Curiouser and curiouser, thought Alice...

... who would have thought you could get cakes that say 'eat me' in Aberdeen??

Well, you can, and I found them in a FANTASTIC new shop called Johnny Come Lately. JCL is Fay's shop, in George Street, two doors down from Party Mania, across from Maberley Street, for those of you who are local bloggers. Fay sells lots of dead cool eclectic stuff, some of her own creations and others by local and Scottish artists and craftspeople, including I Like's Anne, from Glasgow and my mate Gabi Reith.


Tonight was JCL's Alice in Wonderland discount night, hence the title of this post. We had cakes, wine, chat and lots of lovely things to ponder over buying!

Cakes were supplied by Maggie - of Maggie's Cupcakes and very lovely too. I haven't the heart to eat mine yet! (Wine courtesy of Makro I think!!) You MUST order cakes from her - I once was at a wedding where there was no cake, but hundreds of little cupcakes - what a fabby idea! So, let's have the first local wedding with Maggie cakes!

Here is the stunning Alice cupcake I chose - shedding sugar stars like a comet! Num num!

We got goodie bags - here is what I found in mine:

• Flump sweetie
• Rose-shaped candle and glass holder
• Shiny pink purse (with a pin badge of a clown inside)
• Blue ring
• Greeting card

I put the cake in it and two postcards for other local designers, The Junction and Antoinette Jewellery.

And I bought a great ring - perfect considering all the hearts I've been designing lately for the IheartUTG campaign - a sparkly, orange heart... with my 15% discount too!

(My fingers are really NOT that podgy!)

Now that's just darling! This is the sort of shop I've wanted in Aberdeen for YEARS. It reminds me of Loot - late-lamented wonderful trinket emporium in St. Andrews which I miss like mad - and Bonkers, another St Andrews store which still exists, thankfully, who also sell cool and bizarre stuff. So, hooray Fay, your dizzy decision to open your shop was the right one! Hoping very much to see some designs from fellow blogger Elle Carter of American Duchess Apparel in the next wee while, as we've been Facebooking to sort out something. So Johnny Come Lately could be the first truly international art store in Aberdeen! Great stuff!

BTW - the origin of the name... I don't know if Fay references any of these, but putting my folklorist's hat on, here are some factoids about the phrase/name 'Johnny Come Lately'

1. Dictionary Def...

n. Informal, pl., John·ny-come-late·lies, or John·nies-come-late·ly (jŏn'ēz-).

A newcomer or latecomer, especially a recent adherent to a cause or trend.

2. A 1943 film starring James Cagney about a drifter who helps a woman save her ailing newspaper

3. An indie rock band

4. A song by Catatonia

5. A song by Steve Earle

6. A Florida blog about the restaurant industry!

And that's just what I could find on Google!

Which just goes to show, if you call your shop that, you are a trend-setter, rather than a follower! Good luck, Fay, and lets hope there are many more 'cake nights' to come!!

Arty Quine - Celebrating Images of Scotland

Announcing the launch of a new commercial venture - Arty Quine Scottish Products

Scottish Images - art and photography by local artist, Jane Swan, at her Zazzle shop which can be reached via the wiki site - here

Examples of products:

iheartutg campaign t-shirt featuring flower power heart design (this type of shirt £20)

Black and White 'Ringer' Mug with Dark Flower Power Design (£14.00)


Inverallochy Castle Postcards (£1.25 each; £8 for a set of 8)

Aberdeen Beach Shelter Postcards (£1.25 each £8 for a set of 8)

Do come and buy!!! http://www.zazzle.com/artyquine

insert - heart - here

Aberdeen's artists are alive and well!

After messing about hob-nobbing with film-types at the ODR Aberdeen premiere, it was sooo refreshing to get back to old-fashioned hand made creativity. No offence to messers Clark and Stirton, but speaking as someone who used to love drawing, I do prefer pencil and paper.

Insert follows on the back of the fabulous I Heart UTG campaign, displaying 'hearts' from different local artists, some established, some recent art school graduates like the wonderful Katie Guthrie who started the campaign, and selling them in order to help fund more publicity for the campaign!

I couldn't resist!

