Blogs

Ever mindful of our duty to entertain our loyal readers and members, tonight we bring you the amazing iOS6 Maps!!! Yes folks the worst digital cartography of all time has been unveiled by the wizards of Cupertino. Many hilarious samples have already been posted to this blog:-

http://theamazingios6maps.tumblr.com/page/3

Please take a look and once you've picked yourself up off the floor let us know which cartographic masterpiece is your personal favourite Here are some of mine:-

1. 

   Downtown Houstons newest filling stations on the skyline rooftops! (Those are corporate headquarters, not gas stations).

if all of downtown indianapolis is flat, then whats casting all those shadows?

Plenty more where those came from

Reproduced with kind permission from David Western's Portland Lovespoon Blog

I've got a confession to make. For the last month Laura and I have been having a private heart attack as our West Coast Eisteddfod lovespoon negotiated its way through the border/customs process of international mailing. Owing to poor old Laura getting some completely duff information from US Postal, the spoon wound up being tremendously overinsured and then triggered a customs charge of nearly 200 dollars at the border!! Since neither she or I could pony up that kind of dough and since the whole idea of the lovespoon is to raise funds rather than spend them, the only option left was to send it back to customs and appeal the charge. Needless to say, it was a long, nerve-wracking ride for the pair of us and we were getting fairly certain the project would not be happening this year after all.

BUT, Canada Customs came through with an expedited processing and we are now back in business!

I'm really excited to get going with some carving of my own, but before I do, I have to quickly blog and let everyone know how BEAUTIFUL this thing is so far!! Laura has done a lovely job and the 4 balls rolling in their organic cage look fabulous. It's got the trademark Jenkins Lovespoons delicacy and elegance and is wonderfully 'touchable'. Whoever wins this thing is going to be over the moon... it is easily our best spoon so far and its not even done yet!!!

So, to keep on track for the Eisteddfod, I will be getting my head down and my backside up for the next few days. I'm hoping I can make good headway and keep the project on track for the big day in October......not so very far away now!!

If you're wondering what all the tape and plywood 'crutch' is all about, there's no breaks or anything, I just want to protect Laura's delicate work while I am bashing away on the scroll saw. I think I would have an aneurism if I managed to break it after all we have been through...so for the next little while it will be behind scaffolding!!ven if you could give a tinker's damn about Eisteddfods or anything Welsh, Laura and I both hope you'll fall in love with our lovespoon and want to have it (or even better, you'll want it to give to your sweetie)

Please consider donating a couple of bucks to the West Coast Eisteddfod and you could win this lovely, lovely spoon!!

One of the most incredible boxers, if not athletes that Wales has ever produced is Fred 'Welsh' who came from Pontypridd.

One of the first sporting superstars of his age, Freddie is something of a curiosity. His career began in the gyms of Philadephia, where he took on some of the best that the lightweight division had to offer. Welsh only entered the ring after travelling as a hobo, in search of work throughout the US. A need to put food in his grumbling stomach forced him between the ropes for a paltry purse so that he could buy a slice of pie and a cup of coffee.

He remains an enigma. Scholar, health guru, businessman and dandy, he reached the top of his game in 1914 after taking the world lightweight title. As a quick thinker with a great line for any pressman, able to talk authoratively on a number of subjects from poetry through to philosophy or the best diet for the average working joe to improve his health, the dapper Pontypriddian had a style that set him apart from the ringmen of his time. Some have claimed that it was Welsh that was the model for Jay Gatsby in F.Scott's Fitzgerald's 'The Great Gatsby'.

Came across a great little documentary on Freddie's life and acheivements on youtube. His scrapbooks are now held in the National Library at Aberystwyth. Well worth a look.

Sadly there is no statue to Freddie at his hometown of Pontypridd, even though he put the town on the world map more than any man before or since.

A statue was suggested by his biographer Gareth Harris (Freddie Welsh - World Champion Boxer, Pontypridd Legend - Coalopolis Publishing) a number of years ago, and was booted about by a few politicians eager to secure column inches, but nothing came of it.

