so 2022 goes out and 2023 comes in

horsemouth is back in hackney in time for the new year for the first time in many years. for many of the last few new years he has stayed in or gone and visited his parents to be out of the way.  

having given some spare change to a homeless dude he decided to walk back (liverpool street overground station was shut down). and because he walked back (and because the universe was smiling upon him)  he bumped into sam hug (on the top of brick lane) and then german mick on the top of broadway market (long time no see people). by pub on the park he met up with tim goldie and then walked back over with him. when they got back to horsemouth's gaff he  tried to give away some shirts. 

(as he always say) if he is going to get mobile he needs to potlatch loads of shit. 

horsemouth has had several cups of tea, half a bar of chocolate and most of a cheap pizza. he has stuck a wash on. he will wait until tomorrow to hang 2023's countryfile calendar, the 2023 diary he has already started using (though he hasn't quite finished with the 2022 diary just yet). it begins on the 30th december 2022 - so for a few days horsemouth will be in the handover. 

he drew a little on the train. his journey back was uneventful.

2022 goes and 2023 comes in - horsemouth is not sure how he will handle it yet. 

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

from here on in horsemouth re-posts his summary of the year (but tidied up a little).

horsemouth has had an even more moderate year than last year in terms of cultural production. 

he did only one gig last year at waterintobeer way back in february (as a split show with howard).thanks to martin for putting them. 

horsemouth did a little recording with howard in 2022 (but it languishes unfinished on soundcloud). howard recorded an EP of songs in the summer and will record more of his solo stuff over christmas (so look out for that in the new year). horsemouth played some guitar and some bass on a track by catastro/FILLE (this is available upon request). 

musical instrument-wise horsemouth is up a 12 string guitar and a small (and somewhat parched sounding) rainstick. he can't remember if the glockenspiel  was a this year purchase or even earlier. 

horsemouth was involved in no golden glow mixes in 2022 (and indeed they may all be vanishing due to a change in mixcloud policy so listen to them before they go).

2022 was his first full year of retirement. 

he kept on writing this blog. in 2021 he saw an AI powered voice over/ text reading service advertised on youtube. in 2022 he saw an AI that offered to assist you with writing your blogs.  

he read a fair bit (though not with the concentrated effort that he has managed in previous years). he watched a lot of films (mostly giallos, horrors, and ghost stories). he didn't listen to much music (his amplifier needs replacing). he listened to webb david's techno-dub show on new river radio, and the CDs of the new albums by the robert lawson trio as they arrived. he spent a lot of time waiting for the hawkbinge podcasts to come out. he watched a lot of thrift a life (even though he was wearing a DIJ t-shirt one time) and outlaw bookseller. 

he did a fair amount of walking (often with TG, sometimes with ayesha). he stopped doing the child-minding. 

in 2022 the decarbonisation of social housing has become the main thing.

he's probably not doing enough to prevent boredom but he has been spending his way through the redundancy cheque, an advance on the pension and his works pension (small though it is).he is in fact spending hardly any money at all (except for rent).

he bought far fewer second hand books and fewer CDs than he would have in a normal year, book boxes have replaced second-hand bookshops in his affections. 

his homestead (the gaff) has taken a further dive over christmas whilst he was away. the living room is once again fucked. there's some stuff in the corridors. the back garden has been fucked. horsemouth no longer gives a shit. the front garden has at least been cleared.

he continued cooking more regularly (but a limited range of dishes). he continues to be a lazy, morally compromised, lacto-vegetarian. 

for yet another year he didn’t manage a foreign holiday (but as in 2022 he hopes to manage one in 2023, indeed he announced it as part of his plan for the year). he spent a lot of time at his folks (which has been good).  

horsemouth thanks howard, enza, catastro/FILLE for joining him in his creative endeavours and all who have read, watched, listened to him, or liked or commented on the things he has produced (thank you people, horsemouth is very grateful).

roll me on the water

horsemouth has survived the CAROUSEL, he has survived his time with THE PLANET PEOPLE, he has survived his crossing of DAMNATION ALLEY. . 

in some ways horsemouth is very lucky. 

he has slept OK but not massively well (he normally sleeps like a log). it's a bright clear day outside. he has had his cup of coffee (and to put it indelicately a dump) and has cheered up. he's hearing bonnie kolocs in his head for some reason (though not this one). 

today a meet up with richard and stass at sainsbury's (2PM) . horsemouth has a couple of spare musicians of bremen CDs stored at his parents - he'll take those just in case.  

last night he watched half of a drama called mayflies - we cut back and fore between middle aged people confronting mortality and youngsters out on the radge - horsemouth cannot see that, if it is really two episodes, it has enough time to do what it needs to do to bring the plot to a satisfactory conclusion. they are off to the inauguration of the hacienda, to see the fall. his mum has become a fan of the detectorists that is good. 

horsemouth has posted his read, watched and been to list for december (this is slightly early). once again he forgets much of what he does and has to be reminded of it. the hawkbinge hasn't happened - horsemouth opines that the early stuff (and the bob calvert) is worth getting out of bed for, but that the later stuff is a case of diminishing returns - he will defend the bronze age  (and to a lesser extent the RCA years) largely based on his enthusiasm for huw lloyd-langton's songwriting and guitar playing.

as he's away visiting he may not be able to blog until either the new year or until new years eve  - this may be 'it' for the season. he has already summarised his year several times (on 9/12/22 for example and improbably on 11/11/22). december 30th, percy shelley and mary godwin mary at st. mildred's church (bread street - under canon street station as now is). saturday the year ends. 

films, books, gigs, events december 2022

once again a bit early.

films

- the detectorists

- west side stories (patti smith, jonathan miller)

- dudes promoting the judee sill movie

- outlaw bookseller, thrift a lifem skills builder 

- the screaming mimi (film noir)

- straus-huillet interviews and part of kafka movie

- traumazone, adam curtis on the collapse of communism and democracy in the former soviet union and an early  documentary on britains's housing crisis and the problems with system build by him (1985)

- the eagle has landed

- a cluttered life

- rose simpson interview, various linda perhacs interviews

- shows on dusty springfied and tina turner

- LRB after the midterms

- documentary on the buddhafield cult 'holy hell'

 - the secret agent (toby jones)

books

- roald dahl's book of ghost stories

- freya stark 'the coast of incense', biography

- the backwards research guide (sonya huber)

- privacy: a manifesto (wolfgang sofsky)

- torygraph (self-building article)

- guardian (dismantling sellafield article)

- LRB, NLR, the rest is politics podcast 

- clark ashton smith 

- 6 1/2 hour discussion of the blue oyster cult

- the land that time forgot

- R4 documentary on  the new translation of bruno schulz 

- titus alone (mervyn peake)

- on violence (hannah arendt)

gigs (online)

webb david show, zali krishna 

events 

back to folks, over to richard and stass's

on horsemouth's further bargainings with time

horsemouth was discovered. there had been a misunderstanding and horsemouth had been admitted. the books (gifts) to the two little girls were discovered to have been purchased second hand, there was a letter in one - the eldest was already too grown up for the book (and none too pleased with the gift). the books themselves were reddish and probably about historical matters. horsemouth was on maximum charm (he was handling the situation well). 

such was the dream and now it is on with the business of the day (to be a rainy horrible day by all accounts). 

a young adam curtiss tells us about the problems with new system build housing estates (and the failure of oversight in their construction). the key example given is ronan point - there was a gas explosion and the whole side of the tower block collapsed like a house of cards. 

