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Saturday Night Retro

TODAY I flew on an airplane from Fort-Lauderdale/Hollywood International Airport to Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport. It was the umpteenth time that I flew anywhere. (I actually don’t keep track of all of my airline flights via an EXCEL spreadsheet.) I’ve lost track of my flying over the past 23½ years. I’ve flown first class once or twice (wasn’t too impressed), and I’ve flown most of the major airlines that are still in business today. Flying is not as fun as it used to be (prior to September 11TH 2001). This morning I left my home at precisely 6:30 AM to get to the off-site parking area at the airport by 7:30 AM to get to the terminal by 7:45 AM to check-in, get through security, and get to my gate prior to boarding at 9 AM and departure from the gate at 9:30 AM. And then there’s the 3-hour flight. It basically took longer to get from my home in Homestead to the aircraft at the airport than it did to actually fly that aircraft more than halfway across the country !

Check out this classic 60-second television commercial for the legendary Eastern Airlines of the way things used to be. Compare our baggage handlers of today with those depicted from the 1970s.

Before I turned 18-years-old and moved away from home to join the circus USAF I recall flying only twice in my life – twice to and from Bermuda on summertime vacations as a little kid during the mid-1970s. I recall Bermuda to be a fun little place out in the middle of the Atlantic – sort of a hybrid between a Caribbean nation further south and the United Kingdom further east. I wish to go back there one of these years to check it out all over again for the first time in over 30 years.

And now Ladies And Gentlemen – IT’S GO-GO TIME !  Let’s kick it old school !

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History Life Music Travel

Saturday Night Retro

The month of November is chock-full of anniversaries for me. 28 years ago in 1980 me and my family moved from one side of Washington D.C. (Maryland) to the other side (Virginia). Our lives changed for the better on the opposite side of the Potomac River. 23 years ago in 1985 I moved out of the country for the first time ever courtesy of the USAF. That anniversary was actually last weekend. I flew from D.C. to London England, and then I took British Rail westward from London to Swindon. I took a taxi from Swindon to my new home at RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire. I did all of that just 5 months removed from my 18TH birthday.

I lived in the U.K. for some 105 fun-filled weeks. In fact this weekend is the 21ST anniversary of my departure from the U.K. – and U.S. homecoming. I would eventually arrive at – Homestead Florida !

I haven’t been back to the U.K. ever since I left, but you can bet that I will return some day for a visit. I enjoyed the time of my young life for two years over there, and I surely did ‘Live It Up’.

Here’s Australian super group Mental As Anything. They’ve been together for the past 32 years, and in 1985, 1986, and 1987 they scored the biggest worldwide pop smash of their entire career with this uplifting track that you may just remember from the ‘Crocodile Dundee’ movie. Check it out:  

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History Holidays People

Veterans Day – Honoring All Who Served

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History Music

Saturday Night Retro

Exactly 22 years ago in October and November of 1986 I was a young and crazy 19-year-old USAF Airman serving my country overseas in a foreign country. I was in the United Kingdom, and I was having the time of my life back then – livin’ it up in the London and Oxford pop music concert scene. During one particular 3-month time-span from October 1986 through January 1987 I attended 7 LIVE concerts featuring such diverse acts as Huey Lewis And The News, Bruce Hornsby And The Range, Ultravox, The Communards, The Eurythmics, The Human League, Frankie Goes To Hollywood, and Berlin.

Oh yeah – I missed one – Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark (OMD). They are one of my all-time favourite music acts in history, and their 1986 album “The Pacific Age” is one of the greatest ever made as far as I’m concerned.

"The Pacific Age" - OMD (1986)

I saw OMD LIVE in concert at the Oxford Apollo on the night of the 28TH of October in 1986. Check out their big hit below – “We Love You” – from the album above from exactly 22 years ago in November of 1986. The concert that I attended – it looked just like this:

See if you can find me. I’m the one that’s dancing new wave style like a zombie.