Qualvista

Postmodern Dread

2010-10-20T18:12:00.011+01:00

And so the world went on as it always had done, with the Earth rotating slowly, and stately on its axis whilst innumerable carbon-based lifeforms scurried hither and thither across its surface. And nobody actually noticed immediately when asteroid 15382 Vian suddenly veered out of orbit from the main belt and made a seemingly unscheduled detour our of the Solar System to parts unknown. In fact, it wasn't until a week later when a tired astronomer at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California happened to see that 15382 Vian didn't appear on the latest deep space imaging, that anyone released the asteroid was missing. But by then 15382 Vian, which had picked up some considerable speed once it had passed Jupiter, was out past Uranus and far enough away to prevent anyone on Earth from pinpointing its location or accurately tracking its trajectory. Scientists at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory were baffled. The Small-Body Database Browser, which stored information on all of the main belt asteroids, showed nothing to indicate that Vian would inexplicably deviate from its usual orbit, let alone find it's own means of thrust from which it could break out of the main belt. In the end, the Advisory Committee at NASA called 15382 Vian an "anomalous reading", that's its disappearance was "inexplicable", and suggested that actually the asteroid had never existed in the first place. After a year or so, 15382 Vian was mostly forgotten, and looked upon by astronomers and the scientific community at large as an interesting curio: The asteroid which disappeared.

What they totally failed to recognise was that Vian was not an "anomalous reading". It's true purpose was far more disturbing, and ultimately this minor miscalculation would prove disastrous.

A brief introduction to something I cooked up whilst I was bored. I hadn't actually decided what Vian was up to: I guess it was something to do with aliens but I'll leave that up to your imagination. Also interesting to note that everything factual in the introduction is true: There really is a 15382 Vian, and the Small-Body Database Browser really is hosted by the Jet Propulsion Laboratories at Pasadena. Nobody can accuse me of not doing proper research.

Truly Awful 60's Songs

2010-09-30T17:49:00.006+01:00

Helen Shapiro - Walkin' Back to Happiness
Helen Shapiro manages to encapsulate everything that failed about the 1960's in a single song. No mean feat, given she only has a few minutes to do it. "Walkin' Back to Happiness" wants to destroy your immortal soul through the use of kitsch imagery, and it can succeed if you allow it. Helen Shapiro was one of the 60's icons which could only have worked in that decade. If she had been around in the 70's she'd have been lumped alongside the Carpenters, and any decade later than that would have seen her totally relegated to the Easy Listening shelves. Even I am not that cruel, but this song is certainly suitable for masochists who really want to punish their auditory canal.

Leapy Lee - Little Arrows
Dear Lord preserve us, this song is just about one of the very worst things music has ever produced. I'm sure it was a massive success in getting prisoners of war to confess to horrific crimes, but as a form of entertainment you'd be better of putting a shotgun in your mouth and guessing what happens when you pull the trigger. I would rate this as one of the worst songs ever written, period, but I don't want to give it that honour because it simply doesn't deserve it. Every second listening to it makes you want to hunt down Hammond & Hazlewood and perform unspeakable acts of violence upon them and their families.

The New Vaudeville Band - Finchley Central
I kind of have a grudging respect for The New Vaudeville Band: They played their act very well, and they never broke cover. They wanted to do vaudeville, and that's what they did, unflinchingly to the end. However, that doesn't mean that there songs were good though; they most certainly were not. Finchley Central is simply one of their worst (or greatest?) simply because the lyrics are so memorably irritating. "Finchley Central, is two and sixpence, from Golders Green on the Northern Line". See what I mean? Only worth a listen if you want to laugh whilst grimacing in pain. Still, the best of this quartet, if that means anything.

The Rockin' Berries - He's in Town
I guess these guys hadn't heard of the word melodramatic, because this song is so far past melodramatic it is essentially swimming in honey covered rats. The orchestration is indeed so lush and the voices so melodic that it is best listened to whilst punching yourself in the face if you don't want to pass out in sheer boredom. If you try to imagine a tropical sunset and a group of hula girls dancing on the shoreline, you might just be able to save yourself from wanting to throw yourself out of the nearest window, although I find that a pair of earplugs are a good alternative. And to think, this is the decade which generated The Beatles.

Goodbye Church View Road

2010-09-25T14:30:00.005+01:00

At the junction with South Lawn,
The road sign which once welcomed pedestrians
To Church View Road is ripped in two,
The old, rotting wood splintered,
Likely when some vandal decided in a moment
Of abandon to launch a momentary vendetta
Against a piece of street furniture.

The pond, with yellow and red fish in the garden
Of Number 28 is still here.
And each morning I would walk past
Said pond to school, and in the afternoon
I would return.
Today, the fish swim lazily and without purpose.

Church View Road.
An ironic name, considering after the houses
Were constructed in the 50’s, it was
No longer possible to see the church.
I pause, and look towards the top of the street.
I remember a telephone box,
Never used, used to stand up there.
I can’t see it now, or even notice
Any indication it had ever been there.

But I’m here. Standing outside Number 16.
My childhood home, of which so little persists.
New double glazing, new attic conversion,
New double wooden gates which block the view
Of the garage, new varnished wooden fence
Which replaced the brick wall my grandfather built
On a hot summer’s day.
Indeed, aside from the pebble-dashed exterior
And the porcelain tiles announcing “16”,
There is nothing I recognise.
Even the plants in the front garden are different.

But I do not feel upset, or angry.
How can I? Things must change.
We moved from old homes and built new ones.
And I am placid, until I look next door,
At our semi-detached
Partner of Number 14.

It was here, oddly enough,
Our next door neighbour used to live.
An elderly widow, with few friends besides us,
And a remote family who visited seldom.
Her house was stuck in 1965;
The original windows, drainpipes and guttering,
She even diligently used the original oven,
Original moulded sink, original wallpaper,
And until the door fell off the 40 year old fridge,
She used that too.

And even though we moved away, across town,
To a larger, creakier house in a nearby village,
We stayed friends; Her visiting us every Birthday,
Every anniversary, every Christmas Day.
She wasn’t just a friend: She was family.
But then, one fine week in April,
I didn’t need to cut her lawn anymore,
And I would never set foot in her house again.

So now, looking up at her grand old house,
I feel nothing but rage and sadness.
For the new owners of Number 14 have
Ripped her industriously manicured plants from
Their beds; the once fine lawn invisible beneath
The oily mud and stacks of bricks,
The frames of the old windows lying in pieces
Beneath gleaming white double glazing,
The new breeze-block portico half built,
The wrought iron gates removed,
The garden wall demolished,
The old mint green garage doors
Now just a sheet of sliding steel.

Everything of which I remembered, or cherished,
About her house, has been
Systematically removed from existence.
Unlike us, she didn’t move away,
Or part with it voluntarily. It was taken away.
So that when I return home, and look up an old picture
Of her house on an online street map,
It registers as just a memory of what that house
Has become today.
In time no doubt, it will be as beautiful as ever,
But not to me.

So Goodbye Church View Road,
Where you can’t see the church at all,
And the trees in the gardens are gone.
You can't keep me pinned back in the past,
I'm going back to where I belong.

What has happened has happened,
What’s next is undecided.
So I've decided that my future lies,
Far beyond Church View Road.

With thanks to Sir Elton John for inspiring both the title and the final two verses.

Polar

2010-09-09T15:57:00.007+01:00

This is the story or a bear, or moreover, of a Polar Bear, named Polar. Not a real bear you understand, but a cuddly bear. He can't be called a teddy bear because he isn't a teddy: He's a polar. If you search online for pictures of toy Polar Bears you will, unless you know the right phrase, be hard pressed to find a bear that looks like Polar, because it seems like the cuddly bears of today strive for anatomical realism, and Polar in no way looks like a realistic bear. He was manufactured by Gund, who continue to make cuddly animals to this day, and in a way, he is an icon of the 1980's. And actually until today, I had no idea that Polar was famous in bear terms. Of course, Polar is not the actual name of the brand of cuddly bear here. According to Gund, the bear is called Snuffles, and is their most successful cuddly toy to date. He was designed in 1980, and is relatively unique in that he looks up at whoever is holding him. Whilst the Wikipedia article shows Snuffles of various colours, shapes and sizes (all of whom look vaguely frightening if I must say), manufactured since 1980 up until the present day (his 30th Anniversary year), my Polar is pure white and 13 inches tall. And he has been with me, more or less, since birth. He can be seen hanging out in the background of several of my baby photographs from 1989, and my Mum recollects that I was initially frightened of him (probably because as a baby, a white bear that was approximately the same size as me likely seemed quite threatening). Today, he is the only cuddly toy I own.

Considering he is the same age as me, he's looking pretty good. His nose is a little worn, his tail is fraying (bears have tails?! Yes they do) and and his fur under the arms is falling out, but other than that, he is still as huggable and soft as ever. Why am I bringing up in such exquisite detail my affectionate relationship with a cuddly toy? Because I would like to believe that in the event of a fire, Polar would be one of the first things I grabbed to save. You can have your computers and games and CDs, because they are replaceable. But to me, Polar has become irreplaceable. Even though I could buy a new Snuffles bear, it wouldn't be Polar: It would just be a new Snuffles bear. To me, Polar is a physical manifestation of my childhood. I look at him and can vaguely remember, with weakening certainty, what things were like back then. Unlike my sister, who was so attached to her cuddly toys they literally went on holiday with her, Polar never really left my bedroom, and to be honest I didn't hug him much. He was just... there. Like an old friend. Sitting in the corner, smiling benignly. Never passing judgement or wanting for anything. And for that, just for being there, I am grateful.

Of course, all this might be a tad weird and creepy, so if you're freaked out, I apologise.

Disappear Here

2010-09-06T13:41:00.012+01:00

Bizarre. I think that's the best word to use to describe "Lunar Park" by Bret Easton Ellis, the novel I have just finished reading. It is extremely unlike his previous books in many ways (I have read them all aside from "Glamorama", which I shall endeavour to read next). I suppose the best way to describe the novel succinctly is 'Bret Easton Ellis does Stephen King', even though this is woefully inadequate. "Lunar Park" is basically a fictional autobiography meets horror adventure. It's narrated by Bret Easton Ellis (who I shall refer to as simply Bret from hereon in in order to differentiate between the author and the character), whose background is remarkably similar to the author's, up until the point he marries a fake celebrity actress and father's a son with her. He moves into a McMansion (a large, tasteless house in a new neighbourhood) with his family, and tries to begin a suburban life. However, it quickly is established that the house and Bret are haunted by something horrific, and reality soon blurs with fiction as many of Bret's characters start to effect his life. Throughout the book you aren't really sure whether it's Bret's father who is haunting him, or if it's the literary monsters he has created (most pointedly, Patrick Bateman from "American Psycho"). Maybe it's both. What is more pointed is that Bret doesn't really notice that his characters are coming to life. He is visited by a student at the local college called Clayton, who apparently bears a striking resemblance to a young Bret, Patrick Bateman and who's name and demeanour are similar to Clay, the protagonist of "Less Than Zero". Clayton also apparently drives the same car which Bret used to drive during his late teens, which his father had given him.

Bret is also interviewed about a series of Bateman-inspired murders (possibly undertaken by the character himself, or a copycat) by Donald Kimball, the detective sent to investigate the disappearance of Paul Owen in "American Psycho". Bret seems unaware of this, until is it discovered that Donald Kimball may have been an alias used by someone else. Moreover, Bret's next door neighbour is Mitchell Allen, a minor character from "The Rules of Attraction". Bret says that he remembers him from college and also his bisexual affair with Paul Denton, a similar fictional character from the same novel. Bret shows a huge reluctance to grow up throughout the novel, still hoping he can behave how he did in his twenties, but drinking far too much and experimenting with a variety of drugs. His real-life friend Jay McInerney shows signs of wanting Bret to shape up, but is happy to encourage Bret's reckless behaviour in spite of his family. The novel has a definite "American Beauty" feel about it, in that Bret is evidently unhappy with his middle-aged suburban life and wants to break free, but cannot do it without making a fool of himself. The haunting of Bret's house is the physical manifestation of these worries and desires: Freudian angst against his father, fear that people would copy Patrick Bateman in real life, problems of bonding with his son, Bobby. Overall, "Lunar Park" is far from Ellis' greatest novel, but it is nonetheless an interesting change.

Rising for the Moon

2010-08-31T19:03:00.008+01:00

I travel over the sea, and ride the rolling sky,
For that's the way it is, that is my fortune.
There are many ears to please, many people's love to try,
And every day's begun rising for the moon.

There's a heart in every place, there's a tear for each farewell.
For that's the way it is, that is my fortune.
I'll lure you as the lace that the wayward gypsies sell,
With the sinking of the sun, rising of the moon.

Rising for the moon, the sun has set and it is dark,
But the star of the enchanted tune is bright as any spark.
The chorus of the dusk regail the evening lark,
Whose every day does start rising for the moon.

We travel over the sea, and ride the rolling sky,
For that's the way it is, that is our fortune.
There are many ears to please, many people's love to try,
And every day's begun rising for the moon.

I had no real reason for wanting to repeat these lyrics verbatim here, but it was mainly done to fill space and make it look like I wrote more than I could. Still, I think Sandy Denny really did a great job at writing this song. It's a simple tune, but nonetheless very catchy and emotionally deeper than it might first appear. Much of Fairport Convention's stuff which they did later isn't very good, but this song is one of the exceptions to that rule. And night owls like me will appreciate the references of enjoying the night more than the day. Who is to say that the day is over just because the sun has gone down? Some people simply rise for the moon. I most certainly do not intend any sexual references which might be read into the previous phrase. Please strike them from your mind immediately. I don't even know why I mentioned it. Probably because that's what "The Sun Also Rises" by Ernest Hemingway is actually about. It's true. Look it up.

Things are going to be OK

2010-08-29T23:23:00.008+01:00

"What's the point of OK? Well, what's the point of anything?" OK Soda slogan.

In 1993, The Coca-Cola Company wanted to try something different. They launched a brand new soft drink, ostensibly marketed directly at members of Generation X and Y, with an offbeat and controversial advertising campaign. The drink was called OK Soda (or just OK), and was mainly sold using a variety of unusual techniques, including sarcasm, reverse-psychology and even outright negative publicity. Ultimately, OK Soda wasn't a success and never went into full-scale production, and consequently it was discontinued in 1995 shortly after distribution testing had ended. The tale of the brief life of OK Soda isn't simply the story of the failure to market a brand of soft drink: It can be viewed as an analogy for the state of consumerism today, where we are not told simply what to buy, but also how to feel, think and act. OK Soda was the brainchild of Sergio Zyman; the man responsible for the New Coke fiasco of the mid-1980's, where Coca-Cola changed formula, and then abandoned their new version after a huge public outcry. Zyman was rehired to The Coca-Cola Company, and because of his successful marketing of Diet Coke, was given a new lease to design a new drink which captured the one demographic which Coca-Cola felt it was missing out on; Those misanthropic, confused, yet ever so hip Gen Xers. The company had done some research during the 1980's which suggested that "Coke" was the second most commonly recognisable word in the world, behind "OK", a word of acknowledgement or mediocrity. Zyman believed that OK had brand potential, and decided to market a drink towards the very people who were openly sceptical of advertising.