it is an early documentary, one not burdened with excess media ontology. it pretty much all repeats the great inflammable cladding and tower bloc fires scandal  of our times. in the 80ies cladding was proposed also. the cladding was designed to insulate the properties (because  no-one can afford to heat them with electric and were not allowed to  heat them with gas because of the risk of explosion and collapse) but also to keep them dry, to stop exposed metal ties rusting and dropping huge panels of concrete on the people below. 

but when they tested four new systems of cladding - they failed even to keep water out. 

the guy from hackney council is at the trowbridge estate (it's falling down, falling down) he says that the architects and structural engineers are very persuasive when they sell him the remediation strategies but that they were just as persuasive when they were selling him the now failed system build in the first place. the regulator is some kind of a business itself and claims to have no enforcement powers. 

so what have you learned about horsemouth in the last year? (in other words - why should you continue to read this blog?)

that horsemouth is a pessimist 'however bad things are (they can always get worse)' he opines (but he does celebrate the solstice). 

and that his pleas for privacy are somewhat undermined by his willingness to tell you about himself. 

tomorrow he goes to meet richard, billy and stass.(and all at wildhare mansions). soon enough he is back in the wen (john will be visiting and then it's on with the business of the year). 

mixcloud are changing their business model, they propose charging the DJs, hence the end of the golden glow (probably). this affects dying for bad music also (they put their excellent compilations of american primitive guitarists up there). for this reason they are releasing the current mix as a zip download (it looks most excellent). 

horsemouth planning out of the year to come (time will tell)

horsemouth has begun the planning out of the year to come.

his new day a page 2023 diary begins on the 30th (richard's open day)  and shortly thereafter john is around (2nd of january onwards). he has marked both of these. 

similarly with the countryfile calendar he has marked the week we are currently in (as a run in to january). the equinoxes and the solstices (he should probably add the celtic quarter days). 

his existing diary covers the year from the 15th of august 2022 onwards (due to the premature disintegration of his main 2022 diary) in a small black notebook given him by TG). when horsemouth returns to the wen he will place it (with due reverence) with his box of diaries (which is now too small for its allocated task).  the diaries themselves will not tell you much (booking times, client initials, lists) 

another example of his planning is that he has constructed a table of the expenses likely to be involved with delivering the decarbonisation within the communal endeavour  over the next 2 1/2 years (roughly). now, assuming the bid is accepted and everything goes smoothly, there is the pre-procurement phase from april until the end of september 2023, then there is the procurement phase the last 3 months of 2023, the whole of 2024 and the the first 3 months of 2025. 

plus there are the estimates of the actual costs of the works themselves as they occur during the procurement phase. . 

given this and the costs it is possible to work out the amount to be spent in each month and thus the amount to be spent in each year. now these you need to now because you need to be able to source that money up front from the reserves to pay for the works to be done. 

of course you need that money up front - but perhaps not all of it. in theory as the works are done and signed off the government pays for half (assuming all their requirements - PAS 2035/2030 etc. have been met). 

a lot depends upon the budget for 2023 - horsemouth looks forward to seeing this. 

this, ladies and gentlemen, looks like the best part of his 2023. (plus there will be the other usual collective endeavour anxieties and activities). and this is only the stage one of the decarbonisation.

he hasn't particularly thought about the music. the stuff with catastro/FILLE  will happen when it happens (that's part of the deal for making it happen). howard is making noises about wanting to do something in the guitar duo line. again time will tell.

one thing about linda perhacs is that she said she suddenly realised that if she didn't make a second album (and soon) it wouldn't get done. horsemouth was having a re-listen to  volume four and the demos himself and howard recorded in april. and then there's the demos of howard's tracks he has heard. there's enough there certainly. 

boxing day (pénuries artificielles)

here horsemouth is. he can do no other.

he has found a copy of terms and conditions: welfare edition amongst his parents books. he had forgotten he had given it to them - they are very fond of dictionaries and such like (particularly his father), he thinks he brought it as a christmas present together with a copy of ambrose beirce's the devil's dictionary - he was hoping to smuggle some radical thought into the fortress of reaction.

from whence (terms)  this description of scarcity.

'it s a fact well-known... that scarcity to a certain degree promotes industry, and that the manufacturer who can subsist on three days work will be idle and drunken three days of the week... the poor in the manufacturing counties will never work more than is necessary  just to live and support their weekly debauches... we can fairly aver that a reduction of wages in the woollen manufacture would be a national blessing and advantage, and no real injury to the poor. by this means we might keep our trade, uphold our rents and reform the people into the bargain.' - john smith, memoirs of wool, 1747. 

horsemouth is not for a second arguing that what we are currently witnessing is an attempt to drive people back into further work by means of high food and heating prices and thus a reduction of wages in real terms (heaven forfend). 

yesterday a wander round with his mother down to the abbey and up by the river conducted earlier than usual. later he had a quick dash up to the common to make use of the last half hour of daylight. 

later christmas dinner. later still rather a lot of tina turner (following on from a dusty springfield session a few weeks ago).  in terms of christmas presents horsemouth is up a diary, a shirt, some socks and a countryfile calendar (vital to his psychic economy). 

horsemouth hails catastro/FILLE's dog and bone as the the tune of the year for him - the organ, the drums, the guitar are all great. enza features in the video (together with various other mobile phone users). 

il est ne le divin enfant

so here it is, merry christmas, horsemouth is having fun (at least). he has a cup of coffee. he's blogging away. he had a very interesting dream last night (about which he can tell you nothing). 

the day is fairly predictable (famous last words). 

rise. wish merry christmas to the dog and then his father. make coffee. blog for a bit. go down to breakfast. wish merry christmas to his mother. eat breakfast. possible exchange of presents. at some point the family (as is) will either go for a walk together (the monmouthshire canal at govilion is a usual favourite) or beg off due to health concerns (horsemouth will in any event go for a walk). his mum will cook christmas dinner (with a vegetarian alternative to the meat for horsemouth). to assuage his guilt horsemouth will try and be helpful. himself and his father will probably polish off a little of the red wine left by his brother. there may be something on tv for all to watch or they may split up early to their separate entertainments.

horsemouth will now disrupt this pattern by going for a second round of coffee. 

the calendars are running out. the diaries also. the day is set aside for rest rather than labour. there are a few logs horsemouth could move for his father. the bbc predicts greyish but dry in the morning and possible rain for the afternoon.

the divine child is born (how folk is that!). and in the middle of winter too (when people could do with some good news). 

as usual horsemouth is very partial to songs in french.   

he appends an interview with linda perhacs. she got lucky (she met the right people), she had a vision (she saw music visually). it is another rediscovery tale - because she got something out the first time she could be rediscovered later and the masters existed.

(horsemouth was just having a little fantasy about being rediscovered in such a fashion).  

 and she made a second album. 

yesterday horsemouth spent a little time thinking about cashflows for the insulating social housing thing. it is obviously unwise to count your chickens before they hatch but it is a good idea to get a feel for how much money will be needed to do the things you want to do. 2023 is opening up before horsemouth (2024 more dimly). it will fit in with the budget andy has been preparing. for the bid the communal endeavour were fairly casual about how it will all be paid for - as they move (hopefully) towards actually doing it they will need to plan it better.  

