If you've been reading my Twitter posts recently, you may have seen me occasionally use the tag #LastNightIDreamt from time to time. There's actually a Last Night I Dreamt account on Twitter which tracks and then re-tweets anything it finds with that tag, and sometimes it's interesting to see what people dream about. I've had a strange sleeping pattern for two decades now - I tend to have two periods of sleep a day, usually about three hours in the daytime and five at night, so I've got twice as many opportunities as most people have to dream, and maybe I'll post a few more to Twitter - or maybe here if they can't be described in 140 or less.
One of the earliest blog posts I wrote here - back in October 2008 - was about some of my recurring dreams, and I've noticed two particular things which tend to happen there, both of which came up in the dreams I've had this week.
The first one is the "underground" theme - in this one, I was at what I presume was the house I lived in as a teenager (I tend to be about 19 or so in my dreams, even today) and I had "discovered" some rooms underground which I was turning into a secret little "house" for myself. I was only found out when my dad went exploring underground himself and saw me!! We decided we would split the rooms between us, and I would have a couple of them as my underground "home".
I've always been interested in living underground - or up in the air, like the 58th floor or something - I suppose it's the love of "unusual" things which is coming through there. I remember Wired magazine writing a piece on this subject a few years ago which interested me.
I have big blackout curtains on my windows, and I tend to keep them closed all the time: partially due to my strange working and sleeping hours, partially due to just feeling fragile and not wanting to face the world, and partially due to the view outside - what we call a "housing scheme", and what an American would probably call the "projects" is not exactly the best of views to look out on. Obviously I open them when people come to visit, but usually they stay closed all the time, so it's almost like I'm living "underground" as it is. And I like it that way. (In case you're wondering, yes I do have the lights on a lot, but they're energy saving ones and they actually cost even less to run if you have them on all the time - and I have a lightbox too)
The second recurring motif is "floating" or hovering in the air. I've mentioned this before in passing on these pages - it's a common thing in my dreams to be able to float about in mid-air, something I would love to do in reality sometimes when I come home from work with aching legs! It's not flying - I'm only a metre or two off the ground usually. The method to get airborne varies - sometimes it's a mental wish alone, sometimes I have to climb onto a wall and jump off it. Usually I have to slowly pedal like I was on a bicycle to keep airborne, although sometimes I don't have to do anything, and just naturally slowly return to earth.
Sometimes I try to float in my dreams, and can't do so, which is usually a sad feeling, but when I can do it, I feel really happy, and that feeling can come with me into the "real world" when I wake up. Anyway, last night I was dreaming I could float, and I was hearing this song in my dream as I was doing so... which happens to be from one of my dad's favourite bands. I quite like them too :)
THE SHADOWS - ATLANTIS
(single released 1963)
2009-07-31
2009-07-30
South Of The Border, Down Antarctica Way
This is a personal blog - sometimes, very personal, as my long time readers will testify - but occasionally I like to do entries about others, when I feel they deserve it :) Well, this is one of those times, concerning an internet friend of mine and her dream - and how you can help.
The friend in question is a New York city gal who I know from Twitter (where she posts under the ID misssomething) She also has a blog, which looks a lot more professional than this one - there's videos on it and everything! - and shows up occasionally on sites like flickr as well.
Recently, the credit crunch which has been affecting most of the planet for what seems like ages got a lot more personal for her, as she lost her job. I know what that feels like (GroupieGirl has been looking for work for a while now, and I spent most of the last recession unemployed) and I rather doubt it's any easier on the other side of the Atlantic.
How does she intend to bounce back from this? Well, how about going on an expedition to Antarctica? And of course, since this is the internet age, blogging about the experience... There's a competition being run where the winner will get to go and do just that, and it's clearly something she'd like to do, as she states in this blog post.