Thus, OK Soda was born. Zyman's initial predictions were that OK Soda would be a resounding success, and could quickly secure at least 4% of the US national beverage market. OK Soda was launched on a test marketing basis; being delivered to specific areas of the United States where the take up in different population demographics could be recorded. An unusual aspect of the testing was that four different can designs were also launched, and each location where OK Soda was available could compare and contrast the designs for themselves. Unlike the bright red of Coke can designs, OK Soda cans were uniformly grey and black, with intermittent splashes of red around the logo and in pictures. Text on the cans encouraged drinkers to call an 800 number where they could record their various thoughts about the drink, including a warning which stated that "Your comments may be used in advertising or exploited in some other way we haven't figured out yet". They also assured the drinker that it was good to think that "Things are going to be OK" (OK Soda's main slogan). TV and print adverts openly stated that the flavour of the drink wasn't important but was nonetheless "fruity", and that they were really just marketing the 'feeling' of the drink. The idea behind this campaign was that Gen Xers knew that they were being manipulated by mass-marketing, and so in order to counteract this, OK Soda would simply be cool and upfront about it.

Some of the television adverts featured messages apparently left at the 800 number's answering machine, even if they were entirely negative. One famous example included an angry woman stating "You don't know what I've been through in the last month. I really resent it. I'm tired of you people trying to tell me things that you don't have any idea about. I resent it." before hanging up. In the end though these interesting advertising techniques backfired. Nobody, not even the Gen Xers seemed to 'get' OK Soda. In the test markets it sold poorly, and it was officially pulled from production before it was rolled out nationwide. Furthermore, it apparently it didn't really taste very nice (a mixture of a dull orange soft drink and flat Coca-Cola), which has to be factored into its failure. But perhaps it was something more than that. Any product which states on it's side "There is no real secret to feeling OK" isn't going to particularly motivate anyone to ever purchase it. People might feel OK, but that's no reason to triumph it, or use it as a product statement. Overall, OK Soda was an OK idea, borne of an OK premise, and it met an OK demise.

Deutsche Demokratische Republik

2010-08-28T04:40:00.023+01:00

The German Democratic Republic was a flawed nation. For one thing, it never really needed to exist. If it were not for the Cold War, Post-War Germany might have remained a single nation, and the hideousness of the Cold War may have been avoided altogether. Instead, the Iron Curtain cut the country in half; a division which kind of persists to this day, despite the Berlin Wall coming down. The reason I bring this up is because I've just watched "Good Bye, Lenin!" a German-language film set in 1989-1990, during the collapse of the GDR. It revolves around an East German family, Alex Kerner, his mother and sister. Alex's mother is a staunch Socialist, and falls into a coma shortly before the Wall came down. Upon awaking in 1990, the doctors tell Alex that any further stress may kill her. Therefore, he decides to pretend that the East Germany she has always known still exist, and goes to considerable lengths to keep up the facade. The film is very funny but also highly poignant, and asks many questions about how society and the individual interact. It presents a nostalgic half-longing for an East Germany that no longer exists, and actually, in real life, never existed. The GDR was extremely authoritarian towards it's citizens, as apparently "The Lives of Others" demonstrates (which I want to watch at some point). Still, the bureaucracy of the GDR and its mismanagement is what really has a lasting legacy.

Take this example: After the Second World War, the Berlin Stadtschloss (City Palace) was heavily damaged as a result of the allied bombardment, and was basically reduced to a burnt out shell from its former Prussian glory. It was still considered possible to save the palace, but unfortunately it was located inside the Soviet Zone. In 1950, the ruins of the Stadtschloss were torn down and in its place was built Palast der Republik (Palace of the Republic) a staggering modernist concrete structure very much triumphing the typical design philosophy of Communism. It was used as the seat of the East German Parliament, and also as an arts and cultural centre, housing restaurants, a theatre and even a bowling alley. However, shortly before reunification in 1990 it was discovered that the building was contaminated with asbestos, and it was closed to the public. Throughout the 90's it stood empty and unused, before in 2003 the German Parliament decided to demolish the building with the hopes of one day reconstructing the former Stadtschloss. And yet, despite this building being a symbol of much that was wrong with the GDR, many people protested against the demolition of the Palast de Republik. Kind of makes you reconsider how people can become attached to something they previously despised. Kind of like Stockholm Syndrome, in a way.

Bringing the Yearlings Home

2010-08-15T15:10:00.009+01:00

Just gotten back from Fairport's Cropredy Convention 2010 (known unofficially and previously as Cropredy Festival), and feel tired, but no longer dirty, thanks to a nice hot shower. Camping for two days in a wet field near Banbury hasn't opened my eyes to the joys of camping any further. I still hate it. I partially think this might be because the tent I was in was a small two-man one which we've had since I was seven and doesn't have room to swing a cat in, but I think mainly camping doesn't appeal because I like the creature comforts. As much as I complain on this blog about the pervasiveness of technology or consumerism and how bad it is, most of the spare time I had when I wasn't listening to the music at the festival was spent camped out in the back of my Dad's car, eating Blue Ribands (I pronounce them rye-bands, and I don't care) and enjoying the fact that the rain was getting the car wet but not me. Nevertheless, the festival was a great experience, despite the poor weather. For one thing I saw one of my favourite bands from the 1960's and early 70's, namely Fairport Convention. Never mind that half of the original members are now dead or not involved (Richard Thompson is still very much alive), it's still Fairport. They took to the stage on Saturday evening, after Martyn Joseph, who I will dub as a Welsh Bruce Springsteen meets Bob Dylan's acoustic days. He was actually my favourite act, because he actually had a message to give alongside his music. Still, Fairport were also very good, but only when they played their old stuff.

On Friday, my favourite artist was the 60's American band Little Feat, who had the previous day lost their drummer Richie Hayward. He had been absent from the band for several months, and even though such a close friend of theirs had recently died, they played magnificently. I enjoyed very much their rendition of The Band's "The Weight". The headliners on Friday were Bellowhead, who I suppose would call an experimental folky Rock band, and whilst the small orchestra of members which made up the band sounded great, some of their slower songs weren't so good. It was their fast jigs that really got everyone moving. Moving back to Saturday, and half of Fairport's own headlining set was dedicated to putting on the highlights of "Excalibur", a Celtic Rock Opera which was so over-the-top and Hard Rock it seemed mightily out of place at a Folk/Indie Rock festival. Fairport were assisted in this endeavour by a variety of guests, but the "Excalibur" extravaganza lasted far too long, and the rain seemed to mirror the dramatics of the music by coming down even harder. Still, former Fairport member Dave Swarbrick made several unscheduled appearances on stage near the beginning of their set, and even coaxed the other members of the band into a great unrehearsed rendition of "Sir Patrick Spens". Finally, at the end of the night we were treated to the classic "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?", which still can never sound so good without Sandy Denny singing it and is now indelibly linked in my mind to my recently deceased Godfather. Then it was the stormingly great "Matty Groves", to which I sang along loudly, before finishing with "Meet on the Ledge". For some reason the final song left most of the audience in tears; I guess I'm not yet old enough to reflect on the inherent sadness of the lyrics. All in all, an excellent musical experience, where I listened to a lot of new acts (which I have conspicuously failed to mention at all in this posting). Just a shame about the weather.

The Graduate

2010-08-13T00:24:00.002+01:00

Just like Benjamin Braddock, I am now a graduate. If anyone knows of any married older women named Mrs. Robinson looking to have a brief extramarital affair with a 21-year-old graduate with a mediocre degree in Philosophy, please get in contact (I jest, please do not; I don't think it would be an entirely sensible idea). Graduation itself was nice, and made me half wish that academic dress was the university standard, like at some of the Oxbridge colleges, although I suppose it would be a terrible hassle having to constantly wash it. Still, my blue tie matched perfectly with the university colours, which was a happy coincidence. That, and the weather was pretty nice, if a little windy. Still, if there is anything which the film "The Graduate" shows is that you can't do nothing with your life: You always have to be doing something, even if it isn't important. "Ben, what are you doing?" "Well, I would say that I'm just drifting." I have to stop drifting and start going somewhere. But unless you know where you're going, you won't get anywhere. What am I saying? Even I find it very difficult to put into simple terms the way things work. You can see the way the world operates and how actions occur, but actually explaining how these things happen is far more complicated.

Much like this blog post really. Each, or at least most, of these postings have been an attempt to express how I feel or what I'm interested in, but honestly I doubt any of them have even come remotely close. Wittgenstein was seemingly correct: Without language you cannot appropriately express thought. But I think you can have ideas which cannot be expressed, but because they can't be expressed, they cannot be shared. Only through communication can you give credence to any idea. I suppose that's why most philosophers haven't been embraced by the popular media: Although their ideas might have been the best, they are often the worst people to actually communicate their ideas. A bit like politicians really, although not as universally untrustworthy. If I wanted someone to watch my shopping whilst I went to the Post Office, I would definitely leave Immanuel Kant rather than Thomas Jefferson. The worst thing Kant would do would be to eat an apple, whereas Jefferson would declare my shopping deserved independence. I kid, I kid. I also respect Jefferson. I have nothing further to say at this juncture.

Less Than Zero

2010-08-03T23:53:00.017+01:00

"Nobody was saying anything at all." Elvis Costello, 'Waiting for the End of the World'.

When I suddenly became a massive fan of the novels of Bret Easton Ellis I don't know, but last month I read his first novel, "Less Than Zero". I started at "American Psycho" and then worked backwards with "The Rules of Attraction". Now I need to start working forwards onto "The Informers", "Glamorama" and "Lunar Park". His most recent novel released this year, "Imperial Bedrooms", is apparently a sequel to "Less Than Zero". I am picking up definitely themes in Ellis' novels, most notably heavy drug use, drinking, and moral apathy. Characters go out to parties, get drunk, have sex, then go to sleep and wake up and do it all over again. It makes you realise what a terrible world they live in and how absolutely nobody is satisfied or has any kind of real happiness. Wikipedia calls it "Postmodern dread", and I kind of like that. His first three novels certainly deal with very similar subject matter. In "Less Than Zero", our main character of Clay, who is perhaps the most reluctant character to engage in this excessive and pointless consumerism, nonetheless comes back from college to Los Angeles over the Christmas holiday and basically does nothing for two weeks but go to parties, hang out at his friends houses, drink and take drugs. In "The Rules of Attraction", more or less the same thing happens, but this time it takes place in Camden College; a liberal arts university on the west coast. And then in "American Psycho" the same thing happens again, but it is coloured by the fact that protagonist Patrick Bateman likes to rape, torture and murder people. But still, no one notices and nobody cares. I read Ellis for a good dose moral bankruptcy and societal apathy, because it reminds me how prevalent it has become in the world today. It's great satire.

Bret Easton Ellis as a man though, I cannot fathom. Have a look at his Twitter feed. I cannot tell if he is purposefully being bizarrely funny, melodramatic and weird, or if he is actually like that: His characters are just mirror images of his own personality. I'm wondering if he's actually writing as the character of Bret Easton Ellis (he stars in "Lunar Park"). The Tweet where he says "Not to sound too much like Bateman but the James Perse t-shirts and hoodies I bought a week ago are the best clothes I've worn in a year..." had me in stitches, because it is exactly the kind of think Patrick Bateman would say, always going on as he would about bespoke suits and the best kind of mineral water. Reviews for "Imperial Bedrooms" have been rather mixed if not to say polarised, but I'll probably read it eventually anyway. I actually looked up Ellis' various playlist songs from his website using Spotify, and it introduced me to the great song of X, a Los Angeles Punk band who never really got hugely big but were kind of big in the late 1970's and early 80's. Also got me into early Elvis Costello, so I have to thank him for that as well I guess. Just remembered and note to self: Must read, "The Outsider" (also known as "The Stranger") by Albert Camus. Cannot believe I didn't read such an important philosophical novel whilst I was studying.

Maybe You're Right

2010-07-29T17:50:00.007+01:00

I have regrettably become, once again, awfully behind schedule when it comes to putting out these blogs. I even recently contemplated ending Qualvista entirely to focus exclusively on A Note of Criticism, but I thought that I would still like to have a place where I can write what I want, when I want (ish), without any kind of limits on what I might want to say. A Note of Criticism is all good, but because I have to write in a certain style, and not my natural flow of writing (however awful that might be), it can never truly replace Qualvista. Besides, this blog is now becoming a grand old institution, considering in the life of the Internet things don't last particularly long, and I have been writing practically every month since 2007. Or at least, the dates say I have been writing every month. I logged on and started an article on each listed day, but that doesn't necessarily mean I finished it on that date as well. I could change to the new Blogger editor, which would list the date as the day the post was published, but if that was the case then you'd get a day a month where I wrote in a huge burst and then nothing the rest of the time. I hope that in 2017 I will be able to still look at what I wrote on Qualvista, even if I have stopped writing on it by that time. I would hope that I would still be writing then, preferably professionally, but we'll see. Writing well is not the same thing as being paid to write. The more I write the better, because then I can try to shift from simply writing something which is alright into writing something truly great. That would be amazing, but I still believe it is quite a way off, if it is indeed possible.

More recollections from Berlin: At one point I was approached by a student and asked the way to the Humboldt University library. I was forced to admit that I had no idea where the library might be since I was equally unaccustomed to Berlin, and that I suggested he return to Unter den Linden and was more likely to find someone who might know the way. Also, on the flight back, I sat next to two philosophy students, from Harvard. I have rarely felt truly stupid in my life, but those two were frighteningly intelligent. They knew more about philosophy that I ever have, and they were in their first year. I was brave enough to strike up a conversation with them and told them I had just graduated, and we mused for a while about the great and good in philosophy (no quarter was given to the likes of Heidegger). Indeed were were chatting so animatedly we were told to talk quieter by the stewardess because people were trying to sleep. The experience was illuminating but disconcerting. The Harvardians were evidently utterly passionate about philosophy, above and beyond anything I have ever felt, given that the frequently launched into full blown philsophical arguments under their own steam whilst I sat next to them pretending to nap, and read philosophical texts for fun. People who read those books for fun are likely to be either A. crazy or B. insanely crazy. I can imagine that in a few years they'll be running the US State Department. Nonetheless, Fight Fiercely Harvard!

