findingthemojo no 257

Morning

• delighted to see that in yesterday's A Word A Day (awad), that magic and charming word mojo was the word of the day - very apt!

image:  seanverret.com

• from The Times cartoons of last week - brilliant!

cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 256

Hi there - so here are a couple of interesting numbers

• according to The Guardian, Polish is now England's second language - there are 147,000  French speakers and 273,000 Punjabi speakers but a whopping 546,000 Polish speakers living in the UK

image: bbc.co.uk

• and, according to The Independent on Sunday, one in eight Britons now live in a house where no one has a job, compared with one in 30 in Japan - scary stuff!

image: telegraph.co.uk

cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 255

Hello again - happiness is.....

• "Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be" - Abraham Lincoln, quoted in the Tampa Bay Times

image: news.discovery.com

• "It's easy to be miserable.  Being happy is tougher, and cooler" - Radiohead's Thom Yorke quoted in The Sydney Herald

image: last.fm

cheers, lovely weekend
jp

findingthemojo no 254

Hello - apart from the Cheese Festival in Stellenbosch and the Olive Festival in Prince Albert, here are this weekend's winners

• so, you've simply got to get to Decorex at the CTICC this weekend (opened on Thursday till Sunday) for SA design drama! This year's theme is Bliss - always something awesomely interesting to peruse - tickets at the door @ R70

• and don't miss the fourth annual Sound and Screen Film Festival at The Labia starts Friday 26 April till Thursday 2 May - tickets R35 @ the door

cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 253

Morning - never a dull moment in this City of ours

• give The East Side of the City a try - especially @ night!  it's cooking!

image:  Sugarhut Club

• also pay a visit to The Alexander Bar & Cafe in Strand St for after-work drinks & eats, music and fab theatre - always have a great line-up upstairs.  Also on fb

cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 252

Hi there

"

"Here at Liverpool, it's the second half - or as Luis Suarez calls it, dessert

• from today's Telegraph, here's Matt & Alex's version of biting humour

•  also loved some of these, for more check these out

 

• from The Times cartoons of last week

cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 251

Hello - travelling tales

• Chinese tourists have overtaken Germans as the biggest-spending travellers in the world.  They spent 102bn dollars last year - 41% more than in 2011 - The Guardian

image: elitechoice.org

• for those who have everything....... 'the ultimate round-the-world-trip' - go to www.veryfirstto.com to find out more about an amazing two-year holiday, taking in all 962 UNESCO World Heritage Sights, includes staying in the world's best hotels and business-class travel, of course.  Price? only 990,000 pounds! - source: The Lady

image:  sheknows.com

cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 250

Hello hello - wit and wisdom from the Iron Lady for your weekend
 

•  "If you just set out to be liked, you would be prepared to compromise on anything at any time, and you would achieve nothing" - March 1989

• "I'm extraordinarily patient, provided I get my own way in the end" - April 1989

cheers and enjoy the last of the autumn weather
jp

findingthemojo no 249

Welcome to your weekend - made any plans yet?  well it's all happinin on Saturday, folks

• get your gear on - "pin up your hairdo and pull up your cowboy boots for a rocking subculture carnival", join the Rockabilly Lifestyle Show starting at 2pm, get all the info here or go to their fb page

image: hireanillustrator.com

• join the Make Believe Train Party to the Glencairn Hotel and then back for the after party in the City.  Party kicks off at midday at the main station (tickets limited to 500) - get all the details here or go to www.make-believe.co.za

• not your thing? then head to the V & A where Tommy Hilfiger and Topshop have just opened - don't forget the credit card!

enjoy and cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 248

Hi again - random bits of happiness

• common cranes were virtually extinct in Britain by 1600 but thanks to "The Great Crane Project" four birds have returned to southern England and have started nesting there -  "they were reared from eggs at the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust's Slimbridge centre in 2010 by "crane mums", who dressed as adult cranes to teach the youngsters how to survive in the wild, and were then released on the Somerset levels"

image: pa

• recognising your type of thing - at an Affordable Art Fair in Battersea, London, humans weren't the only ones interested in the exhibits

Cyberdog by Finn Stone with interested party, Rex Features/Getty Images

cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 247

another day, hi!

• loved this one from The Times' cartoons of the week- rip Maggie

• amazing shortlist of pics that are up for the Sony World Photography Awards 2013  - take a look

Architecture - Martina Biccheri, Italy

cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 246

 Hello there

 

• once described as "the most unpleasant work to be published in the 20th century"  by critic William Feaver, Tretchikoff's Chinese Girl recently caught the eye of  wealthy jeweller Laurence Graff, to the tune of 982,000 pounds! there's no accounting......

