We have recently had some requests for a Dunans Castle Project flag, one that all the Lairds and Ladies can get hold of and fly if and as they so desire. Well, today I am delighted to say, we have finalised our design and the order for the prototype has been made. Once we’ve received the flag we’ll check the colour reproduction, and adjust the final pantones accordingly.
All we need now is a flag pole!
For the last couple of years the TWTC website has been using a theme from Pagelines which has served us well. However, we started to hit its limits when the number of pages on the website exceed the menu functionalities capacity (128 pages, I think!). So it was back to the drawing board, or rather back to adapting one of WP’s venerable themes. Twenty Twelve lent itself readily and along with a sliding image plugin and some nifty CSS work, the website now looks spiffing and works properly…
… well mostly, Firefox, is good, but the webkit browsers Safari and Chrome are not rendering the sliding images at the correct width. I’ll be working on this over the next few days so check back then (those of you with webkit browsers that is!)
The last book in translation I read, or rather listened to, was the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo – which was blisteringly good. Jean-François Parot’s novel is a different beast altogether, despite the fact that it too features a novice detective set an impossible task by a wealthy and influential superior. The plot is well-conceived, albeit slightly undermined by an opacity in the language – at times description, dialogue and characterisations seemed at odds with the plot. Like translations I have read of Russian novels, The Master and Margarita and Petty Demon to name two, the reader always feels that somehow in English they are being short-changed, that the fullness of the author’s original intent has been lost. If only I kept thinking I could read this in the original, these elisions might not have been present.
Having said that, murders in Paris which straddle the Royal Court and demi-monde together will always hold a level of fascination, as will protagonists who conform to contemporaneous mores which conflict with those of the present day, and yet still maintain a level of sympathy with the reader.
Here’s the link to Amazon.
Should also mention that in a previous career I designed Gallic Books website, hence the initial impulse to pick Parot’s book up.
G. won the 60m dash in fine style by all accounts, and H. won gold in the football as the Kilmodan team’s goalie – saving some very important shots on the way!
Today I finally found time to draft the new tabletop signs for the front of the castle and the side of the bridge. The idea is that they provide a table height interpretation for both structures which can (a) be moved as the restoration projects demand (just like a table) and (b) the signs themselves can be swapped as needed when there’s a significant update (like the bridge being restored or the castle re-roofed).
Left is a sketch of the wooden frame we are going to make from the Lime I have loaded up in the sawmill at the moment. The signs are A0 size or 841mm x 594mm … More once the signs are in place and the frames made!
Super, super song which just deserves the full Queen treatment. I know from years and years of listening to them that on every album Queen did Roger always brought two or three earth-shaking tracks to the table – often worldclass – like I’m in Love with My Car, Tenement Funster, A Kind of Magic and of course Radio Gaga. Sunny Day is a great, great song. Roger’s voice is so soulful, but I found myself really hankering after Freddie’s voice & Brian’s guitar, those harmonies, and the ineffable gorgeousness of one of the world’s great rock bands …
Right, off to listen to a classic, Sheer Heart Attack
… and they’ll be getting back to us in 10 days. As soon as they feedback we’ll report here. In the meantime here’s the detail of what we said:
Continue reading Initial Enquiry into the Heritage Lottery Fund for Dunans Bridge Today!
… actually it was great fun, which I think comes across. Particularly like the bits where Clare is trying to get Sadie and me to concentrate on the more challenging times and we keep laughing about them – especially the midges swarming over the windows on the red shed.
I mentioned the interview on my blog at the time and it is going to be broadcast at 13.32 gmt on Thursday this week, BBC Radio Scotland. Here’s the link:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b045byym
Right is the official photo with Clare to prove she was actually at Dunans (in the kitchen)!
CGDT is pleased to announce that the trust has recruited Eamon King and Margaret Shields to the post of Community Forest Project Officer for the remainder of the initial phase of the Stronafian Forest project funded by the Scottish Land Fund and Highlands and Islands Enterprise.
Eamon and Margaret started in their new posts on Monday and will be taking forward the huge variety of projects for the Forests together in a jobshare arrangement which provides the trust and the community with the best of both worlds.
Both project officers will be available at the CGDT office during the week, please drop by to find out who is in and when.
For more information contact: cgdt@cgdt.org
It took a week to put into the right words, a second to submit – on Friday at around 3pm – but this application (and the one to HLF which I will be working on this week) starts a process that restores the bridge by October next year and enables the opening of the castle by late 2018.
It feels onerous on the one hand, but fantastic to be finally moving on the other!
Below is the edited text of the application.
Continue reading Cause for Celebration! Application to Historic Scotland completed and submitted
