flood

So - interesting week for the Rees's.
We're up in Scotland on holiday and meantime, the photo on the left shows you what's been happening on our street. The white house you can see on the right hand side is ours.
So - that's going to be fun to go back to on Saturday!
Thankfully, we have fantastic friends nearby who have been amazing. They have keys for our place and have been in and moved most of our stuff upstairs and even got some of the neighbours to help them put our sofa up on breeze blocks. By all accounts the community spirit has been amazing (and we're gutted we've missed out on that). Our mates went to bed slightly pissed the other night cos they'd been invited into so many houses for a glass of wine!
So - we've been trying to have a holiday up here while listening to the news reports and getting updates from our friends. It's not easy to relax - especially when you switch on the TV to find a Top Gear special on BBC2 where Jeremy Clarkson sets out to prove it's possible to drive to the North Pole! Great timing mate - my house is underwater, due undoubtedly in part to global warming and you're driving across the polar ice caps. Nice one! Tosser.
Is it time to start rounding up two of each species?
Thankfully it sounds like the levels are starting to drop.

Live Earth

Well then, Live Earth. I have to say I was disappointed.
It made me depressed at the lack of genuine musical talent that there is out there (although I guess those with that kind of talent were probably not 'household names' and therefore weren't gonna get invited).
I know that focusing on the music is kinda missing the point but some of it was soooo dire - I mean...The Pussycat Dolls?!! A bunch of go-go dancers pretending to be a band. Watching them made me think that the end of civilisation as we know it wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing.

And I loved the way that so many of the bands desperately hunted through their back catalogue to try and find a song or two that had some sort of connection with the environment. Unfortunately, for the aforementioned Pussycat Dolls that means 'Don't you wish your girlfriend was HOT like me?' - at least it had the word hot in the title.

Having said all that I do genuinely like Al Gore. And he did make a point of saying that these concerts were only the beginning of a 2 year programme to change popular perception (apparently more than half the people in the UK, let alone the US, still don't believe human beings are contributing to climate change). God bless him and the work he is doing.

It's easy to be cynical about these things. Chris Rock, the American comedian, when interviewed by (the very annoying) Jonathan Ross, said that he believed Live Earth would solve the problem of climate change in the same way that Live Aid solved the problem of world hunger. Easy to be cynical, harder to remain positive and try to make a positive contribution. Gore has to be respected for that.

And anything involving a reformed Spinal Tap can't be all bad. Their new single 'Warmer than Hell' (in which they ponder the relative temperatures of hell and a climate changed earth and muse on which one Satan would enjoy more) was possibly the musical highlight of the day.

Sister Corita

When we were in St Ives a few weeks ago we went to the Tate - like you do. There was a great exhibition on at the time (it's still on) called 'If Everybody had an Ocean' based on the life and music of Brian Wilson from the Beach Boys.
Anyway, one of the artists whose work was featured in the exhibition was a new one on me - Sister Corita Kent. She was a Catholic nun and quite an extraordinary graphic artist who was quite prominent in the 60's counter-culture. Someone said that she did for bread and wine what Andy Warhol did for Campbell's tinned soup. I was quite taken with the pieces of hers that were in the exhibition and particularly with the way that her faith, art, and the counterculture blended to produce some striking results. For example, how's this for an altar piece:

or this....and here are some of the nun's from Sister Corita's community in production...


Anyway, if this flips your widget you can find out more about Sister Corita here or purchase an art book with lots of her stuff in on Amazon.