the last night of the proms

'somehow things seem to look brighter and more cheerful this morning...' - kilvert on this day 1871. 

'investigating from the very edge of the last plague' 

- benediction after the eating of the sheep, ostia, sergio citti and pier paolo pasolini (auto-translate). 

saturday afternoon horsemouth and howard met for zoom beers.

one topic of conversation was the repurposing of vaudeville tune ta ra ra boom de ay to the current chant of we want our country back. (many other words fit to this song why don't you just fuck off springs to mind). 

100,000 into the anti-immigration thing march in the streets of whitehall. the counter demonstration is much smaller and has difficulty getting away. it is depressing times. horsemouth assumes that this will keep on right up until the next election (he doesn't - at the moment - see why the next election should come early). 

at that point it may transfer to electoral politics or it may carry on as a mixture of  the streets and the ballot box (as it is at the moment). curiously the next town up with a prospective reform win by-election is caerphilly (horsemouth's old home town). 

as it turns out ta ra ra boom de ay is not in fact french in origin (as horsemouth assumed - though there was in fact a french version) but merely mock french and american in origin (and possibly african american).  the version that is famous in england is the lottie collins' version. 

(there's a version by elmo). 

howard attempted to share harry mudie and king tubby full dose of dub but horsemouth couldn't play it at the time and could only play it later. 

later he watched ostia a film written by pasolini and staring one of his favourite actors franco citti. 

his mum watched the last night of the proms (for the patriotic flag waving). 

horsemouth doesn't think there is harmless patriotic flag waving but there is certainly less harmful patriotic flag waving.