Unknowningly, when I saw the artwork I fell for, I'd picked Katie's! I said to her, 'I've seen the one I want,' and I pointed it out to her, and she said, 'That's mine!' I don't think she believed I really meant it!! But I did. I will post a proper pic when it comes off the wall. It's a heart made up of dots, based on the colour-blindness test.

Katie writing SOLD under me heart...

Why did I fall for it? Two reasons, colour, blues and pinks - blue goes with my spare room, pink has always been one of my fave colours (mix of red and purple, which are my faves); AND when I was little and lived in our old house, we had 'the Book of Colour', a riot, nay a feast of colourful pix, and one of the things was the colour-blindness test. That's when I found out my Dad can't tell red and green from grey, and I'm perfectly fine! But I loved and adored that book, there was everything about colour, colour in nature, colour in culture, pop-art, traditional painting, cars, things, pots of paint, light, laser, wow, if ever I loved a book... I have another one called 'Dreamlands' which is a collection of illustrations from a graphic artist, and I just sit and look at it. Same thing, a feast for the eyes.

So Katie, you brought back memories of sitting in the sun lounge on dark winter afternoons, drooling over the fabulous, unimaginable colours that showed a magical world that I wanted to disappear into. If ever there was a colour 'Bible', that was it.

Anyway! The rest of the hearts had just about sold out by 7.30pm, only 1hr and a half into proceedings!

Met Phil and Gabi, the Thompson-Reiths, - Gabi of course being Sara Reith's sister, and Sara my fellow PhD-er. Their little girl was there, a vision in pink. She looks affa like her cousin Ailsa, same big green eyes, that must be a Reith trait! Anyway, Poppy was noming up the jelly beans, as was I. She was intrigued with the heart made out of two speakers, the roundels forming the top bit of the heart, especially cos there was sound coming out of them! Now that's what I like, that goes down the road of Scrapheap challenge, foraying into the land of cars and engineering which I also like - esp after a discussion on Facebook about men in sheds, and the lucious James May from Top Gear, who is a man who loves mucking about making things in sheds.

Anyway, back to the art, another intriguing heart was a book, with a heart stitched in what looked like thick raffia thread right through it. Phil had a chalk on slate anatomical drawing of a heart and Jo Gannon had a weird but cool Gothic-biker-megadeath-stylee heart with skulls. Hmm!

Jo's Biker-Goth-Megadeath heart

Gabi had a selection of postcards which I had already seen at Tea Cosy (more on that in a forthcoming post), but they all featured a heart. The selkie and the birds were my faves.

Gabi's beautiful bird

I only wish there had been more! I can visualise thousands in my head. Time I got my one done.

Anyway - the lack of blogging has all been due to the thesis, which has less than three weeks to go now, and I've spent most of my leisure time on Facebook, moaning to aabody about it! I found out most of my fellow bloggers are far more avid Facebookers, tsk tsk! anyway, it lead me into our city's contemporary art world, and that's fine by me.

Maybe I should do a selection of me own heart patterns??

Well, back to the grindstone... but I may go via the pencil and paper!

I LOVE UTG

You'll notice there's a new badge on the blog sidebar - I'm demonstrating my support for the campaign to protect Union Terrace Gardens from destruction!!

The campaign, which so far includes a petition, badges, activities, was set up by art student Katie Guthrie, initially to support Peacock Visual Arts in their bid to hold on to their proposed development of Union Terrace Gardens which would build an arts centre into the existing site. Peacock, as I mentioned on an earlier post, already HAD planning permission, but the City Council's greed and financial mismanagement led to them falling over themselves to sook up to a certain local tycoon - no not Mr Trump - who plans to concrete over the gardens and make a ridiculous 'civic square' where there is no room for one!!! How's that for stupidity? You give permission to one group, then someone with more money comes along and you say, right, we'll put the first group out of business so we can line our pockets! That's wrong on so many levels!!!

Right, you all know what I'm on about. Katie sent me an email urging those of us who don't want to see our historic gardens, home of the Corbie Haugh, a remnant of one of the few indigenous woods in the city, to fill in GreenStat's survey about UTG - yes you can say its rubbish right now, but you need to say what better things money could be spent on to make it good again!!

The link here takes you to the City Council web site, then that links to GreenStat's survey - you also get access to any of their other surveys about green spaces all over Britain, but just click on Scotland, register your details (you can remain anonymous), and click the button to do surveys on parks, then you can pick UTG.