Alone in Berlin

2010-07-25T20:22:00.012+01:00

I have just returned from my very first overseas solo endeavour; four/five days in Berlin, Germany. Although I have documented my entire time in a diary, I feel slightly self-conscious in repeating verbatim everything I wrote down, since I did become a little obsessive-compulsive at remembering German street names and U-Bahn stations, and thus some parts are just listing how I travelled from one place to another, and what directions I took. Nonetheless, I fully enjoyed my brief holiday alone. The main downside of travelling on your own is sitting in restaurants. Having to order for one takes a little getting used to, and it is at times like that when you think it would be great to have someone to talk to. Plus, I felt rather paranoid that everyone was either looking at me or wondering why I was dining alone, but that's probably my normal state of paranoia just ramping up a notch. Anyway, my first solo sojourn was excellent fun, only marred by the fact that coming back my plane was delayed by a chemical spillage at Luton Airport, and thus I missed my bus and had to spend a night at a hotel at the airport. Still, Berlin is excellent. I almost always felt safe and comfortable, and it was only around Checkpoint Charlie I didn't like. It felt unfinished and touristy, and it was the only place in the entire city where there were beggars. Still, the Checkpoint Charlie Museum was definitely worth the price of admission, and has to be one of the weirder museums I've visited. If you didn't take the time to read the displays you would think that the museum was a bit of a let down, but the stories on the walls were totally fascinating.

An example I could remember off hand was of a child who fell into the Spree River, but because the river was in East Berlin but the bank was in the West, nobody could dive in to save the child without being shot at by the East German guards, and consequently the child drowned. It opened the door for new legislation which made sure that in such an eventuality again, an emergency button could be pressed to allow a rescue to be attempted. Potsdamer Platz was also a very modern square, with lots of high-flying modern architecture. Hardly any old buildings exist because it was bombed extensively during the war, and then also because the square had existed right in the middle of the course of the Berlin Wall, and so what was once one of the busiest plazas in Europe was reduced to a wasteland. Looking back on the trip though, one of the things that has struck me is that for all I saw and did, there was so much I missed. Although I went to and toured the magnificent Pergamonmuseum (featuring the Pergamon Altar), I didn't go into any other museum on Museum Island. I didn't see any of the preserved sections of the Berlin Wall (apart from a small section in Potsdamer Platz), and I only looked around Alexanderplatz for a few minutes. Just shows how much there will be still to do when I go back.

P.S. Now I've got back I've started reading "Alone in Berlin" by Hans Fallada; a novel I bought on for the title alone. I couldn't resist it.

Pass the Sunglasses

2010-07-11T17:11:00.032+01:00

The sun beats down without recourse to the needs of the general population, as the weather has become decidedly clement. It's a nice change from all that rain we've had recently. Taking advantage of the need, I went into Oxford and bought some new sunglasses, which I will require for when I go on my planned excursion to the great German city of Berlin next week. The pair I bought in Debenhams were relatively cheap and non-designer (seriously, over £100 for a pair of glasses? I'm only willing to pay that for glasses that will last for years and years), but have the exact appearance of a pair of Ray-Ban New Wayfarers (a style similar to the sunglasses Audrey Hepburn wore in "Breakfast at Tiffany's"). So I am pretty happy with them style-wise, and since they aren't the real deal as it were, it didn't cost me a bomb to get them. Just a shame that at the moment there seem to be relatively few opportunities to actually put on sunglasses because previously our general climate hasn't been, shall we say, Summery. Interesting that sunglasses really have only developed since the beginning of the 19th Century, but didn't become popular until the 20th. I expect that prior to that people simply didn't spend so much time in direct sunlight (come on that's patent nonsense: What about all those people working in the fields every day? If anything they spent more time in the Sun).

And now, a quote from Paul Rudnick about writing: " Writing is 90 percent procrastination: reading magazines, eating cereal out of the box, watching infomercials. It's a matter of doing everything you can to avoid writing, until it is about four in the morning and you reach the point where you have to write." Can I put that percentage up to 95%? Seriously I don't understand why I have found it so difficult to write anything recently. I used to be able to write quite a bit every week, but now it's good if I can manage even a single post, article or entry. So consider this my admission that I need to act to improve the volume and quality of what I write. It might take some time, but if you work at anything hard enough, you raise the chances significantly of being able to succeed. There's some liberating advice for you.

Fighting for Independence

2010-07-04T14:32:00.004+01:00

I fight for my own independence and piece of mind every second and every day of my life. One thing I have to get used to now I have returned to my family home is the diminished sense of freedom. How apt that it is Independence Day today. Whilst at university I was more or less my own agent. For better or worse, I lived by my own agenda. And I enjoyed it immensely, not having someone yell at you for sleeping too late, or for eating badly, or for not doing your washing. But at the same time, I didn't really do myself any great favours by ignoring or putting off things which needed to be done. Now I'm back, it is tempting to regress to late childhood once again, but I know that that isn't possible. I want to stand on my own two feet, but to achieve real independence means to have become either entirely self-sufficient, or to have built a new system upon which you can rely. Sometimes you have to comply with others wishes to get ahead. Individualism can never make you really happy, because as "Into the Wild" showed, "Happiness is only genuine when shared." Nonetheless, although I must follow certain rules or guidelines, I do not really do so with genuine gusto, if you catch my meaning. I do so reluctantly, and although I wish I could commit myself to fully engaging with the situation, I have developed such avoidance techniques that can distance myself from the problem. Even writing this very posting is technically 1. an avoidance technique and 2. breaking a rule set down primarily for my own benefit.

As I have stated, it might be done with the best of intentions, and although I offer myself the very best of advice, I very seldom follow it. I am very illogical. What is even more confusing is that I like my illogicality. So much of my time I am stable, dependable and constrained I feel it is good to have a part of you which remains wild, untamed and bottomless. The issue with the anarchistic views express by the likes of Kropotkin or even Oscar Wilde in his 1891 essay "The Soul of Man under Socialism" is that the solution they offer would throw up such terrible problems. On the face of it, the picture Wilde paints is beautiful. "One will live. To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all." But it's all too perfect. It doesn't realise the innateness in man to have conflict. It's so sad to admit it, but strife is one of the few common aspects of almost every period of history. Very seldom has there been an extended period of peace and harmony. The abolition of private property or the state would devolve us into hunter-gatherer types, where what is 'mine' is what I hold. Striving for a common good only works so long as people agree, and this does not always happen. Perhaps the topic has veered slightly off course, but nonetheless, I live in this state of semi-independence for the timebeing, and I shall make of it the best I can.

"And you wise men don't know how it feels, to be thick as a brick." Jethro Tull, 'Thick as a Brick'.

21st Century Blues

2010-07-02T21:06:00.009+01:00

"Who's escaped those weary 20th Century Blues?" Noel Coward, '20th Century Blues'.

Been listening to quite a bit of 1930's, 40's and early 50's music recently. I like call it "Music for the Post-Apocalypse", since it would no doubt be in the soundtrack to a Fallout game, or something from BioShock. Plus, I feel that if the apocalypse did come along and I survived, it's all I would want to listen to. I'm determined to learn eventually all the lyrics to "The Major-General's Song" from The Pirates of Penzance by Gilbert & Sullivan by heart. One of the most lyrically complicated songs I've heard, with the possible exception of versions of "I've Been Everywhere" by Johnny Cash or Rolf Harris. And on second thoughts, "The Elements Song" by Tom Lehrer, which has the same tune as "The Major-General's Song". In matters vegetable, animal and mineral, I am the very model of a modern Major-General! Makes me kind of wish I was one, if for the fact that being a genuine Major-General is nothing like the song or Light Opera actually suggests. Ah, my eyes become tired with the brightness of this screen. Anyway, yes, the blues. In the 2oth Century, I guess Noel Coward was fed up with the materialism and with the sense that nothing really mattered. Now in the 21st Century the same problem continues, but it has been changed because our consumerism is so pervasive. If Coward thought it was bad when he wrote that song, it is fifty times as bad today. So much time each day is spent seeing things which need buying or watching other things demand you buy them.

I guess you could call me a supporter of Enoughism, which is the idea that when we get to a critical point of buying everything we need, our lives actually get worse if we buy more; things we don't need, but simply want for the purpose of wanting. You can't be downright anti-consumerist, because that would result in a total withdrawal from mainstream society and living like a hippy who thinks this is 1968. I have just discovered what I suffer from. I have noticed the existence of the philosophy of futility, in the words of Columbia University's Paul Nystrom from 1928. Nystrom described the philosophy of futility as being the disposition in people which is caused by the mindless monotony of the industrial age. Because people feel this angst and are unhappy, they seek to solve it by having gratification in various material goods, but this in turn causes more futile feelings, which in turn increases consumption, and thus is the vicious circle complete. You buy more to feel better, but buying more only makes you feel worse, so you buy even more. The longer I look at Capitalism, the greater I am convinced that it isn't healthy for humanity. A system which values the acquisition of material goods, or links happiness to earnings seems just cruel. You only need to look and see that in the end what you have doesn't really matter. It's what you do that counts. And yet, I worry that the process is insidious and is not slowing. The lust for consumerism will be a difficult beast to slay.

The Last Day

2010-06-26T13:04:00.009+01:00

"All those moments will be lost in time like tears in rain." Roy Batty, Blade Runner.

Well, this is it. The first day of the rest of my life. No more university is currently booked, and all my attention should be focused on finding a viable means of employment. But, deep down, I really am immensely apathetic. Much of my mind has become accustomed to days which pass doing not a whole lot productive. Laziness, that's what it is, in plain and simple terms. I wrote a while ago about the goodness of idleness, but perhaps they were right after all that "idleness warps the mind." The last thing I want to do in my life is to be stuck in a job which I neither enjoy nor find engaging. Few people find such a job, but I really cannot countenance the idea that that is all I am destined to be: Unhappy, or unfulfilled. I want to make a difference. Who doesn't want to make a difference? You show me a line of tyrants and leaders down through history who wanted to make a difference, positive or otherwise. Each of them nonetheless left a mark, but so many people are consigned to the dustbin of history; the memory hole in "Nineteen Eighty-Four" where they neither exist nor ever existed, because there is nobody left who knew they existed in the first place. I realise that nobody will ever remember anyone when the world is burnt to a crisp in a few million years by the expansion of the Sun, but memory, or the persistence of thought is something which is fascinating and often occupies a lot of my mind. I know Plato existed because I have read his writings. I know the RMS Titanic sank in 1912 because there are many news reports documenting it, and the wreck still lies at the bottom of the ocean. But in 2410, when I, my possible children and children's children will be dead and buried, who will remember the young man who wrote this blog? Will it even exist, or did it exist? Who can say.

There is a reason the above quote from Blade Runner has achieved legendary status, and it isn't simply because it's a good corny line to be used in a death scene (although it is that as well, I grant you). It's because of the truth in the line. Everything, even the works of Shakespeare, are tears in the rain. Who is to say in the year 10,010 AD that whatever humanity might have evolved into will even have any detailed records stretching back to this point in time. Of course, this is all another bought of endless speculation. I can speculate till the cows come home on what might or might not happen in the future. So what I suppose I am trying to say is that we can only make and shape the future as we impact on it. You might not be able to start or end wars, or solve the energy crisis or cure cancer, but what we can do is take another step along the beach, and watch as the tide washes our footprints away. On the spine of £2 coins it says "Standing on the shoulders of giants." Whilst it might appear this way, we aren't really standing on the shoulders of giants. We're standing on the feet of colossus. What has happened has happened. What is next is undecided.

Fear and Loathing in Southampton

2010-06-23T18:36:00.016+01:00

I am gripped by a sudden and all-encompassing sadness which has just washed over me, and I am not entirely sure where it has come from or what it is doing. Perhaps it's because I'm so confused and lost. I mean, I've come to the end of my time at university and where I go from here is entirely undecided and almost totally up in the air. Up until this point in my life everything was clearly planned out: Go to school, pass GCSEs, go to Sixth Form, pass A-Levels, go to university. But now I've passed out of that, I have another long series of hurdles appearing on the horizon and it is my job to fault them once again. In the words of Pink Floyd; "No one told you when to run: You've missed the starting gun." But not only did no one tell me when to run, no one told me where to run: It's up to me where I want to run to. Problem is, I just don't know. There is so much I don't know. If Philosophy has taught me anything, it's that people think they know too much. In reality we are all severely suspect to interference and misinformation. You know that history is bunk because it was written by people. What actually happened will be decided by who writes the history books. That's a very cynical and dangerous approach to take, but I've started to believe in it. Truth is you shouldn't because people are all we have. What else to we have to rely upon? Don't go bringing up the religion card as this point because I won't buy it. As a pessimistic realist philosopher, that business doesn't fly with me. Has anything caused more or bloodier wars? I doubt it.

I was just thinking, Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World" is such an amazing novel. It is often viewed today in the shadow of Orwell's "Nineteen Eighty-Four", but they are in fact extremely different. I'm not trying to put down the greatness of Orwell, but Huxley's work just feels very different. "Brave New World" is a false utopia, whilst "Nineteen Eighty-Four" is simply an out and out dystopia. The citizens of the World State are brainwashed into believing that the world they inhabit is perfect, and World Controllers like Mustapha Mond (one of the greatest character names ever) are there to pacify the population and keep them from discovering anything which might go against their world view. Alas, I notice that I have flown wildly off-topic. Such is the way with over 90% of the postings on this blog. My mind is so scattergun, as I have previously stated, and so I rarely can hold my attention to a single subject for long. Funny, since usually I consider myself very single-minded. If I decide on something, it is done. Problem is, at the moment there is nothing to decide and nothing to do. We have to find something to occupy our time. I wish I knew what.

Plundered My Soul

2010-06-22T10:12:00.018+01:00

Been listening to the remastered version of The Rolling Stones "Exile on Main St." recently. It sounds more or less the same, but the Deluxe Edition comes with a few new/old tracks, including the newly overdubbed "Plundered My Soul". The song itself is a mixture of original instruments from the 70's and then a newly recorded voice and guitar track by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. There was a BBC Imagine documentary called "Stones in Exile" on recently which piqued my interest in the album again. My Dad says that "Sticky Fingers" might be their best album, and I'm possibly inclined to agree with him, because that album is more cogent that the sprawling mass than is "Exile on Main St." It's The Rolling Stones very own 'White Album', in that it is undoubtedly a fantastic and elongated assortment of tracks, but it doesn't have such a unified voice. In fact, it is the lack of unified voice which gives it its strength. "Sticky Fingers" has a unity and flow that are magnificent, but it is not as eclectic as "Exile". The documentary was pretty good but was mainly comprised of still images and testamony from when the band relocated to Villefranche-Sur-Mer on the Riviera, rather than actual video. Still, it was an interesting watch nonetheless, and it certainly interviewed the great and good.

