Consuming Volume 7, have already consumed Volume 9. Find the Tchaikovsky 5th a bit weird after falling in love with my Gergiev/Wiener Philharmoniker recording.

Just finished listening to the Tchaikovsky and must say that Mravinsky’s last movement here beats Gergiev’s hands down. The Russian musicians just aren’t as expressive in the first three though.

The Beethoven 4th is great too. Best I’ve heard so far (and I already have Barenboim’s and Abbado’s).

Some funny Houellebecq-esque snippets, but nothing but a condensation of his other more substantial works.

By accident, my checking this out from the library coincided with the onset of a craving for jigsaws. Didn’t know the book was about jigsaws till I started reading it.

It started out fine but I’m getting jaded about the narrator’s love problems, the same way I get jaded about Winterreise despite all its emotional power. Just tired of the inexplicability yet assumed importance of it all.

Every few pages I keep slamming the book shut and putting it aside, frustrated by the narrator’s thoughts. Possibly it’s my recent crankiness. But I wasn’t this way with the other Murakami books.

For some reason the sound in this gives the impression that one is sitting at a remote corner of a cavernous hall.

First movement ordinary, second movement one of the better ones I’ve heard. Third movement is just feeble really. Overrated recording.

3rd movement is a bit too slow and ponderous for my liking, but the rest of the symphony is great.

Came across Greenman by chance via Perillo’s website, and liked it, so decided to try more XTC.

Considering a trekking trip in South America next winter.

This made what Dava Sobel claims is the list of candidates for the LA Times’ annual Science Book Prize. She brought a stack of candidates to class and had us each pick one to review. First course I’ve taken where I’m offered a book instead of having to buy one.

Way too frivolous, doesn’t convey grandeur of fundamental physics. I’m giving it up about halfway through.

Beautiful. Maybe too beautiful to be true.