'brownings, thackereys and trollopes had all been guests, until her husband was bitten by a mad dog...'

last night zoom beers with howard. 

it wasn't quite zoom. if horsemouth remembers correctly 

it wasn't a smooth process. he couldn't get the zoom working on his end and so they did it with facebook messenger. initially horsemouth couldn't get his camera working either (so howard was talking to a black screen). 

'it's just like a phonecall' howard remarked, in a jumper, in a darkened room, only his leigh folk festival glass illuminated. 

even when horsemouth could get his camera working he had still fudged the lens producing strange pointillist images of himself. 

horsemouth offered up freya stark (from whence the title of this piece). howard had heard of the patti smith in new york film before. howard offered up a book on indian devotional art and a clip of bert jansch and john renbourn working on a tune together for bert and john.  it may be that this guitar duo strategy is a way forward for musicians of bremen.

horsemouth is currently one of those economically inactive over 50 retirees you have been warned  about. 

you know the ones, the ones who are wrecking the economy. the ones who need to be enticed back to work. on the upside this means he has more flexibility as to where he can be and when. but he has not been able to utilise it yet because of the pandemic and such like.  

so what does the world of work in 2023 have to offer?

'wages next year will fall back to 2006 levels, (there will be) a slide in house prices and an increase in divorces... the cost of living crisis combines with rising unemployment, an increase in bankruptcies and struggling public services...  the main measure of life satisfaction is expected to slump to its lowest level since records began in 2013.'

meanwhile horsemouth is just getting on with this blogging nonsense. there may even be some music to be done. 

'lonely and resistant re-arrangers of things, anxious malcontents, children afflicted... by some presentiment of loss.' -  joan didion,  (from on keeping a notebook). here rearranged in an allen ginsberg style.

today he will go for a wander (naturally). he will post a reminder to his housemates to take some meter readings (the better to keep on top of the gas and electricity bills). he has heard from richard wildhare. later (he supposes) present wrapping (and such like). 

it is the anniversary of one of horsemouth's golden glow mixes (he will be sharing this later). 

'people come here to be stars (but there ain't no stars in the sky).'

 'people come here to be stars but there ain't no stars in the sky.' 

patti smith plays the hick who loves new york city. it's early in her career (it's 1972). she's running around meeting everybody (is that moondog?), she's done the st. mark's poetry reading (with lenny kaye and reading an early version of fire of unknown origin). her poetry and her work writing lyrics for the blue oyster cult  has begun. the city is the star - old new york. 

it was allegedly jim desmond  the cameraman's idea to get her in the film. he persuaded director tristram powell to go and meet her. she becomes the main event - jonathan miller is trapped in his role as a somewhat intellectual comedian. his footage is good(ish) (he's being interviewed for the radio - there's an unexplained  woman with a baby in there). but it is the footage of patti that is pure gold. 

interestingly this film doesn't seem to have made it onto the IMDB (internet movie database). jim desmond surely rates an entry  having filmed martin luther king, the monterey pop festival etc. etc. 

horsemouth languishes in rural obscurity (he's walking a lot and it is good to see his folks). he has started reading titus alone  by mervyn peake - titus washes up in a dark and disturbing city (kind of like old new york).

horsemouth is also reading privacy bit by bit. he is dipping into the newspapers. 

today a day of rain. and (should it be possible to go for a walk in the afternoon) of mud.

horsemouth has posted his solstice 2021 poem  and it seems to be getting a fair few likes. a friend talks about wanting to walk the golden valley and about having walked/ hitch-hiked from shrewsbury to kington as a youth. it is an area horsemouth does not know (it is too far to walk, it would need someone with a car to drive him up there, even the railway line above ludlow does not go that way). there was a folk festival up there one time  (run by a band called haress), himself and howard were thinking of going, but in the end bottled out. 

the cult that (eventually) imploded

'the unicorn represents the chances the NHS workers will get a decent pay rise.' - comment on the winter solstice sunrise at stonehenge 2022 feed. 

horsemouth was up early enough to watch the sunrise from stonehenge (2022) - but only just. (his mobile phone being off he couldn't set himself an alarm and had to rely upon his body and brain and luck to wake him up in time). 

last night horsemouth watched holy hell a documentary made by an ex-cult member of the buddhafield cult. it benefits from the californian sunshine. it's beautiful people in beautiful nature. there's a lot of sunbathing and wallowing in the surf and fun and frolics. basically it looks like the best club 18-30 holiday ever (if what you wanted from life was to be the member of a hippie cult  then this would be a good choice). the aesthetics are great - lots of meditation, lots of going to he gym, lots of ballet. they film  themselves. they build buildings. they do performances. (they also have day jobs).

but there's coercive control here (it's that old guru prinzip). and there's hypocrisy and paranoia. eventually it falls apart, the truth comes out and it splits. the escapees are left full of regret and remorse. 

horsemouth has always been interested in cults. they are churches but also monastic orders.  horsemouth guesses they are like states - he makes that analogy.

'there are moments in history where countries chose their own decline.' - alistair campbell 

and so was brexit probably. or would have been had there been any real interest in its implementation among the political class. instead of the grand plan and the necessary task mere events come along. 

horsemouth thinks everything moves pretty much as it would have done anyway. brexit does not crash the stormont assembly - the loyalists crash the stormont assembly because they don't want to accept that majority has passed from them, they would have crashed it anyway. 

EU citizens in britain lose their votes, but then their vote could never change anything anyway (except if they had been allowed to vote in the brexit referendum itself). the government is cured of any desire to resolve political issues through referendums. one reason for brexit was a failure of political representation - but brexit itself cannot cure this.

true it fucks the economy. but other factors were going to fuck the economy anyway (and a 'strong' economy does not benefit everyone equally anyway - that was the other key reason for brexit). 

and so the euro cult eventually imploded. 

and so the brexit cult eventually imploded. 

except that neither has yet. 

forward to 2023. forward to the equinox. victory to the nurses, postmen and railwaymen. 

SOLSTICE - horsemouth beset by santas (and not out of the woods)

8 years ago horsemouth played a gig at cafe bohemia.  he was (like the opening  scene of the city of lost children) beset by many santas (in fact the band albino dressed up in seasonal costume). horsemouth can't speak as to the quality of the gig he played but he had a most excellent time rattling through his hits. sean was there, and max (who took photos), horsemouth got  andrew minty and howard up to sing. 

today at some godly hour (21.47) it is the SOLSTICE. english heritage will be transmitting a sunnrise at stonehenge cast from about 7am tomorrow morning (sunrise at 8.09am).  we have the longest night and the shortest day. from here things can only get better (at least in the sense of there being more sun and daylight).

sadly the same cannot be said about the political situation. the government seem intent on rerunning the miners' strike (but with nurses, railwaymen and posties this time). horsemouth thinks they are just holding out to look good before they cave in, so they can drive the NHS to collapse and so provide themselves with an argument for wholescale re-organisation of these industries (with a greater role for the private sector). 

the problem with this strategy is that they won't be around to implement it (they'll have to leave that to the labour party and witless hamsters like wes streeting)

horsemouth has finished watching adam curtis's traumazone on the collapse of the soviet union and then the collapse/ failure to launch of democracy in russia, ukraine etc.. 

there's an argument doing the rounds that there's a parallel between the situation in the UK now and the situation in russia then - yegor gaidar (the then russian prime minister) even makes it at one point arguing that while the russians might have lost their empire (the soviet union) the british didn't like losing their empire either (but they had to get used to it as a poitical reality) - but horsemouth doesn't buy this analogy, it is being made for effect (things are just not that bad in the UK yet). . 

