Life proceeds largely unchanged. Have taken up swimming like a duck to weasel juggling. I used to be a reasonably strong swimmer when I was a kid, but I seem to have forgotten everything I’d learned, and have a distressing tendency to forget to use my legs, so my arms wind up protesting more than perhaps they might if I was swimming properly. Also, lack of goggles is preventing me from doing an adequate crawl, leaving my stuck with a doubtless slightly stupid-looking breaststroke. But despite that I’m enjoying it immensely, and plan to continue.

I’m listening to the excellent Barrage currently, but I saw Nick Cave play live on Saturday. As I already said, he was better last year, but what struck me was the near-complete absence of stuff from the new album – “Bring It On” and “Rock of Gibraltar” showed up, but that was about it. However, he did make a nice, subtle point about the difference between his old and new stuff, as the did a version of “West Country Girl” that wouldn’t have sounded out of place on the likes of Let Love In, sitting comfotably alongside “Loverman” or the like, while the first half of Saturday night’s rendition of “The Mercy Seat” could almost have been from The Boatman’s Call – all the same notes were there, played at the same speed, just arranged a bit differently, to place the piano or guitars differently.

Currently reading “Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked”, an examination of that fairytale (and related topics), it’s origins, and how it, and interpretations of it have altered through the centuries. Next up “Stagolee shot Billy” a look at the origins of the ballad of Stagger Lee. By that time, I hope I’ll have got hold of the new Harry Potter book. Then I think I ought to re-read “Smart Mobs”.

I started this entry intending to talk about what I’d been doing, but I seem to have divereged into consumerism. Oh well.