• sculpture of a different kind: "Nathan Sawaya quit his job as a corporate lawyer in 2001 to return to his boyhood obsession - making things out of Lego. "I used to spend my day sitting in a board room, negotiating contracts and I would find at the end of the day I would need some sort of creative release and Lego was that," he said. "Around the turn of the century I left the law firm to become a full time Lego artist and opened my art studio here in New York" - from The Telegraph

cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 245

Morning morning - enjoyed these two

• "there can be no true beauty without decay" - Uncle Monty (played by Richard Griffiths - recently deceased) in Withnail and I, quoted in The Guardian

• "for a pure sense of being tumultuously alive, you can't beat the nasty side of existence" - Philip Roth, quoted on NPR.org

image:  online.wsj.com

cheers and lovely weekend
jp 

findingthemojo no 244

 

Hello weekend ahead, grab your mates and get out there!

• the 6th Cape Town Taste Festival has opened and is on all weekend - yum!

• bundle the bucket, spade, dogs etc into the car and head out to Hout Bay Beach for the 17th annual sandcastle competition from 8:30 - 13:30, lots of fun and all for a great cause.  When you're done being sandy, head to The Chappies Hotel for their classic calamari lunch or take your pick of the eating spots out that way - enjoy!

cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 243

Hi there

• how about these two interesting (and seemingly unrelated) stats:

"the number of regular attendees to City of London churches has risen by 24% since the financial crisis struck in 2008" - Diocese of London/FT

" three out of five Premier Footballers go broke within five years of retirement; one in three get divorced within a year of retiring" - Xpro/The Times

image: dailymail.co.uk

•  from The Times best cartoons of last week - loved this one, scary tho'

cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 242

Morning - there are some fascinating exhibitions on at the Iziko Museums in CT

Illustration by Jacques Barraband

• do not miss going to view The King's Map - "In the late 18th century, Francois le Vaillant travelled through South Africa, recording all that he saw. On his return to France, he created a huge map of the land and its inhabitants for his king. For the first time, that map is on public display",

linocut: Robert Siwangaza, Unemployment, 1987

•  also, Uncontained the Community Arts Project Archive - "The title of the exhibition refers to the opening of a collection of artworks which has largely lain dormant in the storerooms of the Community Art Project and Arts and Media Access Centre, and the re-activation of the archive from neglect by mainstream cultural history" - ps: exhibition ends this week

cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 241

Greetings - Pablo Picasso posts

image: AFP/Getty images

• did you know that "more of Picasso's paintings have been stolen than any other artist, and 550 of his works are listed as missing" or, that "he wrote around 300 poems and two plays"? - read more in The Telegraph's "20 surprising facts" article - fascinating!

Le Reve

• last week, according to The Times, Steve Wynn (casino owner) sold his Picasso painting Le Reve to hedge fund manager, Steve Cohen,  in spite of Wynn's unlucky 'elbow accident'; upping the original price (in 2006) of 139 million dollars to 155 million dollars! for the since repaired portrait (the highest price ever paid by a US collector and the most expensive Picasso) - amazing!

cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 240

Hello weekend

• "Art is not the only desire to tell one's secret; it is the desire to tell it and hide it at the same time" - Thorton Wilder quoted on Salon.com

image:  thepictureproject.org

• "Life is melodrama. Only art is real" - US novelist and essayist Andrew Lytle, quoted in The Paris Review

image: blogs.guardian.co.uk

cheers, fab weekend
jp

findingthemojo no 239

Morning - another great weekend ahead and many many visitors in CT, you should therefore plan ahead

• enjoy the last of the outdoor Kirstenbosch Summer Sunset Concerts this Sunday with friends, family and your picnic - Johnny Clegg doing his White Zulu thing, a classic!  Get there early or else!

• book tickets for a deliciously dark comedy opening this Friday 5 April, at The Fugard:  The Champ - winner of the best script for 2012 at The Fleur du Cap Awards

cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 238

Hello - mid-week and the weather is wonderful! - from The Times

•  loved this one from 'pictures of the week' - March 24, 2013. Competitors warm up in the hallway at the World Irish Dancing Championships in Boston, Massachusetts
  
  

image:  Jessica Rinaldi—Reuters 

 

• loved this cartoon from 'cartoons of the week', March 23-29

cheers
jp

findingthemojo no 237

Happy April greetings! - trust you had a marvellously sweet weekend.  Another short week and many fab events not to be missed!

• get yourself to Green Market Square (early! starts 5pm - 11pm)) on Wed 3 April for the annual free after-work concert which heralds the start of the annual Cape Town Jazz Festival (sold out weeks ago!). Fab line-up including acid-jazz/UK funk group the Brand New Heavies, Jimmy Dludlu as well as the winner of the popular local Open Mic Jazz Vocal competition Candice Thornton, Cape Town pop star Jimmy Nevis and the St Joseph Maritz's School band will be on stage

image: thebaxter/rolex

•  and definitely try to attend at least one of the Unique Gathering lectures at The Baxter Theatre, starting on Friday 5 April, featuring William Kentridge, Wole Soyinka and Peter Sellars - going to be fascinating!

cheers
jp