7-oh.

I know it's hard to believe for many of you, but there was a time long before this time, but a ways after the dinosaurs, where people lived in cities that looked pretty samey as the ones we live in now, but where no one was packing an iPod or a mobile phone. Where if you wanted to get a call, you had better be at home on time, or at the phone booth across the street. It was weird, but no matter which side of the street you lived on, the phone booth was always on the other side. If you wanted to listen to your favourite songs, that was no problem, you just took your transistor radio, and tuned it into your favourite radio station. And you'd get down with Dr Hook, or Cat Stevens before he converted, or whoever was big back then. In many ways, life was the same...people had stress and shitty jobs, they had to pay the rent. You could eat fried chicken that tasted exactly the same as it does now, although the Coke was different. You could go on road trips in big powerful cars, and get sunburns, and have sex with strangers. And there was no AIDS. The guys hair was longer, the girls had some crazy Farrah Fawcett curls happening, trends, just like any other time. And guys still played guitar at the beach, and hoped the girls would dig it, while their dogs got wet and sprayed everyone when they shook themselves out, same dopey doggie grin yours has right now, panting in the sun. People got loose, got drunk, danced, took acid...had car accidents, and jerked off to movies that came on a reel, genuine film. Chuck Norris was every bit as cool as he is today, and he looked identical, save for the room in his pants back then. We still fought useless wars, for exactly the same 2 reasons we still do now. Still got married, went to church a bit more often. Bicycles had one gear. Eye shadow was blue. Books were big. Star Wars was the most mind bending thing ever, and Jaws kept thousands of people out of the surf every summer. We used to send letters. Long distance relationships meant walking out to the mailbox breathlessly anticipating every day. You got to know the smell of it. And it was an art form, writing letters. Guess what? No hip hop yet. When you called a company, a person answered the phone, and they lived in the same country you do. Taxis knew where they were going, and had an opinion on everything from politics to which horse to back that afternoon. Cars were made of steel. Microwave ovens hadn't hit, if you had a grill in the stove, you were just fine. People were generally a lot more racist than now, ethnics weren't so integrated. Kids could buy cigarettes, and so they did. So it wasn't all sunshine and sepia tone. And you're wondering what the point is here, and I'll be honest and tell you that there are 2. One is that it's kinda nice to reflect, it's a little like a holiday, and seeing as it costs us nothing, then that can only be a good thing. The other is that I genuinely hope that in another 30 years, all the quad xeon dual processors and jumbo lcd's and titanium/carbon fibre fighter planes and bionic hands we're running this week will look as quaint to us as black and white tv sets the size of a fish tank in a swank bar do to us now. And I hope that with all that juicy technology we're gonna get out filthy hands all over, that we might have evolved a little more than we have so far, and stopped thinking being "grey space" is ok. Stopped believing that because we dress right and listen to the right music and look right, that we ARE right. Because you're not...sorry. You're mindless robots walking around thinking you have a life, when you're programmed via DVD's and tv shows paid for by people who hate you. And you look down on the hippies now, when they shit all over you for originality and style, because they do what they do despite the fact it's not in any more. You spend every cent you don't have desperately getting that shirt with the bird shit print, or the ridiculous pointy shoes, or that music to play in your car that really only little girls should listen to. If that. You think you're so superior because you fit in, when fitting in is nothing short of a nightmare to my people. People who aren't limited by your ridiculous mindsets, or hold your biases, or inherent racism, or total absence of originality. If you have to be told what to do by a magazine, you're dead already. If you write the magazine, full points to you. Consumer is actually a dirty word, now, we're not in the 70's any more, and can't get away with not knowing. Consumers are rapists. And the supreme irony is they are raping themselves as well. It's weird you have to write this down, and that some people would never have thought about it had I not. How with all the information at our disposal we as a race think less than ever before. I guess it's easier to ponder the mysteries of the Universe while looking at a sunset, as opposed to a full email inbox or a credit card statement.

I'll be at the phone box across the street if any of you want to talk to me.

This is knifey, from 'the internet'.