Friday 3rd August 2012 Well I Ask You

REMEMBER WHEN:
All the girls had ugly gym slips

It took five minutes for the TV to warm up

Nearly everyone’s Mum was home when the kids got home from school

Nobody owned a purebred dog

You’d reach into a muddy gutter for a penny

Your Mother wore nylons that came in two pieces

All male teachers wore ties and female teachers had their hair done every day and wore high heels

You got your windscreen cleaned, oil checked and petrol served, without asking, all for free, every time..

It was considered a great privilege to be taken out to dinner at a real restaurant
With your parents

They threatened to keep children back a year if they failed the school year. . .. And
They did!

When a Ford Zephyr was everyone’s dream car…
And people went steady

No one ever asked where the car keys were because they were always in the car,
In the ignition, and the doors were never locked

Spinning around, getting dizzy and falling down was cause for giggles?

Playing cricket with no adults to help the children with the rules of the game

Bottles came from the corner shop without safety caps and hermetic seals
Because no one had yet tried to poison a perfect stranger

And with all our progress, don’t you wish, just once, you could slip back in time
And savour the slower pace, and share it with the children of today?

When being sent to the headmasters office was nothing compared to the fate that awaited you at home

Basically we were in fear for our lives, but it wasn’t because of drive-by shootings, drugs, gangs etc. Our parents and grandparents were a much bigger threat! But we survived because their love was greater than the threat.
As well as summers filled with bike rides, cricket, Hula Hoops, skating and visits
To the pool, eating lemonade powder or liquorice sticks.

Didn’t that feel good, just to go back and say, ‘Yes, I remember that’?

I am sharing this with you today because it ended with a Double Dare to pass it on. To remember what a Double Dare is, read on, and remember that the perfect age is somewhere between old enough to know better and too young to care.

Send this on to someone who can still remember the Lone Ranger and Sgt Bilko

How Many Of These Do You Remember?
Coca Cola in bottles.

Blackjacks and bubble gums.

Home milk delivery in glass bottles with tinfoil tops

Hi-If’s & 45 RPM records.

78 RPM records!

Adding Machines.

Scalextric.

Do You Remember a Time When..
Decisions were made by going ‘Eeny-meeny-miney-moe’?
‘Race issue’ meant arguing about who ran the fastest?
Catching tadpoles could happily occupy an entire day?

It wasn’t odd to have two or three ‘Best Friends’?

The worst thing you could catch from the opposite sex was ‘chickenpox’?

Having a Weapon in School meant being caught with a Catapult ?
(we used unwind the core of Golf balls for the elastic!)

War was a card game?

Cigarette cards in the spokes transformed any bike into a motorcycle?

Taking drugs meant orange – flavoured chewable aspirin?

Water balloons were the ultimate weapon?

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1492 – Christopher Columbus left Palos, Spain with three ships. The voyage would lead him to what is now known as the Americas. He reached the Bahamas on October 12. He was having a good time

1750 – Christopher Dock completed the first book of teaching methods. It was titled “A Simple and Thoroughly Prepared School Management.” Still not right

1914 – Germany declared war on France. The next day World War I began when Britain declared war on Germany. The countries were tied in by treaties

1933 – The Mickey Mouse Watch was introduced for the price of $2.75. People are still selling Micky Mouse watches!

1936 – The U.S. State Department advised Americans to leave Spain due to the Spanish Civil War. I don’t think many people in the younger generations realise just how bad this civil war was

1936 – Jesse Owens won the first of his four Olympic gold medals. I`ll bet Adolf was hopping mad

1943 – Gen. George S. Patton verbally abused and slapped a private. Later, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower ordered him to apologize for the incident. Good

1958 – The Nautilus became the first vessel to cross the North Pole underwater. The mission was known as “Operation Sunshine.” The captain was Nemo

1985 – Mail service returned to a nudist colony in Paradise Lake, FL. Residents promised that they’d wear clothes or stay out of sight when the mailperson came to deliver. They were stark, staring mad

1988 – The Soviet Union released Mathias Rust. He had been taken into custody on May 28, 1987 for landing a plane in Moscow’s Red Square. I think he was a very brave guy

1989 – Shiite Muslim kidnappers suspended their threat to execute another hostage. It had been reported that the terrorist in Lebanon had hung Lt. Col. William R. Higgins three days before. These guys are menace

1989 – Hashemi Rafsanjani was sworn in as the president of Iran.

1990 – Thousands of Iraqi troops pushed within a few miles of the border of Saudi Arabia. This heightened world concerns that the invasion of Kuwait could spread. They were spoiling for a fight

1992 – The U.S. Senate voted to restrict and eventually end the testing of nuclear weapons. Good

1992 – Russia and Ukraine agreed to put the Black Sea Fleet under joint command. The agreement was to last for three years. Dodgy

1994 – Arkansas executed three prisoners. It was the first time in 32 years. Not an easy decision

1995 – Eyad Ismoil was flown from Jordan to the U.S. to face charges that he had driven the van that blew up in New York’s World Trade Center. No comment

2001 – A grand jury indicted Robert Iler on charges that he and two teen-agers robbed two other teen-age boys for $40.

2004 – In New York, the Statue of Liberty re-opened to the public. The site had been closed since the terrorist attacks on the U.S. on September 11, 2001.

2004 – NASA launched the spacecraft Messenger. The 6 1/2 year journey was planned to arrive at the planet Mercury in March 2011.  Long trip and is it really worth the money?

