The Numbers Lessen

 Most of the visitors have gone now- leaving only the young lovers- who are old enough to care and cater for themselves but still young enough to like playing board games. His heritage is Cameroonian, hers is Greek. She cooks toasties for her breakfast while watching Rick and Morty on her phone....

God, but Rick and Morty is frenetic! 

Yesterday, while we were all out, a young woman from the Council stopped by and asked Damian if she could take pictures of our garage conversion. He said that on the whole he'd rather she didn't. He suspects our next door neighbour- who hates him- has lodged a complaint with the Council in the hope that we'll have contravened some regulation or other. Which we haven't.....

The Last Alp Left Unclimbed

 One of these days I mean to read Poust. I'll know the time is ripe when I come across a cheap secondhand edition of Swann's Way- in English of course, because while I have a little French it doesn't stretch much beyond newspaper articles.

Until I get that sign I'll read other things.

Once upon a time I maintained that there were too many books in the world still unread for me to waste time on old favourites, but now most of the things I read are things I've read before. At the moment it's the Allan Quatermain books. I'm reading Child of Storm (which I think the best of them) for the third time and after that I'm going back to the beginning with King Solomon's Mines. It's not just about comfort (though that figures) because re-reads can reveal things you'd overlooked or not been equipped to see earlier. For instance I find Rider Haggard is deeper, smarter and trickier than I'd once have given him credit for. On a sourer note I tried to re-read one of Iris Murdoch's later novels- one I used to love- and found it quite insufferable. All that dinner party philosophy! I know the intention is partly satirical but that stuff and the people who spout it interest me so little now that I'm not even going to stick around to laugh and point.

Have I reached the end of the shelf of books I want to read? Not quite. Because there's still A La Recherche du Temps Perdu....