Hyperbole? Maybe. Better than hypocrisy. Dominic Cummings, the power behind Boris Johnson's throne, is in trouble. He's in a lot of trouble. He's after going for a drive and in doing so, a little bit of endangering the lives of his family and others has become the least of his problems...

Cymbals are everywhere. Literally everywhere and you can't get away from them. Try it, and you'll only end up listening to The Velvet Underground and Einstürzende Neubauten forever. Why though? Why cymbals everywhere, and not anything else?

In 1988 Mike Tyson became Lineal Heavyweight Champion of the World by defeating Michael Spinks. Watching the fight today, there is a very incongruous mention by the announcer: The name Donald Trump. The fight was at his hotel, or so it seemed. Is it possible to equate Obama v Trump to Tyson v Spinks? Well, spoiler alert, no it isn't. The only Obama v Trump fight is going on 24/7 in Trump's head, and the clash of two highly skilled, deserving champions in Tyson and Spinks is not exactly indicative of the, ah, discrepancy in political ability between Trump and Obama. But why compare the two at all? Well...

The Lost Words, by Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris is a beguiling book the captures the magic of the kind of nature that's all around us, every day. And it has an important mission, to save the words we might lose and stop them from fading away forever. I saw an eagle once, wild, up close and on the wing. And I saw an owl the same way. I found it hard to describe them, the words weren't there. Let's not lose them.

"Stay Alert," the new English government advice for dealing with Covid-19, threatens to split the union. England is on its way to disaster on the international stage, while Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland stay home. Football fans will be familiar with that state of affairs, but it's no joke as 40,000 are dead. Today we're talking about the recent vogue for completely empty, meaningless slogans, and why they're so wildly successful.

An appreciation of Florian Schneider, among the most influential and important musicians of the 20th Century. He gave me one of the most profound musical experiences of my life, and I'm forever grateful for his, and Kraftwerk's music.

Rumblings are beginning, disturbing the quiet solitude of isolated life, that we might be approaching the end of lockdown. Naturally there are good reasons to end lockdown, after all we can't stay this way until the entire economy collapses. There are reasons not to too, like all the dying people. But lockdown life isn't without its benefits, and in some ways it's showing us some of the things we've lost in the modern world. Some of the lockdown end games are sensible, like Ireland's and Scotland's, some, like America's barely count as plans at all. But they all must end eventually. Could we take this opportunity to keep a few of the changes? To make a few more?

I had to watch Planet Of The Humans. If I didn't do it, you might have, and I was willing to sacrifice myself to avoid that eventuality. This is not a good film, either as a documentary piece or as a set of convincing arguments about renewable energy sources and their supposed problems, damaging the environment even as they purport to save it. That those imagined problems are the fever dreams of the fossil fuel industry never gives Jeff Gibbs pause, and the lack of self reflection evident in that is unfortunately the nicest thing one can say about the film.

So, Boris Johnson is back at work, and the naively optimistic among us had been hoping that perhaps he might return changed, in some way a better leader for having experienced the challenge facing his people. Not so, on the strength of his first speech. But the world changed around him, in a scant few weeks, and he faces new challenges and problems. No longer is laughing at Premier League sex worker orgies the measure of the UK's reaction to lockdown.

The Premier League was born in a TV rights deal, and presumably one day will die in one. But will it take the rest of the world with it? If you believe certain excitable commentators, it's responsible for most of the ills in modern society. that said, it probably can't take down the whole project of human society. Probably. But Saudi Arabia could do that, and The Premier League stands ready to help them, in return for piles and piles of cash. Surely the League can't accept a regime like the Saudis owning Newcastle United, one of the historic clubs in the game?