A very kind person commissioned Pencilsqueezer to do a painting for me. Peter and I then had a chat, I mentioned his pictures I’d particularly liked from his website http://pencilsqueezerartwork.weebly.com/ and we discussed colour preferences but otherwise I left it up to his excellent judgement. Sometime later he emailed me the finished image below named Flower Bomb. I was dazzled by it, a glorious radiating sunburst of flowers, big and tiny, and it had purple in it too! This week it arrived, even better in the flesh with the details and intricacy and is now hanging in my hall. Every time I pass it, it gladdens my heart and I will always treasure it. So if you too would like a life-enhancing work of art, look no further than Pencilsqueezer.

http://i284.photobucket.com/albums/ll19/c48lina/PeterPic%202_zps2jrbfsg6.jpg

Reading the Civilian thread has been very entertaining but I have to admit to my own civilian moments and wonder if others have had them too. The worst of them was when I went to a local folk club. I got talking to one of the organizers and I was enthusing about a regular local House Concert. They had very talented artists but none that anyone would have heard of, even if they had been the most dedicated Word reader. She told me they had great musicians who played at their club often including Martin Carthy and Martin Simpson. She was obviously expecting a big reaction from me but I must have looked at her blankly as I had barely heard of them and thought they were run-of-the-mill minor folk artists. While not on quite on a par with rocking up at the Globe theatre and not knowing who Shakespeare was, this was still very bad and I cringe at the memory.

Also I presumed Bon Iver rhymed with skiver rather than fever for a long time. Anyone care to share their faux pas?

Listening to the album Fancy by Bobbie Gentry I came across her cover of Leon Russell’s Delta Lady, only in her case she made it Delta Man and it made me think of Reverse Gender Covers and how successful they are, especially where Man Woman Girl or Boy are in the title or the gender is central to the lyrics. Bobbie’s is a fine attempt but the problem lies in the title – it needs a two syllable word to match ‘lady’ for it to work properly. If she was Scottish she could sing Delta Laddie I suppose! I think a better alternative would be Delta Baby as at least it would scan right. I don’t know what the legalities of changing someone elses lyrics are though. So what other gender swapping covers are there and how well do they work?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oW_Njk3GEu8

I have just got a new Revival Istream Roberts Internet Radio with my birthday money. And it has DAB so I can listen to 6Music for the first time. So where to start with this world of radio at my fingertips? I would be grateful for any recommendations of interesting stations. They could be either music or speech – just a few provisos, nothing too noisy/fast tempo/dance/hip-hop and no free-form jazz. Other than that I am up for anything.