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More on the subject of default icons ( daffshead's ) soon

Dr. Bevil in period costume circa 1830

DR. J. MARSHALL (JACK) BEVIL is a retired string music educator, a musicologist, and a composer. He holds the degrees M.Mus and Ph.D, both in musicology, from the University of North Texas, with dual specializations in oral-aural traditions, especially those of Celtic Britain and the Celtic diaspora (particularly the American Southern Uplands), and British national music of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, from Sullivan through Vaughan Williams. In addition to his teaching, research scholarship, and composition, he also acts on occasion as a forensic musicologist, or consultant and expert witness in copyright and intellectual property disputes.

http://home.earthlink.net/~

llywarch/cth01.html.htm - thesis abstract

http://home.earthlink.net/~

llywarch/disab.html.htm - dissertation abstract

http://home.earthlink.net/~llywarch/pubpr.html.htm - list of publications and presentations

http://home.earthlink.net/~llywarch/tnc02.html.htm - post-doctoral investigation, question of music played during the Titanic disaster

http://home.earthlink.net/~llywarch/ku2009.html - post-doctoral investigation, linguistic basis of British national musical style, ca. 1870-1920

www.scoreexchange.com - compositions online (under Browse by Composer / B

It happens to us all. Our first Blog.

It's like our first day at school, looking through those gates as they clank closed and we realise there is no way back, we are TRAPPED. As we get older it is our first day at work, 40 years of grind ahead of us to pay the rent and feed ourselves...everyone feeling really depressed yet? Except if you are in Entertainment, then the hurdle in life that will make most grown Suits, Crew and Talent cringe, cry and hide in a corner screaming, "No, don't make me do it!!! I can't cope" it is being told to write your first blog. The line used to encourage you is Itll increase your profile of course it will it will prove that you are a grammatical Neanderthal whose most grammatically correct line you are capable of writing is This is the last bit wot I wrote, bleedin good innit finished if with either bucko as a threat to someone you dont like or boyo if you wish to be more pleasant or if you want them to buy you a pint of Brains SA aka Skull Attack. PR and Publicists take great delight in this day like sending a child they have created into the grown up world. We must stand on our own two feet fly the protective nest that the PR and Publicists create for us. Oh yeh, great fun!

PR and Publicists are a much maligned group in Entertainment they have to deal with tantrums or behaviour by those they represent that would make an 186 BC celebration by the cult of Dionysus look like a party that just got a bit out of hand and threats or blackmail from the media that would have most of us wishing the plagues of Egypt on all the houses of the journalists or paparazzi. The Blog idea is their revenge on all of us. The more we foul up on the blog the more we have to pay them to extract us from this mess of our own making and listen to the inevitable lecture of, You said what in your blog!!!!!!.....Youre not safe to be let out alone, Ill deal with this problem now you understand why you need me so much.

I have girded my loins and am ready for the forthcoming tongue lashing, humiliation and to being reminded of how much PR and Publicists are needed.

So here goes, my first blog or second if you wish to be really pedantic but Im not, as the above is my disclaimer, this whole escapade into creative writing was not my idea. I am doing this under duress and only because I need the work!

Using Windows Operating System.

If you want to add a photo to a blog this is what you need to do :

Understand the 3 elements involved:

• Opening a up new Blog
• Locating the Icon for uploading the image
• Knowing where to find your image on your PC (recommeded on Desktop, unless you are happy with file and folder structures)

This image inserted below is a screenshot of the desktop - this is where I recommend you save your image - unless you are really comfortable with File/Folder structures for storing your images.

HERE ARE THE TWO SHORT VIDEOS TUTORIALS I HAVE MADE FOR MONA (& others who want to begin uploading photo's in their blogs): You can make this video fit the whole screen by clicking on the icon with 4 arrows, bottom left corner of the video panel. When finished press the ESC key on your keyboard to get back to the normal screen.

1. Shows you where to find the Icon which we need to use to upload the photo.

2. Shows you the steps you need to take again : use the Icon to upload a photo that is located on your desktop . Reinforcing the position of the image into the blog - the space around it in relation to the text.

I hope this has helped, drop me a line or add a comment below if there is anything still puzzling you about the procedure.

If you did find this useful and would like to see this Tutorial Help available as a regular feature on Americymru visit this page and vote for ParaTecVA's suggestion for a new Group here on the Americymru, GowerBizAngel and other techie-types, will do their very best to come to your assistance .

We really do want everyone on Americymru to be able to blog without having hurdles and barriers in their way. x

Trefin is a small village situated to the north of Pembrokeshire, between Fishguard and St David's. The old name, Trefaen, means 'village on a rock'.

