Trainspotting in the 1950’s

The Observer Book of Steam Trains

  "What do you want to be when you grow up"? a question often asked to all young boys and girls. Now the answer would probably be a member of a boy band or anything related to being a celebrity, but back in the 1950's things were different, the reply from a boy would more ...

When Frugal was just a way of life

Chopping the Kindling Wood

  To many people living frugally is something, for want of a better word, clever. For some it's a necessity, for some a kind of hobby but for many of those in my age bracket it's just something we learnt or picked up from our Grandparents and have continued the trend. In 1950's post war Britain, no matter ...

Mods & Rockers – blast from the past

Mods and Rockers

  "Are you a Mod or a Rocker?" was quite a common question at School, College or the Workplace during the mid 1960's. Unless you were covering it up though, it was reasonably easy to tell. Mods had short hair, Rockers had long hair combed into shape with Brylcream or of the like. Mods would waer Duffle Coats, ...

The beauty of old Rayburn’s

  You will see from the photograph of my Rayburn that it's a bit worse for wear, but consider the fact it's the same age as me (built c.1948) and has been just as battered around by life as myself, it's not bad. Not only all of that, it heats the Kitchen and Sitting Room all on ...

Home Delivery – the old way

I can just imagine some bright spark in the Marketing Department of a large Supermarket Company stunning his or her colleagues with the revelatinory idea of Home Delivery "What we do Team is to save our Customers coming to the Supermarket by building a Website where they can order their goods online and we deliver ...

What’s that in old Money?

"What's that in old Money?". Many young people may wonder what on earth some of us more senior people are talking about! Well, the problem is that over the years everything has gone metric, but it hasn't altogether! We buy Petrol in Litres yet every Car Manufacturer still sell their vehicles with miles per gallon stats. ...

Long (song) Time Ago!

I was browsing my mind through some of the Singles of mine from days of old the other day and the thing that seemed to show up was the fact that I liked, and still do, long records. Needless to say there are Albums of mine such as King Krimson and Pink Floyd which have tracks ...

Days of future past

Days of future past is an Album made by the Moody Blues a long long time ago when I was young and the height of my fashion sense was earing bright scarlet Hipsters, white belt, flower shirt, head band and with an imaginary sign on my head saying "Prat" ! It's an expression I use quite ...