Vox Populi, Vox Dei, as they say - if we don't speak out, the council will just carry on with its self-centred greedy ways - just look at Mr Cassie!! oops, well, that's public domain.

We voted for these eejits - well, maybe we didn't, but somebody did, let's make them accountable!!!

The badge on the sidebar will take you to Katie's campaign site - there is one on Facebook too, which is at the moment advertising a mystery treasure hunt! Cool!

Stanley Robertson 1940-2009 - RIP

Stanley, in his element

Master Storyteller, singer, balladier, the last of the great Traveller tradition-bearers in the North-East of Scotland, Stanley Robertson, MUnv, died yesterday of a heartattack. He will be sorely missed by his friends, students, and listeners. The funeral is due to take place on Friday at the Mormon Church on Anderson Drive, Aberdeen. Many folk will want to come and pay their respects.

Stanley was our friend; he was the honorary president of Grampian Association of Storytellers and it was always a special night when Stanley came to a GAS meeting. I first met him when I went to a storytelling and singing circle which was hosted by the Elphinstone Institute (even before I was a student!) in Aberdeen Uni's Humanity Manse, College Bounds. I had never heard of him before and was bowled over by his fabulous folktales. And Stanley never forgot me; I sang my most favourite murder ballad - the first one I ever learned - Long Lankin, and he always commented upon it after that.

Any story I ever heard Stanley tell stuck right in my head and I was able to tell my own version. I interviewed him for the GAS newsletter a couple of years ago and he told of his difficult childhood as a Traveller bairn, despised by his teachers and hated by some of his less-than-friendly neighbours. The town represented the scaldie world, but the road... now that was the Traveller's world, one where the stories of the family were as real and as vibrant as any history book. Stanley delighted in the auld road o Lumphanan, which was guarded by Auld Crobhie, a master oak tree which had a special significance for the 'Gaun-Aboot-Folk'. Stanley's daughter Nicole brought a scaldie friend with her on one such summer trip, and the girl scoffed at the notion she should shake hands with Auld Crobhie, but the tree demonstrated its ancient power as a branch slapped the girl in the face for her ignorance.

Stanley told of how his great aunt Maggie taught him to recognise the difference between story-time and real time, as he went 'through the eye of the skull', an imaginary technique that he taught to us storytellers, and it really works! Modern people would call it 'getting in the zone', getting 'Zen', but it is the trip along the auld road into a world where there are fairies, demons, witches, and the Earl of Hell himself, as well as knights, wizards, queens, ladies, and of course, canny Traveller folk like Stanley himself, and his perennial hero, Jack.

From Stanley I realised I was remembering stories I already knew - now where they came from, perhaps buried in the memories of childhood, but I have no idea - he had a magic of his own, he could bring out the best in those who wished to learn. He taught us about things you can't ever learn in books and put new heart into old ballads like The Silkie of Sule Skerry and Lowlands Away.

Many folk will remember that amazing supernatural ballads weekend at Edzell where we were taught The Four Green Fields, the Irish rebel song. Something very strange happened when we sang it - I think we were all taken back to the land of those sorrows, to Mother Ireland, and felt her pain, because Stanley took us there. We practically raised the roof singing it. It actually sounds terrible in the recording, proving that magic can't be captured! I remember that weekend because it was the same time Maggie Fraser shared her ghost-story, I scared myself with a most spectral version of MacCrimmon's Lament, and we all had our souls stretched.

Another time of great emotion and amazing experiences was the storytelling weekend at the Grant Centre near Monymusk. We had snow, sun, blizzard winds, were chorused awake by rooks, learned about the two statues near Bennachie, the Maiden Stone and Persephone, both having fantastic tales attached; we wrote poems that were better than any of us had ever written, we made up plays, we sang, we ate, and on that last Sunday afternoon, we shared. That was when our hearts were opened like never before. There was no fear, everyone bonded together like I have never experienced.

Those are times I will treasure - as well as all the stories, all the insightful comments, the more 'fruity' jokes that came out in late sessions at our much-missed storytelling weekend at the Woodend Barn, Stanley's rapier-like perception which could destroy his enemies and comfort his friends.