Cerys Matthews, mother of Glenys Pearly-Felin and Johnny Tupelo Jones was married to Seth Riddle in Rehoboth Chapel, Trevine. Her parents live here and she went to Fishguard County Secondary for her 'A' levels.

Years ago, my daughters and I went to Cardiff to a Tom Jones concert where Cerys and Tom sang 'Baby it's Cold Outside' and the place was packed. Trefin is a long way from Nashville, I suppose, but who needs Nashville?

I like out of the wayplaces and Trefin is isolated. When I look at John Knapp Fisher's paintings of this part of Pembrokeshire I identify with theloneliness he captures. Stunted trees bend in the wind, one lime washed cottage is silhouetted against a distant coastline, rocks and boulders jut out of sparse grassy knolls.

There was aflour mill in Trefinfor more thanfive hundred years. Crwys, the poet and bard,wrote Wales's most famous poem about this mill.

Saturday night Harry stayed in a farmhouse nearby, an end of season get together for the lifeguards.

To reach the farmhouse it's necessary to negotiate a one way track, (few passing points) and trees overhang the lane making it dark. In winter, frost and snowmake travelling difficult if you live here.

Today I pondered all this and,you know what? I'drather be sitting in a little cafe in this part of the world, some farm vehicles passing by, than any glitzy shopping area you could think of, unless it's Cannes, of course.

Years agohiring fairs were the 'job centres' of their time, where servants could find work. (Thomas Hardy's 'The Mayor of Casterbridge'touches on this).

I've been looking at an account book dating from 1807, written by a Pembrokeshire farmer's wife.

Servants were hired from one Michaelmas to the next and, if unmarried,lived with the farmer and his family.

Many farmhouses were built in a style known as 'longhouse' and there was noupstairs passageway.

The bedrooms led into each other, so presumably those living at the far end of the house found it prudent to go to bed first, otherwise they had to pass through bedrooms already occupied, which might be a hazard. (I shall leave that to your imagination.)

A man servant was paid about 9 a year, a lad 5.10 shillingsanda maidabout 5. (No equal rights in those days. Hardly any rights at all, for anyone).

On one particular farm in Trevine (the Trevine made famous by the song: 'Nid yw'r felin heno'n malu, Yn Nhrefin ym min y mor), maids were givena pound of wool and a flannel apron as part of their wageswhen they began work.

5 a year did not stretch far and one entry shows that Jemima, a farm maid, needed a gown and a bonnet. She went to Fishguard, a distance of about ten miles, to buy the articles and they cost 2, whichwas almost halfher yearly earnings.

Jack James, a servant on this particular farm, had to pay eight and sixpence for a pair of shoes and 1/6 for his mother's candles.

Handkerchiefs cost between two shillings and two and sixpence, which approximates to forty hankies for a year's work.

Hard times, indeed.

Ten years have elapsed since that fateful Tuesday morning when four hijacked aircraft rocked the foundations of the United States and changed the world. My wife and I had arrived on holiday in Wisconsin the previous evening and were having a slow start to the day. Then all hell broke loose. The phone rang at 8 am (one hour behind New York) and the friend in whose home we were staying told us to switch on the TV. Immediately, a horrific scene of the North Tower of the World Trade Center in flames appeared on the screen and less than two minutes later we watched live as the second plane smashed into the South Tower.

At that stage of the unfolding drama, the TV commentary was almost incoherent as trained reporters were alternating between expressions of horror, incredulity and heroic attempts to be professional. After a couple of hours we went for a walk along State Street in Madison, the main shopping street. Every shop had a portable TV showing pictures of the unfolding drama and nobody was interested in anything else. For several days all TV schedules were abandoned in favour of hastily compiled 9/11-related programming. An abiding memory was the heartbreaking handwritten or computer produced fliers posted by relatives, frantic for news of their missing family members who had worked in the Twin Towers.

So many things touched us, like the totally disproportionate appreciation expressed by so many people when the Star Spangled Banner was played at Buckingham Palace during the Changing of the Guard ceremony. Bewildered Americans, shocked that such an atrocity could happen on US soil, were hugely comforted that others overseas shared their grief. We noticed that every single house we passed was flying the Stars and Stripes or had red, white and blue rosettes on their front door as an expression of identification with a common grief.

My most enduring memory is of the following Saturday when I was in Wisconsin Dells with an old friend, when we heard sirens approaching the main street. A convoy of fire engines was travelling at no more than 20 mph and the first engine had a simple laurel wreath on the front. Cars stopped and their drivers got out, people came out of shops and pedestrians quickly lined the roadside. As the vehicles passed there was spontaneous, sustained applause from everyone toward these fire-fighters who were standing proxy for their colleagues who died in New York.