Of course, she's got to win the competition first. Which is where you all come in. So I'd really like you to do the following to help her achieve her goal:
1. Check out her pitch at the competition website.
2. Register with the website, which you have to do in order to vote. Don't worry, all you have to do is provide an email address and a password - this is to stop people from spamming the vote. They'll then send you a confirmation email (which, for me, ended up in my "junk" folder, interestingly)
3. Cast your vote for Nicole St.Clair. This is the most important part - they can only count votes which are actually cast, and voting for someone else...well, that's not going to help her any, is it?
4. Call, write to, or email all your friends and tell them to repeat steps 1-3.
And if all that sounds like too much hard work, and you or someone you know is on Twitter, then at least re-tweet the original message which she posted there yesterday.
Go on...you know it makes sense. Think of it as your good deed for the day. I mean, how often do you get the chance to help someone fulfill their dreams? And it's not like you have to put your hand in your pocket or run a race in a silly costume or anything like that. Just a few taps on a keyboard and a couple clicks on a mouse. That's it.
Good luck in your quest to reach the seventh continent, Nicole. Looking forward to reading all about it :)
UPDATE, 2009.07.31
Nicole's contacted me with details of a new blog she's started, called simply, I Want To Go To Antarctica. Feel free to check it out. Oh, and if you haven't already done so, don't forget to VOTE!
The friend in question is a New York city gal who I know from Twitter (where she posts under the ID misssomething) She also has a blog, which looks a lot more professional than this one - there's videos on it and everything! - and shows up occasionally on sites like flickr as well.
Recently, the credit crunch which has been affecting most of the planet for what seems like ages got a lot more personal for her, as she lost her job. I know what that feels like (GroupieGirl has been looking for work for a while now, and I spent most of the last recession unemployed) and I rather doubt it's any easier on the other side of the Atlantic.
How does she intend to bounce back from this? Well, how about going on an expedition to Antarctica? And of course, since this is the internet age, blogging about the experience... There's a competition being run where the winner will get to go and do just that, and it's clearly something she'd like to do, as she states in this blog post.
Of course, she's got to win the competition first. Which is where you all come in. So I'd really like you to do the following to help her achieve her goal:
1. Check out her pitch at the competition website.
2. Register with the website, which you have to do in order to vote. Don't worry, all you have to do is provide an email address and a password - this is to stop people from spamming the vote. They'll then send you a confirmation email (which, for me, ended up in my "junk" folder, interestingly)
3. Cast your vote for Nicole St.Clair. This is the most important part - they can only count votes which are actually cast, and voting for someone else...well, that's not going to help her any, is it?
4. Call, write to, or email all your friends and tell them to repeat steps 1-3.
And if all that sounds like too much hard work, and you or someone you know is on Twitter, then at least re-tweet the original message which she posted there yesterday.
Go on...you know it makes sense. Think of it as your good deed for the day. I mean, how often do you get the chance to help someone fulfill their dreams? And it's not like you have to put your hand in your pocket or run a race in a silly costume or anything like that. Just a few taps on a keyboard and a couple clicks on a mouse. That's it.
Good luck in your quest to reach the seventh continent, Nicole. Looking forward to reading all about it :)
UPDATE, 2009.07.31
Nicole's contacted me with details of a new blog she's started, called simply, I Want To Go To Antarctica. Feel free to check it out. Oh, and if you haven't already done so, don't forget to VOTE!
2009-07-29
Glasgow Trip Pictures
I'm going through one of those times when my sleeping pattern bears even less resemblance to society as a whole than usual. I'm also going through one of those times when there seems to be no time to do anything and so much to do :(
So instead of wittering on and on I've decided to follow the old adage "a picture paints a thousand words" and link to my latest flickr upload.
I took a day trip to Glasgow yesterday, and after the Megabus debacle last time I went a-roaming, I decided to take Sir Jimmy Savile's advice from the early 1980s...