of course we are not out of the woods with the collapse of the soviet union. it is difficult for horsemouth to look at the destruction of grosny without imagining kyiv similarly treated. 

horsemouth supposes the take home message is however bad things are (they can always get worse).

yesterday he went for a wander over the common to ewyas harold. later he went for a wander with his mother and the dog down to the abbey and along by the river. 

in a bit breakfast. after which horsemouth will go for another wander round. we roll towards midwinter and christmas  and then the uneasy times before and after new year. 

ghost town (the motorways of hackney)

eight years ago and horsemouth was preparing for a gig at cafe bohemia (thanks albino). he remembers it as being very cold. there are photos (is this the gig with the multiple santas? like the dream sequence that opens city of lost chidren).

if it was then sean was there (and minty and howard). he demoed a version of noah.  he will be showing you the photos as soon as facebook shows him.  

today a day without rain (allegedly). horsemouth will use it to wander around (his clothes having dried out from the last time). he will put some  clothes in to be washed (thanks mum). 

he dreamed it was his birthday and he was meeting loads of friends down by a river or down by the docks in some kind of post industrial set up. then he dreamed he was living in an old dark house but the doorbell was always going and there were guests. 

the motorways of hackney

there was a guardian article (and then a letter) about the 60ies plan to drive a huge ringroad (a motorway box) through the inner london boroughs. little of it was in the end built. the hackney wick to kidbrooke section actually got built) but because of a spirited campaign of resistance little of the rest did. 

a friend admitted that having grown up on kenton road he would have welcomed the motorway if it got rid of the rat running traffic for dover. 

the argument is the one between robert moses (prosperity, cars, cross bronx expressway) and jane jacobs (vibrant communities, pedestrians, no new roads). the result of this argument is the cities we have, cars jammed through medieval street plans, streets choked with parked cars, dangerous air quality. 

horsemouth briefly worked on a government make work scheme in the path of the M11 link doing up people's gardens before the wrecking ball came. 

ghost town

terry hall (of the specials, colourbox, the fun boy three) has died. ghost town  by the specials (video allegedly directed by barney bubbles) is the key record that you could use to define the times - exhaustion, decay, menace, do nothing the primary sentiment of the age (boredom). hall's voice was the voice of it all. they are inside the car but are they safe, the car swerves all over the road while driving through a dark wasteland.

'by the time anton B. left the building in the morning, he'd already been recorded three times...'

horsemouth shares with you the first christmas present of the season (from his brother and family) - privacy.: a manifesto by sociologist wolfgang sofsky.  

'by the time anton B. left the building in the morning, he'd already been recorded three times...' goes the kafka (metamorphosis) echoing opening line. sofsky tells you a tale of surveillance. one that (interestingly) relegates foucault to a footnote. sadly sofsky does not go on to tell us what changes this causes in anton B. (or at least not immediately). 

horsemouth's parents internet service provider will have logged him looking at amazon's page for it (so that he could show you a picture of the book on facebook).and now he's telling you about it. the owners of all the pages horsemouth uses will know (this is basically the deal). 

horsemouth (due to an unfortunate series of events) is onto his second biometric passport. - he has come back into the UK through one of those automated borderforce robocop facial recognition barriers. 

for the last few years the government could tell where he was by means of his debit card transactions (tap tap tap). horsemouth, a fully paid up member of the tinfoil hat militia, is contemplating a return to cash. this is not because he is engaged in party work requiring the utmost secrecy but more because small shopkeepers get charged a transaction fee whenever you tap. (further it is useful to have change to fund the addictions of the homeless)

however tapping for everything was most useful to him as it enabled him to keep a better track of his expenditure (particularly down the pub). horsemouth is not in fact a great pub drinker.

as you can see horsemouth's plea for privacy is somewhat undermined by his willingness (enthusiasm even) to tell you about himself. 

horsemouth's impromptu gift to his brother (not in exchange) was his copy of hannah arendt's on violence. 

now hannah takes the unfashionable side of the student power, black power arguments (she's against them and she is not impressed by their arguments).  she is, for horsemouth, overly impressed by the US constitution's separation of powers,  seeing this as some guarantor of freedom. but this opposition is interesting because we are at a moment when those kinds of claims are being made again in the current debates. she also notes the change in the ability of violence to resolve political disputes that the age of nuclear deterrence and the balance of terror ushered in (an age we may have left as we dismember the ghost of the USSR) and the defection of the new left from marx's critique of political economy towards an insurrectionism.

ok horsemouth is off to breakfast. 

he's back from breakfast he has got his tea.

he has donated the nylon strung guitar he keeps at his parents to his brother's eldest's desire to learn guitar (he may replace it when he is back in london with a better nylon strung guitar from his collection if this looks like a good idea. 

in a little bit he will be out of the door in search of wandering about. what he will get up to this week he does not know. he has been watching adam curtis's traumazone about not just the collapse of communism in the USSR but also the collapse of democracy too (and the sheer economic looting of those years). anyway he will watch the rest of those as well. 

appareled in celestial light (the horsemouth has landed)

so after a wander as far as the abbey horsemouth settled down in the evening to watch the eagle has landed (1976), a bad nazi-sploitation film - here is michael caine as the good german officer, donald pleasance as super-villain himmler, robert duval as a.n.other good german officer, donald sutherland as the irish rebel helping them out, jenny agutter as the english rose. there is all the right kit - a DC3, a motor torpedo boat, a stork spotter plane (a fieseler Fi 156 storch). horsemouth saw it at the castle cinema in caerphilly (probably in early 1977). he might have read the book even.

it is (of course) a  went the day well? remake. but it's not deep it's just a star vehicle. the action goes off in a picture postcard english village (complete with watermill). 

it's getting to be review of the year time. what a long strange year it has been.so who here remembers 'operation big dog?'. three prime ministers, two monarchs etc. 

horsemouth prepares for the 2022 golden glow christmas campaign.

with a return to horsemouth and howard's 18th december 2015 mix. lata mangeshkar, sproatly smith, lemmchen grundschule, canned heat, alice coltrane and more. he's just finishing off 12th december's mix -'morning final' by the blue oyster cult comes in very nicely after what sounds like a backwards mark bolan song and transitions out to the headhunter's 'you got it, you get it' (horsemouth once robbed the berimbau/ guitar part). 

today more wandering about (probably).  

abundance (spare us the clutter)

horsemouth has allowed his life to become cluttered (similarly for the other three of his housemates). it is a world of abundance rather than a world of scarcity.  for horsemouth the danger is thus within a ten minute walk of his home the middle class leave out their books out in a book-box (and a thoroughly decent selection it is). furniture/ crockery too.

all of these are well supplied. before he would have picked up his books at second hand bookshops between bookings of work. furniture he has almost never had to buy (though he has paid daryll to put up some shelves for him).

sten and daryll's form of hoarding takes the form of tools and materials - things that will allegedly someday be useful. there's some hoarding of food (of the kind multiple  freezers provides with no thought as to how refrigerating food for years affects its energy efficiency).

horsemouth is currently at his parents' in the countryside. now it is possible there's a book box in the village (but horsemouth is so far unaware of it - ok ok he will walk in and look), there is a (volunteer manned) library.  

to purchase second-hand books requires a visit in the car to hereford or hay or abergavenny. nonetheless there is a permanent collection of books at his parents house (horsemouth's dad has a folio book club phase, penguin classics/ modern classics are well represented). here are two grumpy old men discussing the slippage of the term classic.

