It's getting towards that time of year when I start to see the appeal of going outside again. Admittedly, I am sat indoors as I compose this with blinds to protect me from the sun's deadly radiation. Hurrah for Spring and, believe it or not, there's quite a lot to do and see in the coming months. So 'why don't you' check out (public service blogging, that's what I'm about. Today...) the EAT Festival site for the lowdown on all that is happening in the realms of Emerging Artistic Talent (the three day event is taking place at the end of April). You may even want to get involved, although involvement isn't something those lurking around this site are known for. But who knows? This could be the time to throw off the shackles of cynicism and show your creative endeavours to the wider world. I said could be.

Anyway, EAT is supported by lots of nice-sounding, blue-sky-thinking, artistically-minded people including the folks at aspace gallery, Somnio (there is some good local street art on the site, if that's your thing) plus the usual host of local PR chancers practitioners making a living by 'empowering' and branding the whole thing (they don't need the links). For the record, I reckon a festival of this kind is a great thing for Southampton and it certainly has the potential to be an interesting weekend, although 'the arts' is a pretty broad term, leading me to fear the presence of local 'poets' reciting their latest nonsense coupled with self-important sub-boho trustafarians congratulating each other in a daisy chain of mutual self-satisfaction. Not to pre-judge of course. We'll see. Provided we attend the events.

(I don't know about you but I've never really taken to poetry. Or maybe it's that it just doesn't like me. It could be because - at its worst - I find it impenetrable and self-indulgent, or perhaps it reminds me of the time when I worked for a magazine that ran a monthly poetry competition: it was my task to edit and page up these affronts to the English language. I shudder at the memory...)

While I am single-handedly supporting the creatives of this fair city of Southampton (damn, my secret location revealed. Now my enemies will find me and smite me down. Or something) it would be prudent to give mention to (all that talk of smiting has given me cause to write olde englische...) the BBC's Big Screen Online Film Festival. I've had a look at a few of the entries and some of them are really impressive. As with all these kind of events, there's a strong showing from the animation world, which is good for me because I love all that stuff. Plus, you really should get on the BBC website because (a) you pay for it and (b) it's rather good (and how it makes me happy when I email them about yet another spelling error. Sad but it keeps me off the streets at night.) There's a clip of a comedy entry (oops!) called Gloves that left me wanting to see more.

As usual, your comments will be welcomed like the proverbial prodigal son.