How's about that then?? :)
It's also the age of the iPhone, and while I was strolling around the beautiful Botanic Gardens in the Hillhead area of the city, I took a few snapshots, which I've uploaded to flickr. So, maybe you should check it out, yeah?
And once you've done that, you might want to read what Glasgow City Council have to say about the place. They're quite proud of it, and rightly so. If you've got any interest in rich variety of plants from around the world, it's a good place to visit if you're in the area. It's completely free, which is always a plus, and it's a nice oasis of calm in the middle of the biggest city in the nation, just three or four stops on the subway from the centre.
I also picked up a couple of things for GroupieGirl including some designer nail varnish (a bright yellow shade called "Carnaby Street") and a new headset for my iPhone from the only Apple Store in Scotland - though with another due to open just a few km from where I'm typing this, they won't hold that title for long....
So instead of wittering on and on I've decided to follow the old adage "a picture paints a thousand words" and link to my latest flickr upload.
I took a day trip to Glasgow yesterday, and after the Megabus debacle last time I went a-roaming, I decided to take Sir Jimmy Savile's advice from the early 1980s...
How's about that then?? :)
It's also the age of the iPhone, and while I was strolling around the beautiful Botanic Gardens in the Hillhead area of the city, I took a few snapshots, which I've uploaded to flickr. So, maybe you should check it out, yeah?
And once you've done that, you might want to read what Glasgow City Council have to say about the place. They're quite proud of it, and rightly so. If you've got any interest in rich variety of plants from around the world, it's a good place to visit if you're in the area. It's completely free, which is always a plus, and it's a nice oasis of calm in the middle of the biggest city in the nation, just three or four stops on the subway from the centre.
I also picked up a couple of things for GroupieGirl including some designer nail varnish (a bright yellow shade called "Carnaby Street") and a new headset for my iPhone from the only Apple Store in Scotland - though with another due to open just a few km from where I'm typing this, they won't hold that title for long....
2009-07-23
Highland Fling
Those who know me know I like being in places where there's a lot to see and do - one of the reasons I love London so much!! However, this weekend just past found me and GroupieGirl in very different surroundings to what we'd usually find if we were off on a trip somewhere... Groupie had won a competition in the paper, and the prize was a free weekend break for two in a three-star hotel up in the Scottish Highlands, so she invited me to share in her adventure in the little town of Pitlochry, in Perthshire.
Getting there turned out to be a rather stressful experience. We'd decided to use megabus.com to get there, a company we'd both used for rock concerts in Glasgow in the past. This time, though, we were going to Perth, and would get another coach to Pitlochry there. Well, all went well until we got to Perth, or rather the outskirts of Perth - namely Broxden Junction. This threw me as I was expecting us to pull into the bus station in the town centre. Then the announcement came on "Next stop, Glasgow..." and I discovered that what we should have done is got off this coach at Dundee and caught another one there, which would have gone to the bus station. Well, why weren't we told this when we booked the tickets on the website? Or when we got on the coach at first? Or even when we arrived in Dundee? My alien powers of telepathy don't work on this planet you know... and it's a rather important detail, don't you think?? There was nothing for it but to hike the 3km into Perth town centre and hope we'd get there before our connecting coach left... which thankfully we just managed to do. Skipping ahead a bit, there were similar hassles on the way back home, and it's made us think that when either of us goes anywhere in future, it'll be by courtesy of Scotrail - at least you know exactly where a train's going to!
And as for the hotel...well, we kept getting reminded of this classic BBC TV show:
I really don't know where to start with the place - the VERY old and probably HIGHLY unsafe lift with no interior door, or the frankly appalling breakfast service (it was fun to look around the restaurant at the faces of the people who had actually paid for their stay though). Also, the room was cold and I couldn't get the heating on - but that was an excuse to snuggle up close at night, so I shouldn't complain!
However, the service in the restaurant in the evening was much, much better - very classy joint, and the fresh salmon (no doubt locally caught) was excellent. And on the Sunday night, I found myself eating pasta for the first time in my life - and I have to say, it was all right!!
