As you may have noticed, decided to install a new theme onto my WordPress site this Sunday afternoon and have spent the last few hours, tinkering with the colours, formats and layout to try and achieve my goal. Ultimately if somebody has taken the time to find my personal blog, they need to be able to quickly and efficiently go and find anything they want. Still not happy with the current look and it will take a few days to settle on the best colour scheme but I hope this new theme is more in line with how I want myself represented online. Now, all my social feeds can be reached from one place. Althought not all our publically available.

What have you been up to recently? It has taken me a while, but I finally found a reason to use Pinterest. Actually proud that it only took me nine months to figure it out. I am using the Social Media site to record two things. Books I have read – an ongoing list as I continue to recall all the books I read, particularly in the prolific period between 2005 to 2010. Plus this is a great tool to motivate me to continue reading, I feel in the last few years, my brain has slowly turned to mushy peas as I fail to read books and expand my mind. My list is currently eleven, including the book I am currently reading, which is listed on the sidebar on my blog. Expect this to expand in the coming weeks, as I try and dig out an old reading list.

My second board relates to films I have seen at the cinema. I tried to do record this previously by using the hashtag #cinematrip on Twitter but I sometimes forget, plus there are plenty of films I have seen prior to May 2008 when I was an early adopter of the microblogging platform. Looking through my archive, I have recorded 14 uses of the hashtag (not including duplicated tweets, when I refer to the same visit more than once) Again, over time, particularly when I re-watch movies on NetFlix or on television, I am reminded that I originally caught a film at the multiplex, so I am then adding to my board. The interesting thing is movies I missed the first time around and then caught only the sequel(s) on the big screen to differing responses. A poor example would be Pitch Perfect, the first outdoing the second, whereas Back To The Future, would perhaps be one of the few examples of the sequel outdoing the original on multiple levels. To date 118 pins on the board and it will continue to grow. The last movie I caught at the cinema was Trainwreck, which was the trigger to start recording these visits.

Do you sometimes surprise yourself with your own unique tastes? In my case, I heard a song played constantly on the radio over two years ago and initially dismissed it away as a one-hit wonder. However, as Antenna was given so much airplay over the summer, I thought it would be worth keeping an eye out on the British born Ghanaian artist, FuseODG. Six hundred and fifteen days ago, he actually appeared on BBC Newsnight. For some reason, I happened to be watching this edition of the late-night show and caught both his song and the performance of second single. For once, this was not just about the music, this was about a message. It reminded me of a speech from Tony Blair gave almost five thousand days ago. What has changed in the intervening thirteen years, Africans have decided to take control of their own destiny, rather than hope to rescued by some Western politician with his own agenda, ideals and motivation. Watching the interview with the young man, I was inspired by his message. TINA – This Is New Africa. Fuse ODG is passionate about raising the profile of Africa and Africans. TINA, the movement he founded urges Africans to rebuild communities and present a positive image of the motherland to the rest of the world. Admirable to see somebody willing to use their creative talent to channel a movement across an entire continent. (Just watch Paxman’s reaction to their interview on the YouTube clip) Update: Of course, it is almost a decade later and this episode is long gone from BBC iPlayer, but I had to embed the YouTube clip for all to enjoy.

So, fell asleep watching @BBCNewsnight. Woke up to see @FuseODG performing to Paxman. Had to rewatch on iPlayer to make sure it was real.

— Gareth J. Hughes (@TheHistoryMan) February 5, 2014

Unsure how I discovered Adam’s blog, it may have been via a shared link on Twitter but I have lost count of the number of hours spent trawling through his blog which brings back memories of my childhood days from both a television but also radio/music perspective. This is somebody who has recorded and catalogues a great deal of television onto VHS and now screen grabbed many shows, intents and other treats from yesteryear. In particular, I was fascinated by the Thames Television section, as I can recall with fondness the change from Thames to Carlton in the late 1990s. He also has a section dedicated to computer games at the turn of the century. Well worth the read, just a shame the navigation is far from perfect.