Sep 11
So it would seem, according to the learned judging panel behind the UK’s first ever “City of Culture” competition. 29 locations – including “The Countryside” are nominated.
Not one of them is in Wales. The closest you get is Chester, which is very un-Welsh.
Announcing the list, Ben Bradshaw, Culture Secretary, said that it proves “that cultural life most definitely does not begin and end within the M25″. It seems to end on the Welsh borders, according to the committee…
Sep 25
Maybe this is where my slight fear of Saturday nights started, after I spent five years living in Cardiff City Centre and seeing sights like this most Saturday nights. And Friday nights. And Wednesday nights, for that matter. And, of course, hearing teenagers sobbing and arguing outside my bedroom window at 2am. But I did kinda like it, in the sense there was always life outside my window. So why go any further?
These pics are part of a gallery that a photography student is having exhibited in London. One of my flatmates used to also take random pics of drunk people on the streets of Cardiff. Then he graduated to video – and there’s a classic one where he’s filming two very drunk women arguing with a bouncer, and then they slowly turn to camera and shout “WHAT THE F**K DO YOU THINK YOU’RE LOOKING AT?”
Also covered in BBC News Wales
Somehow, I’ve managed to be the winner of the Best Media Blog and the Best Eclectic Blog in the Welsh Blog Awards.
However, given I only got 22 votes in the first category and 8 votes in the second category, I won’t be quitting my day job *just* yet.
But *sob sob* thank you all for voting. I’d like to thank my Agent, the Academy, my wonderful friends and family without whom none of this would be possible. I’m so grateful for all your support. Now I’m going to crack open the cocaine and party like it’s 1974!
False alarm! Alas, it appears that the pages I thought were the results of the vote were merely the results of the votes to decide which blogs go through to the final. Damn.
I didn’t even know there was a Welsh Blog Awards, and I didn’t even know I was in the nominations - and yet, somehow, you can theoretically vote for me as:
- Best Media Blog
- Best Specialist Blog
- Best Eclectic Blog
- Best Looking Blog (They have *got* to be kidding!!!)
Like Woody Allen, my funny days are probably behind me, but please feel free to vote for me or The Gospel According to Rhys. I’ll be sure to thank you in my acceptance speech.
There’s an election today, to elect members to what is effectively the government of Wales. And finally, after 20-odd years of following politics and voting, I happen to live in a marginal constituency “with bells on” (along with Rhys), where the votes actually count.
I’ve always imagined that during election times, marginal constituencies become a hive of political activity, with people distributing leaflets and begging for your vote left, right and centre. But I’ve been in Llandudno and Colwyn Bay – the two main town centres – over the last couple of days and seen pretty much nothing going on. The odd poster in a shop window or farm (it’s always Plaid Cymru posters in farm fields, oddly), and the odd leaflet coming through our door. Including one from the far-right British National Party proclaiming how proud they are to retain Britain’s heritage – but neglecting to print their leaflet in Welsh. Despite, y’know, being in Wales.
The only “active” campaigning I’ve seen were people from the Liberal Democrats and the UKIP standing in Colwyn Bay high street, looking at no-one and talking to each other instead of trying to get people’s votes. And all this on a glorious sunshiney day.
The best the Welsh Conservatives have managed – aside from choosing an fundamentalist Christian who may consider homosexuality to be a sin – to fight for the seat next door – was to take out a full-page colour advert on the back of the local newspaper attacking everyone else. Unfortunately, a printing error meant the whole advert was rather blurred so you couldn’t make out much of the text. (Insert joke here) At least Labour’s full-page advert said something about making sure all hospitals would remain open – which seems a bit of a joke considering they’re running the Welsh government as it is.
No-one around me has talked about the election – hell, as far as I know, no-one around me is going to vote (save for Miss R). Upon some prompting, we had a 20-minute chat about politics in the office – about how the fringe parties are going to pick up a lot of votes because mainstream politics has become all too same-y – but even then, no-one said they were going to vote.
