Paul McCartney

I cannot let the opportunity pass without mentioning 'The day I met Sir Paul McCartney.....

This how he looked then....just so handsome !

We were in a stream 0f traffic driving along a congested street in Liverpool city.

It was 1964 I was a very happy teenager and had fallen in love with the guy I was to marry three years later.  We drew alongside a very smart, silver Aston Martin DB6 and who should be driving it but Sir Paul McCartney. I nearly passed out, he was so handsome. He wound the window down to speak to me, I spluttered to him, "I absolutely love your latest record, 'I want to hold your hand". He asked if I would like to hear it, then pressed a button on his 6 track tape recorder and played ' I want to hold your hand'. Then he proceeded to sing along with recording.

I bet there's not many girls can boast that they were personally serenaded by Paul McCartney. His father was sitting alongside him, smiling proudly.

Although, I'd seen The Beatles perform live at The Cavern  years before, they were just a talented, local band of boys and didn't have the pazzazz that  they'd achieved by 1964. 

Paul with the Beatles in 1964   

 

 

During the heady days of the sixties they used to sing a song called Penny Lane.

Long before they recorded it, Paul  was sitting in a Bus depot waiting for John to arrive. Whilst he was looking around the environs, he started to write the lyrics for the song, which was recorded later.

 It is a song I very much relate to because it's a place I know well as it's not far from where I live now.

 

 Here are some of the lyrics that a very talented young Paul wrote whilst waiting for John Lennon, little knowing what lay in store for them.

 

I unashamedly say that, I am one proud person  to have been a part of Sir Paul McCartney and the Beatles phenomenal rise to fame!

 

Here a few lines from that touching little ditty......

 

In Penny Lane there is a barber showing photographs

of every head he's had the pleasure to know

And all the people that come and go

Stop and say hello

 

Behind the shelter in the middle of a roundabout

The pretty nurse is selling Poppies from a tray.......

 

Penny Lane is in my ears and in my eyes

There beneath the blue suburban skies

I sit

Penny Lane,

Paul as he performs today.

 

My sincere thanks to the patient Denise for devising Abcw and Roger for his painstaking efforts in his administration of Abcw.

Trubes and Paul McCartney
Trubes

Octopus and an Odd Ode

In it's raw state I love Octopus, the first time I tasted it was on one of our many holidays in Turkey. I know, in it's raw state it is most unattractive, but when it's prepared and cooked, it is most delicious.  

  It takes on a pretty pink and creamy hue, the flavour of griddled Octopus surpasses most other seafood delicacies, (that is, in my humble opinion)!

 Altinkum in Turkey is where I  had my first experience of Griddled Octopus, we dined in a simple little Locanta on the edge of the beach, we saw the fishermen out in their brightly coloured boats in the morning, hauling in their catch which included our dinner!

 

The stunning beach at Altinkum.

 

 

 

 

 

Now an ODD ODE!

 

The Owl and the Pussy Cat.   By Edward Lear.

 

The OWL and the Pussy-cat went to sea

In a beautiful Pea-green boat

They took some honey and plenty of money

Wrapped up in a five pound note

The OWL looked to the stars above

And sang to a small guitar

"O lovely Pussy O Pussy my love

What a beautiful Pussy you are

You are,

You are!

What a beautiful Pussy you are"!

 

 

Pussy said to the OWL "You elegant fowl!

How charmingly sweet you sing!

O let us be married! too long have we tarried:

But what shall we do for a ring?"

They sailed away for a year and a day,

To the land where the Bong-Tree grows.

And there in a wood a Piggy-wig stood

With a ring at the end of his nose

His nose

His nose

With a ring at the end of his nose

With a ring at the end of his nose.

Nonsense Poetry

I love  Nonsense Poetry.

Amongst my favourite writers of Nonsense verse are Ogden Nash,  Edward Lear and the highly acclaimed Liverpool poet  Roger McGough,  ( part of my subject matter for the letter M).

