Days 2085 - 2091

Aka Monday 3^rd August - Sunday 9^th August 2020

…this week was pretty much like the preceding few weeks, living the new Covid-19 normality, where the main difference to last year is the lack of nightlife – no pubs, restaurants or clubs to go to or if they are open it doesn’t feel right going to them. The little differences that did bring some joy this week were:

…getting and listening to Bobbie Gentry’s ‘The Delta Sweete’. Bobbie Gentry wrote and sang the classic ‘Ode to Billie Joe’ and ‘The Delta Sweete’ was her second album, released in 1968 and is a concept album about life in the Deep South. With her songs covering life at home, the church, going to town for fun (and business) and her childhood. This reissue includes the mono version of the album, a new stereo mix, alternative mixes and demos (an almost acapella version of ‘Sermon’ is quite sublime). ‘The Delta Sweete’ is a really enjoyable listen. While listening you feel emerged in the swampland of the South and although none of the songs quite match the excellence of ‘Ode to Billy Joe’ several come pretty close (like Gentry’s cover of ‘Big Boss Man’ and the demo version of ‘Sermon’) and you look forward to your next visit.

…I also got a copy of ‘The Soul of The Memphis Boys’, which should be a good listen given the musicians involved, and I got this week’s New Comic Book Day comics:

…I got this month’s Empire, which has some nice articles on ‘American Psycho’, Hedy Lamarr, Oliver Stone and ‘Kung Fu Hustle’:

 

…I also finished reading ‘Joe Country’ and started and finished ‘The Catch’:

…‘Joe Country’ is the sixth novel by Mick Herron in his Slow Horse/Jackson Lamb series (there’s also three novellas) and it’s a very tough read. The story starts with a mercenary noting that Two Slow Horses had been killed, the story then goes back a few days, maybe a week, and we find out what happened and why it left two Slow Horses dead. The story revolves around blackmail and double crosses and River’s dad, and if you’re like me you spend a lot of the read hoping that it isn’t your favourite Slow Horses that have died. I don’t what to say anymore because I don’t want to spoil the story for you. Except I will say that as the novel progresses there is a growth feeling of things getting tighter for Jackson Lamb and his Slow Horses. That the noose is starting to tighten, and Jackson Lamb may soon be for the drop.

I can’t wait to read the next novel to see how things play. The next novel is called ‘Slough House’ and is due in 2021 and from the title I’m guessing that it might end the series, ‘cos the first novel was called ‘Slow Horses’, so the title ‘Slough House’is a nice bookend to the series. It could mean that things will come full circle/to an end for the remaining characters, maybe with Slough House closed down?)…

...I also read ’The Catch’ is the third novella in the Slow Horse/Jackson Lamb series and it centres on John Bachelor, who is tasked with locating a old client, who is has information that he should have. Or does he? Like all good spy stories the story twists, twists some more and then does another twist, just to show off 😊 It also shows some of the fall out for a peripheral character from ‘Joe Country’. Both stories are great, entertaining reads.

…and from Friday the weather got so, so hot, so unbearably hot…so, hot that there was no Long Walk this week, it was way too hot to be outside doing stuff for more than five minutes, let alone walking up and down hill for 10km…

…and I also did this week’s G2 Crossword:

…and Monday’s crossword gets the week off to a flying start as we only had to cheat on one twenty-third of the clues (one out of 23). The little grey cells smashed through the clues like they were pinata’s, scattering answers like sweets. Except for ‘encircle’, which, even with the intersecting letters, we couldn’t get from ‘surround’, but a great start to the week…

…and Tuesday’s crossword dipped a little as we had to cheat on an eighth of the clues (three out of 25). Maybe the little grey cells were a little tired from yesterday, but they still swashbuckled their way through the vast majority of the clues. Slightly annoyed that we went for ‘illegal’ for ‘unlawful’ and not ‘illicit’. But we did learn that a ‘barbican’ is a ‘defensive tower above a drawbridge’ and that ‘Tinea’ is the official name of ‘ringworm’, so not a bad day…

…and Wednesday’s crossword goes pretty well as well, we only had to cheat on a seventh of the clues (three out of 21). Although we missed an obvious answer, ‘goings-on’ from ‘funny business’, the swashbuckling continued and most of the clues fell like skittles and we learnt that the ‘stableman at a coaching inn’ was called an ‘Ostler’. But we’re not sure about ‘distaste’ being the answer for ‘antipathy’…

…things took a tumble with Thursday’s crossword, we had to cheat on a fifth of the clues (five out of 24). But out of those five, the only two we should/could have gotten were ‘asleep’ from ‘out for the count?’ and ‘schism’ from ‘division into opposing factions’, which means that we learnt that ‘sangfroid’ means ‘aplomb’, that ‘mulct’ means to ‘extract money (from someone) by deceit’ and that the ‘Apennines’ is an ‘Italian mountain chain’…

…things pick up frantically for Friday’s crossword as the little grey cells were on the top of their game and swashbuckled through all 18 clues without having to cheat on any clues…

…and the same thing happens with Saturday’s crossword! We got all 19 clues without any need to cheat.We did get stuck on the last four clues, but a little break, to refresh, meant that when we came back the answers just popped into place. A great way to end the crossword week!