Dublin v Kerry: The things-ain't-what-they-used-to be nostalgia starts here

Let's forget the match a while and get down to what was happening that week, the last championship meeting between Kerry and Dublin. Like a TV producer with a cheap idea to fill the Saturday night schedules, let's turn our attention to popular culture first. The number one of the week - well let's say the Kerry fans weren't the only ones Dancing In the Street, those pair of old codgers, David Bowie and Mick Jagger, were at it too and were rewarded with a number one in Ireland, Britain and the US.

As for television, well it was less Big Brother, just more of the same - the move of Gay Byrne's Late Late Show to Friday nights was still causing frissons, Blankety Blank was being hosted by Les Dawson and Dynasty and Falcon Crest were going head-to-head on the American soap front. For the class act of the schedules, there was Steve Bocho's Hill Street Blues - Norman Bunce, the original of the species when it comes to classy New York cop TV characters.

In the cinemas - cineplexes were still a developer's fantasy at that stage - you could munch your way through Cocoon, Falcon and the Snowman or the James Bond offering of the day, A View to a Kill (with Roger Moore on board). For the more highbrow among September Road readers - and we know there are many - Subway, with Christopher Lambert and those eyebrows and the way they might look at you, was the cinema buff's choice of the day.

With a big leap, let's move on to current affairs and the news of the day. The silly season was in full swing with the politicians away - Garret FitzGerald as Taoiseach and Dick Spring his Tanaiste - but Minister for Health Barry Desmond was still able to incur the wrath of workers at Gallagher' cigarette factory for his "drug pushing" attack on the tobacco industry. He should have tried banning cigarettes from pubs in 1985.

On the world front, Mexico was in chaos after a devastating earthquake left over 3,000 dead and French Prime Minister Laurent Fabius held up his government's hand and finally took responsibility for the sinking of Greenpeace's Rainbow Warrior in Auckland harbour the previous July.

There was the little matter of John De Lorean too. Acquitted on drug charges the year before, time caught up with him on All-Ireland weekend when a Detroit court indicted him on 15 charges of racketeering, mail fraud, tax evasion and interstate transportation of stolen money. Hard to see how anything good could come of the man who designed that car

Back on the home front, Bob Geldof was in town collecting £7.5 million from President Paddy Hillery on behalf of the nation, and much was being made of the fact that we raised millions more than the Brits - proportionately of course.

The weather was, well, miserable with the north-west suffering its "worst ever" flooding, while you could buy a three-bed house in a new development in Dundrum for £40,000 - and that included a vanity unit in the main bedroom.

On the soccer front, well the old First Division still existed. It contained such now fallen giants as Oxford United - pre-Robert Maxwell - and Luton Town, while West Brom, rooted at the bottom of the table from early in the season, and Birmingham City were also part of the pre-Sky money elite.

Micky Hazard - great barnet - was debuting for the ever-cosmopolitan Chelsea after his move from Spurs while Manchester United were top of the league - consolation back then, of course, was that they couldn't win the title.

On the domestic front, there's certainly a feeling of dΘja vu: defeats in Europe for Galway United, Shamrock Rovers, and Bohemians - the current league champions going down 5-2 at home to Dundee United in the UEFA Cup. Current Shelbourne manager Dermot Keely won plaudits for his performance against Honved in Hungary, while Galway's John Mannion got sent off against Lyngby. In boxing, meanwhile, Barry McGuigan was in Belfast preparing for a world title defence against Bernard Taylor.

As for the All-Ireland, well Micheβl O'Hehir was in hospital and couldn't commentate, the first final he had missed since 1938, and ... Kerry won. But sure there'll be a lot more talked and written about that before next Saturday.