Tuesday, February 25, 2020

CP/M on a Sinclair ZX Spectrum

After the Nostalgia Nerd reviewed the Sinclair ZX Spectrum on Youtube I reminded myself today that I always wanted to run CP/M on it. THere it is. I got - again - stuck in ED's insert mode. Just felt like 1982. :-D






Friday, February 14, 2020

Look at my D*CK

Funny fake TV commercial about deck sealant from New Zealand. Nice play with words. :-)



Thursday, January 16, 2020

The two British invasions in pop music

In terms of pop music of the 21st century two British invasions occurred. That happened twice, when single artists or brand from Great Britain ruled the music charts of other countries, especially the USA, and scored one number one hit after the other over months and years.

The first British invasion

The first took place between the late 1950s to the early 1970s, when band like The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, Queen, The Who, Led Zeppelin, single music artists like Elton John, Eric Clapton, Phil Collins, od Stewart and others were on the top of the music charts of many countries, not only in the UK. They moved local bands and artists to lower places, depriving them to reach the number one position of their respective chart. Audiences, especially teenagers, went mad and bought more records than of local acts.

The second British invasion

Between the late 1970s and mid 1980s was the era, when the second British invasion took place. Its focus was on synth pop, which emerged around that time. Acts like Gary Numan, Depeche Mode, OMD, Yazoo (known as Yaz in the USA), The Human League hit the number one spot also in charts outside the UK. Local artists were again moved to lower chart positions. Interestingly, while the first invasion was focused on Rock, the second invasion with focus on synth pop also created several new music genres, like New Romantic Wave, New Wave, Ska. And opened the way to cyber punk while competing with Disco Music. This invasion fizzled out around 1983, when American musicians were again able to rule the charts of many countries.

My opinion

Looking back I miss that time of the second invasion. I was a teenager back then and loved to listen to the radio while recording the songs to create mixed tapes (on compact cassettes, kids today won't know). I doubt that there will ever be a third British invasion again.

Saturday, December 14, 2019

Ageing music artists

When you think of it you might realize that most music artists have their chart success when they are between 20 and may be 35 years old. That makes averagely five to ten years. Take Pink Floyd or The Rolling Stones for example. They were all over the charts in the 1960s and 1970s with Pink Floyd's The Wall being the last album in 1979 to score a single as hit.. The Rolling Stones kind of fizzled out in the late 1970s while Mick Jagger had a few singles in the 1980s as solo artist.

My favorite pop stars from the 1980s when I was a teen and twen are Howard Jones and Nik Kershaw. From what I read is that Nik was pressed onto the bubble gum pop track by the music label but had huge hits on his 1984 albums Human Racing and The Riddle, scoring several hits from each. Besides one or two singles from the following album that was it for him. Not bound to the label anymore he continued to produce rock albums but never had any chart success. He and most other "80s stars" are still on tour and play their charts hits from the 1980s for their ageing fans.

There are a few exceptions like Madonna. Starting 1982 she had a string of hits until today. But I doubt that for example Miley Cyrus, Rihanna or Beyoncé can follow Madonna's footsteps to keep being successful.

Why is that? I can only assume that most of the music artists are not able to adapt their music style to please the young generation. Seems only Madonna and a hand full of other music artists.

Thursday, September 19, 2019

Buck Rogers in the 25th Century from 1979

The movie Buck Rogers in the 25th Century was released 1979, marking it the 40th anniversary in time writing this. I starred the hot Erin Gray as Colonel Wilma Deering in a jump suit and a handsome Gil Gerard as Captain Buck Rogers, based on this comic character created in 1928 already.

The intro might suggest this it's a soft porn movie, but it is not. But as close at it gets to be allowed on prude 1970s US TV. I was in my early teens and when Erin Gray was slipping up and down the illuminated letters of BUCK ROGERS... Oh boy. :-)

It's a space soap and rides on the success of this new genre created by Star Wars two years earlier. The movie also spawned a TC series spanning over two seasons the same and following year. After the quality of episodes quickly went down and with it the number of viewers the series was cancelled.

I missed this time just after Star Wars hit the big screen 1977 with all the cheesy space operas movies and TV shows as a result. Another I really liked was the first Battle Star Galactica series from 1978. Space soaps died out around 1982. And He-Man took over. ;-)

Compensation flight delays Lufthansa

Flight delays and flight cancellations during private and business trips are not uncommon. Even airlines can be affected. If the delay is greater than three hours or the flight is cancelled completely, the passenger has the right for a compensation.

Get a compensation when flights were delayed for more than three hours. We will check your claim for any delay or cancellation of any airline in which you made a trip by air, free of charge and without obligation. The amount of the compensation can be between 200 and 600 Euros, depending on the distance between the departure and destination airports.

We work with experts on all aspects of travel law and enforce their claims in the event a passenger experiences a flight delay airlines, if necessary in court.

Background information Lufthansa

Destinations served are largely located in Mediterranean regions. Other popular holiday destinations, such as the Canary Islands, Cape Verde, Egypt or Madeira, are also on the flight schedule. In Germany airplanes usually serve (as of 2016) 23 different airports. These include Berlin-Schönefeld (SXF), Berlin Tegel (TXL), Bremen (BRE), Dortmund (DTM), Düsseldorf (DUS), Erfurt (ERF), Frankfurt (FRA), Frankfurt Hahn (HHN), Friedrichshafen (FDH) , Hamburg (HAM), Karlsruhe (FKB), Cologne / Bonn (CGN), Leipzig / Halle (LEJ), Memmingen (FMM), Munich (MUC), Münster (FMO), Nuremberg (NUE), Paderborn-Lippstadt (PAD), Rostock (RLG), Stuttgart (STR), Sylt (GWT) and Usedom (HDF).

Further information

The German airline Lufthansa was founded in 2007 after the companies were merged. The airline advertises its flights with fair prices and offers as a special service to inform its passengers about any delays on the day of departure. Victims can claim up to 600 € per person

Claim Save

HOW DOES IT WORK?

  • 1 Data entry
  • Find out how high your claim for compensation is.
  • 2 Have the data checked
  • We check your claim within a few minutes and take care of everything else.
  • 3 claims to pay
  • You receive your compensation. If your claim is justified, we will transfer your money. After that the problem is done for you.

If you want a link to your law form here instead of this form, contact me.

Wednesday, August 21, 2019

My earliest arcade video game experiences

The first video game I saw was Pong in a restaurant I visited with my parents visited. Must have been 1974 or something. Two years later I saw Gun Fight on a fairground and a year or two after that Seawolf II, or was it Depthcharge?

The pizza restaurant in our small suburb put 1980 the game Asteroids in a corner of the hallway near the entrance and youngsters lined up. He later added Defender and more youngsters showed up, while the restaurant had only few visitors. By 1982 he dedicated the smaller room to arcade games, removed tables and chairs and by the time Donkey Kong by Nintendo or Sega's Astroblaster hit the German market he offered ten or so cabs. Every other week a new game came and each time I was blown away. This room was cramped with teens and twens, while the restaurant was mainly empty.

Now the "shocking" part. On April 1st 1985 the German government put a law into action to protect the youth. Violent video movies were moved into a separate room. Vending machines selling booze were removed and besides more things so were video game cabs. So this pizza restaurant probably went bust that year. If you wanted to play video games you had to go to dedicated arcades where the minimum age to enter was 18. And when the guy in front was in doubt you needed to show ID. I was lucky because I just turned 18 a few months prior. Not so lucky to friends being one and two years younger than me.

Imagine you love to play arcade games and are hooked since a couple of years and suddenly this love is taken away from you. I can only imagine how hard that must have been for them.

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