Best thing of the remastered version though is the extra tracks. In terms of sound the actual album sounds almost exactly the same as the previous CD release, but never before has an album by The Rolling Stones been rereleased with bonus content. It's maybe a slight victim of the Loudness War by being slightly too loud in a couple of places, but overall it's great. And a good knock-on effect of this hype is that their other albums have been discounted in stores and on Amazon, so I'm tempted to get some of the albums I have previously overlooked because they were expensive. Like The Beatles, The Stones can get away with charging over £10 for an album because people will undoubtedly buy them. I'm used to getting my albums for £5 or less, considering most music from the 1960's has now been on general release for approaching fifty years. I consider the price should naturally decrease over time. I wonder what is going to happen to audio recordings in the future when copyright runs out on them. Even some songs from the 1930's are getting pretty close to that date. Stuff by the likes of Django Reinhardt. I just suppose it will mean that anyone could share the recording without having to pay for it. People will undoubtedly still pay for a good quality version of it. That's why people still buy classical music.

The Fall and Rise of My Computer

2010-06-18T19:15:00.005+01:00

Well, what an exciting 24 hours in the life of my computer it has been. Still not entirely sure if everything is back to normal, but I've run deep virus checking scans and cleared just about every temporary Internet file I can think of, so I am keeping my fingers tightly crossed and touching wood at the same time. It began at about 3AM last night. I had been playing a game (Mass Effect 2 if I recall), when suddenly it jammed. This was surprising, since it had never done it before and the computer had been very good at not jamming in recent months. Anyway, I was able to quit to desktop, and since it was late I turned off the computer and went to bed. Jump forward to this morning, and when I start up the computer I discover that it can't connect to the Internet, McAfee Security has been disabled and the sound card wasn't working. In essence, it seemed that my computer had been crippled and was dead in the water. I immediately suspected some kind of virus or malware, but couldn't think off-hand of how I might have acquired such digital woe. Anyway, throwing caution to the wind I phoned McAfee to ask them what I should do. After a relatively brief wait I was connected through to a nice woman who was seemingly calling from India. After parting company, on the spur of the moment with a whopping £59 for her help, she was unfortunately not able to connect my computer to the Internet, and thus couldn't help. She told me to call BT Internet to ask if their was a connection issue.

Thus, I called BT, and was connected to a gruff but extremely reasonable man, also in India. After I tried to connect to the Internet physically via an Ethernet cable and still couldn't establish connection, the man from BT assumed that it was my adapter which had faulted, and told me I would probably need to go to PC World or somewhere to have it fixed manually. I thanked him and called McAfee back, and got a different by equally pleasant woman in India again. After I told her what the guy at BT had said, she said that she would refund my money because they were unable to solve the issue, which I was pretty pleased about. By this point, I had resigned myself to the inevitable hard drive wipe and operating system re-installation, since System Restore wasn't ordinarily working on the computer. So I put in my Windows 7 disk (eternally grateful I paid a little extra to get that disk), and was greeted with a message asking whether I wanted to reinstall Windows... or restore my hard disk using a system image. I had set up the computer to automatically back up each month to the second hard drive, but I didn't realise that that back-up included a system image of the computer's previous state. So I followed that option, and after about 45 minutes of updating and recalibrating, the computer was back. Overall, I had only lost 15 days worth of stuff, which was hardly anything. So in the end, the story seems to have had a happy ending.

E3 Doesn't Stand a Chance

2010-06-14T15:47:00.009+01:00

This week heralds the Electronic Entertainment Expo: The annual Event of the Year for the video games industry. There have been pretenders at the throne of E3 in the past, but none have managed to shake its grasp. Indeed, even the previous downsizing and then up-scaling of the Expo have done nothing to prevent E3 from continuing to grow in importance within the fiscal year. There is the Autumn 'holiday' season as the Yanks call it, and then there is the May run-up to E3 where a few big titles are launched with the hope of cleaning up at the awards. It is also customary at E3 for various undisclosed games to loosen their jaws and spill the beans on what they are working on. But most of all, E3 these days seems to be a competition between the Big Three manufacturer's (Sony, Microsoft & Nintendo) to fight it out over who has the biggest display booth, or who has the best organised and most interesting press conference, or who has the biggest stars supporting their games. In recent years Electronic Arts and Ubisoft have also been invited along to this Mardi Gras Fish Fry as like extra hangers-on, who provide 'meat in the room', to borrow a phrase from "In The Loop". Ubisoft last year was almost a literal car crash of a press conference with James Cameron groaning on and on about, supposedly, the video game of Avatar, and Electronic Arts showed off some delightful casual games for small girls. It was clear they hadn't got that hang of who was actually watching their conference.

Still, I have high hopes for this year. By the end of the event last year I had reached the stage where I was literally fed up to the back teeth with E3-related news and gossip, because I had reached a saturation point where I physically could not absorb any more news, previews, interviews, etc. So this year, in order to not go completely insane (instead of just reasonably insane), I'm going to try not to go too overboard when it comes to the Expo. Just take it slow, steady and easy going. GameSpot really ramps up seriously when E3 rolls around because of its importance, so it's important to keep a cool and reasoned head. Anyway, that's about it for now. Maybe write more later, but at the moment I feel like I am suffering from a terrible Writer's Block. I really don't like it.

Converse Repeater

2010-06-09T20:37:00.009+01:00

I'm rather tired at this precise moment in time but I really wanted to write a blog post because I wanted to know what it felt like to write something in a stream of consciousness style without any planning beforehand because I thought it would be good to get some practice. J. D. Salinger did stream of consciousness and it was probably his most boring work, so if this ends up as deathly dull I apologise humbly and profusely for wasting your most valuable and precious time. You deserve better. I would turn Bruce Springsteen up, but I'm slightly worried about upsetting my next door neighbours, although I believe they may be either deaf or blind, so if they did get angry and come round, at least they couldn't either hear or see me. I don't believe they are both, but something about the way they shout at each other and there dog suggests that they aren't entirely happy. Or maybe shouting at each other is the best way to find some tiny aspect of happiness in their daily routine. Doing too much which is ordinary is very upsetting. You should always strive for the extraordinary; defeat the tedium of the normal. Again, you deserve better. In fact, I would so far as to suggest you are better than that. Not that I can judge your sentimentality, but I am only making an educated guess, which is as good as any random guess is ever going to get. Nobody can "guesstimate". There is a guess, or there is an estimation. Always hesitate to speculate. Always speculate to accumulate. If nothing else, please remember that. It will be important.

I think I might actually be gaining a second wind, which is saddening. I didn't want a second wind. I wanted to get to the end of this next paragraph, stop writing, publish the post, turn off the computer and fall into bed and sleep until 9:30am tomorrow morning, whereupon I shall wake up, make myself a cup of tea and a bowl of porridge, and then perhaps go and do something productive. But if I get a second wind I won't feel tired right now, so I will stay up stupidly late doing absolutely nothing interesting or informative, then go to sleep before waking at 1:00pm and cursing myself and my stupidity. So I would rather go right now. Perhaps if I will myself I can still do the right thing. Nothing is certain except that which you have decided. I have therefore decided that nothing has been decided. None of this has happened yet. I don't know where I'm going and that scares me. But as much as it scares me, I know that I cannot avoid it. I will still have to walk that way eventually. We cannot stand still, as much as we might like to. If time stood still, nobody would ever do anything. Is this making any sense to you? Please, I did advise you at the beginning that little here would make much sense, so if you have progressed to this late stage your endurance is commendable. But I would advise that you pursue more interesting lines of reading. John Steinbeck, or F. Scott Fitzgerald for example.

Repeat, conversely.

Face for the Radio

2010-06-08T06:58:00.017+01:00

So, three years on student radio have come to an end. Or have they? In fact, I discovered that I might be able to do an addendum show next week, so I may just do that. I might change the name since I talked for however long about how it was the 'last' show. Looking back, in the three years I've been broadcasting a lot of things have actually changed with the station. For example, when I first arrived we had to record all of our songs played on paper, file them after the show, and then it must have been some one's tedious job to go through all those pieces of paper and collate the songs played. That is thankfully no longer the case; Now songs played from the system are automatically logged, and if you play a CD or from a iPod, you can manually log songs directly to the computer. There was also no proper keyboard for the computer. Instead, you had to make use of this tiny one-handed thing which felt like something an Operator from The Matrix films might use to jack-in. The main problem was that if you when to hit a key, you were liable to hit four or so keys around it, so that anything you attempted to write was a random jumble of letters and numbers. Logging songs became a tiresome and rather difficult process, but I got used to it. Getting a real, standard Mac keyboard was a great leap forward though. Made just using the computer a lot easier.

But all that is over now, and it is time to move on. Time waits for no man. It was fun, and it was interesting, but nothing lasts forever. I would thank the experience for helping to develop my music takes a little further. I am still very close-minded when it comes to modern music and very easily dispel most stuff out of hand, but there are at least a few things I now see the beauty of. Still, they don't come up to the standard of the older stuff, and I doubt they ever will in my eyes. I suppose all that is left to say is to thank anyone who might have listened to me ramble on Monday evenings or Thursday mornings (in 2007 that's when The Yesterday Programme was scheduled. It was a horrible time because nobody listens to the radio at 11am, even less than those who listen at 8pm). I hope you learned something, and I hope you enjoyed learning it. Perhaps I will return to some form of radio or print broadcasting in the future, but as of this moment, those scenarios remain undecided and indistinct.

Barclay James Harvest

2010-05-31T19:12:00.023+01:00

Finally made use of Spotify in a way that is actually beneficial, and that is listening to bands of which I have never listened to before. In this way, I have only just discovered the likes of Wishbone Ash and Barclay James Harvest, of whom I had never heard of before. I listened to the first track from Wishbone Ash's "Argus", and it was excellent, as is BJH's "Hymn", a totally mesmerising song which swells like a symphony to a grand finale. Also got to making some actual playlists, and so have managed to collate some of the genuinely good songs from the 1980's of which there aren't a huge lot, but those that do succeed deserve recognition. For example, Genesis' "Land of Confusion", or The Buggles brilliant "Video Killed the Radio Star". I'll freely admit that a lot of the songs on that playlist are courtesy of Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, but man that game had an awesome soundtrack. Looking back I think I was too young to appreciate how truly fantastic the soundtrack was. I should play Vice City again if only just to listen to the radio. VCPR (Vice City Public Radio) is utterly hilarious. I mean GTAIV had a great soundtrack as well, but it still isn't a pinch against Vice City. Much of the time I was listening to Independence FM, the unique PC version station where I could put on whatever the hell I liked. So most of the time I listened to John Lennon and Bob Dylan, and other songs I felt suitable for a New York-inspired landscape. "Land of Confusion" reminds me rather of "Money for Nothing" by Dire Straits. Both songs cover much of the same topics; the excesses of Capitalism.

James Barclay Harvest's "Hymn" on the other hand is mainly about the crucifixion and Jesus, and although I'm not religious, it is still an excellent song nonetheless. Another great song Spotify brought me was Ramases "Life Child". Ramases is actually a very little known Prog Rock outfit by Martin Raphael, who was a former Army PT instructor. He only ever recorded two albums, the first called "Space Hymns" with the members of the band who were soon to become 10cc, and the second with session musicians which hasn't been ever re-released on CD. He died in 1978, but his death wasn't actually widely reported until the 1990's. If "Life Child" is anything to go by, this is still some great Prog Rock nonetheless. "Space Hymns" apparently when first released had some fantastic gatefold art, of a spaceship in the shape of a church steeple, blasting off from the roof of a cathedral. It's very dramatic if you see a picture of it. There is so much music out there like this which must just fall by the wayside either because the critics aren't up for it or nobody buys it. Of course for the actually bad music this doesn't matter much, but I'm sure there are many pieces out there which may be fantastic but everyone has forgotten about. And you must always remember that music, like art, is a subjective process: People like different things in different measure.

I know where my towel is.

2010-05-25T13:45:00.022+01:00

"Any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still knows where his towel is is clearly a man to be reckoned with." Douglas Adams.

Today is Towel Day, and it is my only regret that I neglected to actually leave the house with a towel slung over my satchel, because I only remembered after I returned to the house. At least I actually did remember it this year, thanks to it being a trending topic on Twitter. If you don't know what Towel Day is, I'm ashamed. It's a day to commemorate the life and works of the late, great, Douglas Adams, creator of "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" and the BBC's h2g2, the best online collaborative encyclopedia out there (better than Wikipedia because it has an editorial peer review process, which means that nothing which hasn't been debated gets into the Edited Guide). The idea is that you take a towel around with you all day in rememberance. One of these days I will actually remember to take the towel with me. I have for a long time been a supporter of everything Douglas Adams-related, so one of these days I will make a point of remembering in advance rather than as is usual, when the time has past. I'm frightened that this BBC Review might decide to either shut down or remove BBC support for the h2g2, which would be a incredible disappointment considering the huge work Adams did for the BBC and was instrumental in devising the forum system which the BBC continues to use to this day. That's why if you check a BBC forum's URL, it will include the letters DNA (Douglas Noël Adams).

Sadly at the moment, I'm not feeling particularly like I actually do know where my towel is. Exams loom up, and after that all that's left is graduation and then I'm out in the big wide world without any sort of cogent plan of what to do. You know hopefully that Douglas Adams came up with the idea of "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" whilst he was lying drunk in a field outside of Innsbruck, Austria in the mid-1970's. He was staring at the night sky and had a copy of "The Hitchhiker's Guide to Europe" in his bag, and thought randomly that someone should right a similar kind of guide for the whole galaxy, a sort of electronic book. Whether or not that story is apocraphal is irrelevant; what matters is that he had the idea and he didn't let go of it. The concept niggled away at him and led him to write the radio series, the novels and everything else in between. I guess what I'm trying to say is that you should follow your dreams. People always tell you to do it, but seldom to you realise how important doing what you want to do can be. It can make all the difference in the world.

Of Culture and Race

2010-05-21T22:36:00.013+01:00

As part of my revision for my Philosophy, Science and Race exam, I've been reading a non-fiction book by Anne Fadiman entitled "The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down". The novel is about a refugee Hmong family from Laos, who settle in the United States in the early 1980's as a result of the Civil War in Laos. Lia Lee is a child of the family born in California, who is diagnosed with severe epilepsy. However, the Hmong are extremely suspicious of Western medicine, and there are many complications and problems that arise. The family are distrustful of the doctors at the local hospital, and don't really understand the need for the medicine. However, on the other hand, the local doctors are unable to understand the Hmong language as usually there isn't a translator available, and are very uniformed about the local customs and culture of the Hmong. The Hmong believe that certain diseases, such as epilepsy, are caused by evil spirits known as dabs. They are also very concerned about soul loss, and believe that medicine should protect the soul as much as the body. Lia's parents believed that her epilepsy was bought about by a door slamming, upon which her soul was frightened by the noise and left her body, allowing an evil spirit to take control of her. A literal translation of the Hmong name for epilepsy is "the spirit catches you and you fall down". Due to the communication and cultural problems between both parties, who both what the best for the child, Lia is eventually left in a persistent vegetative state; effectively all of her higher brain functions are inoperative. The entire case if ultimately extremely sad, because the situation could have been prevented if the doctors had understood Hmong culture, or if the parents had understood American medicine. But what it does highlight is the underlying cause of many international incidents: A lack of understanding.