The town of Pitlochry only has a population of 2,500 or so, so the atmosphere was a bit different... in a way, it was almost like a return to my childhood days in rural Aberdeenshire. But we still found lots to do, such as a visit to the local power station. It doesn't sound like much of a tourist draw, but they get half a million visitors every year so they must be doing something right!! Scotland's geography means we have a lot of hydro-electricty schemes here, and this particular one was built in the 1950s. There was concern about how this would affect the salmon returning upriver to spawn, so beside the station they built a fish ladder - a series of pools each slightly higher than the last so the fish can swim up them. There's even a video camera so you can see the fish swimming in them - there weren't any when we were there, but then we were probably out of season :(
Most people go there for the hillwalking - you're right in the midst of some really beautiful scenery, the sort of thing you find on shortbread tins all over the world. Probably because I grew up with this sort of thing I'm not exactly a lover of it, but there's no denying it's a beautiful sight to see. We did do some walking about in it though - including going over a bridge which could easily have been a prop in the film "Raiders of the Lost Ark". Honestly, I felt quite the Indiana Jones going over this, and poor GroupieGirl was most distressed by the crossing - even though you knew the thing had stood for decades and was quite safe, the wobble as you crossed over was quite unnerving, with the river Tummel stretching deep and wide beneath you.
We even got to have a go on a putting green, something we haven't done for years! I won, but I doubt you'll see either of us at your local golf course any time soon... but it was a laugh.
Anyway, like I said, not my usual scene. And if you go there yourself - take a light raincoat at all times, the drizzle was never far away!! But it was a nice refreshing change, and I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would. GroupieGirl's trying to win another trip away now - I wonder where the next one will take us?
Getting there turned out to be a rather stressful experience. We'd decided to use megabus.com to get there, a company we'd both used for rock concerts in Glasgow in the past. This time, though, we were going to Perth, and would get another coach to Pitlochry there. Well, all went well until we got to Perth, or rather the outskirts of Perth - namely Broxden Junction. This threw me as I was expecting us to pull into the bus station in the town centre. Then the announcement came on "Next stop, Glasgow..." and I discovered that what we should have done is got off this coach at Dundee and caught another one there, which would have gone to the bus station. Well, why weren't we told this when we booked the tickets on the website? Or when we got on the coach at first? Or even when we arrived in Dundee? My alien powers of telepathy don't work on this planet you know... and it's a rather important detail, don't you think?? There was nothing for it but to hike the 3km into Perth town centre and hope we'd get there before our connecting coach left... which thankfully we just managed to do. Skipping ahead a bit, there were similar hassles on the way back home, and it's made us think that when either of us goes anywhere in future, it'll be by courtesy of Scotrail - at least you know exactly where a train's going to!
And as for the hotel...well, we kept getting reminded of this classic BBC TV show:
I really don't know where to start with the place - the VERY old and probably HIGHLY unsafe lift with no interior door, or the frankly appalling breakfast service (it was fun to look around the restaurant at the faces of the people who had actually paid for their stay though). Also, the room was cold and I couldn't get the heating on - but that was an excuse to snuggle up close at night, so I shouldn't complain!
However, the service in the restaurant in the evening was much, much better - very classy joint, and the fresh salmon (no doubt locally caught) was excellent. And on the Sunday night, I found myself eating pasta for the first time in my life - and I have to say, it was all right!!
