I feel under pressure. My objective was to have pressed the publish button on 500 posts before this blog reaches its 10th birthday at the beginning of January, but I am now way behind schedule with seven still to write. As regular followers will know, there is a good reason for that, but as I still plan to reach my goal, I’d better get a wiggle on. Time for a web-diary type post.
It’s only 12 days ’til Christmas but I’ve not started thinking about it yet so no festive songs this time. Instead I’ll write about the other big things that have being going on around here over the last three weeks, starting with the trip to London we were advised to still go ahead with despite my mum’s passing. It had been planned for ages and it would be a while until her funeral service so it was a nice respite.
Just about every one of my friends had already seen the ABBA VOYAGE show in their purpose built arena in Stratford, but one who hadn’t, asked me a while back if I wanted to go. Then it turned out her husband wanted to join us so Mr WIAA decided to come too. This was the same couple who came to Eurovision with us 10 years ago, when we dressed up as Bucks Fizz, but this time we decided the outfits were just a little too outlandish (especially the mens’) for people of our vintage so I left my bright blue knickerbockers at home!
The hologrammed ABBA on stage!
As for the show, it certainly was an experience. You are in awe of the technology that allows them to be there on stage…, without them actually being there on stage, and the big wraparound screens showing them up close and personal were spectacular. I thought it would feel as if I was back in 1975 again, but I didn’t, as the arena is far more state of the art with fancy light shows than the small theatres I went to see bands in back then, and of course the audience is generally made up of people of a certain age. In the hour and a half running time however, there were only three songs we didn’t know with the rest all being crowd-pleasers, everyone singing along and dancing to the music. Would I go again? Probably not as I’ve done it now, but I’m glad I did.
The ABBA show was on the Sunday night of our three day trip to London which left plenty of time to do other things. We split up with our friends on the Saturday which was fine as I had got in touch with our blogging pal Ernie Goggins of 27 Leggies to ask if would be willing to show us round his ‘hood? He was going to be available and was happy to do so, which led me to sending out a last-minute invitation to C from Sun Dried Sparrows to ask if she would be able to come through from Suffolk. I thought I had left it too late, but hurrah, she was free too, so we planned to meet up at Liverpool Street Station mid morning.
Ernie took his role as guide very seriously and had planned out a route that took in Brick Lane, Spitalfields Market, Graffiti Alley, The Huguenot Quarter, Shoreditch and The Dissenters Cemetery. The weather was a tad inclement but luckily we managed to fit all that in before the rain really started to pour down, after which we headed to the Barbican where Ernie had worked in his youth so he knew all the nooks, crannies and shortcuts! There we found a great photography exhibition featuring the icon that is Debbie Harry, back in her heyday. A great day was had by all and I now feel familiar with a part of London I had never visited before.
As for the rest of the trip we became very familiar with the Westfield Shopping Centre as our hotel was attached to it, but also The Olympic Park, the Docklands Light Railway and Canary Wharf. There, the tall glass towers housing financial institutions skirted the south side of the old East India Dock, but on the north side there was still Warehouse No. 1 and 2, which had been spared in The Blitz and was now a Museum, celebrating how the docks and wharfs of The Isle Of Dogs had at one point been the busiest in the world.
Crikey, my trip to London has fairly used up a lot of my words so I’ll be brief with the other things that have been going on around here of late. Even if you’re not a football fan it would be impossible to miss that we are now building up to the next FIFA World Cup to be held in North America next year. Scottish fans have not been privileged to watch their national side play in that competition for 28 years, but in a spectacular match against Denmark, where we scored two goals in extra time, we suddenly topped our group so are now definitely going to be taking part. For anyone aged 35 years or less, it will be a first-time experience so excitement is running high although I see the cost of tickets, flights and accommodation is going to be prohibitively high for all but the fans with the most Money, Money, Money. A great shame. Such was the spectacular nature of the goals scored in that last match, the merchandisers have been hard at work, and prints of those goals have been selling fast.
The hero of the night was Scott McTominay who seemed to defy the laws of gravity with his goal. Scott is also namechecked often in this song, already shared around here last year for the Euros, No Scotland No Party. It is true that until the Tartan Army arrive at a tournament, the party has not really begun, so I hope a fair number of them have enough money in their bankies to make the big trip across the pond to Boston and Miami.
We had a birthday in the family yesterday. Yes, Alfie the puppy turned one-year-of-age. We look after him a few times a week so despite not having chosen to own a dog ourselves, he is most definitely now shared by all of us. Needless to say he got a fair few presents and DD baked him some “pupcakes”, so he certainly was a pampered pooch.
Alfie in his new ball-pit with his birthday treat-holder!