Think about the continuing conflicts in the Middle East. The Palestinians and Israeli troubles can be partly attributed to a lack of mutual understanding. The book gives an example of a man called Dwight Conquergood who was working at a Hmong refugee camp, and was trying to encourage the location population to vaccinate their dogs against rabies. At first, there was very little involvement; many in the camps viewed the hospital with deep suspicion, because the doctors asked such probing questions, and apparently took the organs of people out of their bodies after death (a Hmong taboo, because the body should be intact ready for the afterlife). Then Conquergood came up with the idea of having the local population perform a mixture of plays and carnival-like parades, incorporating into their cultural stories the importance of vaccinating their dogs. The parade was entirely made up of Hmong, who Conquergood had suggested the idea to and encouraged them to perform it in their own style, accompanied by the usual ritualistic sacrifices (chickens, etc.). The next day, the station where the dogs were to be vaccinated was so crowded, at the beginning they couldn't vaccinate fast enough. The example just goes to show that cross-cultural advances can take place, but it should not be a case of one culture imposing itself on another. At the same time, Conquergood learnt many techniques from from Hmong shaman which he took back into his medical work. The best fusions occur when the best aspects of both cultures can work together in co-operation and respect.

Revolution, I Love You

2010-05-17T09:52:00.012+01:00

Let's not change bosses: Let's change life.
The more you consume, the less you live.

The concept of revolution is one which I have slowly co-opted and embraced. I don't have any particular revolution in mind to advocate; certainly not a typical Marxist one, and in reality permanent revolution of the state simply wouldn't work because it would end in anarchy, but that doesn't stop revolutions in the mind. Perpetual revolution can always happen in your head. I feel we are far to complacent in our average, everyday consumer lives; happy to just placidly walk along and buy things, work, watch TV, play computer games. But it shouldn't be like that! There is more to life than consumer society. Even if you are totally against going out and burning down your local TV station (something I am definitely not advocating; people in local TV are lovely), there are just little things which we can do to essentially free our minds of the tyranny of normality. If your mind is free, then you can take anything the world throws at you. I have taken the 1968 slogan "Boredom is always counter-revolutionary" very seriously, and in fact much of May 1968 in general. You have no right to be bored, and you shall never have a right to be bored. Happiness should not be something that needs to be bought. Just because things are the way they are, doesn't mean they should be, and it is this desire for action which necessitates all revolution. Henry David Thoreau wrote an essay in 1849 called "Civil Disobedience" in which he stated that it was the duty of people to not allow government to overrule or atrophy your own conscience. If you register your disagreement, you have a right, even a duty, to act in support of it.

Revolutionaries, per se, are extremely inspirational. George Washington, Vladimir Lenin and Dr. Sun Yat-Sen were extremely influential in the American, Russian and Chinese Revolutions, respectively. The only major figure I feel who utterly subverted the revolution was Maximilien Robespierre, who shortly after the French Revolution embarked on the Reign of Terror, where around 20,000 people were sent to the guillotine. He claimed the action was necessary but it certainly was not; it totally undermined the principles of liberté, égalité and fraternité upon which the revolution was founded. He thrust France into the modern era, but at the cost of an awful lot of dead people who were no longer around to enjoy it. And of course, he indirectly facilitated Napoleon Bonaparte's foundation of the First French Empire (otherwise known as the Napoleonic Empire). I don't count Joseph Stalin or Mao Zedong as the revolutionary fathers, because neither of them actually lead a genuine revolution. Plus, they are both responsible for some of the worst mass murders in history, Stalin more so than Mao, but equally Mao during his "Cultural Revolution" (which wasn't so much a revolution as a witch hunt which ended in a slaughter). So, I suppose it is important to remember that revolutionaries can be a bit of a mixed bag. Don't trust everything you read, especially on the Internet. The truth is in the looking.

A Week at Westminster

2010-05-12T21:51:00.023+01:00

A week is an eternity of time, and nowhere is this more evident than in Westminster politics. I would say that this has been the most interesting political week in my life so far, but perhaps that is an overstatement. And of course, there is always next week, but somehow I suspect things will finally quieten down for now. At any rate, there have been few times I can recall politics being this exciting. Usually it is deathly dull and I have to motivate myself in order not to sink into an apathetic mess, but not so this week. We began with a Hung Parliament, and we have ended with, of all things, a Lib-Con Coalition. This totally surprised me. I didn't expect 1. the Conservatives to offer a coalition, or even 2. the Lib Dems to accept it. So now David Cameron is Prime Minister and Nick Clegg is Duty Prime Minister. Not sure what to think about that second position. I mean, when John Prescott was Deputy Prime Minister to Tony Blair, he was essentially a nobody really: Didn't do a whole lot and was simply Deputy in just name. Apparently Clegg is going to get a department concerning political reform, so at least he will have power over something. Anyway, I feel I have talked politics for long enough, considering the previous blogs I have devoted to this topic. Let's move onto something brand new.

Exams are not too far away now, and as much as I try, I still find revision tedious. I suppose it is all in the title; re-vision, in that you are having to revisit stuff we have already been taught. Even if you might have forgotten some of the stuff, you are still treading the old ground which doesn't thrill you. I have a great love of knowledge, but it is limited by the boundaries of my interest in certain topics. I studied Philosophy at university partly because 1. it seemed like a fascinating topic I didn't know a whole lot about and 2. I was frightened that if I studied History, I would learn to loath History and historians. Well, three years of academic Philosophy has made me loath most philosophers, but thankfully not Philosophy in general. The main problem facing the whole of Western Philosophy going into the 21st Century is that it is far too obscure and purposefully high-brow. Academic philosophers huddled in their little faculties in universities the world over continue to churn out possibly interesting, but very poorly written essays which aren't at all understandable to anyone who hasn't had a firm grounding in Philosophy already. Popular culture has dismissed Philosophy as a subject which is neither relevant or interesting, but I firmly believe it is both. The trouble is, those who should be championing Philosophy most of all, the philosophers, are in effect actively working against its popularisation.

The Beautiful and Damned

2010-05-07T20:35:00.008+01:00

We're in political limbo. Nobody knows what's happening and nobody really knows what to do. All we can do is wait, and for a generation now obsessed with everything happening instantly, patience is something they will have to relearn. The election is over, but the outcome is far from clear. The results were disappointing for the Liberal Democrats; despite gaining a larger share of the voter than ever before, they actually lost seats; a rather evident display of why First Past the Post is not the best electoral system in the world, since it will always favour the largest parties. Labour didn't really do as badly as many had expected (or indeed hoped), still having over 250 seats and effectively putting them in opposition. But for the time being, Gordon Brown remains as Prime Minister, because the Conservatives didn't manage to secure their majority either. So not both parties are running to the Lib Dems to try and convince them to form a coalition, or to allow the Conservatives to form a minority government. I really don't know what the Liberals will do; despite losing seats they actually have more power than ever before. They hold all the keys to decide whether Labour can carry on, or if the Conservatives should take over. I personally don't know which would be the better option. Only one thing is certain; Gordon Brown is going. He will resign at some point, and will no longer lead the Labour Party.

Nick Clegg has the enviable task of trying to weigh the pros and cons of what both Labour and the Tories are offering him. I am very nervous of forecasting what is going to happen; I would tentatively suggest the Lib Dems will forsake Labour but not enter a coalition, and simply let the Conservatives get their budget and Queen's speech though, so we'll have another election within another year. However, everything is so volatile at the moment forecasting anything seems dangerous. What I say now may be incorrect in the next half hour, by the standards things have been moving since last night. Goodness, after all the boredom politics has been recently, it's nice to have an exciting time for a change. Still, no doubt a conclusion will be reached reasonably soon, and then we'll return to the tedium of normalcy. It need not be normal. Politics should be exciting all the time, and it's only politicians who make it dull. Maybe if we abolish politicians, politics would remain interesting. They are at their best when they aren't pulling all the strings, and that's why I think a Hung Parliament was a good idea.

A Very British Election Night

2010-05-06T23:13:00.014+01:00

I originally intended this to be as simulated 'as live' recollection of Election Night, but since it's only just underway and the night is yet young and I'm not that interested in typing into the wee small hours as Frank Sinatra calls them, you'll have to make do with my usual ill-informed, biased and totally awesome personal viewpoint in usual blog form instead. The BBC have gone all out Election crazy, and I have to admit, I am totally engrossed by their enormous, American-style network news set. In the centre of the wheel of news is David Dimbleby, as he rightly should be, with Nick Robinson as his right-hand man and someone called Professor Vernon Bogdanor from Oxford University on his left. Then ranged up on a balcony above them is Jeremy Paxman, located so he can interview various people on the huge screen, but also interview the parade of various people seated next to him at the same time. Across the other side of the studio on the other balcony is Fiona Bruce, who is ostensibly the 'newsreader' who appears each hour to give a general synopsis on what is going on. Finally, Emily Maitlis is poised standing with the Director or Ipsos/Mori to give specific numbers information about constituencies next to an interactive white board, whilst Jeremy Vine is exiled to the virtual studio where he can play with digital swingometers and the like. They really are pulling out all the stops tonight. Their intro was simply epic.

But onto the Exit Poll, which was very disappointing for the Lib Dems. It actually shows them losing seats. I'm not sure whether to trust it or not. I mean, did all that publicity Nick Clegg generated do absolutely nothing? It would be a very large disappointment if this election was mainly useless for the Lib Dems. On the plus side, I suppose, it is predicting a Hung Parliament, as I predicted with the Conservatives having the majority of seats. That seems to confirm my suspicions that we'll have a Tory minority for a while, before another election is called and we have to go through this whole rigmarole again. But of course, it is too early to call. Exit Polls have been notoriously wrong on other occasions, so this may be one of them. Part of me hopes so concerning the Lib Dems, but of course the other party of me wants the Hung Parliament prediction to be correct, so I suppose I will have to judge which is the better situation to ask for. Probably the Hung Parliament, because in any event, even if the did end up with less seats, the Lib Dems would still hold the absolute balance of power, because they would be in the position of deciding who they should support to be the government. But for now, I think I will go back to watching David Dimbleby debating with Nick Robinson about what might happen, because nobody really knows who has 'won'. If Robert Peston had been there this evening as well, I think that would have been perfect. He could give a Business update, just because he can.

A Very British Election, Pt. 3

2010-04-30T00:20:00.009+01:00

So the final debate has rolled around just a couple of hours ago, and it wasn't particularly enthralling. True, David Dimbleby was easily the best host of the trio: The ITV and Sky hosts couldn't hold a candle to him. The debate itself though wasn't the be all and end all that many had anticipated; instead it simply fizzled out. Again I though Clegg did remarkably well, but he did repeat many of the things he had said at the second debate verbatim, and so did Cameron. Gordon Brown... What can really be said about him? In a way, part of me just feels sorry for him now, especially given the "bigoted woman" fiasco. He said himself "That was a disaster", little knowing how true his words would be. He was never really Prime Ministerial material. In the same way that George W. Bush might be a perfectly good man to invite for a barbecue, I think Brown would work perfectly well as a Scottish country doctor caring for the elderly, but I wouldn't entrust him with a running an island nation, and in the same instance, I wouldn't trust George W. Bush with the most powerful country in the world when he is ideally qualified for cooking a good steak. They are just ill at ease with the profession they have chosen. Perhaps that isn't their fault, but they must take responsibility for the consequences of their actions. Someone said that Gordon Brown has been the worst Prime Minister ever. I think that is unfair. Surely he wasn't as bad as George Canning, who was Prime Minister in 1827 for only four months before he died. He didn't have a whole lot of time to get anything done.

Interesting looking through our list of Prime Ministers. I mean, I can rattle off most US Presidents by heart, but ask me Prime Ministers before Chamberlain and I'm not so sure of precisely when they were in office. I know David Lloyd George was the last Liberal Prime Minister in 1922, and that Ramsey MacDonald had a great moustache. Also Viscount Melbourne (Prime Minister twice in 1834 and 1835-41) is where Melbourne, Australia gets its name. In fact, we had a lot of members of the aristocracy serving as Prime Minister during the 19th Century. The Duke of Portland or the Earl of Derby for example. William Gladstone was Prime Minister four times, more than anyone else, although Robert Walpole, the first Prime Minister, still served the longest time. Spencer Percival is still the only Prime Minister to have ever been assassinated (although their were attempts on others). He was shot in the lobby of the House of Commons in 1812 by John Bellingham, a man who had been unjustly imprisoned in Russia and had demanded compensation from Parliament, but his petitions were rejected. It is amazing all the new things you can learn every day. And here I thought I was supposed to be writing about the third debate night. Honestly.

Two Postmodern Speeches

2010-04-25T00:39:00.014+01:00

I wrote neither of the following monologues. The first was written by Paddy Chayefsky, the screenwriter of the 1976 film "Network", and is spoken during the film by Peter Finch. The second, by author Bret Easton Ellis from his 1991 novel "American Psycho". I wanted to copy these speeches verbatim here because I think they portray two very stark ideas of what is wrong with the world, and possible solutions for improving it. I think their similarities, and apparent dissimilarities, are very telling on how life is being dehumanised by the mass media, by international corporations, and by industry and business. In "Network", the character of Howard Beale has suffered a breakdown after failing ratings on his nightly news show lead to him being fired, and delivers this speech to camera whilst live on air to his TV audience. In the latter, the character of Patrick Bateman (who, if you have read the novel of watched the film you should know is a murderous psychopath) is asked by his friend Tim Price what are more important problems in the world to solve than massacres in Sri Lanka, which gains this response. I have edited out the narrative parts which break up the speech.

Howard Beale's "Mad as Hell" speech from "Network" (1976)
I don't have to tell you things are bad. Everybody knows things are bad. It's a depression. Everybody's out of work or scared of losing their job. The dollar buys a nickel's worth. Banks are going bust. Shopkeepers keep a gun under the counter. Punks are running wild in the street and there's nobody anywhere who seems to know what to do, and there's no end to it.

We know, the air is unfit to breathe and our food is unfit to eat. And we sit watching our TVs while some local newscaster tells us that today we had 15 homicides and 63 violent crimes as if that's the way it's supposed to be! We know things are bad; worse than bad. They're crazy. It's like everything everywhere is going crazy so we don't go out anymore. We sit in the house and slowly the world we're living in is getting smaller, and all we say is "Please, at least leave us alone in our living rooms! Let me have my toaster and my TV and my steel-belted radials and I won't say anything! Just leave us alone!" Well I'm not going to leave you alone. I want you to get mad!

I don't want you to protest, I don't want you to riot. I don't want you to write to your congressman because I wouldn't know what to tell you to write. I don't know what to do about the depression and the inflation and the Russians and the crime in the street. All I know is that first, you've got to get mad! You've got to say "I'm a human being goddamn it! My life has value!" So, I want you to get up now. I want all of you to get up out of your chairs. I want you to get up right now, and go to the window, open it and stick your head out and yell "I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!"