horsemouth's dad has a garage in which to store his tools (cars are now considered not so delicate that they can't be left outside, driven out by the clutter).

people (of course) love their stuff but all of this makes getting mobile more difficult. a friend has their stuff in storage while they are away.

here it is a frosty morning. horsemouth's brother and his family are up visiting. horsemouth has his coffee (but he may sneak downstairs in search of seconds). soon(ish) breakfast (and then - horsemouth guesses - a walk).  

horsemouth floats free from the wreck (nothing beside remains)

horsemouth typed this while listening to the wave debb show .it's a bit of a late start by horsemouth because he was watching lots of footage of a somewhat pop-eyed dude explain about insulation, condensation and heat-loss from houses - thanks dude that was really helpful. 

today horsemouth visited TESCOs with his mum to do the first part of the christmas shop. he hopes he was helpful. it was knee deep in geriatrics (and the horsemouth who is telling you this is nearly 60). there were some howling kids attempting to wander off and get separated from their parents (but strangely few). 

a guardian newspaper article has reminded him of an earlier part of his life when he volunteered for an anti-nuclear group. 

their main aim (in truth) was to get sellafield (aka. windscale) shut down and to get it to cease operations as the world's nuclear laundry and dustbin.

they failed, but, some 30-40 years later, it has finally been shut down and the site been handed over to the nuclear decommissioning authority. 

in normal operation uranium in a reactor makes plutonium - and that plutonium can be extracted by a process called reprocessing and then either used in bombs or in further reactor fuel. now its use in bombs horsemouth does not approve of and frankly its use in reactor fuel horsemouth does not approve of either. the process creates vastly more nuclear waste than the spent reactor fuel you started with and now we face decades (possibly centuries) of clean up work at sellafield/ windscale/ whatever it is called in a hundred years time or a thousand years time to come. 

best not to do it at all opined horsemouth at the time.he quoted 'ozymandias'at the MPs - it did no good. (they thought it was a hymn of praise to wise king ozymandias.  he lost that argument).).

at some point horsemouth decided the whole effort was futile and returned to fill-time unemployment and drinking (his first love). he was fundamentally not suited to the work of campaigning and the whole operation was so precarious it didn't bear looking at. it survived not because  anyone cared but because horsemouth was effectively doing the donkey work for free. 

the work suited horsemouth because it alibied his music (a similarly largely fruitless endeavour but one about which he feels better). 

a while later his then flatmate denise ishaque recommended he get an actual job (and the rest is history).

for 25 years horsemouth worked integrating deaf students into the hearing higher education system and for 25 years sellafield worked as the world's nuclear laundry, strangely multiplying nuclear waste and contaminating still further (at a minimum) the land it is on and the irish sea.

and now it is all over - (nothing but the clean up).

'nothing beside remains. round the decay

of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare

the lone and level sands stretch far away.'

once again horsemouth floats free from the wreck.  

-----

'in this third, and, for the present, last volume of autobiography, I have followed the previous system of alternating letters from the past with my present day impressions, so that the result may be, I hope, the composite one of memory and refection; present and past; plaited in together as they are in actual life: for it is usually a chord and not a note that we remember.' 

- forward to 'the coast of incense: autobiography 1933-39' by freya stark.    

    

a difficult year

 2023 what sort of year will it turn out to be? let's ask mr. wolf (martin wolf of the FT)

'assuming nothing bad happens , really bad, then it's going to be a difficult year.'

the internet seems sluggish  this morning (maybe the electrons are cold and don't want to be shifted from their nice warm beds). horsemouth supposes the real problem is for people on key meters. once the juice is gone you face a walk to the shops in the snow to get the power back on. and once your money is gone you have no way to get the power back on.

horsemouth lived with key meters when he was down in popl(u)lar (pesky things). 

horsemouth wonders how the lads are doing back at the homestead. they adjusted to paying the increased charge before the government announced its 66/ month help 'package'. so far this winter they have held that in reserve. in a bit he will take a look and see if they want more money from him. they presumably will do after horsemouth submits the next set of meter readings (towards the end of the month). 

outside it resembles nothing so much as a US landscape painter's image of the winter. apparently it's very cold by british standards  (-5C). horsemouth has been out in minus 30 (in montreal) er. but not for long. 

'in october... liz truss’s government was ready to launch a formal campaign but decided against it. it later emerged that jacob rees-mogg, then business secretary, had signed off a “light touch” £15m campaign to save consumers £300 a year on energy bills but the move was blocked by truss, who opposed a “nanny state” intervention.' 

it is a difficult moment. advising people to turn down their heating in the middle of a cold-snap. but the battle must be fought all of  the winter long. beyond that there is the infrastructure battle to upgrade the electricity grid to provide enough power for people to actually use their air-source heat pumps (when and if those actually happen). 

horsemouth was in bed (but this doesn't mean you should miss out on some culture) 11.20pm  sky arts chasing trane  a documentary on john coltrane. horsemouth tends to actually listen to alice coltrane more, alice coltrane and pharoah sanders. he should listen to more sun ra and other jazz dudes (but he doesn't). miles davis  he listens to (but more electric miles). 

well it's looking glorious outside. in a bit breakfast. then a walk. etc. 

'we were taught maypole dancing' (when the words won't come)

somebody left horsemouth a voicemail message the night before last but he doesn't recognise the number.

1) horsemouth can't get at his voicemail messages (he has no credit on his phone and no way of putting credit on).

2) his parents house has no mobile phone signal - so he gets your texts etc. when he goes for a walk. 

if you want to message him it's either on here or email.  if you want to talk to him let him know.

'trying to live in the moment... (meant)...

no one knew what was going on half the time'

listening to rose simpson of the incredible string band. (there's another rose simpson, an artist in the states, she welcomes the convention goers to the convention. like the rose simpson of the incredible string band she is in to just doing things.

rose points to her teachers, the post first world war generation and their responses to the horrors of the first world war (vegetarianism, nudity, getting back to nature). she sees these as  transferring seamlessly to the hippie life.

'we were taught maypole dancing.'

she says what she wanted to write was a book that told you 'this is what it feels like to do it'

it is not a great interview. the interviewer barely knows who she it. he leads her down dull paths and agrees with her in a formless manner. but you can't beat the story - the story is just too good. 

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

last night

 'it seems to be one of those nights when the words won't come. which is ok.' 

horsemouth has no real strategy for such nights (except to go and sleep and trust to the morning). 

the morning -  a bright cold morning (a walk later). 

the evening routine of a slow living minimalist (grand designs)

so horsemouth is back at his parents. he just went up on the common to get his mum some holly with berries (for some reason there's not a lot of it about) and then he was out hauling logs for his dad (well actually his dad (80 something) did the hauling, horsemouth did the loading and the making sure the logs didn't fall off the sled while they were being hauled up the incline (by his dad). 

horsemouth's parents read the torygaph (just to be clear they are tories and brexiteers). there was no torygraph today so his dad got the grauniad instead). there was a piece on self-build in the saturday torygraph (of the we pay builders/ grand designs type). it featured a number of self-builders including bryony harrington (of the right to build task force - a government funded team aiming 'to help local authorities make self-build more accessible'). 

apparently 13000 homes a year are delivered in the UK by  custom build, in germany it is over half. (like horsemouth says this is more the 'grand designs' end of it).