What’s It All About, Alfie? by Cilla Black:
The final thing I wanted to share is that last week the charity shop I volunteer in moved to new premises in the centre of town. It’s big and shiny, like a “real shop” but maybe not the kind of place octogenarians are going to be able to help out in. An empty unit became available when quite a large chain clothes shop closed down, so those who plan the shop side of fund-raising quickly snapped it up. I think they had forgotten however that charity shops, in order to make money, rely on volunteers of a certain age to run them and even I was pretty tired after a four hour shift, what with a steady stream of customers queued up at the till, stock to price and replenish, shelves to tidy, and trips up two flights of stairs to fetch things. It feels at the moment like hard graft with no time to chat to your fellow volunteers or engage with customers, which was the fun part. The initial flood of business might tail off, but if it does the shop won’t make Money, Money, Money so a bit of a catch-22.
Although I said we no longer have time to engage with the customers, I did manage a quick chat with a 50-something year old chap with a hipster haircut who bought a clutch of singles, all from the 1980s. In fact it could have been a Who’s Who of people who appeared at Live Aid. I love catching people off guard as I don’t think they expect the volunteers to have much knowledge of the records we sell. I still don’t know why he liked the look of these particular singles so much but one of them was this, The Riddle, by Nik Kershaw. I ended up with an earworm that lasted several days, and I still don’t know what it’s all about!
Until next time…
Money, Money, Money Lyrics
(Song by Benny Andersson Bjoern Ulvaeus)
I work all night, I work all day
To pay the bills I have to pay
Ain’t it sad?
And still there never seems to be
A single penny left for me
That’s too bad
In my dreams I have a plan
If I got me a wealthy man
I wouldn’t have to work at all
I’d fool around and have a ball
Money, money, money
Must be funny
In the rich man’s world
Money, money, money
Always sunny
In the rich man’s world
Aha-aha
All the things I could do
If I had a little money
It’s a rich man’s world
It’s a rich man’s world
A man like that is hard to find
But I can’t get him off my mind
Ain’t it sad?
And if he happens to be free
I bet he wouldn’t fancy me
That’s too bad
So I must leave, I’ll have to go
To Las Vegas or Monaco
And win a fortune in a game
My life will never be the same
Money, money, money
Must be funny
In the rich man’s world
Money, money, money
Always sunny
In the rich man’s world
Aha-aha
All the things I could do
If I had a little money
It’s a rich man’s world
What's It All About? 
Your visit to London sounds like a real winner. It’s such a great city. It would take years to explore it fully.
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I know, I have visited many times now and still only scratched the surface.
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On behalf of all the team here at Goggins Guided Tours, many thanks for your kind words. We greatly enjoyed showing your party around our manor, so much so that we are offering a 20% discount for any WIAA readers who sign up for similar tours.
E. Goggins (Proprietor)
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Be careful Ernie, putting out an offer like that might see you inundated with bookings!
Seriously though, we both really enjoyed the day and saw so much of London that was hitherto unknown to us. Got some great photos.
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Lots going on for you both sad and happy, but I’m so glad there have been some real highlights for you the last few weeks as well. I think you absolutely did the right thing to keep to your London trip and I’m so glad I could come along for the ride that afternoon too, it was lovely. And thoroughly recommend Goggins Guided Tours, we couldn’t have been in better hands! (Expect your 5 star review on Trip Advisor any time soon, Ernie).
I think I must have felt pretty similarly to you after seeing the ABBA show – very much in awe of the technology and effects, great to hear the familiar songs, but not like a gig as such and once will be enough. I found it interesting looking at the projection screens and seeing the details of their faces so enlarged, and how they were so intricately replicated with the pores in their skin and individual strands of hair, but the one thing that just couldn’t be achieved was the life in their eyes! It seemed really obvious viewing it like that – there is just that certain something about real eyes that can’t be mimicked, no matter how good the artistry and technology. I think that’s actually something to be grateful for!
I hope things can settle into a comfortable middle ground with your charity shop work. Perhaps after the Christmas madness it will slow down enough to not be so intense. I remember my baptism by fire of the brand new record shop opening just before Christmas and starting my first proper job there – our feet hardly touched the ground, it was so intense I never thought I’d last, but it did calm down after the festive madness. Fingers crossed!
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I enjoyed the ABBA show as an experience but as you say, definitely not a gig. I was taken in by seeing the small figures standing on stage, but once they were blown up to ginormous proportions on the big screens they looked just too perfect and the faces didn’t have changeable expressions like they used to have on stage – laughing with each other and smiling with their eyes (good point). Impressed with the arena itself though, and the clever light shows/lasers. It’s now ticked off “the list”.
That first morning it was just mad but we had bosses from head office joining us too. They have now retreated so it’s down to the volunteers and a couple of extra paid staff to man things. I don’t think many of the older volunteers will last, even if it does quiet down as the shop area is just so big and the upstairs part is up two flights of stairs, but if they have to hire more paid staff that will eat into any profit. We are a £5 and under charity superstore really, so you have to sell an awful lot of items to cover costs before there is any profit for the charity. I will stay as I like shop work but time will tell how it continues.
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