I always like to receive interesting mail and by trading my zine this month, a number of interesting packages from the other side of the world have arrived as a result.

I love them all and have read them a couple of time over as some of the content is really well written and somewhat inspirational. They’re now a valued addition to my ever increasing library of self-published work from around the globe and seeing my collection just confirms to me even more that theres some really creative (and generous) people out there. Why not pay this month’s traders a visit by popping over to Barf Color and tamagokkoh.

If you’re interested in trading your creative goodness too you should check out We Make Zines and the recently stumbled upon Trading Network.

The Five Zines of February

Seeing as though the zine trading has got off to a great start this year, I’ve set up the Rusty Rocket as a place to advertise my zines and to act as a kind of trading post. I have produced a series of bookmarks with the Rusty Rocket address on it and they will be included in all outbound packages in the hope of generating more traffic to the site.

So click here, take a look and have an explore using the arrows on the posters. Who knows, if you wait long enough your train might arrive.

I’ll be adding more detailed listings of all my zines and mini-zines just as soon as I find the time but there should be enough content already up there to wet your appetite.

I remember years ago when I was a teen camping out with a few park rangers as we guarded a marquee overnight which was being used for a show the following day. To keep us occupied we managed to hook up an old radio and listen to one of the forces’ radio stations which was broadcasting a live baseball game from the US. I have to admit, I don’t have much interest in the game but the fact that we were listening live from a country park in Lincolnshire just amazed me. I guess from then on I’ve always been interested in radio, quickly become a fan of the old Radio 5 before it sold out to sport. I even had dreams of starting a radio show with a friend from round the corner when I was a kid (I dug out the old test transmissions, you can hear them by clicking here). More recently I discover number stations and you can hear an eerie one that I recently found here thanks to Ev’s shortwave radio.

Anyway, this week the Gadget Show did a review of the top 5 apps for phones and OoTunes featured quite highly. Its a rather nice app that lets you listen to live radio stations from around the world with added features like the opportunity to record. I am now finding myself streaming some of the US talk show stations while I’m feeding Charlie and I’m completely hooked. I know I live in a more technologically advanced world compared with the one when I listened to American baseball but I’m still fascinated by the concept of listening to live radio from the other side of the world.

Our little boy isn’t very well again, hes caught the cold which seemed to be doing the rounds last week. Its rather heartbreaking to see as he suffers with it and struggles to sleep. When he does finally manage to snatch some sleep, he then snores really loudly which would be cute if it wasn’t at 4am. I wish there was more advice out there for first time parents for this sort of thing, in my experience you only really hear about how well behaved other babies are and never really learn about the difficult side of parenting - its all rather hush hush.

I still managed to get a snotty smile and a giggle out of him this morning whilst I tried to make him comfortable and for a brief moment all the frustrations resulting from the previous night were forgotten about. Now I’m in somewhat of a stunned state as I reach the halfway stage of the working day and rather annoyed that the OCD-like tendences are creeping in again as things are checked, checked and checked again even when carrying out the simplest of tasks to ensure things are done correctly.

The chicken pen I made a year ago has been relocated and in its place I’m installing raised beds. Our girls now have a new house care of our generous and creative next door neighbour and although a little spooked at first, they seem to be settling in nicely nearly one week on.

Our new beds will be put to good use soon as we again attempt to grow a varied and successful vegetable crop this year. Its also nice to release our wonky pine tree from the grip of the old chicken pen, I think Charlie already has his eye on it for a potential tree house location.