Meaningful music turned to Muzak.

Posted on by Opher

The underground music of my youth is now mainstream. They play it on the radio. It is in adverts. It’s the background to football matches. It’s become Muzak!

The marketing geeks have purloined it. They think they can use it to sell things.

What the hell’s going on! This is the music that meant something! That said something! That was building a new world! This was our music!

Keep your hands off our music! You don’t understand it! It is not background Muzak! It was made to be listened to! Intently! It had meaning! It was my rebellious youth for fuck’s sake!

Keep your grubby hands off my generation’s music! It was not recorded to sell products. It’s too personal for you to relate to! You couldn’t possibly understand the ideals that are wrapped up in it! It’s not the background to anything, least of all your shoddy attempts to sell stuff to the morons that buy plastic garbage.

That’s the complete opposite of everything we stood for!

Jimi’d turn in his grave!

11.11.01

An American Driving License – an extract from ‘Farther from the Sun’.

Posted on by Opher

I decided I’d go and get an American driving licence in case we decided to hire a car to travel across the States at the end our time in Los Angeles. My English licence was valid but it caused a few problems when we were stopped and it might not be any use for hiring a car. I’d noticed a licensing centre on my way home and decided to go in to check out what I had to do.

When I dropped by to enquire it seemed that they’d do it there and then. In England there was a three month waiting list.

I joined the line. The first part was a multi-choice written section. It asked all sorts of strange questions about road signs that I’d never seen, highway code that I never knew existed, and insurance details that I had no idea about. It was all American and different to England. You had to get 70 right out of a hundred on this test. I knew some and had a guess at the rest and scored 65. When my test score had been assessed and I had been told I had failed a very pleasant lady went through my wrong answers and pointed out where I’d gone wrong.

“What’ll I do now?”

“You can go away and learn up on it and come back another day or you can join the line and do it again. You’ll have to take another paper though.”

I was enjoying myself. I decided to do it again.

I lined up and took a different paper. Most of the questions were the same as on the first one though, and the lady had told me the right answers. This time I got 92 and was deemed an advance driver. Not bad in quarter of an hour – from failure to advance status in one fell swoop!

I was directed to the eyesight test, which I passed, and then outside for the practical road test. It was the same format. You had to get 70 out of 100. Every mistake you made the examiner deducted points. He was a sombre looking gentleman who didn’t say much, apart from giving me instructions on where to go and what to do, looked thoroughly bored and sat there with a clipboard on which he kept ticking boxes.

We went out on the road and came back. I’d scored 68 and was a failure. I was a little miffed because I considered myself a pretty good driver and hadn’t made too many mistakes that I knew of.

Once again I was led through the sheet. He seemed really friendly now that he’d failed me and apologetically informed me that he’d had to knock points off every time I looked over the wrong shoulder. He looked bemused and asked me about the peculiar hand signals I had been doing? I explained that they were the English ones. He laughed and showed me the American versions.

“So what’ll I do now?”

“You can come back another day or join that other line and take it again with another examiner.”

That’s what I did. I took it again. This time I was equipped with the right hand signals and knew which way to look. I achieved a score in the 90s and was deemed an advance driver! I like this American way! Instant learning! Instant gratification! No hanging about! You can go from complete failure to the pinnacle of success in two easy moves! It’s the American Dream in working practice (or is it?).

I went in with my slip of paper to say what a genius I was, had my photo taken and left with a new gleaming plastic license. From beginning to end it took an hour and a half. No messing! From failure to super-driver in quick succession! That’s the American way!

I’d only dropped in to enquire!

31.10.01

 

I believe we all change the world. The sum total of all our minds is the current zeitgeist.

18.9.01

Lightnin’ Hopkins – It’s a sin to be Rich

Posted on by Opher

Lightnin’ was the first Blues singer that Dick Brunning introduced me to. He’s superb.

I discovered this gem by him today.

You know that it’s a sin to be rich But it’s a low down shame to be poor It is a sin to be rich You know that it’s a low down shame to be poor

 

Today’s Music to keep me eanse in Isolation – John Lee Hooker

Posted on by Opher

I felt like a good bit of earthy Blues today – something with a beat! I chose John Lee Hooker!

I was introduced to John Lee Hooker by Dick Brunning. I remember we went down to the record shop (in Woking?) to buy a record or two. He had his eye on this John Lee Hooker EP featuring Dimples. I tried to divert him on to the new single by the Everly Brothers – Ferris Wheel.  He wisely took no notice of me and bought the EP. I hope he’s still got it!

Back in the sixties, if you were a Beat group, you had to feature at least a couple of John Lee Hooker tracks.