 There are many more, indeed too many to write about so, I have picked Ogden Nash the American journalist and poet.

 

This is one of my favourite poems by him, he was such a wordsmith he mixed his words with occasional hilarious insight almost turning his work into a parable.

Consider the auk

becoming extinct because he forgot how to fly

Consider man who may become extinct

Because he forgot how to walk and learned how to fly before he thinked! 

 

 

Good-by  Now or pardon my Gauntlet .

Bring down the moon for genteel Janet;

She's too refined for this gross planet

She wears garments and you wear clothes

You buy stockings, she purchases hose.

She says That is correct,

and you say Yes.

And she disrobes and you undress.

Confronted by a mouse or moose,

You turn green, she turns chartreuse.

Her speech is new minted freshly quarried

She has a fore-head you have a forehead

Nor snake nor slow worm

draweth nigh her ,

You go to bed, she doth retire.

To Janet births are blessed events

And odours that you smell she scents

Replete she feels when her food is yummy

Not in the stomach but in the tummy.

If urged some novel step to show

You say like this, she says, Like so

Her dear ones don't die but pass away,

Beneath her formal is longeray

Of refinement she's a fount or a fountess

And that is why she's now a Countess

She was asking for the little girls room

And a flunky thought she said

 the Earls room.

 

My thanks to the epitome of niceness Denise, for devising Abcw and to Roger our nimble Administrator for keeping us going. 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

M is for The River Mersey and Roger Mcgough

Life goes on day after day  hearts torn in every way

So Ferry 'cross the Mersey 'cause this land's the place I love

and here I'll stay..........

The above lyrics to a well known sixties song performed by Gerry and the Pacemakers.
Liverpool people are passionately proud of their city and for good reason.

 Dare I mention The Beatles again? Gerry and his band and used to play along side them in the early days when the banks of The River Mersey was awash with Music.

The Mersey is  70 miles long and spills out into The Irish Sea to mix with the Mighty Atlantic Ocean. For centuries the port served as the second largest dockland in the UK where traders earned their millions whilst the dock workers were paid a pittance which, in more recent year caused a lot of industrial strife.
 Eventually the Container ship came to the fore and the docklands became derelict, until Margaret Thatcher's government invested large sums of money and they have been regenerated into a wonderful development of apartments, shops, restaurants and a marina,
 There is an arena where a host International stars perform and a large exhibition centre. All this is housed in The Albert Dock (pictured below).

 

Liverpool has a host of creative writers, many first appeared during the cultural renaissance in the sixties.

 One aspiring poet was a chap called Roger McGough. Roger was my form tutor at college, he was a terrific teacher and I learned so much from him. To appreciate poetry and the classics, modern literature, even contemporary writing too! This was very much frowned upon by the 'establishment'.

Roger hosts a wonderful programme on BBC Radio 4 called  Poetry Please, where listener can request reading of their favourite poems.

He writes quite a lot of quirky satirical stuff, he reminds me of Edward Lear another of my favourite writers

Here is one of my favourites from Roger.

We're the Mafia cats

Bugsy Franco and Tony

We're crazy for pizza

with hot pepperoni.

We run all the rackets

from gambling to vice

On St Valentines Day

We massacre mice

We always wear shades

to show that we're meanies

Big hats and sharp suits

And drive Lamborghinis

 

We're the Mafia cats

Bugsy Franco and Toni

Love Sicilian wine

And cheese macaroni

But we have a secret

(and if you dare tell

You'll end up with the kitten

at the bottom of the well

or covered in concrete

And thrown into the deep

for this is one secret

you really must keep). 

 

We're the Costa Nostra and

run the scams and the fiddles

but at home, we are known as

Mopsy Ginger and Tiddles !

 

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My thanks to the magnificent Denise for devising Abcw and also to the masterly Roger for administrating this marvellous site.