David Maybury | Blog

The Irish Blog Award nominations are out - and it makes for a very long list of blogs… Thank you to whoever nominated me for the Best Art and Culture Award!! Congratulations to the very deserving list of other nominees and I hope to meet all of ye in Cork in February!

The Film Talk
Scamp: An Irish Illustration Blog
Pearls And Rubies
Asylum
Skint
Stony River Farm
An Art and Ecology Notebook
Raptureponies
Pursued By A Bear
Izznit
Arts Management Ireland
Confessions Of A Film Critic
Fair Maiden Of The Mindful Blossom
Musical Rooms
Eoin Purcell’s Blog
The Anti-room
An Cathach
Crime Always Pays
Very Hungry Caterpillar’s Weblog
Éagsúil- Arts Show On West Limerick 102
Bluebirds are so Natural
Fustar - Recycling Cultural Waste Since 2005
A Doubtful Egg
The Red Scrapbook
The Devious Theatre Company
Caricatures Ireland
Chris Judge Illustration
Self Interest And Sympathy
Circa: Now!
[ Irish Kc ]
Dante And The Lobster
Music Roadmusic Road
Fin Keegan

But wait! There’s more - there are plenty of other categories all with long lists of potential winners, the judges have their hands full this year. Get yourself clicking and read some great blogs.

Hello - it looks like this is your first time here - you might want to subscribe to the RSS feed or click here to find out more about me. Thanks for visiting!

Plenty of things happening in the real world these days - and I managed to detach myself from the keyboard and tag along to a few…

First was the Irish Pen event last Thursday on Writing for Children. I had a lovely chat with Sarah Webb and Carbags, as well as a quiet drink with Steve Simpson, of Scamp.ie fame, and Brian Gallagher, a very brief hello/goodbye with Oisín McGann and PJ Nolan, a chin wag with the Hungry Caterpillar and the beautiful letter writer Karl O’Neill. Sarah has a comprehensive review of the night - including stats and notes on what everyone said. And she called me lovely. Yup, I’m lovely. (Not quite on the cute-boy list yet but I’m working up to that)

Saturday saw the inaugural (and amazing) Irish Web Awards. And what a night that was. Lovely to meet the regular gang of cohorts (you all know who you are) and to see some others I don’t get to talk to so regularly - including - Sineads, Jen, Deb, Sabrina, Redmum, Martha, Lexi, Suzy, John, Paula, Ciara, Peter, Niall, Aoife, Keith, Ken, Ross, Alan and hello to Jen - who I sadly didn’t see.

Damien surpassed any and all expectations and put together an amazing night and the Grand Boo-Bah did a stand-up job (see what I did there?) on the mic. Congrats to everyone who won (or was nominated - winning isn’t everything you know). There are plenty of pics out there - so far this has been my favourite:

Caught up with some bloggers (Darragh, Sinéad C - who seemed genuinely distraught by boyish face - and Laura) over the weekend - but managed to miss The Spanish Exposition’s look at the Irish Blogosphere until today. Rosie’s post hits on/near something, I think, that needed to be said - and some of the comments make for interesting reading.

There used to be a time when all Irish bloggers could fit around three tables in the Market Bar. The Irish blogging community is larger now and I doubt that most know who blog in various niches now. - Bernie Goldbach. (BG’s site)

As for the blogosphere itself this is an interesting post. I wrote something vaguely similar a couple of years ago. As the scene matures it’ll will splinter, that’s normal. - Twenty Major. (Twenty’s site)

Others have takes on it too: Le Craic, Alexia, Darragh, Colm, Jazz Biscuit - and more…
Update: Rick O’S has an interesting post take on things too…

And in other news:

> HAPPY BLOOMSDAY!

> Sinéad G is leaving the Sigla blog - the best Arts and Culture blog, three years running.

> The Dublin Writers Festival Blog has some reviews - Esther Freud, Tom Stoppard and the Irish Values Debate.

> Rob got a haircut. (In case you missed it, this is an all inclusive Irish bloggers post)

> Rapture Ponies is excited. Really excited. You will be too, when you see the trailer for the new Coen Brothers movie.

> The Sunday Tribune website has gotten a clean up. (It looks very like Independent.ie)

> And, not Irish, not even a little, but well worth reading. Sigmund Freud vs The Male Nurse.

The mandatory post that covers all things awardsies:

It’s all over for another year and all across the country the nation’s finest are coming-to with some severely sore heads. There was no queue of limo’s outside but there were 400 people in a room watching when Rick cried. (Congrats again).

So much happened last night but here’s a few highlights:

Sinead winning - AGAIN!
Kevin won a blog-dinner - free masala for all!
Feeding Una + Damien some tequila shots. How can a man that small drink so much??
Meeting Lili + Corina: they take pictures of pretty ladies for a livingsies.
Asking Rick to blag Deb into a job in RTE - I haven’t forgotten.
Talking about Elly’s eyes. Honest.
Simon winning the Contribution award - and teaching me how to break people.
Telling Stephen he was from Ballina.
Grandad and Granny Mar’s acceptance speeches.
Wearing Keith’s name tag at the end of the night - no one noticed…
Jason giving me his badge. It may not sound like much but I was damn excited at the time.
Twenty threatening to glass me. Twice.
Drunkenly meeting Annie at the very end of the night and not being able to pronounce Bjarni’s name.
Asking Colm for microsoft’s money - Microsoft, supporting the arts?
Meeting the Humble Housewife and finally getting the joke.
Ken and Ross in Burger King for the after party.

I was looking forward to meeting Aoife, Sinead, Nialler9, Gareth, Bock, Rob, Jen, Shane, and so many others - damn the nerdish shy embarressment. Congrats again to all the winners - the full list is over on Maman Poulet and Irish KC has a run down of the night. Thanks to everyone involved - well done on a brilliant night.

Three cheers to Damien for making it all happen. The man is a legend.

A nerdish link dump - on par with the Grand Poo-bah* himself.

> Never be caught in the embarrassing situation of mispronouncing a writers name again: Hold your head high at parties.

> Since you’re already sounding smart - why not drop a reference to the Large Hadron Collider (The Atom Smasher) and the new developments in atomic physics. Sinead can enlighten you.

> Eventually at this party nature will call. Don’t get caught out by the urinal game - use the divider provided.

> And finally once you’ve had a skin full: Get mad and demand that everyone at the party be versed in interweb etiquette.

*Rick O’Shea is NOT affiliated with name Grand Poo-bah, yet. Who knows, he might stick it on his name tag at the blog awards. Or he might not.

The short list for the 2008 Blog Awards is up online. Congratulations to everybody listed - here’s quick look down the list for Best Arts and Culture (sponsored by Poetry Ireland) :

• Bookmark
• Scamp
• Asylum
• The Sigla Blog
• Eddie Mullan’s No Clarity
• Tuppenceworth.ie
• Dear Dead Beat
• Dermod Moore
• The New(ish) Journalism
• American Hell
• Stunned

Could it be three years in a row for The Sigla Blog? Or will there be a new winner this year? Either way, I’m looking forward to meeting everyone at the awards in March. Best of luck!