Sadly, we have an enduring legacy from those events of ten years ago in the security restrictions we must endure when making journeys by air. More serious is the damage done between Western and Moslem societies. The actions of a tiny number of fanatical zealots have caused permanent damage which has resulted in a climate of suspicion, hate and ignorance, fuelling membership of the English Defence League and other right-wing hate groups. The best we can do is simply to see people as people - each equally significant, important and deserving to be treated with respect, dignity and justice. That will erode and undermine the strategies of the purveyors of hate. I'm proud to be living in Wales with its long history of tolerance and inclusion of other nationalities and cultures - an example to the world.

This year's choir at the North American Festival of Wales in Cleveland, Ohio, from both sides of the Menai Straits, Yns Mon, was Hogia'r Ddwylan . You can see them perform next in the US at St Jerome's Parish Church in Chicago, Illinois. See samples of their performance below:

If you would like to own some of their music, you can purchase their two albums, below:

About thirty five years ago we paid to have insulation injected into the walls of our then five year old house.

I no longer have the receipts but I remember itbeing an expensive job. We were toldwe would see a reduction in our heating bills and soonrecover the initial outlay.

True, once it was installed we usedfractionally less energy but, when we moved fifteen years later, we still had not recoveredthe cost. As a result of the insulating work the wall cracked, which meant paying forrepairs, eliminating any savings- (there weren'tany, as far asI could see.)

Out shopping recently, Iwasasked to answer some questions about global warming, solar panels, energy saving-eco-warrior, that type of thing.

Did I believe in the concept of global warming?

'To a point'. (Ihedged my bets and was not asked where the'point' was).

Did I believe insulation cuts down on heat loss?

'Yes'.

Would I pay to have someinstalled?

'Not if it is going to take one hundred years to recoup the cost, apart from the fact I won't be here then'.

Surprisingly, the interviewer agreed with me that it was an expensive business and took a long time to pay for itself.

We have been in our present abode for more than twenty years and we can havefree installation because of our age. We might have the roof done but never the walls again.

I've been looking atinformationthat says to insulate even a small housewith a top-of-the-range pack is going to cost an eye-popping 90,000. The house needs to be vacated for six months (hotel bills,rent-a-house, caravan, stay with nearest and dearest as long as they can bear you etc) and then, at the end of one hundred years of glorious anticipation, you will make your money back.

No-one is going to be idiot enoughto mortgage their life away for that.

Who arethese peoplewho thinkpackages like thiswill catch on?

Gives a whole new meaning to the words 'saving for the future'.

I've always loved poetry,the sound ofthe words, their rhythm, the images they conjure.

(When my grand-daughter, Maudie, was three, she learnt the word 'porcelain' and used to whisper it to herself. Her lips were rounded as she articulated the exploding 'por' sound. This made me realise, again, how important it is to read poetry aloud, as well as from the page).

Reading poetry with appreciation sets the standard forprose writing.

Poetry demonstratesthatrhythm and balanceis necessary for the sake of style, and this applies to prose as well.

The last sentence of my novel, 'Salt Blue',reads: 'My name floats through the air, like white light condensing on leaves, on flowers, like oil, floating on water'.

'Like white light' has an internal rhyme scheme, and the repetition of'like white light' is picked up in 'like oil'. Similarly we have 'on leaves, on flowers' and 'on water'.

I have used poetic techniques to write prose with the intentionof bringing a long novel to a slow close. The effect of using words such as 'white', 'water', 'leaves', 'flowers'and 'oil' is to createalmost a sacred space, the feeling of resolution. Stella knows and accepts who she is.She is secure in her identity and this is a blessing.

In ' Salt Blue ', too, I've conjured up colours to represent feelings:

'It is the reds, more than any other colour, that vibrate. Cochineal, verbena, magenta, carmine, fuchsia, flaunting crocosmia, Chinese lacquer red, Marilyn Monroe lipstick red and all the geranium combinations that lead to the deep red ox-blood, the same shade as our front doorstep . ..'

Not poetry, quite, but uplifting, creating a mood. Red, the colour of passion, of life, to betaken in small amounts or great, brimming mouthfuls, depending on your need.

One reviewer said 'Gillian Morgan is'nuts' on colour: mayonnaise yellow, slime lime green, Temple gold, Geisha Redand she makes them all up!'

Colourwrites the poetry, drenches the rainbow. Drink deeply.