Start: 95.4 Last week: 88.1 This week: 88.3

Monday 18 September: A weekend away, and no scales for two days, but gratifyingly small gain. Well within previous flutterings. The thing about travel is that damned oil. A little goes a long way, when it seeps out of the container. How do you get it t...

There’s more ➢

It was rainy, the first wet day of autumn that wasn’t also a work day. We were away on a weekend jaunt, just up the coast a little. Not far enough, really. The Squeeze said it felt like an affair, being away and in a hotel but less than an hour from home. And after the stunning storm of the night be...

There’s more ➢

Once upon a time there was farmers’ lung, caused by contact with the spores of mouldy hay and other crops. Today, in a signal shift that summarises just about everything that has changed about the way we feed ourselves, there is popcorn lung disease, which afflicts workers who mix, prepare and u...

There’s more ➢

I hadn't planned to say anything about Bob Dylan’s Modern Times; what would be the point, with all those words already flyin’ about the æther? But then Neddie went and posted a fine item on the structure of songs, and I felt I had to. Actually, it isn’t only about the structure of songs. It’s ab...

There’s more ➢

The opening title sequence was really wonderful. That’s not to denigrate the rest of the film, which was just the job for a slightly morose Monday evening. But the book of Thank You For Smoking is funnier and perhaps more interesting. Of course a film can’t often be as nuanced as a book, but fre...

There’s more ➢