Sunday 28 February 2010

The Time Machine

Penny-Farthing (like yore)

Sometimes you don't really need a time machine to travel back in time, you don't need to risk uneasy encounters with flesh-eating morlocks or being inadvertently trapped inside a mountain.

All you need to do is go for a walk on the river side.

Wednesday 3 February 2010

The Day the Music Died

On February 3rd, 1959, 51 years ago, a small plane crashed near Clear Lake, Iowa. On that day, a solitary cornfield was the only witness to the deaths of three rock and roll legends: Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and J. P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson. Later on, others would even call them the Father, Son and the Holy Ghost.

As Holly, Valens and the Big Bopper "took the last train for the coast", an American period was coming to an end, a time of great hope in the future, distinguished by a feeling that everything was possible and within reach, a period of innocent (and maybe even childish) optimism, a period that started with the Allied victory on World War II that would be soon wiped out by the first serious lashes of the Cold War.

Every time that I listen to the music of that period, or I watch American Graffiti, I feel something very close to nostalgia for those times.


Buddy Holly - Everyday


Ritchie Valens - Donna


The Big Bopper - Chantilly Lace

Is it possible to miss something that you never knew?

Tuesday 2 February 2010

Groundhog Day

Today is Groundhog Day.

As an interested party, we from this blog celebrate this beautiful tradition, imported to North America from Central Europe, where it does not exist any more, and we are curious about what do Phil and the others predict for this year: are we going to have an early spring or do we still have to go through six more weeks of winter?