The town of Pitlochry only has a population of 2,500 or so, so the atmosphere was a bit different... in a way, it was almost like a return to my childhood days in rural Aberdeenshire. But we still found lots to do, such as a visit to the local power station. It doesn't sound like much of a tourist draw, but they get half a million visitors every year so they must be doing something right!! Scotland's geography means we have a lot of hydro-electricty schemes here, and this particular one was built in the 1950s. There was concern about how this would affect the salmon returning upriver to spawn, so beside the station they built a fish ladder - a series of pools each slightly higher than the last so the fish can swim up them. There's even a video camera so you can see the fish swimming in them - there weren't any when we were there, but then we were probably out of season :(
Most people go there for the hillwalking - you're right in the midst of some really beautiful scenery, the sort of thing you find on shortbread tins all over the world. Probably because I grew up with this sort of thing I'm not exactly a lover of it, but there's no denying it's a beautiful sight to see. We did do some walking about in it though - including going over a bridge which could easily have been a prop in the film "Raiders of the Lost Ark". Honestly, I felt quite the Indiana Jones going over this, and poor GroupieGirl was most distressed by the crossing - even though you knew the thing had stood for decades and was quite safe, the wobble as you crossed over was quite unnerving, with the river Tummel stretching deep and wide beneath you.
We even got to have a go on a putting green, something we haven't done for years! I won, but I doubt you'll see either of us at your local golf course any time soon... but it was a laugh.
Anyway, like I said, not my usual scene. And if you go there yourself - take a light raincoat at all times, the drizzle was never far away!! But it was a nice refreshing change, and I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would. GroupieGirl's trying to win another trip away now - I wonder where the next one will take us?
2009-07-22
I'm Still Here...
...just about.
I've been meaning to blog about the long weekend GroupieGirl and I spent in Pitlochry, but I just can't seem to get it together to finish the entry right now. To be honest, I can't seem to get it together to do much of anything at the moment. It wasn't helped by my general experience today - once again I find myself feeling fragile and alienated. I should be used to this though, it's almost become my default state of being.
Anyway, basically the outside world, or at least this part of it, is not being a friendly place to me at the moment, and I'm beginning to wonder if it wouldn't be easier to just not communicate with anyone anymore. Verbally at least. At least with websites and computer-based interfaces I seem to be understood, and don't have to spend twice as long explaining myself as I do putting my point across. Maybe my alien accent is just too difficult to understand. Or maybe the world is just filled with anger and hate at the moment.
So I'm just posting this quick entry here to wish you all a happy new moon :) and hopefully I'll be in a position to write a little more very soon indeed. Until then, here's one of my favourite tracks. Yes, really...feel that bassline!
CLIFF RICHARD - WE DON'T TALK ANYMORE
(from the album "Rock "N" Roll Juvenile", 1979)
I've been meaning to blog about the long weekend GroupieGirl and I spent in Pitlochry, but I just can't seem to get it together to finish the entry right now. To be honest, I can't seem to get it together to do much of anything at the moment. It wasn't helped by my general experience today - once again I find myself feeling fragile and alienated. I should be used to this though, it's almost become my default state of being.
Anyway, basically the outside world, or at least this part of it, is not being a friendly place to me at the moment, and I'm beginning to wonder if it wouldn't be easier to just not communicate with anyone anymore. Verbally at least. At least with websites and computer-based interfaces I seem to be understood, and don't have to spend twice as long explaining myself as I do putting my point across. Maybe my alien accent is just too difficult to understand. Or maybe the world is just filled with anger and hate at the moment.
So I'm just posting this quick entry here to wish you all a happy new moon :) and hopefully I'll be in a position to write a little more very soon indeed. Until then, here's one of my favourite tracks. Yes, really...feel that bassline!
CLIFF RICHARD - WE DON'T TALK ANYMORE
(from the album "Rock "N" Roll Juvenile", 1979)
2009-07-12
A Week In The Life Of The Alien...
I didn't mean to leave it seven days between blog postings - honest, I didn't! But then I've been bouncing between being too tired to blog and being too busy to blog all week, so I guess I should update my readers on what's been going on...
