thursday: horsemouth ends fact checking on planet earth

this sunday in 1871 edmond de goncourt will be off for a tour of the neighbourhoods of paris that have been shelled by the germans. auteuil is no longer part of paris. the trains no longer stop there. the same day kilvert is up in london visiting. 

but that is not today. today is a 'gap in the diaries' kind of day. 

above a song from christ stopped at eboli one of horsemouth's favourrite books and one of his favourite films also. it  is maara ca pittia caco luppina, a traditional folk song sung by the sicilian actress and director muzzi loffredo, from her 1976 album tu ti nni futti (god she's got a great voice). she appears very briefly in the movie (as the policeman's lover). 

there's also a great getting-in-the-harvest song if horsemouth's memors serves. 

 '... keir starmer says he will back “the builders not the blockers”, implying that supply will fix affordability. that would need developers to increase it to the point where they had to drop prices and then keep building – and incurring losses – while prices continued to fall. obviously they won’t do it. it is deeply concerning that starmer and angela rayner don’t acknowledge that...' - guardian letters. 

this seems pretty smart to horsemouth (and pretty much correct) - if the sale price of housing goes down then either the profits for the house-builder have to go down or the wages of the employees (as the major expense) have to go down. it's not that the major house-building companies would go immediately into loss. the real question given this market dynamic is how much higher house prices can go before they become unaffordable to those with the money already even with the artificial scarcity?  how high do they have to go to become a risky investment? 

horsemouth just added a note in defence of john fahey on his substack. it rehashes various arguments he first made four or so years ago when the american primitive revival was in full swing. there is a lot more to say about the curmudgeon. 

it's a cold morning. horsemouth was actually cold during the night. but now he has fed the chickens and has his coffee all is looking better with the world.  in a bit he will go out and check if the bin has been emptied.