of course it has not been plain-sailing for bryony - covid was followed by vast increases in the cost of materials and builders, by with supply chain - 'rising costs are making many self-build schemes less viable' says ms. summercastle of the greater manchester community led housing hub (and another self-builder).

horsemouth recently saw some people go up to get their award at a housing conference for having successfully completed and moved into  their eco/ self-build/ community land trust housing -  wonderful (but it had taken them 7 years).  

in the evening he was just watching some dude advocating for slow-living (the evening routine of a slow living minimalist - youtube) and before that some bitch wandering round a forest with new age music going on while she talked about 'escaping hustle culture'). the dude was particularly keen to  talk about his evening 'wind down' routine.

now evenings are a very good time for horsemouth. he has done what he was going to do in the day (if anything) and his time is now his own (doubly so in fact). he can get on with things without having to worry about getting on with them.

still horsemouth doesn't want to type too much now. he wants to leave something for him to do in the morning

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

it's the morning already. horsemouth finds himself with not very much to say. mornings are a good time for him (coffee, blogging, weather report, breakfast, on to the business of the day). tuesday the 13th - the RMT strike begins (horsemouth's reason for being out of town so early and thus for having missed the snowfall).

john has been in touch. he'll be in london for the new year. en za left a message,   .    

  

 

'this morning I woke up... I'm gonna take a walk outside'

good morning! good morning!

extend a welcome to london in the snow. horsemouth has to say they seem to be doing better than the rest of us on this (but soon it will turn to disgusting slush, you know this). horsemouth has just had his coffee for the day (than you world for inventing such a fine molecule and a ritual to go with it).

he is listening to his and howard's mix from a year ago - choons selected by horsemouth, mixed by howard, the last one they did together ('this may be my last time'). the cover shows a photo of horsemouth engaged in the fall of the house of fitzgerald (he doesn't dress like this normally honest).

'this morning I woke up...  I'm gonna take a walk outside' sing german hippie ambient musicians in a rare folk outing (12 string guitars set to stun). 

a new translation of bruno schulz is available. horsemouth's friend who spoke polish and english always said the then existing english translation (by celina wieniewska)  was a bit fanciful - but horsemouth has no way of telling. horsemouth reads a lot in translation (the russians, the french) - you are always in the translator's hands. horsemouth has struggled through a couple of books in french (the language he was taught for five years at school), even then he does not understand enough about the language to truly tell what is at stake. 

he was taught welsh for one year at school and can (at best) manage a few words. 

the town schulz lived in is now in western ukraine. like kafka schulz was jewish. kafka wrote in german (rather than in czech). schulz himself is a world author who write in polish (and so consequently is less well known than he deserves to be).   we do not even call the books the same thing - the poles (and just about everyone else) knows them under the title of the first collection the cinnamon shops - in english this collection was titled the street of crocodiles. 

the history of the poles in ukraine was essentially a colonial one - at one point the polish kingdom reached from berlin to moscow (there was a kind of scotland/ england relationship with lithuania also). but then the history of poland was often also a colonial one - divided between the germans and the russians, it's borders nibbled back, its people displaced. 

horsemouth is enjoying his selection (there are a few tunes in there chosen by howard).   

horsemouth will go for a wander on the common. he didn't manage a second walk yesterday. 

 

a frost but no snow

'through frozen rice fields

moving slowly on horseback,

my shadow creeps by'

- matsuo basho.

horsemouth is up and about. he has a coffee (cafetiere coffee granted but coffee none the less) and a sightly stuffy nose. soon breakfast. 

just a second he's been troubled by a memory. no on second thoughts forget it. let's wait until he is more lively to deal with it. 

yesterday, in the valley where his parents live, there was just a frost (no snow yet), in the fields where the sun shone the frost melted and it looked like autumn (there are still leaves on the trees). but where the hedges and woods and hills cast a shadow the frost stayed all day and the land seems frozen - like the permanent winter in the narnia. 

today a day of low cloud, the sun will not be able to reach through and melt the frost, but it is warmer his father says (he's been out already).

in the evening he watched six and half hours of dudes talking about the blue oyster cult (actually in the end he probably watched four hours of it - up to about club ninja). they went chronologically through the albums (with minor digressions for the live albums). boc's career is larded with mis-steps; mirrors, the revolution by night and club ninja  (which killed  them off for the best part of a decade).  but they have survived to be on tour forever. horsemouth regrets not seeing them with albert or joe bouchard.

horsemouth posted the outlaw bookseller's  list of 10 winter SF novels (including ice by anna kavan), a friend proposed he watch quintet.

in a bit he will go for a wander up on the common. later a wander with his mother.  

'to look for precedents and analogies' (in the hands of the austeritarians)

'to look for precedents and analogies (where there are none)' - hannah arendt, on violence. (repunctuated in a horsemouth style).

'so horsemouth has nearly survived the year  (and what a fucking year it has been - war, pestilence, famine, death, tories and other locusts, and brexit yet to come)...' - horsemouth on this date 2 years ago.

ladies and gentlemen. if only he knew what the next two years had in store for him! 

indeed 3 years ago horsemouth was (in a conventional way)  'not that pessimistic'. 

'what is good about current times is that the post-thatcher political settlement (the rich get richer and er... the rich get richer) could in theory change - people at least see it now (which when the crumbs were trickling down from the table they never could).'

of course instead what happened was not the people coming to (class) consciousness but more carnage. the people can maybe see it (but can they do anything about it that is the question). 

now we are in the hands of the austeritarians - the people who hold that austerity is good for us.  a strange retour a normal (back to work) is being conducted as if the past few years was just a fever dream culminating in moral panic and hysteria  over over COVID (and guilty of this and of taking the furlough shilling we now all must pay).

of course this is not a fair reflection of  the situation at all - it is literally ideology, it is literally upside down in this it is the key workers (that is the people who had to keep going through the pandemic) who must now take the beating and accept pay rises of less than inflation (real terms pay cuts) so that the rich should not have to take a pay cut.

horsemouth is at his folks in the countryside. they are comfortably off and are not skimping on the heating or food. he just had a discussion with his dad about the limited effectiveness (and long payback times) of double glazing. decarbonise the countryside? (horsemouth thinks not). he watches the smoke rise from the chimneys and from out of the boilers.

horsemouth failed to bring arendt's the origins of totalitarianism  (a breeze-block of a book) and for many recent years touted as the guide to our strange times (and in particular the trump years - though it applies just as well to brexit and to boris). instead he brought the slimmer on violence - arendt is on the wrong side (we would take it) of then contemporary debates (the student movement, black power for example), she is still haunted by nuclear war fear (in a way that we are not). she notes the way that marxism has slipped its moorings (in the critique of political economy) and become infested  with a georges sorel inspired insurrectionism. 

she has read fanon, she has read sartre, she has little time for an imagined third world to counter the super-power hegemony. 

of course our current times are just as beset by strange bugbears of radical thought. and strangely the right are now insurrectionists, dabbling in assassination, bombings, conspiracy theories. indeed the benefit of arendt's totalitarianism  was the way it described the cross-class alliances of the mob and the ruling class, the conspiracy theories and the scandals. we could see that there were indeed precedents and analogies. 

here the dawns are always beautiful but then (almost immediately) it clouds over. in a bit horsemouth will go for his usual walk on the common (this stands in for his usual walk on the marshes). he will listen to the news but he is drifting out of contact with it.  