So today I’ll play a bit of Hooker!!

The Corona Diaries – Day 142

Posted on by Opher

‘Gadzooks, fish-hooks, shitehawks and heavens to Murgatroyd, it’s a fine mess you’ve got us into this time Dominic.’

Dominic glowered and shook his head, raising his eyes to the heavens.

‘The blighters are baying for my blood. They want the A-Level grades altering.’

Dominic shrugged.

‘Cripes Dominic, nimis gravis supellectilem. They want my guts for garters.’

‘Calm down. And stop coming out with all that crap Latin you learnt at college. It’s really irritating.’

‘But what can I bally-well tell the buggers?’

Dominic shook his head. ‘For heaven’s sake, don’t tell them anything. Every time you open your mouth you put your foot in it. Just keep your head down and let Gavin take the blame. If necessary we’ll dump him. I’ll give you a couple of slogans. Stick to the autocue. Don’t deviate.’

‘Can’t I tell the stinkers that we’re going to go back to the teachers’ assessment.’

‘No bloody way. We don’t let those leftie bastards think they have any power.’

‘But your bally algorithm is causing mayhem. My ratings are minus fifty seven.’

‘It doesn’t matter. Calm down. We’ve got a majority of 80. We can do anything. There’s not even a parliament sitting to question it. We’ve got four years yet. Nobody’ll remember any of this. It’ll be forgotten in a few weeks.’

‘But Bloody hell, my ratings are sinking faster than the titanic. ‘

‘Are we still up in the polls?’

‘Only just. That bloody Starmer keeps putting me on the spot.’

‘Ahead at this point is ample.’ He sniggered. ‘I told you. Repeat a slogan or two. They’ll believe anything. Aren’t the Coronavirus figures coming down?’

‘Yes. But only because you are changing them on your computer.’

‘Yes.’ He smiled slyly.

‘But when all those job losses kick in and when Brexit happens and all the businesses collapse and the car firms head off into the EU it’ll be frightful. The dole figures will be terrible. They’ll be after my head.’

‘Relax. I’ll do to the dole figures what I’ve done with the virus. It’s all under control.’

‘But, bloody hell, they’ll blame me.’

‘No, they won’t. We’ll cook up a distraction or two – the bloody vindictive French deliberately sabotaging trade, the immigrants coming across the channel. We might have to start a war somewhere – Iran might be good.’ He looked pensive with that evil little smile on his lips.

‘If anybody asks you – just say we’ll have world-beating trade deals, oven-ready deals, best in the world. The A-Level grades are stupendous. We’ve got great plans for all the unemployed. Nobody else could do it better.’

‘Right-o. Dom, you’ve really cheered me up. I think I’ll just have a glass or two of red and go for another nap. Toodle-pip.’

So my day is spent imagining conversations in Number 10 as Cummings assumes greater power and pulls the strings.

I went for my customary walk and played some good old Blues in the form of John Lee Hooker. It’s been quite warm but overcast. A strange day.

As the numbers of new cases increase to 1009 with another 108 deaths we proceed to relax lockdown even more. Obviously, the economy comes before people. We buy up many stocks of potential vaccines – 5 shots for every person, in the hopes that one of them works. I hope this isn’t another PPE disaster – more money down the drain. We are putting other countries on the quarantine list – France included.

We muddle through. Every man for himself. Let the intelligent and knowledgeable find a way through.

At least we haven’t got Trump and Bolsonaro! That’s a small comfort. The USA with a continuing rate of 51,335 new infections and 968 deaths. Brazil with 60,091 new cases and a staggering 6,968 deaths. Populist fools excel themselves in ignorance, misinformation, bad example and lack of leadership.

Ignore them all – do what you know is right, isolate, distance, wash and mask.

Stay safe.

Stephen Hawking – Lucy Hawking talking about her father.

Posted on by Opher

Stephen Hawking had a degenerative disease –amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, a neurodegenerative disease that wears away at nerve and muscle function over time. It affects the muscles but not the brain. While in his early twenties he was given just months to live. Most people would have curled up and died.

Here is what his daughter, Lucy Hawking had to say about him:

‘My father never gave up, he never shied away from the fight. At the age of seventy-five, completely paralysed and able to move only a few facial muscles, he still got up every day, put on a suit and went to work. He had stuff to do and was not going to let a few trivialities get in his way.’

What an inspiration that man was!

He is rightfully buried in St Paul’s Cathedral between Isaac Newton and Charles Darwin. Not bad!

