a play for time (and the past keeps on giving)

horsemouth has just heard of the death of welwyn garden city's finest mark astronaut (mark wilkins). there were a number of records by them horsemouth liked. he saw them at various gigs up the robey.  

the mob, zounds, blyth power, the astronauts there were a number of bands in the anarcho-punk scene that horsemouth actually liked. horsemouth remembers a friend saying that mark astronaut  had a thing about not sleeping away from home so the band would often have to take earlier slots in the night so he could get the train home. 

yesterday horsemouth got seriously dragged off course by EVENTS. 

first the 'fall' of boris and then later the visit of the man about the EPC (the energy performance certificate). he got really quite excited. 

the 'fall' of  boris 

horsemouth wouldn't count him out just yet. he's still in no.10. he's still the PM . all the insane legislation is still stacked up ready to go through the house of commons. the sovereign individual himself (jacob rees mogg) has not yet abandoned him. boris has fallen as tory party leader, but the parliamentary party (the MPs and lords) never liked him anyway, they put up with him because he pulled in the vote.

'our brilliant and darwinian system' (to quote his exit speech) has dragged him down low (but not out). horsemouth thinks leaving him in downing street, in role as prime minister, would be a bad and dangerous move. but having said he is going he has effectively spiked the guns of those who want him gone now.  

horsemouth guesses we will see tuesday (22 committee) 

the tories will have a selection process to elect someone who doesn't reach the voters boris can reach. hell they may decide he can run in the leadership competition. three months is a long time in politics (as nasruddin will tell you) and a play for time  can be most efficacious. 

boris was a raging opportunist unafraid to tread on toes, fuck shit up and even splash the cash in pursuit of votes. further he had  a residual stated intention to 'level up' courtesy of dominic cummings. without him the country is in the hands of people who believe they can cut and scrimp their way out of an economic crisis, that the workers will accept wage restraint to pay for the crisis. 

of course horsemouth should welcome a tory government that wants to declare class war on the workers and their living standards because that way revolution is supposed to lie. he just doesn't like the balance of forces. 

one problem with EVENTS is they change as they go along and you tend to get dragged along in their wake. horsemouth had to rewrite yesterday's blog several times during the day as the ground shifted under his feet. there's a lesson there. 

the EPC (Energy Performance Certificate)

well by themselves the EPCs show very little. it essentially seems to horsemouth a quick 'eyes-on' judgement of the the thermal fabric of the building followed by the kind of calculations you would do to size a heating system - size of rooms, strength of boiler, stick the figures in the software, bish bash bosh, invoice, ker-ching. 

horsemouth needs to investigate double/ triple glazing costs. so far (in terms of payback period and CO2 saved) more loft insulation is the clear winner of the cost-effectiveness stakes. it is also cheap enough to get it out and round the properties pronto. (strangely having a little robot crawl around spraying insulation under your floorboards  is probably the next most useful thing you can do).  

anyway the dude visited and then was off

last night a dave crosby documentary, a bitter and remorseful old man who has lost the love and trust of his friends by being a 24 carat golden dick (does this sound familiar). he has 8 stents in his heart and they can't put in any more. there's the archive footage, stephen stills and graham nash want to go to work and get on, he just wants to laze in his hammock. they are literally yelling in his face with frustration. 

he's not so badly off now really, he has a nice house, his wife loves him, he has the money from selling his royalties. he has wrapped his memories and his deeds in hard-won abstractions that stop him from engaging with his wrong doing and repairing his friendships (the friendships he says he wants to repair). 

and the past keeps on giving. 

here is pharoah sanders recorded by ORTF live  at the nice jazz festival in france, july 8th 1971 (tracks 1 to 4), the rest was recorded july 18th so horsemouth will share it again then. it's awesome. cecil mcbee, lawrence killan, jimmy hopps, lonnie liston smith. there's that zither thing again. 

today a beautiful day. horsemouth was supposed to go for a walk (but his friend's cat is sick so it may not happen). he is also supposed to meet up with some other friends in the evening for beers (horsemouth will have to be careful)