'2021 began well at least...' (a brief guide to 2022 which, lest we forget, is not over yet)

horsemouth has had an even more moderate year than last year in terms of cultural production. horsemouth was supported by other people's willingness to engage with digital technology, this was the flaw in his cunning plan. he is aware of it (but did nothing about it).

horsemouth did one gig last year at waterintobeer way back in february (as a split show with howard).thanks martin. 

horsemouth did a little recording with howard in 2022 (but it languishes unfinished  on soundcloud). howard recorded an EP of songs in the summer and will record more of his solo stuff over christmas (so look out for that in the new year). horsemouth played some guitar and some bass on a track by catastro/FILLE (this is available upon request). 

horsemouth is up a 12 string guitar and a small (and somewhat parched sounding) rainstick.  

horsemouth was involved in no golden glow mixes in 2022 (and indeed they may all be vanishing so listen to them before they go).

horsemouth was slowed down in 2022 by the pandemic. he was distracted by the apocalypse of staying home. if 2021 was the year of the redundancy, then 2022 was the year of retirement. 

he kept on writing this blog. in 2021 he saw an AI powered voice over/ text reading service advertised on youtube so that's probably his (putative) ideal  voice-over acting job out of the window. in 2022 he saw an AI that offered to assist you with writing your blogs.  

he read a fair bit (though not with the concentrated effort that he has managed in previous years).

he watched a lot of films (mostly giallos, horrors, and ghost stories).

he didn't listen to much music (his amplifier needs replacing). he listened to webb david's techno-dub show on new river radio, and the CDs of the new albums by the robert lawson trio as they arrived. he spent a lot of time waiting for the hawkbinge podcasts to come out. 

he did a fair amount of walking (often with TG).

he stopped doing the child-minding. 

in 2022 the communal endeavour and the decarbonisation of social housing has become the main thing.

he's probably not doing enough to prevent boredom but he has been spending his way through the redundancy cheque, an advance on the pension and his works pension (small though it is).he is in fact spending hardly any money at all (except for rent).

his homestead (the gaff) has taken a dive. the living room is once again fucked. there's some stuff in the corridors. the back garden has been fucked. horsemouth no longer gives a shit. the front garden has at least been cleared. 

in his room he needs to have another book sale/ book box  giveaway if he is going to get mobile. this plan has so far not succeeded. he bought far fewer second hand books and fewer CDs than he would have in a normal year, book boxes have replaced second-hand bookshops in his affections. 

he continued cooking more regularly (but a limited range of dishes). he continued to be a lazy, morally compromised lacto-vegetarian. 

for yet another year he didn’t manage a foreign holiday (but as in 2022 he hopes to manage one in 2023). he spent a lot of time at his folks (which has been good).  

horsemouth thanks howard, enza, catastro/fille for joining him in his creative endeavours and all who have read, watched, listened to him, or liked or commented on the things he has produced.

politically the year went to hell in a handcart when russia invaded ukraine. capitalism slides from crisis to crisis. coronavirus looks like it is coming to an end (we have learned to live/ die with it). meanwhile the tory party (post brexit) keeps decomposing. there are some welcome signs of worker fightback against the bollocks of it all. 

write about anything ('the conversation took place via email')

from the 'backwards'  research guide for writers by sonya huber. 

this is the kind of slippage that is interesting.  

horsemouth is in that preparing to travel mode. he always finds this situation unsatisfying. plus he must 'pack' (and he has a horror of excess luggage). anyway (enough of the horrors of travel) he has his coffee. remind him to turn down the heating in his room before he goes but not to totally turn it off (he doesn't want to return to damp). 

there's a certain amount of stress - for example horsemouth wants to take care of some tax bollocks while away, there is communal endeavour stuff (that may have to be handled in a zoom meeting) etc.

a little spider has  just made it across the valance. horsemouth wants to time it so that he gets to the railway station with enough time to buy a ticket on the first train out (the first train he can travel on with the cheaper tickets). there is often some confusion as to which train this is with the ticket machines saying one thing ('saying') and the guards announcements on the train saying another. (like wtaf!). 

the book horsemouth has bought is not a nice write your own autobiography book but a a nasty generate your own research question book. it is rather too good at replicating that feeling of blankness and stuckedness that people feel when asked to write about anything.

he's still in doubt as whether to take it or not. you will remember that horsemouth had an ethics of life  writing book on the go for a while - that book was similarly dull (being written in the academic style) but horsemouth felt warmly towards it). . 

'the dust of all ruined things' (on keeping notebooks)

clark ashton smith kept a notebook with, among other things, ideas for stories in it. such as the following.

item 81 (plot germ) - 'an expedition sent from the earth to the extinct sun, for the purpose of rekindling it by means of atomic fission...'  horsemouth likes this story - he lies the notion of dead things being brought (properly) back to life.

like a lot of pulp authors ashton smith wrote a wide range of material - horsemouth hadn't realised frederic brown wrote science fiction as well as detective fiction. 

ashton smith's  notebook was later laboriously copied out and published as 'the blackbook'. horsemouth likes this he likes the idea of writers keeping notebooks (rather than all fiction coming through fully formed from genius and all ideas being effortlessly remembered).

the good news is that horsemouth has found his hat. (where was it? where he left it.) the mediocre news is that it probably needs a wash. 

steffen basho-junghans has died. horsemouth saw him play once (at a robbie basho tribute gig/ film showing of voice of the eagle at cafe OTO). he was (at that gig) playing more the free-improv side of it than the finger-picked guitar side of things. he was possibly robbie basho's greatest fan. 

30 years ago patrick keiller started filming london - it came out in 1994 (and was followed by robinson in space).  there's a showing of the film and a discussion on the 11th (but horsemouth will be out of town already). horsemouth (you will remember) re-watched it recently. it is of its time but that was a very formative time for horsemouth - it was when he decided to abandon politics and cast himself free of his previous moorings, to go off and explore the city.. 

yesterday a fucking disaster of a day in the meat world (so much for exploring the city, horsemouth is out of practice). horsemouth forgot to tap in causing unnecessary travel expense. he then couldn't find any record shops (all the big ones have vanished). train delays on the way back. fuck it all. wandering horsemouth is fine with. going to do specific tasks/ find specific things, he finds stressful.

horsemouth is still struggling with some seasonal gringe (he no longer has the alibi of work). now he's worried that when the tasks that have been stressing him out complete he will be confronted by the emptiness of his existence (make wind blowing tumble weed noises now). rather than relief he will feel existential horror (possibly he's been reading too much h.p.lovecraft and clark ashton smith). perhaps the implications of the last 30 years of history since london aka. his life  are finally dawning on him.

previously his reaction to getting old was yee-hah forward to the bus pass but recently he realised that no he is actually getting old, that time is passing. he watched the bart's covid cruise episode of the simpsons (bart extends the cruise holiday the family are on by faking a worldwide pandemic in the (perhaps mistaken) belief that these will be the best days of his life and that, unless he acts, they will soon be over). 

later he watched toby jones in a version of conrad's the secret agent -  he has bigger problems than horsemouth he has accidentally killed the wife's idiot brother attempting to blow up greenwich observatory and the police know it is him. which ever way you turn for him it looks shit. 

today. last full day in the seaside towns for a bit. 

space is ridged/ hergest deep

 horsemouth's hat seems to have gone missing (tragedy).

ah well. he's up he's had his coffee (ok he has a little left). he has a spare hat (but it's not as good). 

horsemouth is listening to the james blackshaw (it reminds him of space is deep for some reason or maybe hergest ridge  by mike oldfield). 

