Aka Monday 13th
- Sunday 19th January 2020
A bit of a quiet
week this week…although they’re all become quiet weeks. Partly, I guess,
because I’m trying to be more financial responsible (although with a few
excepts like comics and Lego 😊), watching the pennies and not splashing out
on things. Like do I buy lunch from a café/sandwich shop/etc. or do I make
lunch at home for half the price. Or waiting for the DVD rather than seeing the
film at the cinema. But also, because I’m not putting myself out there. As I write this (16th Feb) it's clear that I
really need to start getting out there, reading the local papers and going out to local events, especially
the free ones!
Anyway, this week
the post man delivered my second-hand copies of Beck’s ‘The Information’ and
Bomb the Bass’ ‘Sandcastles’ EP. ‘The Information’ isn’t a bad album, all the songs
are pretty good, but only a few of them soar. From the ‘Sandcastles’ EP, Sandcastles
and Absorber are okay trip-hoppy tracks, but for me the standouts (and the reason
I got the CD) are the Bug Powder Dust remixes. The Kruder & Dorfmeister Session version is an epic number that maxes out the Lalo Schifrinness of the original
track and adds gallons of laid-backness. While the Chemical Brothers Mix goes
in the opposite direction, turning it into an epic dancefloor killer and one of the Chemical Brothers best tracks/remixes.
…I also picked up
these New Comic Book Day gems:
…and a copy of
‘Spook Street’, the next in the Jackson Lamb/Slough House series, to read once I’ve finished reading
‘Keep Music Evil’…
...which I did finish a few days later. ‘Keep Music Evil’ is a
biography of The Brian Jonestown Massacre/Anton Newcombe (who is basically the
BJM), written by Jesse Valencia. ‘Keep Music Evil’ does a great job focusing on
the music and not the more tabloid aspects of the BJM, such as the drug use, fights,
band bust-ups, etc., although they are mentioned and discussed and not brushed under
the carpet. Describing how great the BJM’s music is and it felt like I was dogearing
every other page so I could dig out the album or EP and re-listen to the songs
being described. It also does a great job of inspiring artistic thoughts and
not letting limitations be obstacles or stop you from pursuing your art. 9/10.
…I also picked up
some DC Lego Minifigures:
…and I read ‘Undiscovered Country’ #1, #2 and #3, by Scott Snyder, Charles Soule, Giuseppe Camuncoli, Daniele Orlandini & Matt Wilson. In ‘Undiscovered Country’ the United States has sealed
itself off from the world. And in the thirty years since then the US has become
a mysterious lost land and the rest of the world has gone pretty much to hell, with
a global pandemic threatening to kill everyone. But then a message comes from the
US, the first since it sealed itself off from the world, claiming to have a
cure and offering a trade, so a team is sent into the US to get the cure.
But trouble strikes
as the team’s helicopter is shot from the sky and the America the team find
themselves in bears no resemblance to the US of thirty years ago. It’s very
much a Mad Max style land, with weird creatures and vehicles and weirder people.
With some hints that time has passed much more quickly in the US than
outside. There are plenty of hints,
mysteries and ground-for-future-mysteries being laid, a bit like a comic book version of ‘Lost’, which is more than enough
to hook me in, at least for the next few issues. 7/10.
…and I did this week’s
G2 Crosswords:
…and Monday’s crossword got the week off to a bit of a poor
start, having to cheat on a sixth of the clues (four out of 24), although that
was mostly due to my poor knowledge of geography and historical literature. But
now I know that ‘Hugo’ was the ‘author of Les Miserables, d.1885 and that
‘Bergen’ is a ‘Norwegian port city’. And that ‘punctilious’ means ‘formal’…
…Tuesday’s crossword went even worse, having to cheat on a
quarter of the clues (six out of 23), the little grey cells found this grid too
tough a nut to crack and we missed out on some obvious answers – ‘tumid’ from
‘abnormally swollen’ and ‘nail’ from ‘tack’. But we learnt that ‘piebald’ means
‘marked in two different colours’, that a ‘dingle’ is a ‘small wooded hollow’,
that ‘maggots used as bait’ are called ‘gentles’ and that ‘stucco’ is ‘fine
plaster for ornamenting walls, etc’…
…and Wednesday’s crossword completely reversed things as I
didn’t have to cheat on any of the 25 clues. The little grey cells powered
through the clues and trounced the grid 😊…
…and things are back to normal with Thursday’s crossword as
I had to cheat on a sixth of the clues (four out of 24). Again, the little grey
cells powered through most of the clues but came a cropper and hit the wall
with those four clues, e.g. we went for ‘brag’ instead of ‘smug’ for ‘showing
excessive self-pride’, but did learn that ‘cirri’ are ‘high altitude clouds
forming “mares’ tails”’ and that a ‘Magyar’ is “a member of a people who
originated in the Urals and migrated westwards to settle in what is now Hungary
in the 9th century AD”...
…and Friday’s crossword flows the other way as we only had
to cheat on one of the 22 clues. We didn’t get ‘titanium’ from ‘metal used in
strong lightweight alloys’, which we should have gotten and I’m still not sure
how I know that the ‘Cresta Run’ is a ‘Swiss skeleton toboggan track’, but it
stuck in my brain and every once in a while it proves useful…
…and Saturday’s crossword ends the week on a fairly okay
note as we only had to cheat on 15.38% of the clues (four out of 26), although
it would have gone better if we hadn’t gone for ‘shield’ instead of ‘sheath’
for ‘protective covering’ and for ‘plan’ instead of ‘ruse’ for ‘stratagem’. But
we learnt that ‘Shaw’ was the ‘Pygmalion playwright’ and that ‘Lithuania’ is a
‘Baltic country’, roll on next week’s grids…
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