Encountering The Adversary

Possibly an unexpected title given that England play Germany in the Euros tonight but that is not what this is about. This is the least I've posted in a month on this blog for over ten years, it's not that I've not been not writing, but have been publishing on Vocal which has changed the way I write and also actually increased my writing in a year when I said I was going to slow it down. You can see my Vocal posts here.

The benefit of posting here is that I don't need to wait for story / article approval , which may be a good or bad thing, but I should not neglect this blog.

I have been suffering from a cough / cold possible after effects of COVID jab and since Thursday I have lost 3Kg in weight , probably because of my effective total fasting on Thursday and Friday. Yesterday my weight was 91.8Kg which is 202lb or 14 stone 6 lb , I haven't been that low since my early twenties, so I am now thinking maybe one day a week I will try fasting. Today my weight is 92.1 Kg.

So to the point of this article, I am currently rereading The Adversary Cycle by F Paul Wilson and while I know the overall picture I was surprised to find that the publishers push it as a six book series when in reality two of the books are only marginally related. I thought I was going to start what is sometimes advertised as the third book "The Touch" but looking through my collection I realised I didn't have a copy (I think I borrowed it from my mate Steve Kirby about twenty years back) so I ordered a copy on my Kindle Fire.

I am currently on book three of the four, "Reprisal" having read the excellent "Reborn" which soon became obvious was the real follow up to "The Keep" the start of the series (also a Michael Mann film).

When I reread "The Tomb" I was thinking "This has nothing to do with The Adversary" although the hero (or anti hero) Repairman Jack reappears in the Adversary Finale , "Nightworld", 

All the books are excellent trending towards eventually apocalypse mixing mystery , horror and detective genres which some excellent characterisations and given that I am normally a slow reader , this series is one that I will revisit when I am finished.

So I am going to share Mussorgsky's "Night on Bare Mountain" a scary bit from Disney's "Fantasia" which is a good soundtrack for this piece from one of my mums favourite films.

200

This is post 200 this year , which means 2019 is, so far, my fourth highest posting year since I started. This week I will hit my two thousandth post. I hit my thousandth post , here, in November 2015, eight and a half years after my first post here.  . So my second thousand post has taken about four years so I have doubled my posting rate, which my be a good or bad thing , possibly quantity of quality. You can check the first against the thousandth against this one and see if there has been any improvement at all.

I just got my latest bill from Discogs and I'm now selling about two CDs a week, which is quite impressive as often they are going for above ten pounds, way above the 17p I would get from CEX or Music Magpie. That's nothing against those companies, because they have to take the hit of the stuff they can't sell and then have to hold what they have until they actually sell the things. The latest one will be posted off to Germany this morning.

Today is another sunny day, and I am going to take myself off to work soon so I know this is short, but this won't feature Nico for a change.

I opened the curtains and there was a big fly on the window, but then I noticed it was outside so that was a good start.

So what are we going to have music wise? Just noticed the Faces box that my daughters got me for a birthday, so we'll go for a live take of "That's All You Need" one of my favourite slide guitar rock songs , and this is very rough but totally brilliant.

Enjoy your Tuesday

Women ? Playing Football ?

I've just watched Australia vs Norway which went to extra time and penalties after watching  Germany vs Nigeria earlier. Som "men" has made a big thing about "not watching" the games. Well it's their loss. There is a lot of skill, some very nift touches, great goals, no acting like three year old spoilt brats, and the games are a joy to watch.

I think I've watched more of the Women's World Cup than I did of the men's. We are flooded with football but the women's game gives the impression of people playing for the joy of playing, not chasing a wage packet. And to be quite honest it's a slap on the arse for the misogynists.

Possibly the refereeing is not as polished as the playing, and also because women are generally smaller physically than men the pitches seem much bigger, but the games they give us are excellent, and that's what people come to watch.

The hard work, togetherness and pure joy that they generate is something truly to be savoured.

So what do we choose for music.

It has to be a girl band or singer. So I have gone with the gorgeous "Dark Therapy" by Echobelly who's female members included on vocals Sonya Madan,  Debbie Smith on guitar and Ruth Owen on bass. An incredible song from a great band.

If you haven't watched any of the Women's World Cup, start now. You will be impressed.

Apathy In The Uk

Apathy From The Uk

This is nothing major. Although I am English and live in the UK, I would expect my UK visits to be top 3 normally but they are not.

UK Visits are less than half the USA and Germany and only 20% of the French visits. As I have said before the Unknown region has me flummoxed, maybe some rogue robots.

I'm not complaining, this is just an observation, and lets face it the uSA is far more populous than the UK though I don't think France is (though it is much bigger. Germany is slightly bigger (though that may be completely wrong as I am too lazy to check it out at this moment, but I am glad for the visits)

The recent visit explosion (for me) has boosted the site income from about 10p per week to £10 per week which is a significant increase which I wasn't expecting.

The blog is not about making money but acting as a diary and sharing interesting stuff with people.

I wasn't intending to do this post until tonight, and the title came to me and I thought I'll make a start on it. Although it's about people visiting this blog the title could also apply to political engagement and taking an interest in things that actually affect your life, but most people would rather watch a soap and make a cup of tea.

So maybe I should take the song that I stole the title from and Share a little Alberto y Lost Trios Paranoias (a typical Manchester name) with you. I bet you thought I would go with The Sex Pistols didn't you?

Vietnam

Vietnam?

Every so often I get a reasonable amount of views from some places. Recently it's been Russia, Germany, Peru and Brazil an dthe latest one is Vietnam. I haven't a clue why this happens in this way, it may be that the save up the figures for a month or a quarter and send the to google causing a spike in my viewing figures.

I don't think I've been hit by any spy bots, but only Russia may have been in that area,. Maybe if I mention ISIS, Trump's assassination, Boris Johnson drowning Theresa May there may be a little interest but I doubt it.

But it is weird how these countries apart from Russia don't really seem to repeat their visits.

The USA has little interest in this blog although I do hav mant American friends who may or may not read this.



This is just a very short post (though a lot longer that some of my early posts) about this situation.

I think an appropriate sng for this will be New Order's take on Jimmy Cliff's "Vietnam" which appeared on the "Best of War Child"digital only album release.

Have a rather excellent Wednesday everybody.