I've made a decision to go on some more little day trips on my days off from work - I've often said that the town I live in is not exactly the most happening place, and maybe if I have a bus or train to catch in the morning I won't just lie in bed for most of the day, which is what I've been doing on my days off recently. So I booked a day trip to Glasgow for later this month, and we'll take it from there. It's possible to have some quite inexpensive days out if you book far enough in advance, so maybe I'll be riding the rails on a more regular basis in future.
Mind you, there's supposed to be changes happening at work, and I could find myself on a different pattern of working days in the future, and even working in a different part of town - it all depends on what's decided in the next few weeks, so I can't go booking too far in advance until I know which days I'm due to be off work. Hopefully that'll resolve itself soon - though I know from experience they can take ages to make a decision (and still screw it up when they finally make it, but that's a different story...)
The #zaph80 project continues of course - I'm now up to mid October 1981, and it's even getting "fan mail"!! Thanks to everyone who is listening in via Twitter or blip.fm, glad you're enjoying it. I spent Saturday evening going through the 1982 charts to decide which tracks I'd be picking from that year, and this time I made full use of Spotify (which I joined this week) spending a great four hours auditioning and choosing my favourite tracks of 27 years ago - that almost hurts to type!
The big event of the week was Groupie's birthday - the seventh day of the seventh month, so no-one has any excuse to forget the date :) I bought her some rollerboots - or rather, I gave her the money to order the rollerboots on the internet, they'll probably arrive tomorrow or the next day. She'd been wanting some for absolutely ages, so I thought, why not?? I also bought her a set of earbuds for her iPod which have little flies on them, so it looks like you've got flies in your ear. An unusual gift it's true, but then we both like the off-beat and unusual things in life. It'll go well with her new shirt (yes, she bought it after all, and dyed it green)
She came round to my place that evening and I mentioned it was her birthday on Twitter, which lead to a few of my followers wishing the birthday girl all the best. She was actually quite interested in the whole Twitter thing - we really need to convince her to get a Twitter account, I think she'd enjoy it. She has no computer, but you can do it through a mobile phone these days, can't you?
Her dad's birthday happens to be on July 8, so this evening we had a birthday meal out in their honour at the local TGI Fridays. Except we didn't say it was a birthday - we've made that mistake before when having a meal out at restaurants and they tend to go over the top a bit - announcing the birthdays to everyone in the place, playing stuff like "Congratulations" etc. etc. I know that can be fun for some, but not for everyone - so we kept it to ourselves. The evening went really well, although they seem to put Jack Daniels in absolutely everything these days at TGI's...
Anyway, music...1980s...presents of headphones and rollerboots...looks like this would be an appropriate track for this entry :)
CLIFF RICHARD - WIRED FOR SOUND
(from the album "Wired For Sound", 1981)
I've made a decision to go on some more little day trips on my days off from work - I've often said that the town I live in is not exactly the most happening place, and maybe if I have a bus or train to catch in the morning I won't just lie in bed for most of the day, which is what I've been doing on my days off recently. So I booked a day trip to Glasgow for later this month, and we'll take it from there. It's possible to have some quite inexpensive days out if you book far enough in advance, so maybe I'll be riding the rails on a more regular basis in future.
Mind you, there's supposed to be changes happening at work, and I could find myself on a different pattern of working days in the future, and even working in a different part of town - it all depends on what's decided in the next few weeks, so I can't go booking too far in advance until I know which days I'm due to be off work. Hopefully that'll resolve itself soon - though I know from experience they can take ages to make a decision (and still screw it up when they finally make it, but that's a different story...)
The #zaph80 project continues of course - I'm now up to mid October 1981, and it's even getting "fan mail"!! Thanks to everyone who is listening in via Twitter or blip.fm, glad you're enjoying it. I spent Saturday evening going through the 1982 charts to decide which tracks I'd be picking from that year, and this time I made full use of Spotify (which I joined this week) spending a great four hours auditioning and choosing my favourite tracks of 27 years ago - that almost hurts to type!
