If you want to talk about something then you need to actually study it properly. If you don’t then you should shut up. I am thinking about the government’s report on race issued last week which has been seized on to say that racism isn’t that bad and young people should shut up and beContinue reading “Brother help me please”
Tag Archives: 60s
I am so afraid of dying
I hated school dinners at primary school. There always seemed to be a lot of beetroot and steamed green vegetables. The dinner ladies (now called midday supervisors) made you eat everything on your plate. So I went home for lunch as it was such a short walk away (less than 5 minutes). This meant thatContinue reading “I am so afraid of dying”
It’s just a shot away
I am going to bring up Alan Moore twice in the top ten, his tacit endorsement of artist through his work made it acceptable for me to like them, even if they were too old to be normally acceptable to a teenager in the early 80s. Stephen Doubtfire had tried to persuade me that theContinue reading “It’s just a shot away”
My life’s a vain pursuit of meaningless miles
On the same program that Paul Gambaccini played the Beatles (https://wordpress.com/post/fivemilesout.home.blog/2177 ) he played Jackie by Scott Walker. He admitted that Walker was actually an American and, as this was meant to be a show about his favourite British artists, that this was a cheat. Walker had lived in the UK for twenty years byContinue reading “My life’s a vain pursuit of meaningless miles”
You puttin’ me through changes
I maintain that the sixties (the sixties being defined as 1963-72 as a cultural phenomenon) was the defining cultural period of the second half of the twentieth century. I do not know how well the Carry On series of films are known outside the UK, they seem so rooted in British ideas of class andContinue reading “You puttin’ me through changes”
From the pouring rain, very strange
The Beatles were your Dad’s band. A relic of the past with the individual ex-members producing music that probably would not have got the attention it did without their legacy. Dad had the second Beatles album and I listened to it, but it seemed like nothing special. Like many things you had to compare itContinue reading “From the pouring rain, very strange”
Well There’s So Much You Have To Learn
I never meant to be involved in the Battle of Brightlingsea. I was living in London by 1995, only going back there at weekends. There had been a growing protest against live animal exports that meant that small ports like Brightlingsea had been brought into use to circumvent the main ports. I had seen thereContinue reading “Well There’s So Much You Have To Learn”
They are in paradise
I am not a born Londoner. I had lived in Luton, Royston, Brightlingsea and Cambridge by the time I was 28. I had started working at Newham Sixth Form College in December 1992 (https://wordpress.com/post/fivemilesout.home.blog/922 ). I had anticipated a couple of years there and I would be able to find something closer to home. CommutingContinue reading “They are in paradise”
And our love become a funeral pyre
We left Ranthambore (https://wordpress.com/post/fivemilesout.home.blog/1749 ) by train with Dad and I both ill (as well as around twelve others out of our group of 27). They even overcharged us on the bar bills, I had managed to down several lagers while confined to my room with a terrible stomach. There was space on the trainsContinue reading “And our love become a funeral pyre”
On This Fantastic Day
Day 5 in Egypt was our one late alarm call – 8am, other days were 6am or even earlier (to beat the worst of the heat of or to travel). The boat was already moving away from Luxor when we woke up and, because there were no mosquitos, the windows were wide open and IContinue reading “On This Fantastic Day”
Five Miles Out 