Time for Pontypriddians to stand up and demand recognition for a great world champion.

"A new band we love. Bloody lush!" -Lauren Laverne, BBC 6music

Amid wildly enthusiastic early reviews, Anglo-Welsh-American psych-pop-rockers Howl Griff mark the release of their new album with a free-entry launch party in London this Thursday (20th Sept) and an exclusive offer of a free download from the new set.

The title track to the 'Fragile Diamond' album was immediately made BBC Radio Wales' Single of the Week, and early online album reviews have been uniformly positive. Louder Than War's Adrian Bloxham says "They give us utterly catchy rock, they give us beautiful harmony-drenched pop Trust me on this, you should hear this band," while Echoes and Dust's Martyn Coppack lauds "a cornucopia of different styles that straddles boundaries - it's a crime that songs like this don't top the charts any more".

Album reviews: http://howlgriff.com/press.html

The album will be launched on Thu 20th Sept with a free-entry gig at The Albany, Gt Portland St W1W. Supported by 6music-approved Emily C Smith, the band will play two sets one at 6.30pm for the post-work crowd, and a fuller set at 9.15pm.

The band will also play in Cardiff on Sunday 23rd Sept, with gigs in Wrexham and Manchester to follow in October.

Gigs: http://www.howlgriff.com/gigs.html

Howl Griff give fans a free-download song every month, and as a special launch-fever bonus they're allowing the first 50 requests to download the Fragile Diamond album's epic closing track, Everything, free of charge. See the link for details.

Freebies: http://www.howlgriff.com/freemp3s.html

If you're not quick enough to download it free, not all is lost: you can listen on the link below, and industry types can tap up the band's PR Ffion Davies ( ffion@altpr.co.uk ) or TV/radio plugger Ron McCreight ( ronmccreight@btinternet.com

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Listen to the album: http://www.howlgriff.com/music/howl-griff-fragile.html

That's it - thanks for listening, and enjoy!

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HOWL GRIFF
Website: http://www.HowlGriff.com
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/HowlGriff
Twitter: http://twitter.com/HowlGriff
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/HowlGriffBand
MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/HowlGriff
Bandcamp (downloads): http://howlgriff.bandcamp.com/
Merchandise: http://howlgriffshop.spreadshirt.net

We are: Hywel Griffiths, Nick Moore,
Gary Parkinson, Steve Kennedy and you

I decided one of my hobbies was going to be to collect work by Rhys Henry Hughes, because I love to read him and he's been very hard to find, some of his books are totally out of print and others outrageously expensive on Amazon but I have time to search and to be patient....

I still want to own them hard copy but right now on smashwords.com , you can read lots of Rhys Hughes ebooks at unbelievably low prices.

Rhys Hughes writes brilliant, mischievously whimsical stories, mostly fantasy and science fiction (everything I've read so far, at least).

One I've always wanted to read but could never find was Fables of Rhysop . The short description onSmashwords: " Tired of being given good advice in fables and parables by wise men, sages and gurus? Why not try Rhysop's Fables instead, a set of 150 amoral and irresponsible fables? There are no messages here telling you how best to live your life. That kind of thing is entirely up to you! The philosophy of Rhysop's Fables is that there are no answers to life because life is not a question..."

And continued on Smashwords in Rhysop's Return , " More unhelpful and irresponsible fables from the mind that brought you Rhysop's Fables... Join an absurd host of aardvarks, ghosts, pirates, flying jellyfish, hospitals made of lemon jelly, yetis, rhino cops, slobbery kisses and many more entities in the continuing quest to learn absolutely nothing truthful about life or why we are here! Includes a bonus fable in verse at the end! "

An interesting looking title on this page is The Mermaid Variations , which I'd never heard of and which sounds very interesting and is probably great: "The adventures of an exceptional mermaid as she travels from a carnival in tropical Brazil to a country where it never stops raining, Wales; and from there to the moon, where the lunar mermaids are the wrong way around. A magical mystical miniature trilogy for adults who still believe in whimsy, romance and fables!"