Patrick Bateman's dinner speech from "American Psycho" (1991)
Well, we have to end apartheid for one. And slow down the nuclear arms race, stop terrorism and world hunger. Ensure a strong national defense, prevent the spread of Communism in Central America, work for a Middle East peace settlement, prevent U.S. military involvement overseas. We have to ensure that America is a respected world power. Now that’s not to belittle our domestic problems, which are equally important, if not more. Better and more affordable long-term care for the elderly, control and find a cure for the AIDS epidemic, clean up environmental damage from toxic waste and pollution, improve the quality of primary and secondary education, strengthen laws to crack down on crime and illegal drugs. We also have to ensure that college education is affordable for the middle class and protect Social Security for senior citizens plus conserve natural resources and wilderness areas and reduce the influence of political action committees.

But economically we’re still a mess. We have to find a way to hold down the inflation rate and reduce the deficit. We also need to provide training and jobs for the unemployed as well as protect existing American jobs from unfair foreign imports. We have to make America the leader in new technology. At the same time we need to promote economic growth and business expansion and hold the line against federal income taxes and hold down interest rates while promoting opportunities for small businesses and controlling mergers and big corporate takeovers.

But we can’t ignore our social needs either. We have to stop people from abusing the welfare system. We have to provide food and shelter for the homeless and oppose racial discrimination and promote civil rights while also promoting equal rights for women but change the abortion laws to protect the right to life yet still somehow maintain women’s freedom of choice. We also have to control the influx of illegal immigrants. We have to encourage a return to traditional moral values and curb graphic sex and violence on TV, in movies, in popular music, everywhere. Most importantly we have to promote general social concern and less materialism in young people.

A Very British Election, Pt. 2

2010-04-22T20:36:00.031+01:00

Debate Night: Round Two! Fight! And certainly, this time it was a fight. The nerves of the first encounter were mainly gone. It was dirtier, and rather more confrontational. I personally again thought that Nick Clegg did the best, but the general consensus so far is that it was narrower between Clegg and Cameron. Again, Brown came of worst, and personally I can see why. Gordon was constantly attacking both of the other two, and specifically said "You're weak!" to Cameron and "Your policies will lead the country to destruction!" to Clegg. Perhaps I misquoted the Clegg remark, but he definitely used words to that effect. Brown really wanted to attack them as much as possible, asking probing questions, which the other two then had to field, whilst managing to avoid being asked questions himself. Throughout the debate and afterward, Brown and Cameron pointedly avoided eye contact. Nick Clegg gave the best summing up speech, which basically implored people to vote Lib Dem by saying there is a third way. I suppose that's a sensible position to adopt.

Cameron was probably in second place, but my personal dissatisfaction for anything Dave does somewhat coloured my impressions of him. He just seemed relatively similar to last time, and wasn't particularly memorable. In fact, for part of the debate I got bored and put on ABBA singing "Take a Chance on Me" over the top of them. Was interesting watching. You know, I think seriously, if/when Labour lose the election, Peter Mandelson should be made leader. I only say this because I think that if he were leader, it would finally remove him from Politics permanently, which would be good for Britain, but also I think good for him. He's ascended back up the scale of power to be essentially Deputy Prime Minister in all but name (First Secretary of State is exactly the same thing), despite resigning twice and being exiled to Brussels for however many years. I always think he looks and sounds rather like an excellent history teacher I had during Secondary School. Anyway, election fever continues... Next week, debate three on the BBC, with David Dimbleby. Goodness, that rhymes.

Office of the Philosopher-General

2010-04-21T23:30:00.015+01:00

This is an idea I've had relatively recently. Perhaps this is originated thought: who knows, since I can't find any other references to it online. I think there should be a government position of the Philosopher-General. You know how there is a Surgeon-General, who advises on national health issues and how to improve your general health? I think the Philosopher-General would be there to advise the general public on philosophy matters, but also advise the government on philosophical positions. So I'd issue posters on the side of buses stating: "Does this bus really exist? The Office of the Philosopher-General reminds you that it is good to contemplate the objectivity of reality." Or have those large advertisement hoardings suggesting; "The Office of the Philosopher-General recommends a healthy sceptical approach to advertisements, including this one." As you can tell, I've put quite a bit of thought into this idea. The Philosopher-General would be a great addition to the government. Should we renew Trident? The Philosopher-General would be able to debate this question from a non-partisan, purely philosophical angle. Ideally, I suspect it would be also useful to have several Deputy Philosopher-Generals, who would come from different philosophical perspectives. They could then debate a given topic, say immigration control, and try to reach some kind of consensus outside of party politics. It would be important for these people to be philosophers and not politicians; they couldn't be paid and would have to volunteer. I certainly think my idea has merit though. If I ever run for public office (which I can assure you, I have no plans to do so), I would make this one of my policies. If my party would allow it of course.

Naturally, I am of course trying to follow through with Plato's plan here of the Philosopher Kings. A true philosopher loves wisdom for wisdom's sake. For Plato that was someone who knew of the Forms, but in this day and age, it can mean something very different. But some of you will be saying at this point "Aha! You want an eventual benevolent despotism don't you! Something akin to Enlightened Absolutism perhaps?" To this I respond no; Plato was wrong in giving the Philosopher Kings unlimited power. The old adage about "Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely." seems well founded. What I am trying to say is that for too long, philosophy has been marginalised from the political process. Now, all we hear about it is various political philosophy's of liberalism of conservatism, that are never adequately explained or analysed. I believe one of the reasons so many people in the United States fears Socialism is because they simply have no idea what Socialism actually is; it's just the newest form of the Red Scare. We need to bring the philosophers; real philosophers, back into government, and lend them a voice in the decision-making process. A voice that doesn't kowtow to a party line, but simply speaks from pure philosophical perspectives. That's my dream. But I'm a pessimistic idealist; I know how great the world could be, but the chances of it actually happening are next to nothing. Philosopher-General. You definitely heard it here first.

Fire, Ash and Brimstone

2010-04-17T20:48:00.005+01:00

Volcanoes are erupting; planes aren't flying. Honestly, people are acting like there is someone to blame for this. Blame Mother Nature! It's the Earth's fault that volcanoes erupt, or earthquakes happen. It isn't something that can be avoided. It's going to happen and always will happen so long as plate tectonics continue. And if plate tectonics stopped, then life on Earth would stop. Only through plate tectonics can life on Earth be sustained at a livable environment. It completes the carbon cycle which balances the amount of carbon that is in the atmosphere and in the Earth itself. Continental drift was for a long time (since the 16th Century) suggested as the reason for geological events and the apparent movement of the continents, but they do not 'drift' so much as 'rub', as plate tectonics demonstrates. Subduction for example occurs when one plate is forced underneath another, and where these two plates meet, the magma beneath is forced upwards and voila, volcanoes form. In Iceland, the North American plate and the Eurasian plate actually move away from each other (a divergent plate boundary) so here the magma can easily reach the surface because there is a kind of 'gap' between the plates. Upon reaching the surface, the magma erupts as lava and spits out tiny fragments of rock that form volcanic ash.

Along with being very bad for aircraft engines, inhaling ash is also very dangerous for humans. Essentially you would be inhaling small rocks, so it is naturally not good for the lungs. If ash is present in large quantities, it is always advisable to breath through a damp cloth, because the particles of ash cannot permeate the holes in the cloth. The danger to aircraft engines should not be understated. In large volumes, it can cut out engines altogether, with the possible loss of power throughout the plane. This happened in 1982 to British Airways Flight 9, which flew through the ash cloud of Mount Galunggung. All four engines failed at 37,000 feet, and the plane began to glide downwards. Captain Eric Moody gave a quick announcement to the passengers which has to be one of the best understatements ever; "Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. We have a small problem. All four engines have stopped. We are doing our damnedest to get them under control. I trust you are not in too much distress." However, after gliding for some minutes the crew were able to restart several of the engines, and were able to make a safe landing at Jakarta. The ash which had clogged up the engines in the first place solidified and broke off, allowing air to pass through them again and for them to successfully restart. I think that incident should definitely serve as a reminder for how serious the dangers are.

A Very British Election, Pt. 1

2010-04-15T19:57:00.011+01:00

Tonight was the first Prime Ministerial Debates in history, and it has ignited the true spark of this General Election. And actually, the debate was remarkably interesting. Even though I didn't see it live (I decided in my infinite wisdom to go out and lose at poker again), I've watched enough of it now to see why most people thought that the Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg came out on top. He was attacked by David Cameron, but often supported by both of them at the same time. Frequently, both Cameron and Brown said "I agree with Nick", which says a lot. Both parties are kind of keen to have the Lib Dems on side, especially if we get a Hung Parliament, which is what I am personally hoping for as the best outcome of the election (of course, the secret, wildest dream of a Lib Dem supporter is to see them in office, but that's just not going to happen at the moment). It is too early to say whether these debates will have the same impact as they did in the United States. It was the televised debates for the 1960 Presidential Election that won it Kennedy. Listeners on radio thought that the then Vice President Richard Nixon had done the best, whilst the television audiences thought that Kennedy excelled whilst Nixon looked tired and haggard under the bright lights. The same may very well be said of the leaders tonight. Brown looked again old, tired and like a British Bulldog, whilst Dave looked extensively made-up to almost comical effect, and Nick stood with one hand in his pocket, lounging almost like a secondary school teacher. He was the only one who looked reasonably relaxed. The Times/Populus poll for the debate is amazing, showing 61% thought Nick Clegg did the best.

The media of course are having enormous fun with all of this. ITV hosted the first debate, with Sky News due for the second and the BBC third, but in fact all of them are being broadcast on BBC Parliament as well. I personally though Alistair Stewart was a dreadful mediator, but other people thought he was nicely forceful. I just thought he was very unnecessary in all his shouting, something I'm sure David Dimbleby will refrain from doing when it is his turn. Newsnight also seemed to have a lot of fun interviewing a variety of focus groups, politicians and celebrities, as well as experimenting with live line-graph trend tracking for how the leaders were coming across to some floating voters. You can tell that election fever is being stoked from all angles, because the BBC Radio 4 comedy programme The Now Show has had a special series commissioned called The Vote Now Show, running with three episodes a week at the moment. Anyway, what we should take from this is that the Liberal Democrats are in one of the strongest positions they have had in years. I just hope they take advantage of this position. Because Clegg was right about the other two parties, when he said of their leaders during the debate;"The more they attack each other, the more they sound exactly the same." Too right Nick.

P.S. Evidently I must be there to LiveTweet the next debate, because the BBC are now treating Twitter and Facebook as "news sources". What is journalism coming to...

A 21st Century Production

2010-04-12T21:07:00.008+01:00

Suddenly feeling rather nostalgic, and since nostalgia is a nice thing in small, manageable doses, I thought I'd like to recollect just two of my favourite children's TV series I watched when I was growing up. There were a select view that were rather sacred, and the rest were just monotony that I would watch if there was nothing else left on. Indeed, if I saw some of these were on today, I would still watch them. Let's start off strong: "Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons", known to most as simply "Captain Scarlet". During the mid 90's, loads of reruns of all of Gerry and Silvia Anderson's series were shown on the BBC. Indeed, this was (and still is) probably my favourite of the Anderson's various creations, partly because it had the most impressive explosions, but also because the plot was the darkest. The opening credits have got to be the best intro to a children's TV programme there has ever been, and also featured an incredible theme tune with the distinctive sting. It's all so dramatic, everything from the screaming cat to the creepy voice of the Mysterons. Plus, Captain Black was a great enemy because he began off as a good guy before a mistake on his part made him a puppet (pun intended) of the Mysterons. The Mysterons themselves were also the perfect enemy, because they were never seen, and only ever shown by a simple pair of white circles. I do feel rather sorry though for Captain's Brown and Indigo. Both are seen for only one episode, and both die in those respective episodes.

Second in my favourites list is another Gerry and Silvia Anderson production: "Stingray". Again, the opening credits are beyond sublime. I get goosebumps every time I see it. So much is happening at once, coupled with the pounding drums. Just listen to Commander Shore say "Stand by for action!" and "Anything can happen in the next half hour!" What more can you possibly want?! The main irritating thing about Stingray was Troy's love interest with the mute girl who can breath underwater, Marina. Also, the entire town of Marineville could descent into underground bunkers in case of attack. An interesting point of the series is that most of the underwater segments are actually filmed on a dry set: A thin glass tank of water was positioned between the camera and the set, to simulate being underwater. Of course, we must not forget the perennially loved "Thunderbirds", which I also highly enjoyed, although to to the same extent as those previously mentioned. I felt that they were always unfair to John Tracy, who manned Thunderbird 5, the space station, and so never had an active role. In fact, I've just discovered that the reason John hardly ever leaves the space station is because Gerry Anderson didn't like him as a character; He wouldn't even let him be featured in the final episode. Anyway, I'll leave you with the "Captain Scarlet" closing credits. What a song.

Budget Day

2010-03-24T14:03:00.007Z

Once again, a disappointing, lacklustre budget. I wasn't really expecting better, but still. The only thing worthwhile in it are some tax breaks and investment for UK businesses, which should stimulate further growth in our fast developing video games industry. Darling also forecast for the deficit to shrink. As if. If you keep borrowing such horrendously large sums of money, you are never going to pay it back, and thus never come out of deficit. I don't think either Labour or the Conservatives know what they are going to do to stop the debt. Maybe even Vince Cable of the Liberal Democrats doesn't know. They'll all just hoping for the best. It's not like the IMF or the World Bank are going to come along and say "Hey Great Britain! You know what? Here's £11 trillion to pay off all your debts! Don't worry about paying it back, think of it as a gift!" The mad thing is that even though the debt is so large, we continue to spend like no tomorrow. It's like a gambler who has lost all his money, and is now bidding even the clothes on his back. That, and the banking sector really have such a sway over government it is unbelievable. Hardly any legislation has been brought it which punishes short selling or other such practices.

Not long until the election hots up really. I'm personally hoping for a Hung Parliament, for the simple reason that I trust neither Gordon Brown nor David Cameron. With Cameron my MP when I'm at home, I don't want to see more of him. If there is a Hung Parliament, either party who is in the lead will need the support of the Lib Dems to force any legislation through the house. They will be the mediators and essentially hold all the keys. The question is, if that happens, it might just make the Lib Dems as unpopular as whoever actually is Prime Minister. But hey ho, we'll see come election day. I fully expect that is going to be 6th May, for the simple reason that the local elections are already scheduled for that day, and it makes total sense to hold them both on the same day, so as not to make people go to the polling stations twice.

Welcome Back My Friends to the Show That Never Ends

2010-03-22T18:30:00.011Z

Welcome back my friends to the show that never ends,
We're so glad you could attend, come inside, come inside.
There behind the glass stands a real blade of grass,
be careful as you pass, move along, move along.

