Resolution & A Cultural Revolution

Now referring back it seems I am falling by the wayside, sorry about that, I did also say I would avoid cliches like the plague and falling by the wayside is so-oo cliche. No, what I am failing on is my resolution to post an entry at least twice per week. Now that is a big ask, as some cliche addicted football commentator would say.
(Yes, beating United on their own turf Ron, it's a big ask of any team but Rovers covered every blade of grass tonight in their efforts, literally.)
In my own defence I will say that the work is getting in the way of my leisure pursuits but I do need to buckle down. I'm giving myself a push because I know I can do better, and it's not just on this blog. My last TMA to the OU, while utter crap (see below), was nevertheless an attempt at creativity and that is something that I need to be if I am to retain any real sense of purpose in life.

I look at other blogs, you can see from my links list the kind of stuff I like to read, and I envy these guys their staying power as well as their talent. I am just reminding myself here one of the main purposes of this blog was to track my progress in the OU course, An Introduction To The Humanities and, while I started off well in this, I have not really followed through. One reason for this was a message I received from a well-wisher advising me that, according to the rules of the OU, I was not allowed to post up my completed TMAs. Thank fuck for that I hear you chorus. Well maybe so but it did fill space.

Filling space is not my objective. Using space creatively, that's the point. The next part of the course is entitled; The Sixties - Mainstream Culture And Counter-culture. If there is a subject which should be close to my heart it's the Sixties. I was sixteen years old in 1965. I had already left school and started an apprenticeship in a heavy engineering factory on the Clyde. I still had hair and it was fashionably long in the style of Charlie Watts. I had a girlfriend after going through school feeling myself the object of ridicule of every group of girls who looked in my direction. There was a wonderful new invention on the horizon called lager. The outlook for my self-esteem was rosey.

So it should be a doddle. A few reminiscences on factory life, growing up on a tough housing scheme (Actually it was quite a respectable housing scheme with well tended gardens and the most trouble we got into was for banging on old people's doors and running away), youthful fondling in the park, a first holiday abroad in Majorca with Harold Wilson's maximum £50 spending money (unbelievably there was still some left over after a fortnight's excess).
Instead we get questions like this;
How useful is the term cultural revolution when applied to the Sixties? Support your answer with examples from each of these disciplines ; History, History of Science, Religion, Music and Art. Not more than 2000 words.
The easiest part of that is the 'not more than 2000 words'. That means anything from 200 to 2000, right? I should say not, the fuckers. There might have been a cultural revolution in San Francisco or Ibiza, but not in Greenock. We were too busy serving our time and looking forward to the seventies when we would be journeymen and out of there. The Sixties (with the capital S) only happened retrospectively as far as I was concerned.

Now I'll have to really trawl through the course material and try discover what it all meant. I've got until the 5th of May to get it done by. Wish me luck.