A "Treat?" for the Bank Holiday

Hi there,

My good lady "treated" me to an "Bee Gees and ABBA Tribute" show tonight.

The Bee Gees section is best summed up by their second song which was "Tragedy". I have to admit that the lads sang in tune; but not at the same time if you know what I mean!


The ABBA section was marginally better but Agnetha has definitely been at the pies and the tight blue satin trouser suit she was wearing showed every fold of fat and has completely destroyed nearly 40 years of lusting after the original!!


The thing is, neither of these things brought out the Grumpy Old Man in me! What triggered that was the lighting system!

There were four multi-colour spotlights revolving in three dimensions from the stage. They moved in time to the music, were on for most of the show and were set to blind the audience on a regular basis. As if this wasn't bad enough, the lights on the stage were accompanied by another set of multi-coloured lights up in the roof that were again focussed on the audience.

I must have missed something!

I can well remember that the "glitter ball" (they have one of those as well!) used to spin and throw the occasional sparkle of light at the audience but since when has shining lights on the audience been "the norm"?

Best regards,


PS

We go out fairly regularly and are currently having a bit of a laugh at what is on when we have guests.

In early August my sister-in-law had to be taken to "The Meccano Exhibition" as it was the only thing on at the time she was here; whereas in September an old school mate (who is now a Lay Canon in the church) and his wife will have to put up with "The Calendar Girls" which has a warning that there are "scenes of nudity".

Tough old life eh?! Must dig the binoculars out of the boat!

Hi Dutto,

Had to join in this one, Friday night we went to the opening night of "The Great Colne International Rythm And Blues Festival" ( that is what the local council chose as a snappy title many years ago)

The main stage was £35 each to get in - - - so we went to the secondary event instead - - - only £11 for both of us.

Trouble was, I think they spent most of the entrance money on 500000Kw spotlights, some fixed, some motorised, and guess where they were all shing? - - - Yep, onto the audience (victims may be a more appropriate choice of word here)

No Abba look-alikes(not) here, four real good old boys in suits and hats belting out the blues, BUT the noise level was horrendous - - - when you can feel the base banging in your chest, and see the beer vibrating in your glass, it is time to leave if you wish to retain the last vestiges of your hearing for a bit longer.

We were home watching t.v by 11:00pm - - - sad grumpy old gits or what? pity really, I like this music, it could have been presented so much better for the audience.

Andy.

Hi there,

Ah, "modern noise levels"; where amplifiers and deafness go hand in hand!

I once took my Dad (who was profoundly deaf at the time but refused to admit it!) to see "Joseph and His Amazing Technicolor Dream-coat" at the theatre in Aberdeen.

Before the show started, a man came on the stage to apologise for the fact that the sound system was up the Swanee and that they could only get settings of "really loud" or "off". He said that they would go ahead with the "really loud" option but that people could leave and get a refund if they wished. I didn't see anyone leave but when the show started the sound level was nearly at the "painful" threshold.

By the half-time interval ears were ringing but my Dad (who had been outside for a fag and hadn't heard anything that the man had shouted from the stage at the beginning) told me that it was the best show he had ever been to and that he could "hear every word"!!

To add insult to injury, on the way home after the show it was only by comparing the tachometer and the speedometer that I discovered I was driving along at 50mph in third gear and the engine was revving its heart out!!

Best regards,

Hi guys,

It seems to be the 'norm' these days to illuminate the audience, instead of the artists.

Earlier this year we went as VIP guests to see our friends son in a fairly famous group, as you say the lighting was ridiculous, most of it aimed at the standing area front stage (the 'mosh-pit?) The stage was mostly in shadow, which was not much help as we were 'allowed' by 'security*' to take photos. As we were in the bar area on the balcony, no hope of flash reaching the stage 15-20 mts. away.

(*Security, -thats another story! )

No problem with acoustics, we all wore ear plugs!

Opening for trainee lighting engineers I think, -no good for me I'm too old!

Mike D

Doesn't happen here, I'm pleased and relieved to say:

http://www.high-barn.com/

And it's only a five minute toddle up the road past the Church. Downhill on the way home too!

eggnog wrote:Doesn't happen here, I'm pleased and relieved to say:

http://www.high-barn.com/

And it's only a five minute toddle up the road past the Church. Downhill on the way home too!

Looks good!

I take it that on your "toddle" you carry a kitchen chair and a whip to beat off the local lions!

Best regards,

Dutto, believe me. 'That look' from Mrs eggnog and the entire population of Whipsnade Zoo would be back in their cages promising to be really very, very, good for ever so long..........In the days of airUK/KLM they used to say that only two people in Stansted weren't frightened of her. One married her and the other flew freight and only came out after dark anyway.

Hi there,

Don't get me going about KLM!

In two years of flying the Abadan to London (via Schipol) route with them they lost my dog for three days somewhere in The Gulf, my kids (aged 10 and 12 years) for fifteen hours overnight in Paris and £1,000 worth of air-freight permanently!!