 

Stephen Hawking – Inspiring Quotes

Posted on by Opher

Stephen Hawking is probably the most intelligent man on the planet in the last hundred years – an incredible human being who defied his medical condition and overcame adversity.

I have just read the inspiring book of his (his last) – Brief Answers to the Big Question’. It was very uplifting and enthralling. It made me very sad to think that we have lost such a great mind.

This is what he had to say about the future:

‘We stand at the threshold of important discoveries in all areas of science. Without doubt, our world will change enormously in the next fifty years. We will find out what happened at the Big Bang. We will come to understand how life began on Earth. We may even discover whether life exists elsewhere in the universe. While the chances of communicating with an intelligent extra-terrestrial species may be slim, the importance of such a discovery means we must not give up trying. We will continue to explore our cosmic habitat, sending robots and humans into space. We cannot continue to look inwards at ourselves on a small and increasingly polluted and overcrowded planet. Through scientific endeavour and technological innovation, we must look outwards to the wider universe, while also striving to fix the problems on Earth.  And I am optimistic that we will ultimately create viable habitats for the human race on other planets. We will transcend the Earth and learn to exist in space.

This is not the end of the story, but just the beginning of what I hope will be billions of years of life flourishing in the cosmos.’

Jordan – a pitstop at a café – views and art. – Photos

Posted on by Opher

After travelling for hours we made a stop at a cafe. It was a bit of a tourist trap, situated at a gorgeous spot with great views (except that the day was dusty and murky).

Inside the cafe, we bought some rich dark Jordanian coffee with local honeycake – delicious.

The cafe was a tourist trap – but to me, it seemed a bit more than that. It did not have the same tourist tat. Many of the products on sale had a real vibrant artistic worth. I loved the vibrant colours.

Jordan – Through the mountains and across the desert. – Photos

Posted on by Opher

Dawn had hardly broken as we set off up into the mountains.

Past little villages set in the dust.

In among the rocky crags devoid of vegetation.

There was something beautiful about the barren, rocky mountains.

Every now and again there was a mosque. It seemed hard to imagine that people could scratch a living out of these dusty, hot places.

We passed herds of goats roaming over the land, scratting for whatever they could find to eat.

We emerged onto a flatter plain that was desert brushland – sand and clumps of resilient plants.

There were Bedouin camps with their herds of goats – nomadic people who have lived here for centuries.

The Bedouin herds spread out over what looked to be a very inhospitable land.

Making a blood smear – an extract from ‘Farther from the Sun’.

Posted on by Opher

I was teaching about blood to one of my High School classes in the Spring of 1980. I had gathered them all around me. We were going to make slides of blood smears – a popular lesson. This was the bit they loved. This was when the teacher fearlessly jabbed himself in the finger with a sterile lancet to demonstrate how it was done, and how easy and painless it was.

“Hey man, I missed that! Do it again.”

You had to do it nonchalantly as if it was nothing. You had to produce loads of blood. It hurt.

The kids were always attentive. They were nervous about making their own slides and pricking themselves, but they just loved to see the teacher jabbing himself and bleeding. You usually had one who could not cope with the sight of blood and passed out. It was a chance for the macho ones to show how it was done, but ironically, most of them were the ones most nervous.

I had all the class sit down, so that if anyone passed out they didn’t crash to the floor and smack their head, and applied the alcohol to sterilise the area on my index finger. I played to the house. You swung your arm round to get centrifugal force working. The blood built up in your fingers. You theatrically took the lancet and demonstrated where you were going to jab on the pad of your index finger. The back of the finger at the base of the nail was for cissies, besides it didn’t bleed so much. The forefinger produced a lot of blood.

This was the moment where all the eager eyes were feverishly focussed on you. You dragged it out before jabbing the lancet hard into your finger and squeezing a big dollop of blood out. It really hurt, inflicting pain on yourself is not pleasurable, but you smiled and told them it was nothing.

I could sense that the class were excited as I went through the act, but then I became aware that they were not really watching me. Their eyes were focussed on something behind me.

I looked around. There was Ruben ‘El Gangster’ Alvarado standing behind my ear holding a slide in one hand and a long stiletto flick knife in the other. He had not merely jabbed his finger he had sliced it to the bone. Blood was dripping freely on to the slide and pooling over to trickle on to the floor.

Ruben grinned at me.

I turned back to the class. ‘If anybody has any trouble getting sufficient blood for their smear, they should ask Ruben. I think he has some to spare.’

19.9.01

 

I am changing the world!

18.9.01

 

“Hey man, lend me your eraser.”

“No. Get your own.”

“If you don’t lend me your eraser I won’t let you use the machine gun tonight!”

19.9.01