unconsciously and farts about on the internet. 

this afternoon/ evening the version of le bateau ivre (first two verses) comes back from rob (it sounds good), horsemouth is trying to work out a title for it - boat trip (gone wrong), downriver - something like that. it sounds cheerful even. 

today (this morning) the electricians are coming. horsemouth has woken up the chickens. he figures he can get them into one shed while the electricians work on the other (to reduce the amount of chicken underfoot). there is no chicken problem with the garage. 

today the anniversary of john fahey live in hobart tasmania in 1980. it's an exemplary gig by the old curmudgeon. 

history and conjecture

horsemouth admits

some of this was written the day before 

the idea occured the night before that even when horsemouth settled down to read a few pages from lawrence durrell's prospero's cell: a guide to the landscape and manners of the island of corfu (or as he calls it corcyra).

now this is based on time spent there from april 1937 to the end of september 1938. there should therefore be chances to discuss what durrell was up to in the various months as they occur. horsemouth's edition is a faber and faber (ff) edition from 1983 (horsemouth would have sworn it was earlier).

strangely it seems to have been printed on two paper stocks (or two papers of different ages). the first 32 pages are darkened down considerably, the remaining 110 pages have stayed bright. 

'their daughters are called sky and freedom..,' 

history and conjecture

in october 1937 durrell is reading histories of the island - history and conjecture he says - diodorus, thucidides...

in the morning horsemouth walked the eggs up the hill. he returned to contemplate his reading...

and there horsemouth left it

not seeing a part 2. not seeing, or finding in his reading, something that could be placed in juxtaposition to it. 

this morning part 2 is still proving elusive. 

overnight over on substack he had two likes. a psychologist and someone who has liked his stuff before. the previous liker liked his quoting henry miller's the air-conditioned nightmare. he himself liked a post arguing that people producing work through AI had vastly expanded indicating that the motive was less self-expression than taking up more space in the world. this horsemouth liked by way of agreement. 

the land is dark but skies are bright. the vapour trails of the aircraft brilliant white. the sun breaking through. 

anyway here he is

last night horsemouth had a look back through his posts going back about a year. he was looking for a post where he expresses an opinion about the genocide in palestine. 

as you might expect horsemouth is against the genocide in palestine. 

he didn't have any luck finding his earlier post. (but he did enjoy reading his earlier posts).

to horsemouth it is important that he writes what he likes. others may feel he should do or say more or less. he doesn't care that is simply not his business. 

over on substack horsemouth wrote something on selling your time for money. 

this is something horsemouth did for many years. unfortunately he wrote the piece in a real hurry because his computer started beeping and making strange noises. horsemouth's broad point was that many people are dreaming away on social media sites and one of those dreams is that they will invent a cultural commodity the ones and noughts of which can be sold and  will make them money. 

now horsemouth liked the structure of work, employer, employee - there were boundaries and a pattern there. (not that he was a big fan of it whilst he was in it).

it is important to horsemouth that free activity be freely chosen (well as much as is possible) - activity that is not freely chosen falls into three interlinked categories work, slavery, necessity; 

work is where you sell your labour to enable you to survive, keep a roof over your head, put food upon the table etc. it is for the most part an activity that merely reproduces you (though you may find pleasure and satisfaction in parts of it/ it may move you or other people forward).

slavery is when you are forced and coerced into activity. the decent lineaments that hide the element of compulsion within the system are removed. 

necessity is a rawer version of  work - you have to do it in order to survive  - the decent lineaments of civilisation have been weakened or removed. 

broadly horsemouth views all of this as climbing the pyramid that is maslow's hierarchy of needs. 

hannah arendt would be another guide here. (the human condition rather than anything else)

one thing horsemouth bemoaned was that he has not become mega-creative now that he no longer works. 

horsemouth accepts that his ideology that work (for money) and freely chosen activity (not for money) are different inhibits his ability to make money out of his creativity/  freely chosen activity. he has noticed that many people do not see them as separate and are thus more successful at it. 

anyway here he is. 

today a rainy gray day. later a walk up the hill to deliver some eggs. 

when the real crisis starts

an entirely written in the morning blogpost (excepting the following quote he wrote down in his diary last night).

'a piece of writing is a whole that proceeds as a whole - it never presents itself as a matter of choice...' 

- marguerite duras, practicalities. 

forever war (the stupidest war ever)

horsemouth has said he thinks the current gulf war is the stupidest war ever. unlike the war of jenkins ear it is not the pretext for this war that is stupid, it is the complete failure to think through the consequences.

horsemouth fails to see whose strategic interests it serves and for this reason he thinks it is the stupidest war ever. 

the israelis have lunched their reliable ally status with the US. the US has lunched its reliable ally and hegemon status with the rest of the world by precipitating an oil (diesel) crisis without any clear way out. it is a forever war in which the enemy cannot be dislodged from their fortress and that fortress controls a vital strategic asset. 

the full effects of the crisis have not appeared yet because the world is running on its reserves of diesel. when the reserves are gone the real crisis starts. 

when the real crisis starts

production and distribution can happen because of energy - you need energy to get the workers to work and to  run the factories, and diesel (in particular) to transport the finished goods to market.  a major part of any saleable item in a globalised economy is the transport costs, if these rise (as they will) this will drive up inflation and thus interest rates and thus reduce investment into the economy and drive up unemployment as demand falls.

(horsemouth should really talk to his brother's eldest about this - it's his area of expertise). 

as usual the rich are well placed to ride this out (and indeed will make more money out of the crisis to the extent that they are invested in oil) but the poor of all countries will take the beating. 

the suffering will be pretty much incalculable. 

now the US as a country (as the world's reserve currency and net energy exporter) is well placed to ride this out, the other countries of the world that are not oil or gas producers will take a beating. 

it could be argued that this is a blow against china (and, as a by-blow, other far east economies) in the sense that this is where the oil from the strait of hormuz goes - but no, china has far greater oil reserves than the US and is better placed to ride it out. 

arguably russia is one of the few countries to do better out of the crisis - it gets an export market for its oil and gas. (the people of russia do not benefit from this, the oil and gas they would have used gets exported)

but (similar to covid, the 2008 financial crisis, the ukraine war gas price shock) things that harm the global economy can have side effects in terms of weaning states and populations off oil and driving the electrification of the economy. of course the economic effects of the crisis will limit the ability of the governments, companies, people,  to electrify their energy supply or require greater effort to do so. 

there is the further benefit that the production and consumption that does not happen does not generate the CO2 it would have generated which is then not dumped in the atmosphere, does not contribute to global warming etc. 

further, while gas supplies from the US will drive the EU towards them the knowledge that it was the US that kicked off this crisis will drive the EU (and the rest of the world) away and towards greater independence from the US.

of course horsemouth may just be overthinking it. the direct benefactors are the oil companies (who can now charge a much higher price for their product) and the states that produce oil and gas (and who can get their oil and gas to market). 

we may just have witnesses the beginning of the fall of the US as world hegemon. this does not mean that china will simply and directly replace it or that the world will become multipolar (a bloodbath of competing powers). 

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ok having opened up this issue horsemouth will return to it soon.