Old memories

[lnr]

Small Robots posted a newly remastered robot today: https://bsky.app/profile/smolrobots.bsky.social/post/3lfp4lean6s26

Meet Bow Tie Bot, who looks like a bow tie with a little robot body/face for the knot, with long arms to clasp round your neck

I started thinking about the bow tie I used to wear when playing with Allerton Bywater Colliery band when I was younger, and that set me to having a look at what I could find about them online. There's one photo on a site of vintage brass band photos, which dates from 1988. (I'm not in it, but suspect the old chap in the front is my old teacher Mr Morley, and that's Alan Morrison the conductor next to him).

There's also an archive list of all the official brass band competitions they competed in, including winning the fourth section in 1988: https://www.brassbandresults.co.uk/bands/allerton-bywater-colliery

And that got me thinking. I was mostly only a member of the junior band before that, but I remember taking part in a couple of their very last competitions. And then I remembered that I used to keep a paper diary on and off as a kid, and that I transcribed them all as private entries here. So I went off and had a look, and would you look at that!

https://lnr.dreamwidth.org/1989/03/05/.

I've made that one public, but I think the rest of my pre-teen/teenage diaries can stay hidden :)

Comments

[lnr]

Giggle, I am *definitely* not making my pre-teen love-life more public, but this one is 100% of it's time and made me laugh, after a trip to see a film:

"Back to the future 2 was ace. I hope they get round to putting it on TV so we can tape it."

[glittertigger]

Excellent stuff 😄

Brass band nostalgia

[emperor]

This caused me to look up Staines Brass Band, who I played with as a teenager. I see they're now in the second section, but I was playing with them in 1996 when they came second in the London & Southern Counties and qualified for the National finals in championship section.

I quit the band in September of 1996 (after getting yelled at for missing an 'optional' rehearsal on my 18th birthday), and took childish satisfaction in them coming second-from-last (I had remembered 'last', but that's not correct) in said final in October 1996.

I don't have any photos from back then, but I suspect my parents do...

Re: Brass band nostalgia

[lnr]

I don't think my parents have any contest photos, but they must have at least a couple of the band at assorted garden parties and so on. I'll have to have a look next time I'm visiting.

It's one of the the things I utterly loved about Brassed Off, the feeling of backstage at a competition was just spot on.

I like your petty "revenge" :)

[lethargic_man]

(a) I had no idea you came from so close to my mother's family's stomping grounds in Leeds; we could have met up throughout the eighties if only we had known each other at the time. ;^b

(b) Heh; I recently (re)discovered I also have a backdated entry in my blog from long before it existed.

[lnr]

*laugh* a small world somehow still. I was born in N Yorks, but we lived in Kippax and then Allerton Bywater from 1980ish. My parents moved on to Mirfield in 2000 I think, after I'd moved out and was living in Cambridge, and have been there ever since.