You know, the cover or Emerson, Lake & Palmer's "Brain Salad Surgery" has to be one of the most disturbing pieces of album art ever created. Every time I see it, I am unnerved. The gatefold if already weird, but actually opening it up reveals the true horror within: a woman with alien hair like snakes, her face covered in a multitude of scars, such as an infinity symbol and lobotomy scars. Her face itself looks really quite peaceful, but the unnatural quality of her hair and the grayish white colour makes everything rather sinister. According to Wikipedia, H. R. Giger, who designed the cover, stated that ELP never paid him for the work he did on the cover. Seems rather unfair considering how famous it is. Also, like Led Zeppelin's "Houses of the Holy", the album is remarkable in that the title track is not present, but was included in a later release. Don't really know why I wanted to mention all of that, it wasn't particularly relevant to anything. Nothing ever is. I think perhaps I was going to say that I considered abandoning Blogspot recently. I admit I've even reserved qualvista.wordpress.com in the event of such an export (don't bother looking, I've hidden the site). However, I am holding off for the plain and simple reason that I like the current site design, and since WordPress does not support custom CSS (which this is) unless you pay for it, I think I'll stay. The advantages for WordPress were site statistics (page counters, etc.) and automatic publicity links via Twitter, but I suppose I will just have to remember to publicise Qualvista. Maybe I don't want it publicised...

Alternative Rock has still got my goat. There is no 'alternative'. What's alternate to the alternative if there is no such thing? Perhaps in the actual 1980's it was an alternative to New Wave or something like that, but these days, it is the alternative. Just like Indie Rock/Pop I suppose. There is another massive misnomer. Nothing independent about it anymore. If I were a dictator, I personally would rename Alternative Rock 'Mainstream Rock', and Indie Rock would be either 'Post-Punk Revival', or 'Modern Rock'. Although I do like John Peel's term "shambling bands". Maybe those names don't encapsulate what the music means in such a good way, but I think it would make the genre's easier to understand for the complete novice. I personally see Indie Rock as the leading genre of music at the moment (if you disregard the likes of Americanised Rap, Hip Hop and R&B, which I do for the most part, because R&B is definitely not Rhythm and Blues anymore; the Jazz greats would be appalled). The British invented Indie Rock though, so we may be thankful for that at least. Music will continue to evolve, that much is certain.

5:59 AM

2010-03-17T19:15:00.005Z

Time loops are bizarre things. Indeed, if they occurred we would have absolutely no idea. I've just watched the short film "12:01 PM", from which the film "Groundhog Day" is based. Search for it and you too can find it online. It basically follows one man, who is trapped within his lunch hour of 12:01 PM till 1:00 PM. Time is bouncing back and forth, yet only he seems to notice it is repeating. At first he is confused and sacred, before he tries desperately to find an escape. In the end however, he does not have any absolution like Phil Connors in "Groundhog Day". He is seemingly trapped forever. I would think that would be a terrible existence, especially given the fact that there is no escape whatsoever. You are condemned to eternity reliving the same hour. I suppose part of the point is saying that time is fragile, so use every minute wisely. Sisyphus and Prometheus know this only too well. Live today, for tomorrow you die. Unless you are caught in a time loop, naturally. One of the other films I can remember with a time loop was the totally bizarre but quite brilliant "Donnie Darko". I'm glad "The Times" gave out the Director's Cut DVD free a few years ago. From the sound of what I read, the theatrical release didn't make any sense because a lot of things were cut. The Director's Cut doesn't make sense either, of course, but it is easier to try and find some sense in there. You never saw the loop in action because the film only takes place during one iteration, but it was implied to last 28 days.

The idea I liked most from that film though was actually a relatively simple one though: that a jet engine crashes through a suburban roof, but there is no plane that the engine was originally attached to. Paranormal ideas like that are ripe for development, because it gives the reader lots of questions right from the start, such as why the engine crashed and where the plane is. Plus, there is something about the late 1980's (the film is set in 1988) that is just interesting. Perhaps I have a vested interest in that particular time period, who knows. Just reminded me of another time loop, in Star Trek. There was a Next Generation episode called Cause and Effect, where the Enterprise continually crashed into another starship (USS Bozeman), causing a warp core breach and destroying both ships. Eventually the crew naturally discover a way to avert disaster and escape the loop. There you are; a very brief history of time loops. Time loops are bizarre things. Indeed, if they occurred we would have absolutely no idea...

Four Underrated Guitar Solos

2010-03-13T22:37:00.012Z

Themed blog today, so snap to it! There ain't no "Hotel California" on this list, because that's been said before. I've tried to highlight a few guitar solos which I feel are underrated and under-appreciated for not necessarily their complexity, but certainly their greatness.

Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft by Carpenters
Although not originally written by the Carpenters (as were many of their songs), "Calling Occupants" is certainly best known through them. Klaatu, the original song's writers, were for a little while thought to be a reformed version of The Beatles hiding under a different name, but in fact the bands sounded extremely different. For the Carpenters version, over 160 session musicians were required for the orchestral backing and post-production techniques. The solo in question lasts from 4:49 to 5:12 of the album version, and in those 23 seconds gloriousness beyond words is exhibited. The noise is pure power chord, ascending and descending and the music swells beneath it. As for the guitarist, I presume Tony Peluso, who also voices the DJ at the song's signature opening.

Oh! Sweet Nuthin' by The Velvet Underground
This song has no less than three solos, each one of which improves in quality until the third and final ultimate climax. The first lasts from the song's beginning till 0:27, and appropriately sets the driving, relentless scale of the song. The second, more established solo begins after Doug Yule says "Oh, let me here ya" for the first time at at 2:59, lasting up to 3:26. Finally, the denouement comes at the second of Yule's "Oh, let me here ya's" at 5:06 all the way to 6:33. This one just gets faster and faster until the drums and bounding and rebounding wildly alongside, and the key gets to such a high pitch that it is almost too much to bear. Be sure to listen to this in the dark, and of course, turned up loud. Definitely an epic song, with a brilliant guitar solo finale.

Plug Me In by George Harrison and others
Perhaps this shouldn't count as a solo, since it lasts for the entire length of this instrumental three minute grandstand. Plus, it's a veritable group of guitars competing with each other, and it's an improvised jam. Nonetheless, if you want a masterclass in sublime guitar work, you need look no further. From the first five seconds of the raucous beginning, I am already utterly blown away, and by the end I am completely exhausted. "Thanks for the Pepperoni", another jam included on Harrison's first solo album, is very similar in style and tune, but "Plug Me In" gets the gold star because everything fits together so tightly. To me, it's a guitar solo.

I Heard It Through the Grapevine by Creedence Clearwater Revival
If possible, I actually think Creedence's version of this song is better than Marvin Gaye's famous version. At a glorious eleven minutes in length, the guitar solo comprises most of the second half of the song, from around 5:00 until it fades out a minute before the song's conclusion. Combined with the bounding drum beat supplied by Doug Clifford, relentlessly moving the song forward, the extended solo it where the song gets most of its power. John Fogerty seems to improvise in several ways, providing such a strength of sound which assaults your ears as the song nears the finish. This is the kind of song I imagine being played in some kind of Vietnam film epic, and yet as far as I know, only CCR's "Fortunate Son" has been used in one. It is still crying out for inclusion, because as I listen, I swear I can almost smell the napalm.

The Brazilianite

2010-03-10T18:46:00.006Z

Welcome, new banner! Nice to see you. I like the actual "Qualvista" font, but perhaps the subtext is slightly too large. Still, I'll get used to it. I wanted a centred, standard image which would blend in with the background, and it seems to do that very well. The thing I feel is most lacking now from the blog is two things; images (because everyone likes pictures) and stat tracking. Images is something I can solve, but stats tracking is a back-end thing that Blogger does very badly, and which WordPress does quite well. I did debate exporting Qualvista to WordPress, but I don't think it will be worth the effort of yet another redesign, unless I went the whole hog and purchased a custom domain, but then I might be tempted to abandon the Qualvistan brand, as it were. If you hadn't noticed, I gave up on any redesign of The Siderial Daily Mentioner because I have for all intents and purposes (isn't that an interesting piece of legal jargon we use in conversation, by the way?) resolved to abandon it. It isn't doing anything particularly useful, but I don't have the heart to delete it. Upward and onwards. Started reading "Cat's Cradle" by Kurt Vonnegut recently. Already feeling very different from something like "Mother Night". I do kind of appreciate Vonnegut's almost blunt and matter-of-fact style of writing though. If he wanted to say something, he said it, with minimal faffing about.

Currently listening to Radiohead's "OK Computer" on Spotify. To tell you the truth, although I am reasonably knowledgeable of music from the 60's and 70's, most things from the 80's onwards have confounded me by their awfulness. The Loudness War only helps to worsen the state of the music. Only now am I starting to actually like some modern bands. I'm putting it down to the total immersion with Indie Rock and Pop that I've had whilst broadcasting on student radio. Thus, this is my first listen to of the whole album mentioned above. It's pretty good. Still like "No Surprises" most of all, but then again I had heard that before quite a number of times. It's not like you could watch any media content without hearing it all over the place. Like the time when the BBC used Coldplay's song "Clocks" to adverse the fact that 'Television is evolving' with that old man. I was never really sure how that related to digital Freeview services myself. Talking of services, I have unofficially started what I can only call a boycott of Ubisoft products making use of their Online Services Platform. This is the next in a long line of ludicrous DRM methods, this one forcing players to have a permanent Internet connection, even for single player games, that constantly authenticates with Ubisoft servers. If you Internet ever goes out, the game pauses. Yeah, you can't play it at all offline. Seems totally without cause to me.

Salinger's Characters

2010-03-07T22:34:00.013Z

Having read all of J. D. Salinger's widely published works (aside from "Seymour: An Introduction", which I still have to read) I thought I'd like to highlight some of the best, or at least my favourite, of his characters used in the various short stories in "Nine Stories". Many of these characters have a lot of overlap, and share personality traits, but still, they are unique in their own right. Naturally, I am not including Holden Caulfield because he is easily Salinger's most well-known character, and I have already talked about him at length in the past.

Jean de Daumier-Smith (De Daumier-Smith's Blue Period)
It is clear that Jean de Daumier-Smith is not this character's real name. He is a 19 year-old man, back in the US after spending childhood in France, who grows bored at living with his step-father after his mother died. He decides to apply to work at a small art school in Montreal, and embellishes his CV buy claiming that he is personal friends with Pablo Picasso, as well as claiming that he is a widely published artist. When he arrives at the school, which is run by a Japanese couple called the Yoshoto's, who actually just run a correspondence course, not a genuine art school. In between the boredom of the work, Jean discovers some beautiful art from Sister Irma, and essentially falls in love with a fantasy version of her. The story is incredibly funny, and Jean is interesting because he is disconnected from everyone around him, desperate to interact and be accepted by the rest of society. In order to do this, he lies about his experience.

Franklin Graff (Just Before the War with the Eskimos)
Franklin is actually rather a secondary character in "Just Before the War with the Eskimos". Ginnie Mannox is the main character, who goes into her friend Selena's house, because she wants Selena to pay her back for the taxi fare she got for playing Tennis. Whilst waiting, she encounters Franklin, who is scruffy, wearing pyjamas, and totally absorbed by a cut on his finger. Franklin then talks with Ginnie about how he dislikes her older sister, seemingly because she had ignored Franklin when he had a crush on her. Franklin later comes back, and demands Ginnie eat half a chicken sandwich she says she doesn't want. As a character, Franklin is interesting because of his seeming disregard for his appearance. His genuine, personal view draws Ginnie to him, and makes her forget about the money Selena owed her.

Theodore "Teddy" McArdle (Teddy)
Teddy has to be one of the weirdest characters in the "Nine Stories" collection. For the first half of the story, you think he is a rather adorable, cute and precocious 10 year-old, who seemingly knows a lot more than he lets on. However, in the latter half of the story, it is exposed that Teddy thinks himself to be some kind of spiritual guru who believes in reincarnation and can apparently predict the future. He also knows more about philosophy and religion that a whole board to top university professors. But he is still a child in essence, who obeys his parents and looks up words in dictionaries. The ultimate question about Teddy is whether his ideas of philosophy are genuine, or if everything is merely an illusion. The ending is also a cliffhanger, that doesn't resolve what happens to Teddy, or indeed if anything happened at all.

Seymour Glass (A Perfect Day for Bananafish)
So much can be said about Seymour Glass (and in fact his brother Buddy Glass, who claims in "Seymour: An Introduction" to have written "Teddy" and other short stories). He's a character who we never really interact with directly, as it were, but instead always view from a distance. Even in "Bananafish", where we meet him, there is still an apparent disconnect. Seymour is probably rather unhinged, but it was this random, almost semi-chaotic personality that attracted his wife Muriel to him in the first place. This must also have factored into his suicide, but the exact reasons for it remain a mystery. The main point is not particularly why he commits suicide, but what effect it has on the rest of his family. In "Franny and Zooey", it's clear that all of the Glass family are still living with its effects. Still, he is certainly one of the most enigmatic characters here.

The Chief (The Laughing Man)
The Chief, although not the main character in "The Laughing Man", is probably the most important. He's a young law student studying at New York University, who in his spare time acts as supervisor for a Boy Scout-style group called the Comanche Club, of whom the 9-year-old narrator is a member. He is idolised by the boys, partly due to his sporting prowess, but also because of his excellent storytelling, which he does whilst driving the bus after every Baseball game they play. His latest ongoing-story is The Laughing Man; an daring international criminal and rogue, who is left hideously disfigured and forced to wear a mask to hide his appearance. Later, The Chief introduces Mary Hudson to the Comanches; a very beautiful girl who is also a great Baseball hitter. The Chief is engaged with some kind of relationship with her, which slowly crumbles as the story progresses. Likewise, the situation becomes more dire for The Laughing Man, culminating in his death when The Chief and Mary Hudson separate. The Laughing Man embodies The Chief's fantasy self; whilst he is a shy student, The Laughing Man is dashing and fearless.

Sergeant X (For Esmé – with Love and Squalor)
Set during the Second World War, Sergeant X is an American awaiting deployment in Devon, UK. After watching a children's choir, he goes for a drink in a cafe where he meets Esmé, a girl he has seen performing in the choir. Although given a rather formal education and upbringing, Esmé is nonetheless a polite and innocent child very interested in the Sergeant, and asks him a number of probing questions. Sergeant X is grateful for the girl's friendship, and happy that she promises to write to him after he is deployed. Later the scene shifts to not long after the end of the war. Sergeant X is shown to be a broken and changed man; the war has ripped him apart. However, he notices in his pile of post a package from Esmé, including a letter and her father's watch, which he had seen her wearing before and seemed far too large for her wrist. Esmé's contact is able to restore his faith in humanity, and finally he is able to sleep peacefully. The Sergeant has quite a bit of overlap with Salinger himself, both having served in the Second World War. Whilst many of Salinger's stories reference the war, few interact with it directly.

