Back issues of art magazines – free (or very reasonably priced) to a good home

I’m having a long overdue clear out of old stock from back when I had an apart gallery. To start with, here’s my stock of old back issues of magazines.

It’d be nice to get something back for the amount I spent on them, but in most cases, I’m happy to give them away. If you are in Liverpool I can drop them off or you can come and get them, or if you are further afield I’ll stick them in the post if you cover the cost of postage.

Most are in almost mint condition, some with a few scuffs and marks to the front covers.

Let me know if anything takes your fancy.

Creative Review:
November 2006
December 2006
January 2007
February 2007
March 2007
April 2007 index
May 2007
June 2007 (2 copies)
July 2007 (2 copies)
August 2007 (2 copies)
September 2007 (2 copies)
October 2007 (2 copies)
November 2007 (2 copies)
December 2007 (2 copies)
January 2008 (2 copies)

Wallpaper:
January 2007
February 2007
March 2007
August 2007 (2 copies)
September 2007
October 2007 (2 copies)
November 2007
December 2007

Apollo:
January 2007
February 2007
October 2007 (2 copies)
November 2007 (2 copies)
December 2007
January 2008 (3 copies)
February 2008 (2 copies)

Art Review:
December 2006
February 2007
March 2007
April 2007 (2 copies)
October 2007 (2 copies)
November 2007 (2 copies)
December 2007 (2 copies)
January 2008

Artists & Illustrators:
April 2007
May 2007
June 2007
July 2007 (3 copies)
September 2007
November 2007 (3 copies)
December 2007 (3 copies)
January 2008 (3 copies)
February 2008 (4 copies)

Modern Painters:
December 2006/ January 2007
October 2007
November 2007 (4 copies)
December 2007/ January 2008 (4 copies)

The Art Newspaper:
December 2006
October 2007
December 2007
January 2008
February 2008

Objekt*:
Issue 36 (2 issues)
Issue 38 (2 issues)
Issue 39 (2 issues)
Issue 40 (2 issues)

Provider*:
Issue 4 – fearless
Issue 5 – hybrid
Issue 6 – trans

*these are the ones I’m reluctant to give away for free, as they are a bit more interesting than the average art mag. Let me know if you are interested in them, and I’m sure we can come to an agreement.

4th year med student – free to a good home (for a few weeks)

Hello,

Do you know of, or have a spare room in Liverpool, that might benefit from the addition of a medical student for a couple of weeks. She’s a girl so there’s no need to worry about rugby and beer kegs. And she’ll be renting a flat with a pal when her friend moves to Liverpool in a couple of weeks. In the meantime though, she could do with somewhere to live.

She gets up at 5:30 (quietly) to leave the house at 6:00 so she can get to her placement in Chester. Then she gets home at 8:00 in the evening. So, she needs somewhere quite central, or at least close to a Merseyrail station, and not too far out of town. Somewhere on the Chester branch of the Wirral line would be doable too.

Ideally, somewhere with a desk as well as a bed.

She’s lovely, tidy, and she can cook. She can also babysit on weekends if necessary. And if you have any lingering ailments that you’re worrying about, you can always get her to practise her diagnosing skills on you (that last bit is a joke).

I’ve put this on the internet, but obviously, I’m hoping that someone known to me, or someone known to someone I know might be able to help out. She comes highly recommended by me, so I’m looking for somewhere highly recommended for her to stay for a couple of weeks.

p.s. rent money is available, and under the rent a room scheme you can “receive a certain amount of tax-free ‘gross’ income (receipts before expenses) from renting furnished accommodation in your only or main home”. 

many thanks.

The many blogs of Miss B

Ok, so I counted them, and, including this one I have 6 ‘live’ blogs (and a couple that are there for when I get round to it).

As I see it, there are 2 approaches to blogging in a personal context:

(1) Stick everything in the same place, it’s all me, people can read what they want, why hide things off in other places? That way, you have lots of lovely fresh original content, and can develop a loyal readership who really get to know you, rather than forcing people to go and look in 6 places if they want to read your stuff.

(2) Clearly separate the content into themed blogs, most people are browsers, looking for the content they want, and most people aren’t going to be interested in *everything* that you have to say. Lots of niche blogs helps curate lots of niche audiences, some of which may begin to overlap with each other.

The problem with (1) is that there is a risk that it becomes unfocused and people leave because there isn’t enough of the stuff they are interested in. But then the problem with (2) is that you don’t get as many updates and people stop coming because there’s not enough new stuff full stop.

Decisions, decisions.

Here’s my 6 current blogs, maybe you can help me find a way through this tangled mess.

Ninehundredmonths – That’s this one, it’s a personal blog, and usually the place where I stick opinionated posts about current affairs, politics and other stuff that I feel a burning desire to put ‘out there’.