He was the greatest storyteller of his generation - no-one else I know could tell stories that I immediately learned from one hearing!! I even had the guts to tell one of his stories in front of him at the last GAS meeting we were all at together - and he said it was 'nae bad,' which for Stanley was a massive compliment! He always said that if someone took a story of his, he would expect them to remain true to it, like one would polish a beautiful chalice, but not to add to it and destroy it! I know what he meant. And that story? Jack and the Devil's Auntie! It's in Exodus to Alford and has three of the cleverest riddles I've ever heard.

I'm going to end with them, and direct you to the poems from mini-site I made of the trip to Monymusk. Sadly the original mini-site has disappeared into the ether, but the poems are still there!!

What time is it when the wee dwarfie of the North is chasin his big Ma and Da?

We ken there's a man in the moon, how do we ken there's a wifie in the moon?

How can a one-eyed man see mair than you can wi two eyes?

Answers on a virtual postcard in the comments section please!!

Requiescat in pace

The Secret Life of Walter's Mittens

After a very, very long absence, we have a proper folktale!! This belongs to a very funny monologue from Gary Hogg, an illustrator and writer. He's produced a couple of albums of his stories, and the one I'm going to tell you now was read by Bernard Wrigley, from t'depths o' Lancashire! Gary Hogg is a very funny man, and speaks Geordie, which of course is a language that shares many words with Scots.

But here's the story... The Secret Life of Walter's Mittens

Poor young Walter! He'd got home to find his mother had given a great pile of his stuff to the local Scout Jumble Sale. He wasn't so bothered about his Broons and Oor Wullie annuals, or the bits for his old bike, or even the old clothes he'd grown out of, but there was one very precious pair of items that he really couldn't part with... his mittens!

That was why when the Scoutmaster and the ladies from the Guild came down to the Scout Hut that Saturday morning, they found a very cold, damp Walter huddled on the doorstep.
"Ee," commented the Scoutmaster, "Thou's na right in the heid tae be stayin up aa night, tha'd better come in!"

Walter shivered and was pleased to accept a cup of tea from the ladies as he stood by the heater and dried his wet bum.

"What's tha after at the sale, Walter? Some music? A football jersey? Must be somethin affa important that tha stayed up aa night t'be first in't queue!" one of the Guild ladies asked him.

"It's ma auld mittens! Ma granny knitted them for'ss!" Walter replied, wrapping his cold hands around the hot mug of tea.

"Ah, well, that maks aa the difference, tha canna dae withoot special things like that! Will ah look them out for yis?" she asked.

"Aye, they're a bit auld, and holey, but am not doin withoot them! They're aa colours o the rainbow, they came from an auld Persian rug me grandda brought back fae Morocco fan he was in North Africa during tha war," Walter explained.

The ladies rummaged through the clothes bags that had been brought until they found the one that had Walter's mother's address on the label. They emptied the bag out and carefully folded the trousers, skirts, old dresses, baby clothes and other things. Right at the bottom of the bag were what looked like two matted pieces of wool.

"That's them! That's ma mittens! Ow much will ah have to pay tae get them back?" Walter exclaimed.

"These auld raggedy things? Oh Walter, tha's better buying a new pair, even if yer granny made them!" the Scoutmaster commented.

"Nah, nah, ye dinna realise, they're special... they're magic." Walter's eyes glittered.

The Scoutmaster laughed, thinking Walter really had gone soft in the head. "Oh aye, well, we'll say nine pence," he told him.

Walter scrabbled in his pocket and brought out a little horseshoe-shaped leather coin-purse. He shoogled the coins out into the lid, then counted nine one pences onto the table. "There, nine pence! Now, can I have ma mittens?" he asked politely.

The ladies of the Guild gave him the mittens, admonishing him and telling him to go and wash them. Walter took no notice but shoved them on his cold hands and ran back home. The mittens stayed on his hands for the rest of the day.

Now reader, one might wonder why the poor Geordie lad wanted to profer coins of the realm for something that looked like the cat had been at it! Well, let me tell you about the secret life of those mittens...

