End-Of-Year-Count 2021: Having to talk to fewer people is good in and of itself, but the situation that causes it will have weird effects on your reading

Another funny old year and no mistake.

I did go to a few gigs towards the end of it (after a year-and-a-half off, give or take), albeit each time with a strong feeling of trepidation.  I’m still not sure if it was/is an especially good idea.

The Trials Of Cato/Thorpe & Morrison – The Kitchen Garden Cafe, Kings Heath, Birmingham – 6/10/21

Martin Simpson/Sunjay – Green Duck Brewery, Stourbridge – 7/11/21

Otis Gibbs/Hannah Brown – Thimblemill Library, Smethwick – 20/11/21

Katherine Priddy/George Boomsma – The Kitchen Garden Cafe, Kings Heath, Birmingham – 7/12/21

If that Katherine one had been even a week later then I almost certainly wouldn’t have gone.

There was only one thing that you could really class as theatre, and that was a free one in a park.  Not a play, as such.

11/9/21 – “Rivers – The Thames and The Volga” by the Stan’s Cafe people (Stan’s Cafe) @ Cotteridge Park, Cotteridge, Birmingham

I did weirdly end up going to two stand-up comedy things, though.  I often tend to find stand-up comedy annoying, what with me being humourless ‘n’ such, so it is a bit strange that it worked out this way when I’ve been out to such a paucity of things in general.

13/11/21 – Mark Thomas (“50 Things About Us”) @ The Newhampton Arts Centre, Wolverhampton

23/11/21 – Milo Edwards (“Voicemail”) @ Cherry Reds, Birmingham

My book-readin’ continues to be pathetic.  I still haven’t worked out how to compensate for not having very many bus journeys nowadays.

“Under The Paw – Confessions Of A Cat Man” by Tom Cox (started in 2020)

“Tunng Presents… Dead Club” by Sam Genders

“Lori And Max And The Book Thieves” by Catherine O’Flynn

“The Subcultural Imagination – Theory, Research And Reflexivity In Contemporary Youth Subcultures” edited by Michelle Kempson and Shane Blackman (started in 2020)

“The Connected Lives Of Dutch Punks – Contesting Subcultural Boundaries” by Kirsty Lohman

“The Testaments” by Margaret Atwood

“Girl, Woman, Other” by Bernadine Evaristo

“Libra Shrugged – How Facebook Tried To Take Over The Money” by David Gerard

“The Dereliction” by Liz Berry & Tom Hicks

“If Destroyed Still True” by Liz Berry & Tom Hicks

“Cat’s Cafe” by Matt Tarpley

“32 Counties – The Failure Of Partition And The Case For A United Ireland” by Kieran Allen

It’s even more feeble when you consider that some of those are more-or-less pamphlets.  Or actual pamphlets. Started and crossing over into next year, we have “Working Class History” by the WCH collective and “Neoreaction A Basilisk” by Elizabeth Sandifer.

I watched some films, none in an outside-of-house context (as is my preferred way of doing it).  There were fewer Christmas films at the end than is right and proper.

“Arthur Christmas” (2011)

“My Darling Clementine” (1946)

“Gunfight At The O.K. Corral” (1957)

“Tombstone” (1993)

“Wyatt Earp” (1994)

“King Rocker” (2020)

“Logan’s Run” (1976)

“Silent Running” (1972)

“Made In Dagenham” (2010)

“High-Rise” (2015)

“Frontier Marshall” (1939)

“Wichita” (1955)

“Hour Of The Gun” (1967)

“Tombstone-Rashomon” (2017)

“The Apartment” (1960)

“Django” (1966) (seen before)

“Django Strikes Again” (1987)

“Django The Bastard” (1969)

“Django Kill… If You Live, Shoot!” (1967) (seen before)

“Four Of The Apocalypse” (1975)

“Dune” (1984) (seen before)

“Poly Styrene: I Am A Cliché” (2021)

“The Death Of Stalin” (2016) (seen before)

“The Secret Life Of Pets” (2016)

“The Secret Life Of Pets 2” (2019)

“Die Känguru-Chroniken” (2020)

“The Grinch” (2018)

“Paddington 2” (2017)

“Cinderella” (2015)

There you go, that’s it.  I need to get into the rhythm of reading more when not on a bus, that’s the lesson from all of this.

I don’t like the way that they’ve changed the posting screens on WordPress since last year, I have to say.