2009 – Bolivia became the first South American country to declare the right of indigenous people to govern themselves.Enlightened

1961, Eden Kane was at No.1 on the UK singles chart with Well I Ask You. His only UK No.1 hit He has two brothers who have also had top ten hits. They are Peter and Robin Sarstedt

1963, The Beatles played their last ever performance at the Cavern Club in Liverpool. The Beatles, whose fee for their first performance at the Cavern had been £5, received a fee of £300 for this performance.It’s funny to think the Cavern had been a Jazz club

1963, The Beach Boys released ‘Surfer Girl’, the first song Brian Wilson ever wrote and the first one he produced.A nice song

1964, A documentary ‘Follow The Beatles’ filmed while the group were making ‘A Hard Days Night’ was shown on BBC1 in the UK. Not a brilliant film

1968, The Doors started a two week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with ‘Hello I Love You’, the group’s second US No.1. A No.15 hit in the UK. The group had 8 top 40 US hits from 67-71  They played at Terra Mitica last year

. 1968, The two day Newport Pop Festival took place in Costa Mesa, California with Alice Cooper, Canned Heat, Chambers Brothers, Charles Lloyd Quartet, Country Joe and the Fish, Electric Flag, James Cotton Blues Band, Paul Butterfield Blues Band, Sonny & Cher, Steppenwolf and Tiny Tim. Over 100,000 fans attended the festival. Fabulous attendance figures

. 1971, Paul McCartney announced the formation of his new group Wings with his wife Linda and former Moody Blues guitarist and singer Denny Laine. Nice group
1974, Anne Murray appeared at The Schaefer Festival in New York as the headlining act. The opening act was Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band. 1974, Bad Company went to No.1 on the US album chart with their self-titled debut album.
1985, ‘Drive’ by The Cars was re-released following it’s dramatic use on TV during the Live Aid concert. All the royalties from the record went to the Band Aid trust. This is a classic pop song
1985, Madonna scored her first UK No.1 single with ‘Into The Groove’. The track was taken from the movie ‘Desperately Seeking Susan’ which featured Madonna and Rosanna Arquette. ‘Into The Groove’ is Madonna’s best selling single in the UK, having sold over 850,000 copies.  This really got her career going here in the UK
1985, Tears For Fears started a three week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with ‘Shout’, the duo’s second US No.1.  Great song

1986, The News Of The World in the UK printed an exclusive interview with 16 year old model Mandy Smith, who revealed she has been having an affair with Rolling Stone Bill Wyman for the past 2 and a half years.Bill has the admiration of many men

1991, Cities In The Park took place in Heaton Park Manchester, England. A two day event with O.M.D. The Buzzcocks, The Fall, Wonder Stuff, The Soup Dragons, Happy Mondays, Electronic and The Railway Children.Good gig

1996, Los Del Rio started a 14 week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with ‘Macarena’, a No.2 hit in the UK  Very catchy number with a dance routine

. 2000, Maurice Kinn died aged 76. The UK publisher launched The New Musical Express in 1953, which instigated the first charts based on record sales (first published on 14 November 1952). and organised the annual NME poll-winners concerts between 1963 and 1966. Pivotal member of pop history

. 2001, Co-founder of US group 5th Dimension Ron Townson died of kidney failure aged 68. Had the 1969 US N.1 & UK No.11 single ‘Aquarius’.  Good song

2006, Arthur Lee, singer and guitarist of the influential 1960s band Love died in Memphis at the age of 61 following a battle with acute myeloid leukaemia. He called himself the “first black hippie” and formed Love in Los Angeles in 1965. Best known for the critically revered 1967 album, ‘Forever Changes.’ I know nothing of this band

2007, Queen guitarist Brian May handed in his astronomy PhD thesis – 36 years after abandoning it to join the band. May had recently carried out observational work in Tenerife, where he studied the formation of “zodiacal dust clouds”.A very talented man

2008, Kid Rock was at No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘All Summer Long’. The song is based on Warren Zevon’s ‘Werewolves of London’ and Lynyrd Skynyrd’s ‘Sweet Home Alabama’. A great track

Born on this day

1926,  Tony Bennett, American singer, (1955 UK No.1 single ‘Stranger In Paradise’1965 UK No.25 single ‘I Left My Heart In San Francisco’).
1935, Gordon Stoker, The Jordanaires, Elvis Presley backing group.

1939,Jimmy Nicol, drummer, temporary member of The Beatles for nine Australian gigs in 1964, after Ringo Starr collapsed and was hospitalised on 3 June 1964 with tonsillitis. George Martin suggested Nicol, as he had recently played on a budget label album called “Beatlemania” and knew the songs.
1941,Beverly Lee, The Shirelles, (1961 US No.1 & UK No.4 single ‘Will You Love Me Tomorrow’)

1946, John York, The Byrds, (1965 UK & US No.1 single ‘Mr Tambourine Man’)

1949,  B.B. Dickerson, War, (1976 UK No.12 single ‘Low Rider’).

1951,  John Graham, guitar, Earth Wind and Fire, (1975 US No.1 single ‘Shining Star’, 1981 UK No.3 single ‘Let’s Groove’)

1953,  Ian Brainson, Pilot, (1975 UK No.1 single ‘January’).Hetfield, guitar, vocals, Metallica, (1991 UK No.5 single ‘Enter Sandman’, 1991 US & UK No.1 album ‘Metallica’)

Born on this day