The big event of the week was Groupie's birthday - the seventh day of the seventh month, so no-one has any excuse to forget the date :) I bought her some rollerboots - or rather, I gave her the money to order the rollerboots on the internet, they'll probably arrive tomorrow or the next day. She'd been wanting some for absolutely ages, so I thought, why not?? I also bought her a set of earbuds for her iPod which have little flies on them, so it looks like you've got flies in your ear. An unusual gift it's true, but then we both like the off-beat and unusual things in life. It'll go well with her new shirt (yes, she bought it after all, and dyed it green)
She came round to my place that evening and I mentioned it was her birthday on Twitter, which lead to a few of my followers wishing the birthday girl all the best. She was actually quite interested in the whole Twitter thing - we really need to convince her to get a Twitter account, I think she'd enjoy it. She has no computer, but you can do it through a mobile phone these days, can't you?
Her dad's birthday happens to be on July 8, so this evening we had a birthday meal out in their honour at the local TGI Fridays. Except we didn't say it was a birthday - we've made that mistake before when having a meal out at restaurants and they tend to go over the top a bit - announcing the birthdays to everyone in the place, playing stuff like "Congratulations" etc. etc. I know that can be fun for some, but not for everyone - so we kept it to ourselves. The evening went really well, although they seem to put Jack Daniels in absolutely everything these days at TGI's...
Anyway, music...1980s...presents of headphones and rollerboots...looks like this would be an appropriate track for this entry :)
CLIFF RICHARD - WIRED FOR SOUND
(from the album "Wired For Sound", 1981)
2009-07-05
Dry Roasted
As I'm typing this it's Sunday evening and the end of a week of high temperatures. We got as high as 26 Celsius earlier in the week, which I know may not seem like much to some people around the globe, but for the north of Scotland, that's bloody good going. Even the (admittedly rather short) nights are working out quite warm - in one case I was walking around in a T-shirt outdoors at 01.00 in the morning!!
Anyway, it's too warm to blog right now and I can't really get away with doing another collection of YouTube clips like last time, although the trawl through the music of the 1980s clearly is attracting some people - I've just got my 50th follower on blip.fm, which entitles me to a little white star on my profile picture. Nice to know it's not just me enjoying #zaph80 :)
So to keep my blog reader(s) happy for the moment I'll simply mention an incident from Friday morning. I was walking down the street watching the seagulls fighting over what appeared to be some shredded wheat which had been thrown out onto the road. One of the birds had a large piece in his beak - too large to eat, but he was not willing to share it with anyone!! There were a crowd of about a couple of dozen seagulls flying around and trying to get a piece of the action.
As I turned away from the scene I heard a dull, loud "thud" and turned round to see one of the birds lying on the road, on it's back with it's legs twitching in the air. A bus had gone past and had obviously hit the seagull, going about 50 km/h. The hit bird was quivering on the ground, legs slowly going limp. "Dead" I thought, "or it soon will be, at any rate". Meanwhile the other birds circled around and around in the sky calling out, almost mourning their fallen comrade.
I left the scene - but as I was going something made me look back, and amazingly, the seagull on the road was trying to get itself upright! Despite the force it must have been hit by, it was alive and trying to get away! As passing cars swerved to avoid it, the bird managed to slowly get up and walk away to safety. A lucky escape...
OK, maybe not the most entertaining or deep and meaningful blog post I've written, but what do you expect when it's too hot to think?
BANANARAMA - CRUEL SUMMER
(from the album "Bananarama", 1983)
Anyway, it's too warm to blog right now and I can't really get away with doing another collection of YouTube clips like last time, although the trawl through the music of the 1980s clearly is attracting some people - I've just got my 50th follower on blip.fm, which entitles me to a little white star on my profile picture. Nice to know it's not just me enjoying #zaph80 :)
So to keep my blog reader(s) happy for the moment I'll simply mention an incident from Friday morning. I was walking down the street watching the seagulls fighting over what appeared to be some shredded wheat which had been thrown out onto the road. One of the birds had a large piece in his beak - too large to eat, but he was not willing to share it with anyone!! There were a crowd of about a couple of dozen seagulls flying around and trying to get a piece of the action.