The Pudding Blog- A food blog, about pudding. That’s pretty much it. I like pudding

No Brown Bags – Another food blog, about packed lunches. This was supposed to be a way of helping me get into the habit of taking my lunch into work and therefore eating more healthily, and saving money. So far it only has a couple of posts on it, as I found blogging about packed lunches as well as actually taking them in quite hard work – particularly as my intention* was to do it every day.

Magpies and Mermaids – This was supposed to be a blog documenting the long and tortuous process of finding and buying a house, and then a more ‘house and home’ type of blog. But the process of housebuying has so far been so quick, smooth, and without pitfalls (touchwood) that there really hasn’t been much to say except “woohoo, we’re buying a house that we really like” – which makes for a dull blog. I could still do the ‘house and home’ thing once we’ve moved in though, maybe.

That’s What She Said- The first of my work/project blogs. I’m a bit of a communications junkie: I’m fascinated by the processes, by information, by language, nuance, media, memes, conversations, and all that sort of thing. And I may shortly be going back into that world professionally, in what capacity I don’t know yet (hence it’s gone a bit quiet over there), but that’s where all that sort of thing goes.

The Vintage Market – ooh, a Posterous, that makes a change. This is my second work/project related blog, where I’m doing the research and fact finding for my vintage project. It’s only intended to be temporary, until I am ready to launch the actual vintage thing, but it’s on the list for the sake of completeness.

Now I could merge a couple of them – the food blogs would be obvious candidates, as would this one and Magpies and Mermaids. But would someone who was interested in my new (currently hypothetical) curtains be interested in my occasional rants about why it’s utterly stupid to believe in The Law of Attraction? And is the healthy packed lunch demographic necessarily the same as the ‘sod it let’s have seconds’ pudding eating brigade?

But if I don’t merge some of them? What then? A blog is somewhat like a pet, or a pot plant – it needs tending and attention, and it needs to be fed on a regular basis. If I can’t be a responsible blog owner, should I seriously think about having them put down, or sent to the bloggypound (is there such a place – there really should be, shouldn’t there? Like the Battersea Blogs Home)?

My solution so far (such as it is) has been to link from here to The Pudding Blog (or wherever) whenever there has been something new up there, but is that enough? Is that really the most elegant solution there is?

What do you think, dear reader? Should I merge the blogs together? Dump some? Use this as a hub to link to all the others? Just keep them all separate? Can a blog survive on as little as 2 posts a month?

Let me know what you think in the comment box below – my blog is in your hands.

#30dayblog

*see paving on road to hell for example.

6 good reasons why you should be wearing vintage

One of the reasons that I want to get back into the swing of this blogging lark is that I’ve got a new project brewing. I don’t know quite what it’s going to turn into yet, but I can tell you that it focuses on the current (and hopefully ongoing) revival in vintage clothes, furniture, and other stuff.

So when day 2 of the blogging challenge told me to go and write a ‘top tips’ blogpost, I figured, I might as well start sharing some vintage love around.

So here, without further ado, are 6 reasons why you should consider adding some vintage style to your wardrobe.

1) It’s ‘on trend’.

Fashion has always looked backwards for inspiration, but in 2011, vintage is very much the new black. And whether we’re talking about boho chic, or rockabilly, there’s a vintage look to suit you. And at the moment, there’s plenty to choose from on the high street as well as in vintage shops, perfect if you want to dip your toes into things but are a bit nervous about dressing head to toe in second hand clothes.

2) It’s timeless.

Even when the fashion cycle moves on, you can still look good in vintage. As Yves Saint Laurent once said, fashion fades, but style is eternal. With vintage, you can use the benefit of hindsight to look and see which things have already stood the rest of time. You can break free from the shackles of the fickle fashion mags and use 80 years of quality design to create your own personal style.

3) It has history.

We live in an era of disposable consumption where clothes are bought, worn and discarded all in the space of a couple of weeks – but that’s not how things used to be. People had less, and they had it for longer. Vintage items in good condition today are in such good shape because they have been looked after by someone for the past 30 or 40 years. It may have been a treasured item, or maybe something someone saved up for. Whatever, you can be sure it wasn’t shipped across the globe in a container with 10,000 identical items.

4) It’s green.

We create enough waste already, and choosing something new over something old just adds to the landfill (especially if the new thing falls apart in a couple of months and gets thrown away too). Wearing vintage not only slows down the amount of rubbish we produce, but if you start to get used to things not being brand new and shiny, you may find yourself opting for fewer shiny things in other areas if your life too.

5) It’s great value for money.

I’m not just talking about things being cheap, although some of it is, indeed, cheap, but about value for money. I have a beautifully tailored, green wool, 50′s Jaeger suit that I got online for £60, and some utterly gorgeous evening dresses that set me back no more than £40-£50 each. Even if I could find such items new in the shops, I’d be paying 3 or 4 times the price for that sort of quality. But you don’t have to spend anywhere near that much, with vintage shops often having sales, or bargain rails where you can pick up all sorts of things for under £20.