Smashwords is very user friendly, you can read things from Smashwords on your computer on Mac, PC or Linux and on ereaders likeKindle (and Kindle Fire) iPhone/iPod Touch, B&N nook, Sony Reader and Kobo Reader.

If you prefer hard copy (and I do but I also have a kindle, nothing like holding an actual book in your own two hands), try The Truth Spinner: The Complete Adventures of Castor Jenkins , about an imaginative guy from Wales who tells the best lies, ever. Castor Jenkins is the narrator of the best story in Fast Ships, Black Sails , a collection of pirate stories by multiple authors.

I don't know where this Rhys Hughes quote comes from, I stole it shamelessly from a review on The Truth Spinner Amazon page, but I love it: " The worst kind of fib is the true one, especially if it's true only because the teller is unaware of its truth; the second worst kind is the one where both fibber and believer are in collusion. That kind has a name. Fiction."

And Ceri's very fun interview with Rhys Hughes here .

Many thanks to Peter Thabit Jones for adjudicating the West Coast Eisteddfod Online Poetry Competition for the fourth consecutive year. The results are in and will be announced publicly at the WCE in Portland on October 13th. The winner will receive a $150 cash prize and the winning entry will be published in the prestigious Seventh Quarry international poetry magazine

If you haven't already, please check out the excellent entries to this years competition here:- West Coast Eisteddfod 2012 Online Poetry Competition

Feel free to nominate and comment on your favourites if you wish. See if you can second guess the judges choice

The 2013 Online Poetry Competition Group will be posted in late October ( after the WCE ) . If you missed the deadline for 2012 please wait until then to post and do so in the 2013 group. We will be making several announcements about next years online comps shortly.

Diolch

Ceri

Reproduced with kind permission from David Western's Portland Lovespoon Blog
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We're just waiting for our lovespoon to clear Canada Customs. As soon as it does, I will resume work on it and finish off the beautiful Tree of Life design so graciously contributed by Jen Delyth. As with all things bureaucratic, we don't really know how long a wait we'll have, so in the meantime we'll carry on posting as if nothing's happening....which, alas, may well be the case. I don't even have any photos of it to post, so if you want to see how it currently stands, you'll have to scroll back a couple of posts to the lovely one Laura did showing all the work she has currently undertaken.

The picture I've included today is of a lovely walnut spoon carved in Celtic style and taken from an old panel of wood which was rescued from a dumpster by a friend of mine. The panels are probably around 200 years old (or more) and came from an old bar which had been used on a ship and in an Irish pub....if this piece of wood could talk, it would, no doubt, have a lovely accent and would be full of the blarney!

This particular design combines several examples of Celtic art extending over a time range of about 2-3 thousand years. Although we are most familiar with the insular style of monastic Britain (circa 500 ad -800 ad), there is a rich and varied history of lovely Celtic art which is hardly known. With the theme of this year's West Coast Eisteddfod lovespoon being, "Celebrate your Roots"...this spoon certainly sums up the Celtic pride that we Welsh and our fellow Celtic cousins can feel in our long and varied history.

The West Coast Eisteddfod gives us a chance to highlight our Welsh pride and to bring some aspects of our history and culture to the community. Lovespoon carving is certainly one of those Welshy 'things' that we can feel pretty good about and it gives Laura and I a LOT of pleasure and pride to see our combined efforts result in a beautiful spoon which a lucky draw winner can enjoy for many, many years.

If you haven't already donated to the West Coast Eisteddfod, please consider doing so. Every dollar you donate (in denominations large or small) equals a chance to win...so the more the merrier! We're confident this year's spoon will be far and away the best one yet and will represent exceptional value!!

Please support our cultural efforts and help the Welsh presence within North America!