Feel the heat and let it flow

It's the end of another week, dear reader, and heavens! It's been a hot-and-sticky one...

The heatwave continues today, with an extension of the "red alert, only travel if necessary" message from government - but, to be honest, I haven't seen a huge difference in the number of people commuting, or just travelling, through it all in spite of all the dire warnings. We Brits are more resilient than the tabloids (and our "lords-and-masters" in Parliament)  like to think we are, evidently!

As we sweat our way to the weekend, I'm enjoying this little run of "compare-the-decade" posts [here's 1976, and yesterday it was 1986] - so let's leap one more decade to 1996!

This week in June thirty years ago, there wasn't anything more than "average temperatures for the time of year", so nothing comparable at all to today. There was (yet again), however, a load of football shite preoccupying the masses, with the European Cup.

This might explain the fact that among other horrible occupants cluttering our charts [such as the godawful Fugees' massacre of Killing Me Softly at #1, Slime Dion, Mariah-fucking-Carey and Peter Andre] there were two "anthems" to that sport [including the first appearance of Three Lions by Baddiel, Skinner and the Lightning Seeds] also "bed-blocking" the higher echelons.

Thank heavens, therefore, for this, which held its own for weeks amongst the detritus, and demonstrated that the 90s was, more than anything else, the Decade of Dance!

Thank Disco Eurodance It's Friday!

Livin' Joy - Don't Stop Movin'

You can do anything that you want to do
With your mind body and soul
Do it, prove it to yourself and say
I want (I want)
I will (I will)
I can do anything
It's a difficult world and you got to prove
That you're ready and you can do it
Nothing in this world can stop you
I know I can I will fulfil my dreams

Don't stop movin'
Keep it up
Keep on movin' get it right
Yeah you've got to get it right
Oh yeah oh
Don't stop movin'
I it's your life
Keep on movin' get it right
Yeah you've got to get it right

You can be mystical magical
Physically phenomenal
Good to go
Not slow
Feel the heat and let it flow

You've got to get it right

Have a fab weekend, peeps! Keep cool.

One last time might be forever

As this stifling heat continues [it hit 36.7C/98.1F in Somerset, and 33.5C/92F in London] - and having already taken a trip back to the "yardstick against which all heatwaves are compared", 1976 yesterday - I thought it would be interesting to compare what the summer was like a decade later, in 1986.

Although it's hardly gone down in the record books for its decent weather, it's interesting to note that forty years ago this week, we were indeed in the middle of a hot spell [albeit a shorter heatwave than we have now, with just three consecutive days over 30C/86F]. Also - in a spooky echo of today - in the news headlines was a war in Lebanon, a World Cup, Madonna, and a delusional right-wing US president destabilising the Middle East...

But what was at the top of our charts, I hear you ask?

This!

Wham! - The Edge of Heaven

The last ever single by Wham! before George officially went solo.

Four decades? Where do they go? Sniff.

Ooh ar ooh ar

It certainly has been a hot, hot, HOT day here in London [it hit 36C/96.8F (!) on the south coast - and was definitely not much cooler here] - and I spent three hours of it in a Teams meeting pod in work, with "air-con" that was about as effective as someone wafting a chiffon scarf in my general direction!

Hey ho. As always, any heatwave in the UK is immediately and inexorably compared our most famous one way back in 1976...

...so, simply because this song was indeed #1 in our charts this very week 50 years ago - and in honour of our very own Ms Scarlet, who loves it - let's all sing along to The Wurzels!

The Wurzels - Combine Harvester [Top Of The Pops, 1976]

I drove my tractor through your haystack last night
(Ooh ar ooh ar)
I threw me pitch fork at your dog to keep quiet
(Ooh ar ooh ar)
Now somethin's tellin' me, that you'm avoidin' me
(Ooh ar ooh ar)
Come on now darlin' you got somethin' I need

Cos I've got a brand new combine harvester and I'll give you the key
Come on now let's get together in perfect harmony
Oh I got twenty acres and you got forrty-three
Now I've got a brand new combine harvester and I'll give you the key

We'll have twins and triplets, I'm a man built for speed (Ooh ar ooh ar)
And you know I'll love ya darlin' so give me your hand (Ooh ar ooh ar)
But the thing I want the most is all the acres of land

'Cause I've got a brand new combine harvester and I'll give you the key
Come on now let's get together in perfect harmony
I got twenty acres and you got forty-three
Now I've got a brand new combine harvester and I'll give you the key

Phwoar, she's a lovely bit of stuff 'n' all

For seven long years I've been alone in this place (Ooh ar ooh ar)
Pigs sleep in the kitchen, it's a proper disgrace (Ooh ar ooh ar)
Now if I cleaned it up would ya change our mind (Ooh ar ooh ar)
I'll give up drinkin' scrumpy and that lager and lime

'Cause I've got a brand new combine harvester and I'll give you the key
Come on now, let's get together in perfect harmony
I got twenty acres and you got forty-three
Now I've got a brand new combine harvester and I'll give you the key

Who loves ya baby, HA
Weren't we a grand couple at that last wurzel dance
I wore brand new gaiters and me corduroy pants (Hahahaha!)
In your new Sunday dress with your perfume smellin' grand
We had our photos taken, us holding hands

Now I've got a brand new combine harvester and I'll give you the key
Now that we''re both past our fifties I think that you and me
Should stop this gallivanting and will you marry me
'Cause I've got a brand new combine harvester and I'll give you the key

Arrr, you're a fine lookin' woman and I can't wait to get me hands on your land, haha!

