here were you?
Current Music = Hanging on the Telephone by Blondie
Woke up this morning to find at least a foot of snow (well, it was probably about 4 inches but you know how we men like to boast!) After calling and booking a cab to ensure I managed to get to the train station on time, I wasn’t surprised to find out that the train had been delayed because of the weather. More likely that the train driver either couldn’t be arsed getting out of bed, or was stuck in a snow drift.
Current Music = People help the People by Cherry Ghost
The BBC are currently running a series of adverts advertising their mobile news site. They ask “where were you when you heard the news”, and then say that next time you hear some major news you could be walking in a forest, be on the side of a mountain etc.
It got me thinking as to where I actually WAS when I heard major news in my lifetime, so I decided to sit down and list them.
Assasination of President Kennedy
Alas, I was merely a babe in arms. Everything I know about this event is something I learnt later.
End of the Vietnam War
I was a small child. I don’t remember much, but I do remember a news report with helicopters taking off from the roof of the US Embassy.
Death of Elvis Presley
I was in the local fish & chip shop. It came over the radio as I was buying chips at lunchtime. I remember thinking “I thought he was already dead”
Man landing on the Moon
Again, I was very young, but I remember my Mum & Dad allowing me to stay up very late to watch it. I had no real idea what I was watching. I remember it being very grey, with really bad pictures of a man in a big suit. Other than that, I had no real idea.
Fall of the Berlin Wall.
In the pub. It all seemed to happen over a fairly short space of time. Obviously the East German Government were experiencing major breakdowns. We sat there and just couldn’t believe it was happening, but it was. I remember going home very happy.
Release of Nelson Mandela
I was , surprisingly enough, sat in a pub. It was the Land O Cakes on Lever Street in Manchester. There had been speculation all day that it was going to happen and, we were all sat around with beers. Then suddenly he was walking down towards the cameras. It was the first time I had ever seen anything other than the picture of him that had been taken many many years previously when he had first gone into prison.
Death of Princess Diana.
I was asleep in bed, but I used to leave the radio on all night as I always need some noise to get to sleep. I was dozing at around 5.20 am when I heard the news. At first I thought it was some sort of wind up. You know when you are sort of half asleep and you think you hear on the radio that Ireland has just invaded France, and you sit up with a start, then realise it was a rugby report? Well, it was a bit like that, just sort of noise in the background, until they repeated it, then I thought “Jesus”. The paparazzi had been hounding her for months and months and, given the way the press behave, something like that was almost inevitable. Forget the conspiracies however, just put it down to an accident that happens when you drive fast in a cr driven by a man with alcohol in his system.
9/11
I was in Glasgow at a fashion fair. Vikki and myself were in the room taking an order, when someone rang from work to say that a plane had just flown into the WTC. I, like a lot of people just assumed it was some light aircraft that had been blown off course so didn’t think much about it. Then another friend rang and said “go and find a TV”. Myself and Mike, one of the guys from another company, went downstairs just to see what all the fuss was about and stood rock solid still for nearly 45 minutes watching the footage. When we went back upstairs I was about to get a bollocking from Vikki as to where the hell I had been and then she saw my face and Mike’s face. She went downstairs to see. Strangly enough, on the same day, there was a bomb scare round the back of the station in Glasgow and the hotel was evacuated, except they forgot to tell anyone in the suite of rooms where we were. So for 2 hours we were sat wondering where the hell everyone was