The air-freight got lost during the Iranian Revolution and when I reported the non-arrival they said I should check with MY agent in Ahwaz. I pointed out that there was a revolution in progress and, as the man had KLM stickers on his door, KLM ashtrays on his desk and KLM calendars on his walls, asked why he was suddenly MY agent!

They coughed up in the end but very reluctantly! I've never flown with them since though.

Best regards,

"Dutto Today at 4:01 am"

You on nights laddie, or has the insomnia fairy been playing silly games?

KLM, once upon a time, were a reasonable national carrier (though the Iranian revolution is going back a bit!) no better/worse/more arrogant than most of 'em. In my experience at least. Now they're just another 'legacy' carrier thrashing around in a pit. airUK however were a perfectly good, profitable (that's saying something), good to deal with regional carrier. Then KLM decided to buy them out so as to provide feeder routes to Schipol. Guess what happened? Actually, no need to guess, history simply repeated itself. Crappy unreliable aircraft were put on inappropriate routes, the Eastern England - European business traffic disappeared, the French traffic was flogged to Pikey O'Leary, half the Schipol routes were abandoned; another good little airline vanished down the toilet and the staff were on the street.

Ho, hum said eggnog. (He seems to be doing that a fair bit these days)

Hi there,

Another great little airline was Air Anglia.

Flying from Norwich to Aberdeen once and in a queue waiting to board I saw two lads (obviously a bit worse for drink) entering the plane at the top of the steps.

By the time I reached the top of the steps one of the Stewardesses was leading one of the men off the plane; she shouted to the baggage handler "This one won't be flying. Get him to remove his baggage will you."

In the cabin I sat down and asked the man in the next seat what had happened. "He was swearing and when the Stewardess pointed out that there were children present he swore at her as well." His eviction seemed reasonable to me.

Just then the man who had been accompanying the evictee said to the Stewardess "That was a bit harsh. There was no need for you to do that."

The stare the lady gave him would have frozen molten steel; and the "Do you want to join him?" that followed shut him up for the rest of the flight!

Happy days!

Best regards,


PS It's not insomnia it's osteo-arthritis. If I sleep for more than a few hours I stiffen up so badly that unkinking my joints is one of life's more painful experiences! Still, the alternative to growing old is much worse!

Coming back from someplace east in the early 80's, I found myself on a China-Airways 747sp, its a jumbo, but the smallest (& fastest)
Anyway, when the little stewardess came & asked' tea or coffe' I said 'any beers? Solly, no beers, so I had the coffee!!
A few hours later, we were over a mountain range, don't know where, but this aircraft was unusual (to me at least) in as much that it had a corridor
down the starboard side, just like the old trains, & it was lined with a wall of alloy cupboards, like they have in the galleys on airliners.'
I went into this corridor to take in the views & take some photos, after a while, we hit some turbulance & started bouncing about, when one of the
cupboards flew open, what did I see??? Full to the brim with FOSTERS thats what

So I shoved a few into my camara-bag, went & sat down & started to enjoy myself, when the stewardess came a said, 'where you get beers?'
'Forgot, I had some with me' says I

This was the era of the chairman, & the flight was full of young students, ALL of which were dressed in the grey suits & reading the 'book'
they were very interested in me as I was the only european on board & they ALL wanted to talk to me, pesumably to try out their english,
they asked me things like 'do you have bikes in england' & 'do you know the queen?'

I asked them where they were going, & they said 'Rays' WHERE? 'RAYS' I couldn't work it out, & after about 10 mins, they said,
'you know, engerand, scoterand & RAYS , turned out to be Aberystwyth university

When we came into Heathrow, it slowed, then throttled up, slowed, did this several times, then we passed the threshhold, still quite high, on, & on
& on, well passed halfway down the runway, then we hit, hard, up again, hit hard again & braked very hard & were still going a rate of knots when
we turned hard & fast into the taxi-way.

When we left the plane, the crew waived us off, & the pilot was about 4ft high & was wearing glasses like milk-bottle bottoms
A pal was waiting to collect me, I mentioned the 'interesting' landing & he said 'I watched that come in, & I though it was going to crash!!

Happy days

They're mostly Happy Days in retrospect! At the time after landings like that my buttocks have been clenched so tight I thought I'd die of terminal constipation.

Cracking thread drift this.

Incidentally, I believe, without checking, that Air Anglia in fact eventually became airUK.

Hi there,

I too have had more "landings" than "take-offs"!!

A mate of mine was out in China during the "Red Revolution" when it was quite "normal" for the Red Guard to march into a Company office and demand to know who did what; and then swap people's jobs around.

Apparently, a common trick was to promote the man who cleaned the toilets to Managing Director and then demote most of the management team so that some senior manager or other finished up cleaning the toilets.

According to my mate "It was chaos while it lasted; you could still do business but you could never find a clean toilet!!"

Best regards,

Ian