Carmarthen Library Book Fair, 9 St Peter’s St, Carmarthen SA31 1LN

if you are in the Carmarthen area on Saturday 21^st October, pop in and say hello as I shall be there from 11-1.00pm at their Book Fair. 

I shall have four of the current titles there for you to see (and buy of course!), and I am happy to answer questions about writing and publishing non-fiction. The next Book Fair is December 4th in Llandeilo.

We also have gift vouchers - great option for gifts for yourself or someone else

Fascinating exhibition at Aberystwyth Arts Centre, on until 16^th January 2018, “Hanes – Tales, Stories, Legends and Myths” including works by David Hockney, Ceri Richards, and Lea Sautin. I love the work by Lea Sautin and, of course, the etchings by David Hockney. You can find the gallery easily if you look out for the giant at the doorway! Great job by curator Steffan Jones-Hughes

Feathers Royal Hotel, Alban Square, Aberaeron, SA46 0AQ

We have eaten in the restaurant here before, but have to say this was an exceptional meal. Grilled fish of the day was sea bass, and at £13.95 was really good value. It was melt-in-the-mouth with light lemony touch and beautifully presented. Keeping to the fish theme, salmon and asparagus was also excellent. Generally, salmon is pretty good wherever you go, but this was perfectly cooked, moist but cooked through with a very tasty surface and at £14.95 a great choice.

We felt obliged to try the dessert menu, of course, all at £6.75. The crème brulee was soft and squishy, and sticky toffee pudding with caramel sauce was much lighter in texture than it looked. The house Sauvignon Blanc £16.75 was a good choice with all the courses, which is not always the case with both sweet and fish dishes, so it was an excellent evening out at a small local restaurant in our beautiful harbor town.

Perpignan, South of France

Visiting my brother and his partner in Perpignan, this was our first trip to the region so everything was new to us. It is a fascinating town, lots of lovely little alleys, restaurants and shops in the old part near the castle, and a very pleasant walk along the river that runs through the centre of town. We didn’t have time to try out the public transport on this trip, but the train and bus route maps show an extensive system to go further into France or into northern Spain.

There are several hotels near the modern rail station, although the main street leading to the station is a bit run-down. We stayed at Appart-City on B&B basis, quite basic accommodation which you service yourself (putting rubbish out etc) and simple continental breakfast plus (packet) scrambled egg and some form of sausage. However, there are some great restaurants in the town so lots of choice for eating out.

We loved Grand Café de la Bourse in the castle square (2 Place de la Loge, 66000 Perpignan) where we had fillet of beef and French fries on the last evening plus a bottle of local red wine, all for €43.80 so a great deal.

Perpignan airport is very small so easy to go to/from. We had a package with lastminute.com so flights were with Air France. Great airline but you really do not want to go via Paris Charles de Gaulle, go across Paris by Le Bus to change for Paris Orly for internal flight to anywhere in France. You soon lose the will to live – think at least twice as big as Heathrow, finding the bus (which is not too bad as the signs are quite clear and bus staff very helpful) then going around several terminals before it leaves the airport half an hour later. A member of staff actually took us to the front of the queue of thousands waiting to get through passport control otherwise we would not have got our connection. If you have to go this route, allow at least 4-5 hours transfer time on the way there – not so bad on way back as it is easier to get Le Bus at Orly airport. We then found out we could have had a direct flight with Ryanair from Stansted to Perpignan…

One Man, Two Guvnors 13/10/17 Aberystwyth Arts Centre theatre £12 each

Based on The Servant of Two Masters by Carlo Goldoni, this Black Rat Production is set in the 1960s. Having seen a version based on the original play, we had some expectations of what this version would look like. I think “confusion” best describes our early reactions as the performance started early with a skiffle band on stage, setting the 60s scene and playing several good old-fashioned bop songs. Great musicians, but we were still wondering what was going on.

Basically, an ex-member of the band is minder to an east-end crook Roscoe wanting to collect money owed, but Roscoe is really his twin sister Rachel as her boyfriend Stanley killed Roscoe and they need the money to escape the law…. So, typical mistaken identity, lots of confusion, and the central character Henshall getting in a mess as he takes on work for both Rachel & Stanley while keeping them in the dark.