Then, once you’ve got the bug, and the knack, regular trips to charity shops, jumble sales, and car boot sales can uncover some real treasures, sometimes for little more than than pennies.

6) It’s individual.

If you’re the sort of person who worries about turning up to a party and seeing someone else in the same outfit, then vintage is definitely something you should consider. It won’t guarantee that you’ll never see anyone in the same thing (unless you’re buying vintage *and* handmade of course), but it reduces the chances to almost zero.

And then of course, when someone asks where you got that amazing hat/dress/suit/bag/scarf, in the hopes of going and getting one themselves, you can smile sweetly and say “It’s vintage, darling”.

#30dayblog

Scouting for boys, Washing up for girls

So, the big news of the day is apparently that there are more girls than boys joining the Scouts, which got me thinking back to my days in the Brownies, back when only ‘big girls’ (i.e. ones over the age of 15) were allowed to join the Scouts.

My memories of the Brownies are fairly sketchy to be honest. Aside from the fact that it feels like it was a geological age ago, I was a bit of a sporadic attender. I remember that the subs were 20p a week, I remember the oath and the song (“we’re brownie guides, we’re brownie guides, we’re here to do our best…”), but mostly I remember that The Brownie Guide Handbook contained instructions on how to do the washing up properly.

Obviously, I’ve got nothing against doing the washing up (I have really) but as a suggested activity for girls between the ages of 7 and 10, that does rather set the tone doesn’t it?

Ok, so it was the 80′s, and no doubt times have changed since then, and I’m sure that the new handbook is a little less ‘domestically orientated’, but when I was a kid, one of my favourite books was the Spy’s Guidebook, which taught me how to leave secret codes for people, and create a mini spy kit in a matchbox. We lived by a park and a river where we used to swing on trees and nearly drown each summer, and more than once we climbed on the hay bales in the fields over the way to watch the sun set in the evenings. Maybe if there had been more of that sort of thing, and less advice on how to be mother’s little helper, I would have turned up to Brownies more often.

#30dayblog

Let’s sort this lot out eh?

At the last count, I had about 4 blogs floating around the interwebs, most of which haven’t been updated for aaaaages, this makes me a bad blogger (slaps own wrist, looks contrite at self in mirror). This really needs to be rectified, either by merging them all together, or by sorting out some sort or schedule/reminder so that I don’t neglect them all for too long.

In the meantime, I’m going to focus on ninehundredmonths as my main personal blog, and to get me back in the habit of regular posting I’ve signed up to the 30 day blogging challenge from Nikki Pilkington, SEO expert and all-round good sort.

I’ve been blogging on and off for over 5 years now, but I’ve been majorly slack since The Artfinder’s Blog went to the great blogroll in the sky (long story), so I’m hoping that the 30 day challenge will be able to give me a kick up the digital bottom and offer some new tips and advice too.

It’s free by the way, so if you have a blog, or you want to blog, why not sign up for the challenge yourself? What could go wrong?

A quick post on AV and the idea that it gives some people more than one vote

The usually very good David Allen Green has a blog on the Spectator New Statesman today about AV where he argues that the main problem with it is that it gives some people more than one vote. This argument is usually accompanied by scaremongering with suggestions that voters for the minority fringe parties like the BNP will have undue power and influence – “Do you want the  result of the election to rest on the votes of BNP supporters? Well do you?” Ooooh it’s the bogeyman.

The thing is, as I see it, with AV, everyone gets more than one vote, you, me, the people who vote for the comedy candidates, everyone. The only difference is that as the process goes on, some people’s votes change.

Here’s how it works. You have 5 parties standing candidates – we’ll call them A, B, C, D and E. And for ease of explanation we’ll say that as well as being listed in alphabetical order, they are also in order of popularity.

If, after the first round of voting, no candidate has more than 50% of the votes then, essentially, the election is run again, but without the least popular candidate, in this case, E.

So, in an election between A, B, C, and D, it is assumed that if you voted for A, B, C, or D last round, you’ll vote for them this round – they are, after all, your first choice. If, however, you voted for E then your second choice vote is counted, because you can’t vote for your first choice any more. So, everyone gets to vote, again, but some people’s vote changes (unless they choose only to put a first choice down, which they are entitled to).

If, still, no candidate has a majority, then the process is repeated. Everyone’s votes are counted again, but if you voted for the least popular candidate then you have to vote for your second choice (or third, if you previously voted E), or abstain.

If we had to go to the ballot box after every round, it would be clear that no-one gets more votes than anyone else. The only reason it feels like some people get more votes than others is because some people can’t vote for their first or second choice in the later rounds.

I’ve been fairly sure that I was going to vote Yes to AV, and I was looking forward to reading DAG’s criticism of it, in case he’d seen something in AV that I hadn’t considered, which would change my mind. I’ll be honest, if the worst criticism is that I can go all my voting in one go instead of having to have a week of visits to the polling booth for multiple votes, then I’m sticking with my initial decision.

Yes to AV – it’s not perfect, but then, what is?