Del Shannon as he was around the time of Runaway

Mike's Pith & Wind - Del boy
I’ve always been the oldest. I suppose it started when I just happened to be the first born and therefore the older brother, then continued when I found that I was always the oldest in my class at school. My birthday falls as smack dab in the middle of the year as it’s possible to get and I seem to remember that fact played a part in the timing of my initial entry into primary school. Or maybe they simply couldn’t prise me off my mother’s legs. In any case, I was the oldest in my first year, (but by no means the brightest), and I was always the oldest thereafter.
Which is somewhat of a feat given the number of schools my brother and I went to until we finally lobbed at the forbidding gates of Christ’s College back in 1960. Our mother was a relief teacher and we tended to follow her around from school to school in our primary school days. I think this led to our feeling like perpetual outsiders, with prospective friends falling by the wayside at a dizzying rate as we were whisked off to yet another school half way through the year.
Although there’s a difference between being the oldest and just being old, I think that always being the oldest in the room has inured me somewhat to the sobering reality of being past my prime and sliding at gathering pace towards oblivion. At certain times of the day I wonder if I’m already there..
Anyway, it’s no surprise to me at least that I’m the oldest of the old on this Morning of the Earth read more

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Dick's Toolbox - Unrepresentative..
I have always supposed, being innocent in the ways of the world, that the system of government under which we shelter is called Representative Government because the Government represents the People. We, the common and uncommon mass, traipse off every few years to elect those who put themselves forward so that the opinions of the many can be made evident in law. Unlike ancient Athens there are far too many people to gather in one place to forge some collective decision or banish someone righteous philosopher to a far-flung island. Unlike Athens we don’t have slaves either – just part-time workers. We choose to ignore that the candidates may have been chosen after one too many cocktails in Balmain by women with expensive handbags and men who still wear ties, or by thirty-two scruffy socialists in an unheated room in Mildura, or even by a delusional religious bigot with wealthy friends. read more