Intrepid

Lockdown can't go on forever. It seems somehow regrettable despite the terrible things that have happened these last few months. I was good at it, I thought, but even I have been meeting people from beyond the concentrated archive of books, records and memorabilia that has grown up around me here over the last 22 years.
I hope it's not too soon. I'm not in the vanguard of those charging out to pubs, raves or gatherings in order to release pent-up energy or re-boot the economy. The chaos that any government led by Boris Johnson was always going to cause has only been multiplied by the Covid co-efficient but there is the spectre of bankruptcy lurking somewhere behind continued lockdown, or a second spike in the virus. It's a fine line. He's taking a chance on a 6/1 shot. He seems to be the sort of bloke that, despite incorrigible incompetence, sometimes gets lucky. Let's hope he does. It's already looking as if he might not be a candidate at the next General Election. Let's hope he's not. He's sat in the chair, swivelled round in it and got his photo on the wall. That's all he ever wanted. Perhaps he will go away of his own accord.

Among the many priceless artefacts found in my ongoing tidying process is this ticket to see Rod Clements in a street corner pub in Portsmouth. The author of the first pop single I ever bought, Meet Me on the Corner by Lindisfarne, it was at least like meeting John the Baptist if not Christ or God themselves.
Proust is back on the shelves, now augmented by several old envelopes filled with page references, and it's time for the next big job. No job will be quite as big. I brought down Ulysses and dug out my 40 year old notes on it but decided to save that for a bit later and this afternoon began doing what I ought to have found time for on the Victorian Literature course at University, some Dickens. Bleak House. It is only in later life one can begin to fill in some of the gaps one didn't find time for when doing a degree in Eng Lit, like Charles Dickens ( ! ).