Tuesday 18 October 2011

Wish I weren't there...


Talking about what was then the latest technology for high-quality reproduction of great music, Michael Flanders, half of the historic Flanders and Swann comic duo, pointed to the extraordinary lengths to which people would go, to get the exact effect of having an orchestra playing to them in their sitting room.

‘Personally,’ he commented,  ‘I can't think of anything I should hate more than an orchestra actually playing in my sitting room.’

I thought of that the other day when I saw a sign on a platform at St Pancras International station.

Be in a station, wherever you are. Bliss.
It was a real Flanders moment for me.

‘Why on earth,’ I wondered, ‘would I want to recreate the experience of standing in a station when Im somewhere else? After all, I only go to stations to get somewhere else.’

Still it’s progress, I suppose, of sorts, and who’d want to stand in the way of that particular freight train? 

2 comments:

waggledook said...

You know what, I went to the first address mentioned and got the following error message:

"There is a problem with the page you are trying to access.
It is possible that it was either moved, it doesn't exist or we are experiencing some technical difficulties.
We are sorry for the inconvenience."

Amazing! Exactly like being in a British railway station.

David Beeson said...

It's wonderful when things work out with absolutely perfect appropriateness... thanks for pointing it out!