Walter's grandfather had indeed brought back the most hideous, moth-eaten rug from his time with the Desert Rats, claiming it was a genuine Persian carpet. Walter's granny was so happy her husband had survived the war, she simply gave the carpet a quick shampoo and laid it in pride of place in front of the fire in the living room. Now, grandfather outlived the carpet, as it was clearly infested with some horrible African bug that had begun to eat it! One night, Walter remembered, as a very small boy being in his grandparents' house - his favourite place to be to hear his grandda's war stories - and seeing a fragment of coal jump from the fire, which often happened if there was a bit of slate or graphite in the fire that exploded, and suddenly the rug was smouldering!

Well! Grandma ran for the carpet beater and walloped the smoke out for all she was worth, but by the time Grandda got a pail of water and dumped it over the rug, there was a large hole in it. That was the end of the rug's days, but Walter's grandmother, being brought up with the maxim 'make do and mend', cut off the good bit of the carpet that was left, pulled it out and knitted mittens for Walter.

What no-one knew was that the market stallholder in Morocco who had sold the rug to Walter's grandfather, was actually a wizard! An Arab wizard in hiding from his enemies! His flying carpet was all he had taken with him, and had fallen on hard times - so he sold it, to a Geordie soldier.

The magic carpet had lain on the floor of Walter's grandparents' living room for years without a soul knowing it was a magic carpet, because no-one ever knew the magic word!!

The magic word was ... Alekazam!

Walter's grandparents had both passed away so there was no-one to know otherwise now.

Walter only found out by accident one day last year when he was sent for the dinnertime sandwiches. He was an apprentice at the local garage which was behind the Co-op, and being the youngest, he was always sent to the shop. It was a windy day, so the shopping list blew out of Walter's hand.

But that didn't deter our hero - Walter had an amazing memory, because he had taken a long time to learn to read, and had memorised the storybooks at school as the teacher taught them, so it looked as if he was reading, but he'd just remembered exactly what part of the story went with the pictures. This skill had come in handy.

He recited the list of his work-mates sarnies in his head as he walked around to the Co-op's front door:

"Ray has cheese, and Duffy has egg; bacon and brown sauce for Jimmy, and Billy has spam, and Alec has 'am,"

Well that was it! He'd said the magic word - "Alec-has-'am" the carpet, being of Arabian extraction perhaps had a little trouble with the Geordie accent, because it responded, as it would have done to its master on saying "Alekazam!"

From the thumb of the mitt spake a voice:

"I am a magic carpet - well, mitten - what is your wish, oh master?"

"I can fly you to anywhere - well, hopefully, given my much changed shape," the mitten said.

"Ooh, really now? Well, we could al'us go to Cup Final next May!" Walter exclaimed.

"Cup Final? No probs, I've been bored out ma brains the last fifty years on your granny's floor!" the mitten replied.

They disappeared in a cloud of smoke and sparks and whizzed through time and space until they landed in the best seat in Wembley Stadium. Of course, we can't reveal who won, but Walter cheered as his team scored six goals.

The mitts pulled him into the air as soon as the final whistle blew and they zoomed back to the present, ten minutes after Walter had left. He hurriedly went to buy his sarnies and flew back to the garage, literally!

"Oi, Walter, where's tha been? Why's tha three foot off ground?" the garage lads asked in wonder as he floated to a halt on the forecourt.

Walter recounted his amazing experience and his discovery that his mittens were indeed possessed of magical powers. "I know I musta said the magic word, but ah dinna know what it woulda been!" he told them.

"Ah, it'll likely be abracadabra," said Ray of the cheese sarnie.

"Nah, tha knows nowt," dismissed Duffy.

The lads spent the rest of the day saying any exotic and not-so-exotic word that came to mind directly to Walter's mitts.

Of course, they were totally unsuccessful. And poor Alec! Walter's little trip into space had caused the ham to go off, so Alec phoned in sick saying he'd had a terrible night.

Walter has been trying every other word he can think of every day he goes to the shop in hopes that he might hit on that magical incantation again and bring the mitts back to life.

But it is unlikely he ever will, cos Alec doesn't have ham now.

After the horror of the food-poisoning, Alec turned vegetarian, and has given up on meat entirely.

Poor Walter! The mittens' secret life are at an end... for now, anyway.


And the moral of the story is... always remember the last word you said before a magical occurence!!

This and Gary's other hilarious monologues can be found on the CD - Fairly Truthful Tales; it includes titles like The Lion, the Witch and the Warburtons, Dave the Jackal, and Jack and the Beansprouts he sells on his web site.