Once we got into the plot (and the over-acting!) it definitely got better and was very enjoyable by the end. Lots of laughs and we loved the running jokes about ‘identical’ twins, the contortions of the tall, skinny young man who wants to be “an actor”, where did he get the knife from – Woollies! – and the very Welsh Henshall playing an Irishman. Even better was the part played by Christine from the audience – brilliant! Not what you would call ‘politically correct’, and the language was a bit coarse here and there, but it was still funny and once you got used to them, the regular appearance of the band was very entertaining.

It is still on tour in Wales, with several dates in October and November – see their website www.blackratproductions.co.uk for details. Just persevere past the first half to get the best out of the performance.

Being a small independent publisher
All of you running your own business know how frustrating it can be.

Being an author AND publisher basically doubles up the frustration! Revising a previous version of the book on "Risk Management: 10 Ps" sounds quite straightforward, especially as the book is still regularly copied/referred to even after 15 years.

The new book is finally finished "10 Ps of Managing Risks Post-Brexit: 10 Basic Principles" and at the printer's. Excellent news! it is available from 25th September 2017 via www.amazon.co.uk or through the www.pencoedpublishing.co.uk website and/or through PayPal (see website for payment details) £24 + p&p. ISBN 978-0-9926100-8-1

Frustrations?
- getting page numbering correct (yes, I know it should be easy and I have done it loads of times before!) allowing for blank pages where necessary
- deciding which pages in colour and which black & white
- making sure charts & other images are in "black" colour rather than grey-scale
- delays in final print date.

10 Ps Chart

window cleaners (cover image)

A couple of things you might like to Risk Assess! Note "the cork from a bottle of bubbly leaves it at around 25 miles an hour".

1st Prosecco Festival

 

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The first UK Prosecco Festival

The Gin Festival has been going for some time now (as have we!) and an event that brings 100 different gins together in one place can only be a good thing.

Well, we now have the Prosecco Festival to build on the clear success of the Gin Festival. First thoughts were – will it be as good? How many Proseccos are there? How will it work?

The weekend 18-19^th August 2017 saw the first Prosecco Festival held in UK in Swansea, with more planned throughout the year in other regions from Guildford to Liverpool. Not sure why Swansea was chosen as the first venue, but it was sold out so this was clearly a good choice.

It is the same format as for the gin Festival – order tickets online, well in advance as they sell out quickly, buy tokens at the door for how many drinks you want to buy then swap these for each drink at one of the bars. Swansea Brangwyn Hall is a beautiful venue with a stage, long tables and chairs down the centre, 4 main bars to choose from plus your very own Prosecco glass to keep topping up.

Clearly there were not going to be 100 to choose from, but each bar has 4-6 Proseccos to buy by the glass, plus some extras, plus some more exclusive expensive options to buy by the bottle. A great addition was a table with a choice of flavoured shots to “Pimp up your Prosecco” – the mango flavor was definitely a favourite! A token costs £5, or £4 each if you buy 6, and one token buys one glass of your choice.

Was it successful? Yes, a lively atmosphere with a band and singers on-stage, plenty of seating and Italian street food stalls if you want to buy snacks. The choice of Proseccos is limited, of course, and by the 3^rd or 4^th they taste either ‘dry’ or ‘not dry’ although the shots definitely helped. Unfortunately, we didn’t realise until after the event, when we actually read the ‘Little Book of Fizz’ we were given, that cocktails were also available at all the bars. We didn’t find any Masterclasses like at the Gin Festival, so it would have been nice to know a bit more about Prosecco and how/why it has become so popular.

Warning: unlike the gin which is watered down by tonic and ice, this was (generally) at least four full measures in a fairly short session – and even cheaper if you had bought 6 tokens. The taxi driver said he had picked up several fares as they staggered from the afternoon session! Not us, naturally. We probably wouldn’t go again, but it was a great evening (or afternoon if you prefer) out with friends.

“A Fizzie: a person of wonderful repute, unrivalled class and distinguished taste; a lover of fizz”

“Risk assessment: A cork can reach up to 25 miles per hour as it leaves the bottle”

“Unlike Champagne, Prosecco doesn’t improve with age” so you have to drink it sooner rather than later. But it does have fewer calories than other wines.