Only in this country could something like that top the charts for two weeks and end up one of the best-selling songs of the year, in a year dominated by great stuff from Abba, Elton John & Kiki Dee, Queen, Rod Stewart, Miss Ross and Wings, and the year that also saw the simultaneous rise of Punk and Disco...

Your old pal Keir

Keir Starmer has performed one of his characteristic U-turns by walking back yesterday’s resignation, Downing Street has confirmed.

After thinking about it overnight, the prime minister has announced he is remaining in office and consequently that Andy Burnham can get on his little train and sod off back to Manchester.

He said: “If Starmerism is anything, it is making a hugely damaging announcement then changing your mind and ineffectively reversing it. Which is what I do here.

“Why would anyone be surprised? It’s what I did with winter fuel payments, the family farm tax, Mandelson. So I stand before you today to say I am resuming my position as prime minister.

“Your old pal Keir is going nowhere. I’m going to hunker down and weather the Makerfield win with my characteristic stubbornness. I may, in time, offer Burnham a junior Cabinet position and allow him to work his way up.

“You seem too stunned with excitement to speak. I’ve noted this reaction previously. I shall leave the room to reflect on my infallible political instincts but feel free to form a conga line in my absence.”

Voter Eleanor Shaw of Hereford said: “And we’ll do just as we did when he went back on those previous decisions, and ignore it.”

The Daily Mash

Of course.

I like big muscles and red corpuscles

Yep! Monday again.

We are shaken out of our reverie by the realisation that the old familiar - and endlessly enjoyable - routine that is called work begins once more...

Hey ho.

To take our minds off it - it would have been the 105th birthday yesterday of one of our most revered of all Hollywood vamps, Miss Jane Russell, so on this Tacky Music Monday, let us indulge in some homoerotic fantasies alongside the great lady herself, shall we?

Jane Russell - Ain’t There Anyone Here for Love [Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, 1953]

Have a good week, dear reader. Keep cool in the heatwave, if you can...

Fame or infamy, what does it matter? I shan't be forgotten.

We are less than two weeks away from "Gay Xmas" aka Gay Pride in London, and our outfits are all done and sorted. We can only hope that this new heatwave has subsided by then, otherwise we'll look less-than-glamorous, bathed in sweat...

Speaking of all things gay, we're well overdue another faboo classic film review by the lovely "Tired Old Queen at the Movies" Mr Steve Hayes - and when I saw his latest was one of the great British gay films of the 1980s [cf. Maurice, My Beautiful Laundrette], that coincided with my own coming-out, I whooped with joy! Some of the quotes alone are timeless:

Guy Bennett: "But you couldn't help it, could you? Because in your heart of hearts, like Barclay and Delahay and Fowler and Menzies, you still believe, in spite of your talk of equality and fraternity, you still believe some people are better than others because of the way they make love. Now, think of that for a lifetime. Think of the names: pansy, nancy, fairy, fruit, brown-nose."

Menzies: "You'd better take a pull on yourself, Guy!"
Guy Bennett: "I'd rather do it with you."

Fowler: "I have half a mind to ask Barclay for permission to beat you!"
Tommy Judd: "Well, you've half a mind. We can all agree on that."

Guy Bennett: "Fame or infamy, what does it matter? I shan't be forgotten."

Tired Old Queen at the Movies - Another Country 1984 Review

Wonderful...

Another Country is currently available to watch on YouTube - catch it while you can!

Down Mexico Way - and an unexpected visitor

Brodiaea laxa “Queen Fabiola” is a sparkling joy! [click to embiggen]

It's been rather hot and humid in London again today - and of course, I spent hours in the extensive gardens here at Dolores Delargo Towers, potting-on more specimens that have rapidly outgrown their current space, and watering the whole shebang from end-to end [that's a lot of pots!].

There's one wall-pot that isn't going to be sprayed down with the hose for a while, however - for we have discovered, among the branches of our Fuchsia Viva Ireland (with its companion self-seeded fern), and shaded by a branch of the climbing Fuchsia Lady Boothby, directly opposite our back door to the garden...

...a Robin has made her nest!!

That's a first - for any garden we've had - and it will be lovely to observe [fingers crossed] the pair raise their chicks! If I can do so without disturbing her, I hope to get a pic at some stage.

Meanwhile, let's take a trip to exotic climes, in the company of the ever-wonderful Soft Tempo Lounge, shall we? I think we should:

Soft Tempo Lounge - Holiday in Mexico '63

Just what the doctor ordered.

I wonder if all that hideous brutalist architecture's still standing?

[Music: Orchestra King Zérand - Pop in Mexico]