Ah well. I’ll probably vote – and I’ll definitely be one of those sad geeks watching the news coverage, wishing I was at BBC Wales HQ again and probably live-blogging some bits of it with some fellow Welsh bloggers. Assuming there’s something interesting to say. Because if the politicans can’t be bothered to make a major fight over a marginal constituency like Aberconwy, what hope is there for interesting politics?
I have two claims to fame regarding myself and new Doctor Who head honcho Russell T. Davies:
1. During a fire alarm, I had to walk behind him to the fire exit. He’s a very very tall man. (And no, I didn’t approach him. Being at work I’m sure the last thing he needed was a fanboy going on about Doctor Who and all that)
2. Like him, I was often to be found on a Friday night on the train leaving Cardiff for Manchester – although I never bumped into him on said train, and usually had to get off at Crewe.
However, it seems that Russell never liked the train journey. In this Telegraph interview, he described the journey as “Four hours of hell. It’s like Calcutta – sitting on a box of chickens with peasants hanging from the windows outside.”
This strikes me as rather strange, since it’s actually quite a pleasant rail journey. A peaceful four hours riding up the Welsh countryside, with none of the usual hassles of train journeys (changing trains, drunken hooligans) to worry about. Once the masses of commuters get off at Newport, it’s a very relaxing ride in which you can read books, play silly games, watch downloaded TV on your laptop, whatever. And I would have thought that busy man that he is, he’d relish the chance to spend three to four hours by himself catching up on the world without having the hassles of mobile phone coverage.
Ahh, train travel. I do rather miss it these days.
Just a quick note to say congratulations to worldmegan, a mezzo-soprano and digital mate who came second in her Eisteddfod competition, at her first try over here in the homeland. Woo-hoo!
In the meantime, I shall continue terrifying the North Wales coast with my harmonious renditions of Calon Lan and Wrth ddychwel tuag adref, complete with Germanic thigh-slapping. No wonder it’s been raining lately!
May 22
Ever since I had to spend the summer of 2000 avidly watching and writing about Big Brother 1 (the one with Anna the lesbian nun, Nick the evil Brit and Craig the dumb-but-handsome plumber) for work purposes (oh that glamorous summer), I’ve mostly avoided Big Brother. Especially since it stopped becoming a vaguely interesting look at a cross-section of the British population and became a freak show.
However, this year, interest seems to have really peaked all around me. People keep sneaking into the office with the big TV to watch Big Brother 2006 – because there are two Welsh-language-speaking contestants on it. Although the Welsh gossip network has already informed me that Glyn is actually a nice, quiet and shy boy in real life – then again, I’m not too sure flamboyance would do you much good in Blaenau Ffestiniog.
In a hugely controversial move (well, controversial if you’re in Wales – the rest of the UK couldn’t give a monkeys I’d imagine), Big Brother stopped the two of them from speaking in Welsh (their natural language) to each other.
So there was I, quietly shaking my head at people trooping in and out of the big TV-office just because there happened to be two Welsh-language-speakers on Big Brother. While secretly hating Lea – a former 22-stone woman who’s had multiple plastic surgery, apparently has the biggest boobs in the UK and says she hates fat people.
Then I get home for the weekend, where my sisters gleefully inform me that, of all things, a British-Chinese woman is a Big Brother contestant.
Bloody hell. Now this is progress. I’ve got no idea what she’s like – whether she’s a future Jane Goodey or a future Anna, but by Jove I’ll have to follow her progress, and probably vote for her to stay each time. If I ever find the time. 14 days till I have to move all my worldly belongings into a storage room and a front room!
Listening to the news on local station Red Dragon FM this morning, what was the top story?
None of those things. The top story on the 9am bulletin from Red Dragon FM was about the rise in teenagers going to self-tanning salons. Shock, horror.
You can argue it was an “exclusive” news story, but it’s hardly earth-shattering news. Unless you are only concerned about South Wales teenagers.
Oh, and I met Tom Cruise. But more on that tomorrow.
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