at one point horsemouth had plans to do some hermeto pascoal  style ambient percussion on the start of one of his pieces (the rainstick, the martian death rattle (a golf ball in a pringles container), john's thumb piano, TG's water bottle semi-filled with water and rotated) 

ok problems Publishing post... horsemouth is not so bothered Update failed. he can always copy the test into a textfile and return to it later. 

yesterday a visit over to TG's to drop off the keys, later a walk up the hill to ayesha for a moan about the current political situation (which curiously enough cheered him up), ayesha fed him (baked stuffed peppers that was good) and afterwards cake.  

later a similar conversation about the current political situation with his mum (but from the other side).

and the media - more clark ashton smith, a 1958 noir film the screaming mimi with anita ekberg, lifted from a a fredric brown novel. the inspiration for dario argento's the bird with the crystal plumage apparently. (horsemouth used to have a four novel compilation of his - including the one that is the basis for rear window). horsemouth had a few of these black box  four crime novel packages -  jim thompson, jerome charyn (the isaac novels) etc.

horsemouth is keen to get out of town early to avoid the rail strikes. he needs to hunt down a joan armatrading record (and then he thinks he is ready). remind horsemouth to test before he goes. he has a cold clearly (but he doesn''t think it is anything else). he doesn't want to be a typhoid mary exporting the plague to his aged parents. 

horsemouth and the land that time forgot (grass grows on motorways)

horsemouth is back from visiting howard in far off east ham. they headed off almost immediately to the pub with the pizza (2 pints, a pizza and a carbonara) followed by 2 more at the big empty pub on the corner (where they played some pool). there (very wisely) they called a halt. 

howard is tired but on good form. he is back from madrid over half-term (having seen maria and tyson et al. and grassed over motorways).

howard wanted a psychology book for a sculpture (you know the sort of thing - draw on the pages - william kentridge etc.) horsemouth took a selection from his collection - the bluffers guide to  winnicott seemed the best, old, slightly dirty, full of foldings over, underlinings  and post-it notes. quite why it had to be a psychology book horsemouth is not clear (but it's as good a guide to selection as anything). 

when he got back in horsemouth just caught the end of the land that time forgot on tv. susan penhaligon, part written by michael moorcock, doug mc clure. after that he snoozed a bit, read some clark ashton smith and went to bed early. 

he is up this morning. it is curiously cold. grey skies. later a walk. horsemouth should plug the phone in so it recharges. 

'well done. very brave. let's do the difficult stuff.'

so horsemouth rehearses it. memories have returned to assail him (memories and things left unsaid). 

yesterday horsemouth went for a wander and is now back with you. 

horsemouth had forgotten (again) that it was bandcamp friday. for once horsemouth recommended  his own (well, musicians of bremen) stuff. (despite the fact that he thinks that everyone who is going to buy it has bought it all already).

he was listening to james blackshaw and reading clark ashton smith the dark eidolon (this time in a william beckford/ oriental despot  'vathek' mode). 

last night he wandered over to mike and lou's (lou has a gig tonight down at waterintobeer please go).  they fed him and there was a small can of beer (most civilised). horsemouth was after books (well a book). it looks lie the right book.

later horsemouth is due to wander over to howard's - a student of his wants a 'psychology' book for a sculpture so horsemouth will take a selection from his collection - or maybe howard is wandering over here. (horsemouth is not convinced - any actual book placed in a sculpture will unbalance the work he feels, not in a literal way perhaps but as a balance of meaning, but hey what does he know). 

it's the morning when horsemouth types this. cold, rainy and grey. he touches the radiators to make sure that they are on. he doesn't feel uninspired (but he doesn't feel very inspired either). new things refuse to come. ho hum. horsemouth would lie to be making more music but it's proving elusive.

horsemouth has got it down on paper (and he's done some walking)

horsemouth is not entirely sure when the last day for these things is but soon his mixcloud mixes will be gone so he urges you to get and listen to them now (the better to miss them when they are gone). horsemouth is glad to be back with you  having suffered the blue screen of death this morning. eventually his brave and plucky little laptop sorted itself out (god bless you little computer you have done it again). horsemouth was greatly afeared that, 

'this will be the last entry in my journal, and the last writing I shall ever do.' - journal of giles angarth, 13th august 1930 from clark ashton smith's the singing flame finished january 15th 1931.

horsemouth usually does his writing (ok his typing) in the morning or at night. today (yesterday by the time you read this - or possibly longer) he is doing it in the afternoon.

this is the advantage of internet outages - there is nothing better to be done (or merely looked at) than to write. (wait let him try connecting again).

horsemouth physically writes (i.e. pen on paper) almost nothing these days. for months he barely had a functioning pen (not wanting to go out and buy one). his diary is full of doodles, the odd quote, lists and figures. he also doesn't photograph his doodles any more (nor desecrate copies of the city am). 

horsemouth was just reading some of his earlier prose. he wrote much better then (largely because he was reading loads of beautiful prose in university libraries). the university lecturers have been marching (even the philosophers).

his meet up with catastro/FILLE on sunday has popped. there's a possible meeting with howard saturday, howard wants horsemouth to bring some psychology books for use in a student's sculpture. last night a meeting with (an)tony and rodrigo about the decarbonisation (a walk there and a walk back - so maybe about 4 miles all told - and a bag of chips (2.20)). horsemouth has been getting in some walks this week. (down  to bow monday, back from islington tuesday, down to the office and back from bethnal green wednesday, down to the office and back thursday - easily 20 plus miles all in)..

.   

fate tried to save him (but his will was too strong)

there (phew) horsemouth has got it down on paper (as it were). it was a memorable phrase in a morning dream. 

on his (online) way here  horsemouth also noticed the phrase 'horsemouth the scrivener' (by robert lawson) written in response to horsemouth's previous post, an attempted explanation (aka. kvetching) about  employment.

there were several occasions (when horsemouth's employers  were unwise enough to give him direct instruction) when he was obliged to use the phrase 'I would prefer not to.' (did he mention bad management as another reason for abandoning 'work'?). 

horsemouth does not advise doing a bartleby - he advises accommodation with the forces of injustice sufficient to ensure survival in adequate comfort. he knows this isn't brave or principled (he can hear sartre and de beauvoir tsking  from their cafe table) but it works. bartleby's will was too strong. 

barteby was of course big with the people horsemouth knew, likewise kafka's  story about the ape. 

in retrospect horsemouth knew the gig was up when work appointed a sensible, friendly, helpful manager (instead of someone out of the department). horsemouth regrets that he was a difficult employee but he was often knackered and stressed, busy fitting the square pegs of deaf students into the round holes of hearing education.  

horsemouth went to the last  meeting of the communal endeavour of the year (followed by pizza).      

in general he is against any junket but it has been a hard year. it was a pleasant meal (his waistline is considerably expanded).  horsemouth wonders what the damage is. he was seen (by myk zeitlin) passing infront of hackney town hall on his way back at 11.30. 

this evening another meeting (the decarbonisation - pat and antony and hopefully some others - they are sneaking up on half the households told). friday mike T  meet up. saturday maybe howard. sunday ayesha and then catastro/FILLE. thereon horsemouth is free to peg it off into the countryside - he's turned down a cat-sitting appointment. 

for the rest of today horsemouth doesn't know (he suspects a walk and a write).

ok horsemouth is not entirely sure when the last day for these things is but soon his mixcloud mixes will be gone so he urges you to get and listen to them now (the better to miss them when they are gone).