I've had more than one conversation over the years with so-called "Christians" who tell me that "you have to have faith" when I ask them how they'd persuade an atheist to believe in their god. As far as I'm concerned, if you can't give logical reasons for what you… Read full post »

There follows my report after the initial three trelfthmas of studying the beings on the assigned planet, known to its own inhabitants as The Earth.

From afar it certainly appeared as though the dominant beings on this planet were of a high level of intelligence and intellect. I have to… Read full post »

I wear his ring

I can hardly bear to look

They called me in

Said, "Come for his effects."

Those ones who withdrew it

From cold flesh.

Strange word for a ring, an effect.

His watch was one too

And I also wear that

They both taunt me

That watch,… Read full post »

I haven't posted on OS for a few days because I've been getting some interesting feedback from people who've bought my books through my other blog (Ramblings From Rhodes).

Quite a lot of British visitors who come here during the summer months (which span mid-April thru October) have never experienced… Read full post »

This has been doing the rounds on the e-mail circuit. I never pass on "circular" e-mails, but really wanted to share this thought with fellow OS-ers... 

An elderly Chinese woman had two large pots, each hung on the ends of a pole which she carried across her neck.  One of… Read full post »

R.I.P.

My iPod's broken

I'm devastated,

I dropped it once too often

My iPod's dead

What am I gonna do?

It's gone, but not forgotten.

My iPod's dead

R.I.P.

I really can't face night-time

I listened when I could not sleep 

It soothed me at the… Read full post »

A fly on the wall (or should that be "cloud?") may hear musings...

You say I'm on your side

So do they I hear

You believe 

They believe

What's the problem here?

You say your soul will rise

And theirs will descend

You go up

They go down

You're… Read full post »

If you haven't read Micalpeace's post, "Be Thankful," maybe it would be good to do so before you read this one. It's here:

http://open.salon.com/blog/micalpeace/2009/11/25/be_thankful

It makes reference to domestic violence. Reading it put me in mind of a song I wrote and put on an album I recorded o… Read full post »

You were born there

And I elsewhere

You are dark, I am light

So we fight.

You have so much

That I cannot touch

You're from day - and I, night

so we fight.

Who says we should?

What's bad or what's good?

They will say, we'll obey

and… Read full post »

I was never a Doors fan. I thought them a little too light, a little too pretentious. I mean, at the time I was into Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath. The Doors were almost "pop" by comparison.

But then they came out with L.A. Woman. I seem to remember… Read full post »

Rhodes is really two islands. Granted, nowhere will you find the charm of Symi harbour, but the South of the island is brimming with untouched hillsides of olive groves, pine forests, fig trees and sleepy old white villages where you will still see grandmas sitting on shady steps… Read full post »

Call me sentimental, it doesn't matter. I lost my dear Dad back last January and shortly before he died I wrote the poem below for him. He was a great man. 

No he didn't change the world or achieve great fame. But he was raised from a baby by his diminutive… Read full post »

Having just watched The Who doing "It's Hard" on Dustbowldiva's blog, I'm prompted to ruminate on which have been the best rock voices of the past 40 years or so.

What about...

Robert Plant

Paul Rogers

Roger Daltrey

Tina Turner

Ian Gillan

Roger Chapman (Family)

Captain Beefheart

Billy Gibbons (ZZ… Read full post »

“It’s a bit of a misnomer that really, isn’t it.” Said Gary. He and his “men” (if a gang of two qualifies for such an epithet) were sitting in the shade sipping their tea and dunking their biscuits. They were taking a break whilst tackling one of the myriad jobs (l… Read full post »

Well, I've now been using OS since June 4th 2009 and how do I feel about it?

By and large I think it's excellent. I really like the fact I've struck up a few relationships with people living in places thousands of miles from where I sit right now. I… Read full post »

At a time when most rock bands were plagiarising the great blues artists and often conveniently forgetting to credit them (Led Zeppelin's "Lemon Song" on Led Zeppelin 2 is a good example. It's simply a re-working of Howling Wolf's "Killing Floor," albeit a brilliant one, but poor old Chester… Read full post »

I wrote a while back about helping our friend Josie prepare to move to Arhangelos from her present home in Lindos, here on Rhodes. It was while my wife and I were up and down the stepladder, busily "emulsion-ing" walls in Josie's new home, that Dimitra, her new neighbour, had arrived… Read full post »

I hope I'm succeeding in making my list as eclectic as possible. To many, an album like this wouldn't be classifiable as "rock" per se; though there's no other category you could really put it in either. It's simply one of the most wonderful sounding half-hours of music you could… Read full post »

Too many people would say that Dark Side of the Moon ought to be up there with the greatest rock albums. It would be hard to disagree with them.

But, for me Dark Side - although brilliant and truly "dark" - was the start of a complete change of direction… Read full post »

In July of 2008 we visited my parents in the UK and this pic was the last taken of my dad and I. I didn't know it at the time, when we asked the landlord of the "Cross Guns" at Avoncliffe (an impossibly beautiful place near Bradford-on-Avon in Wiltshire) to… Read full post »

Check this out (http://www.stephencmeyer.org/) and then say that to believe in intelligence in creation is to be a fool?

Where do the subjective, blind-faith Darwinists get off then? It's about time reason prevailed. Let's at least hear some evolutionists humbly admitting that to disagree with them d… Read full post »

On Tom Waits' breathtakingly good album "Mule Variations," from 1999, there's a track which is more of a poem than a song really.

 It's track 8 and it's called "What's he Building?" If you know the track you'll know how fascinating it is, as TW speaks his way through… Read full post »

I was sitting home alone one night

In L.A. watching old Kronkite on the seven o'clock news

It seems there was an earthquake that

Left nothing but a Panama hat

And a pair of old Greek shoes.

Didn't seem like much was happenin'

So I turned it off and… Read full post »