Saturday 31st March

Well shan't go into details but a somewhat fraught last 48 hours or so!

On the positive side, a whole load of new bookmarks to be beaded up arrived from Australia. I don't know whether my seller has bribed the Aussie post office or what, but I've never had anything arrive so fast from down under. Very welcome indeed, as my shop was running low on shepherds crook type bookmarks, which are one of my best selling items. I've spent a fair bit of today busily beading them up, ready to be loaded up over the next week or so.

As I type this, I have the dulcet tones of whoever's commentating on Match of the Day ringing in my ears, which brings me to something I watched last night, which was like - well being taken back to the days of my youth!!! I watched the programme on Hawkwind on Beeb 4, and it was brilliant. About 1977 - it could have been earlier, but I don't think it was, I went to a gig at the Birmingham Odeon, to see Hawkwind. I used to go there regularly, and this was in the days when gigs were real gigs, not mega multi media super stadium events, and you got no closer to the stage than what, half a mile?? No this was the old Brum Odeon, and I went on my own - which was slightly unusual, but I don't think anyone else fancied it. Have to say that was a major, major mistake on their part!!!
Anyhow, I can remember going along, and being searched on my way in, which was the first time it had ever happened to me. I have to say that this may have been before 77 now, because it was before the bombs, and it appeared to be more of a drugs search than a security search which became routine in B'ham in the late 70s. But this could be my mind playing tricks on me.
I had a ticket for the stalls, and can remember staying to watch the support because I'm none too happy in bars on my own, but I remember nothing of the support at all. Whoever they were, they vanished without trace in my memory.
I don't even remember that much about the gig itself. I couldn't tell you know what they played, what order it was, because I was visually suffused with it. I remember Sonic Attack which made an impact on me as if I'd been shot - this was in the days of Bob Calvert, and he seemed to do the thing through a megaphone. It was a riveting experience for a young female science fiction fan - it was the first time that two things had come together for me, the music and the sci fi. I had no idea that there was such a thing as sci fi lyrics, and you know what it's like for a kid when that kind of thing coincides. I can remember getting Quark Strangeness and Charm when it came out - I still have it, it's still one of my favourite albums. They were saying on this programme last night about how much Calvert had wanted to be known as a poet, and dear God if ever a lyricist deserved to be known as a poet, Calvert should be. And my God what a loss. He died a good while ago now, heart attack, and suffered from bi-polar all of his life by the sounds of it, but what a loss. Anyone who can write the following really deserves to be known as a poet. (Incidentally it's Spirit of the Age, from Quark Strangeness and Charm, Hawkwind album.)

`I am a clone, I am not alone
Every fibre of my flesh and bone is identical to the others
Everything I say is in the same tone
as my test tube brothers voice
And there's no choice between us if you'd ever
seen us you'd rejoice in your uniqueness
and consider every weakness something special of your own
Being a clone I have no faults to identify
Even this doggerel that falls from my pen
has just been written by
another twenty telepathic men
All word for word - it says
"Oh for the wings of any bird other than a battery hen."


I think it's brilliant.