The Day the Chickens Marched on Kiev is a great title for a song (props Bill Bailey) or even a cookbook. But it takes on a distinctly bitter, dark flavour if you consider it in the context of what may or may not be on the menu in Ukraine this week. The prospect of the Russian military massing on your borders is a far from appetising one. Even if it’s the bully next door that you have been unofficially fighting off for the…
Things have been a little quiet on this Western Front of late, so it seems fitting to return to the page with a word on silence. And friendship. The following is an adapted extract on the moving backstory to the Simon and Garfunkel song, The Sounds of Silence, in which Art Garfunkel’s former college roommate reveals an untold story of friendship, courage and love. It also shines a poignant light on the song’s opening lines: ‘Hello Darkness my old friend,…
We live in binary times alright. It’s not just computer codes, it’s the whole hologram of modernity, it’s anyone’s opinions on just about anything and now, with extremes of fire and rain, the weather is joining in too. It seems that polarity is where it’s at, which is rather unfortunate, as the poles themselves are also surrendering to the momentum of our oven-ready planet in the great global bake-off. Hot town, summer in the city! If it’s getting a tad toasty where…