Music - Band of the Week: Spoon

I cannot remember what first got me into Spoon. As far as I recollect it was around 2008 and I was in serious need of refreshing my music collection. 

Thanks to family friends I had gone through my angst-ridden youth phase much earlier than normal.

At my Year 5 talent contest in the Isle of White - it was a school trip there, we didn't go specifically for the talent contest - I lip-synced expertly to Conspiracy of One by The Offspring. Some handstands were involved somewhere as well. I won best music performance (my performing career has been downhill since then). 

Celebrity photo hacking - a sexual offence?

Jennifer Lawrence has broken her silence this week on the hack and subsequent leak of dozens of nude photos of herself.

The leak on August 31 was the biggest of its kind, involving dozens of celebrities - all female.

Speaking to Vanity Fair Miss Lawrence said, among other things: "It is not a scandal. It is a sex crime. It is a sexual violation. It’s disgusting."

I agree with her wholeheartedly and the scandal is all the more shocking for the blasé attitude assumed by some men. 

It was an invasion and theft of privacy that resulted in loss of control of her own body.

Fashion: Denim + review of Steady Eddie Jeans (Nudie)

Since I got my job at the Weekly News and had disposable income for the first time since I was 17, I'm slowly putting together a decent wardrobe, albeit with a few misteps along the way (I'm looking at you £100 splurge on ill-fitting Crew Clothing tops).

My denim game has been seriously lacking, with just two pairs of jeans. In fact for about eight months I only had one pair I really liked, which I bought in October last year, a pair of skinny Nudie raws from ASOS. £89 but the fit was not perfect. The waist, at 36in, needed taken in and they could do with being an inch or so longer. 

Apathy - a lost generation of voters

As someone who is not shy of one or two strong opinions there is nothing that irks me more, especially with regards to politics, than apathy. 

Yet I find myself a member of an apathetic generation. 

An apathetic generation with a seeming in-grown hatred of Tories for cuts, Labour for forcing the cuts on us and Lib Dems for getting in to bed with the Tories. A three-way tie of disdain which leads to so many my age and younger giving up on the political system. 

Numerous polls and research consistently tell us fewer young people than ever get involved in local, never mind national, politics. 

Anonymity - what of hiding behind a mask?

Blogging about blogging is something of a faux pas but I feel there is a debate to be had nonetheless...

In the past fortnight much has been made, in North Wales at least, about a blog called Thoughts of Oscar.

Operating for some years the author was anonymous to many if not all and was responsible for several interesting stories about North Wales politics, businesses and individuals.

Because the author was anonymous they had free reign to post whatever they liked regardless of the facts, often relying on simple hearsay or circumstantial evidence. "Oscar" posted some incredibly vitriolic remarks regarding not only my own paper - The North Wales Weekly News -  but also councillors, assembly members and business owners.

Shopping at 6'7"

This is something of a personal rant - what else is a blog good for? 

There are certain things about being more than two metres tall I can understand; ducking under doorways has become second nature to me, my feet almost always stick out of the bed, I'll struggle for legroom on public transport (planes being particularly bad) and some children will gawp at me.

Bamburgh beach circa 2012

But if one thing really winds me up more than anything else, it's clothes shopping.

Eight, maybe even nine times out of ten clothes shopping serves nothing more than to get me in a bad mood and have me f-ing and blinding about my height.

Scottish Independence - a torn issue

It has reached the stage now where one can hardly move for news about the imminent referendum on Scottish independence. You do not need me to say it is an historic vote not just for the Scottish but Welsh, English and the Northern Irish.

This is no mere General Election. The wall-to-wall-to-wall coverage is fully deserved.

The make up of the United Kingdom, something I am largely proud to call myself a citizen of, will change forever.