As I turned away from the scene I heard a dull, loud "thud" and turned round to see one of the birds lying on the road, on it's back with it's legs twitching in the air. A bus had gone past and had obviously hit the seagull, going about 50 km/h. The hit bird was quivering on the ground, legs slowly going limp. "Dead" I thought, "or it soon will be, at any rate". Meanwhile the other birds circled around and around in the sky calling out, almost mourning their fallen comrade.
I left the scene - but as I was going something made me look back, and amazingly, the seagull on the road was trying to get itself upright! Despite the force it must have been hit by, it was alive and trying to get away! As passing cars swerved to avoid it, the bird managed to slowly get up and walk away to safety. A lucky escape...
OK, maybe not the most entertaining or deep and meaningful blog post I've written, but what do you expect when it's too hot to think?
BANANARAMA - CRUEL SUMMER
(from the album "Bananarama", 1983)
2009-07-01
Soundtrack To My Life - 1980
Given that...
(a) I'm shamelessly plugging my zaph80 project on blip.fm and twitter - one alien's journey through the UK pop charts of every week of the 1980s,
(b) One of my favourite bloggers has a section on her blog called "Soundtrack To My Life",
(c) Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery - or, it's always easier to steal someone else's idea than come up with your own,
(d) I'm older than her, and so can go back further in time (at last, an advantage!)
...I present to you twelve of the selections I made from the 1980 charts as a fair representation of the music I was actually listening to back then. No doubt I'll post a similar selection here for 1981 etc as we come to them over the next few weeks. Think of this as a "lite" version of zaph80 for those who don't want to wade through all 52 selections.
Hope you enjoy them as much as I do :)
The tracks featured are as follows (left to right, and top to bottom)
(Jan) Tourists - I Only Want To Be With You
(Feb) The Boomtown Rats - Someone's Looking At You
(Mar) The Police - So Lonely
(Apr) Genesis - Turn It On Again
(May) The Undertones - My Perfect Cousin
(June) Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark - Messages
(July) Olivia Newton-John And E.L.O. - Xanadu
(Aug) David Bowie - Ashes To Ashes
(Sept) Madness - Baggy Trousers
(Oct) Queen - Another One Bites The Dust
(Nov) ABBA - Super Trouper
(Dec) Spandau Ballet - To Cut A Long Story Short
(a) I'm shamelessly plugging my zaph80 project on blip.fm and twitter - one alien's journey through the UK pop charts of every week of the 1980s,
(b) One of my favourite bloggers has a section on her blog called "Soundtrack To My Life",
(c) Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery - or, it's always easier to steal someone else's idea than come up with your own,
(d) I'm older than her, and so can go back further in time (at last, an advantage!)
...I present to you twelve of the selections I made from the 1980 charts as a fair representation of the music I was actually listening to back then. No doubt I'll post a similar selection here for 1981 etc as we come to them over the next few weeks. Think of this as a "lite" version of zaph80 for those who don't want to wade through all 52 selections.
Hope you enjoy them as much as I do :)
The tracks featured are as follows (left to right, and top to bottom)
(Jan) Tourists - I Only Want To Be With You
(Feb) The Boomtown Rats - Someone's Looking At You
(Mar) The Police - So Lonely
(Apr) Genesis - Turn It On Again
(May) The Undertones - My Perfect Cousin
(June) Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark - Messages
(July) Olivia Newton-John And E.L.O. - Xanadu
(Aug) David Bowie - Ashes To Ashes
(Sept) Madness - Baggy Trousers
(Oct) Queen - Another One Bites The Dust
(Nov) ABBA - Super Trouper
(Dec) Spandau Ballet - To Cut A Long Story Short
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