The Queen Pot
The story below reminds me of The Queen Pot, let me explain...

My whole family were obsessed with Queen, we watched their 1985 live video (kind of magic? I forget) so many times that we had all memorised the minute/second count of all our favourite parts. We desperately wanted to see Queen but as the children of unemployed hippies in the 80's, there was not a lot of money around. That's when my dad hit on the idea of The Queen Pot. Whenever anyone found any money in the street, even a penny, we had to deposit it in The Queen Pot. That The Queen Pot was actually a Militant party fund raising jar only added to the excitement- stickers of Lenin! Bright red!

So five of us scroungey chavscum types would scour the streets looking for pennies to one day realise our dreams. My dad even did a couple of minor insrance scams to get some extra money for it, and after over 5 years of collecting other people's money scraps like crazed metallophillic vultures we finally had the ~£200 needed to get 5 tickets to see Queen next time they played and get the train up to London.

Then he died.

My parents probably knew he was ill and thought it was a good discipline to instill in us, saving (and scrabbling amongst overflowing bins looking for a tuppence) rather than buying on credit.

I finally got to see 'Queen' at Hyde Park a couple of years ago and found myself making up an excuse to have 5 minutes on my own, away from the policeman who gave me one of his complimentary tickets for the London bombings etc, so I could have a private little cry for a) dead Freddie and b) a mini rememberence of how poor we were and how my lovely parents taught me that whilst you might go without for years to try and have your dream, it still might get snatched away from you.
(octopuspie, Fri 17 Apr 2009, 15:33, 1 reply)

the money situation in the '80's sucked.
if it wasn't for the cheap chippy around the corner, we'd have starved! i know just where you're coming from.
never seen pseudo-queen, i just couldn't. he's dead. as far as i'm concerned, the band died with him.
( Smash Monkey lowering the tone of the whole internet, Fri 17 Apr 2009, 15:39, closed)