Power to the Press

2010-02-28T14:24:00.009Z

All journalism is investigative. At least, this is what I was told at my Investigative Journalism Masterclass yesterday, given by David Leigh (The Guardian's current Investigations Editor) and Nick Davies, who has also written for The Guardian as well as writing the critically acclaimed novel, "Flat Earth News". Journalism should not actually be "fair and balanced" as FOX News like to shout about. Whenever you are writing a story, you are going to be trying to bring across a certain point of view, even if you are working for an impartial organisation such as the BBC. A totally balanced view would counterpoint truth with lies. So you could say "A plane crashed this evening, killing 109 people. On the other hand, there were over 300 successful plane landings at the same time." That is a balanced statement, but it isn't news. Everything is done in pursuit of the truth. Whatever is true should be what is reported. For a philosopher, this is a bit of a minefield, since it appears that truth itself is mainly subjective. My definition of truth may be very different from yours. You should ignore those people who are trying to obscure the truth, and strive for the most objective outcome. Everyone has an agenda, and so the best journalists are those who see past the fog to discover the truth beneath. Much of the day was dedicated to investigating the best places to gain information, and from that begin a narrative thread which runs through a developing story.

One of the examples they gave was BAE Systems, which The Guardian exposed as having passed bribes to Prince Bandar of Saudi Arabia in order to make large purchases of aircraft. Investigating the corruption took time and luck, which was slowly unpicked. In a similar style, the Watergate Scandal which led to Nixon's resignation was brought to light in The Washington Post by Woodward and Bernstein over a period of months. None of this happens instantaneously. Intuitive thinking is quite important: when looking at a news bulletin or press release, you need to be able to look and think about what isn't quite right. If something doesn't hang correctly, that is the path to pursue. Much other time was given over to listing public information sources, including Freedom of Information requests, good old Parliamentary Questions, public records and other databases. These will only last so long, and after that you will have to turn to people for information first hand. Getting people to divulge information they might not want to is the largest part of how journalists are distrusted. Essentially, you have to think of "a line" to give the person you are interviewing, to make it seem to them that giving you the information is in their best interest. So that's where the controversy comes.

It was mainly fascinating, but it was an extremely long day, and probably talked too much about the Law, and how to actually work with it or around it. Stopping injunctions and that kind of thing.

Comin' Thro' the Rye, Pt. 2

2010-02-23T23:26:00.009Z

As promised quite some time ago (two years ago in fact), here is the second instalment of my literary analysis of what is, in my humble opinion, the greatest novel of all-time. In this segment, I will try to explain why I find the recently late J.D. Salinger’s "The Catcher in the Rye" such a profoundly moving and intimate book, as well as explaining why there shouldn't be a film adaptation of it. As before, it goes without saying that if you haven’t read the novel yet, beyond this point are major spoilers, reader dearest. I urge you to go and buy a copy and read it from cover to cover several times before reading any of this posting. I have just finished what has to be my seventh comprehensive reading of it.

Why there should NEVER be a film adaptation
If, heaven forbid, I should ever catch wind that Hollywood were deciding to adapt "The Catcher in the Rye" for the big screen, I would be extremely angry. I would also hope that most other fans would be similarly angry. For one thing, J. D. Salinger himself has personally said before he died that he didn't want one. When his short story, "Uncle Wiggly in Connecticut" was adapted into a soppy love story, he vowed to never let any film company touch his work again. That alone should be reason enough, even when copyright runs out. He said that another reason he wouldn't want a film would be because "It wouldn't be want Holden wanted" which is also totally true. Holden despised the film industry as one of the biggest phoniness scandals, where people were actually paid to be phony. Quote; “If there’s one thing I hate, it’s the movies.” He also wasn't all too happy that his older brother D. B. had gone to work there, as he saw it as prostituting himself. Therefore, I issue a heartfelt and dedicated plea to the international film industry to never, ever produce a film version of this novel. I actually intended to write to J. D. Salinger to both praise his novel and ask him to put it explicitly in his will that he forbids any films. Sadly he died before I was able to, and so I have put up the partially written letter previously on this blog.

Why I Love the Novel
This is a difficult topic to conclusively pin to the bulletin board. I suppose the main reason is simply because I love Holden. Every time I read the book, I wish I could be his best friend. I wish I were his elder brother, D.B., one of the few people Holden respects (although he isn't happy D.B. is prostituting himself in Hollywood). Holden Caulfield to me isn't just a literary creation; he is practically flesh and blood. He is the only character with whom I have ever felt I have a relationship with, which in recollection is almost unhealthy to a degree. I suppose as Holden says; “What really knocks me out is a book that, when you’re all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it.” I wonder if J.D. Salinger is/was like is creation once. Somehow I doubt it, but nonetheless he must have felt something to be able to bring such complex feelings to literature. I had worried that with time, I would lose sight of what Holden means to me. Perhaps I still will, in many years. But at the moment, Holden is still extremely close to my heart.

I also recommend reading this excellent obituary to Salinger written in, what else? The New Yorker. The magazine was always intimately connected to his writings. I may one day do another portion of my analysis of this seminal novel, I may not. We shall see.

Status Anxiety

2010-02-17T22:20:00.010Z

I have come to the conclusion that a lot of the actions I perform in my life are undertaken as a result of status anxiety. Society shouldn't be set up like this. So, I am determined to try and stop it, at least in my own life. I should really find a copy of Alain de Botton's book of the same name, but that is a different matter. The idea of status anxiety is in effect very simple: We are envious of others for most of the time. You are envious of your friends, who are earning more money than you are, of people on television or in the media who are more popular than you are. You may equally be envious of those who you think hold positions of greater power or prestige, both at work and socially. I confess to having mixed feelings of envy towards a variety of people, and I have come to recognise it as my most damaging emotion. Why do we display this envy? Because we all want to be loved. It really is as simple as that. Everyone wants to be loved, whether socially or sexually. Feeling unloved and undervalued is a despairing feeling, and thus we take steps we think will avoid it. We actively pursue positions of dominance or power, which we think come attached to greater respect and happiness. And when we don't get any happier, we have to continue running to keep up with the Joneses, who have already moved a step higher. We buy our material objects, from cars to computer games, in an attempt to divert our attention from the feeling that our lives are somehow unexceptional and dull. None of this makes us any happier; in fact the exact opposite. We worry that because we don't have that new gadget, we are somehow perceived to be a weaker person.

Do you see the vicious cycle that is perpetuated? People compare themselves against other people. If you view someone to be better off, in one way or another than you are, you then attempt to compete to become equal or better than they are. But in the mean time, the very person you are competing against is already scaling their own competitive cliff against someone else, and so on. It is true that the other man's grass is always greener, because there will always be another man with a larger lawn. Thus, all of this endless worry and social climbing is pointless. So, what should we do instead of engaging with status anxiety? There are several ideas. The first is to realise the truth that an elevated status does not equal happiness. Just because you have a position which other people may respect does not grant any extra happiness. Furthermore, we must get out of the mindset of constantly comparing ourselves to other people. Although it is tempting to worry that you are worse off by not having that particular high-tech console, or not being as popular as someone else, it is impossible to judge your own self-worth by assessing that of others. You are who you are, and nobody else matters. Although this may seem very individualist, incessant benchmarking is going to drive you insane. Above all, the older you get, the more pointless status anxiety will inevitably appear to be. Thus, we must rid our lives of it.

"Happiness is a Swedish sunset - it is there for all, but most of us look the other way and lose it." Mark Twain.

21 in the 21st Century

2010-02-10T21:59:00.014Z

Birthdays are birthdays are birthdays. They come once a year and you never really feel any different, but at the same time, you change almost imperceptibly. It's strange. That is the way the world and universe continues to turn and rotate, and thus I live my life in the only way I can: To go onward. Do you want to know something interesting, but trivial? In Luxembourg, there is a national holiday called the Grand Duke's Official Birthday, commemorating the monarch of Luxembourg. It is held yearly on 23rd of June, despite the fact that no ruler of Luxembourg has ever had the day as their actual birthday. The current Grand Duke, Henri, was born on 7th October for example. If the ruler of Luxembourg is female, it is then known as the Grand Duchess's Official Birthday. I suppose that is remarkably similar to our own Queen's Official Birthday, which isn't held on her Birthday either. Actually, it is held on different days in different Commonwealth countries, which means she gets half a dozen a year. I wonder whether she actually enjoys attending all of those various celebrationary events. I suppose she hasn't a whole lot else to do, and when you've done it all your life you would fall into a routine. The key is too keep doing things that you enjoy. Else, what is the point of living? Nietzsche said that Art was the only thing to keep us from the void of nothingness (or words to that effect). Perhaps he was right, in a way.

Onward! Been reading some T. S. Eliot poetry recently. I have become quite a poetry convert over recent years. I still can't really decipher "The Waste Land" entirely, but I do know that "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" is now my favourite poem. Even if the rest of his poetry is weird, that is sublime. It's just a poem about living. I really don't have anything else to say about it. For my Birthday I got some nice presents. Books ("The Third Policeman" by Flann O'Brien, "Cat's Cradle" by Kurt Vonnegut) and the Special Edition of BioShock 2. Listened to some of the LP of the original game's soundtrack (I have a turntable at home), and it sounded very impressive. I should really buy a turntable for myself to transfer some of my parents LP's to mp3, because the older they get, the worse quality sound they will deliver. As a collectors item though, it's nice to have an LP. I remember seeing an LP of "The Velvet Underground & Nico" for £5 once, but I didn't get it. Tch, all this talk of buying things. Compulsive consumerism and conspicuous consumption is so much of life these days. I like to call it Avian Affluenza. It shouldn't be about what you own; it should be about what you know, or have achieved. Knowledge is Power, afterall.

You Can't Hear Me Because I'm Not Shouting

2010-02-06T15:24:00.011Z

The World Wide Web is not free, and in a sense, it never was. Yet, it is amazing that I'm here at all. This blog is hosted and ultimately controlled by the giant multinational conglomerate Google, who has the power, if not current the desire, to at any time flick a switch and remove all trace of my existence. The same goes for if I posted a video on YouTube, or uploaded photos to Flickr. The power seemingly belongs to the people, but it actually doesn't. The Internet is meant to be a place where anyone can speak their mind about anything, and everyone has an equal voice in the matter. But the truth is that it is simply a case of who has the resources, time and money to shout the loudest. My blog doesn't get high traffic for the simple reason that I am unknown: Nobody knows it exists, and I don't publicise it. You can say all you want about the varying quality of the site content, but this is rather irrelevant. Compare this to something such as The Huffington Post: A site dedicated to essentially leeching other people's work. It posts little of it's own content, instead assimilating and cataloguing other news outlets information. The Huffington Post is internationally known on the Internet, but only as a gateway. It has no integrity in of itself. The key is that the people who founded The Huffington Post had the money and influence to bring their site to the forefront.

I'm a huge fan of the video game website GameSpot. I visit it practically every day I have access to the Internet, and I'm a Community Moderator there as well. For most of its history, the site has been owned and managed by a multinational corporation. First it was ZDNet, then CNET Networks, and finally CBS Interactive today. The company that manages it only really cares about the website for one simple reason: It generates revenue, in both advertising and subscriptions. It is one of the highest trafficked websites around, and all of those clicks equal big advertising deals and monetary gain. Yet, around this website is built a community of people who play games. Originally launched for largely idealistic reasons, it has grown into a series of blogs, forums and unions where people can chat about video games and various other exploits. The reason that the GameSpot forums are largely considered a success amongst Internet standards is because of the high standard of Terms and Conditions each user must abide by if they are to continue to use and contribute to the site. Whilst staff members and site users all care about this community, a corporation has no interest in something that does not generate wealth. It has to be exploited to the fullest potential, and only then may it remain as an asset.

I mention all this because I worry about the future of the Internet. The clampdown, the corporate control seems to be taking hold everywhere. Wikipedia, even though it is mainly managed by ordinary people, has gradually established such a complex and elegant bureaucracy over all decisions that it is almost insane. YouTube may highlight a great number of normal people in videos, but they are essentially being manipulated by the company for commercial gain. Twitter has millions tweeting, but only the celebrities and stars ever really having their voices heard. Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the head of my university's Electronics and Computer Science faculty, invented the World Wide Web twenty years ago. In that time, it seems to have had a number of revolutions, from a counterculture paradise to a commercial capital, and I expect it will also emerge from this one. I just wonder how free it will really be afterward.

New Morning (The Day of the Bananafish)

2010-02-04T19:06:00.009Z

"A Perfect Day for Bananafish" is such a bizarre short story. I'm not entirely sure if I like it. I mean, yes, it is a fascinating short story excellently written, but I'm not sure what it's trying to tell me. Basically, it is a short story about the disconnection in modern society. The first half documents a conversation held between Muriel Glass and her mother, who are talking about how Muriel's husband, Seymour, has been acting weirdly. Seymour Glass and his wife are on their second honeymoon in Florida. Muriel's mother is worried by Seymour's behaviour, and indicates that he attempted to or accidentally crash his father-in-law's car with everyone in it the previous year. Muriel and her mother's conversation is rather shallow and superficial: Muriel asks her mother the location of a book of German poetry Seymour had given her the previous year, but she had never read because it was in German. They talk about clothes and how Muriel still trusts Seymour, before she hangs up on her mother. The second half of the story concerns Sybil Carpenter, a six-year old girl staying at the same Florida hotel. She scampers off down the beach and meets a young man, lying on the sand in a full bathrobe. This is man is Seymour, and has become acquainted with Sybil.

'Where's the lady?' Sybil said.
'The lady?' The young man brush some sand out of his thin hair.
'That's hard to say Sybil. She may be in any one of a thousand places. At the hairdresser's. Having her hair dyed mink. Or making dolls for poor children, in her room.'
Lying prone now, he made two fists, set one on top of the other, and rested his chin on the top one.

Seymour takes Sybil out into the ocean on a float, in order to try and catch a or see a "Bananafish". Seymour tells Sybil that Bananafish are very ordinary looking fish, who swim into banana holes looking for bananas to eat. But when they enter a banana hole, they are very greedy, and can eat as many as seventy-eight bananas. They get so fat that they cannot escape, and eventually die of banana fever, which Seymour calls "a terrible disease". Naturally, this is a childhood fantasy that Sybil accepts happily, stating that she saw a Bananafish with some bananas in its mouth. After a short while Seymour returns Sybil to the beach, whereupon she runs off without regret. Seymour puts back on his robe, pick up his towel and float, and pods back to the hotel. In the hotel elevator, he accuses a woman passenger of staring at his feet, even though she says she was looking at the floor. He exits the elevator and returns to his room. Thus we reach the finale, which is both shocking and sad, but also rather confusing.

He glanced at the girl lying asleep on one of the twin beds. Then he went over to one of the pieces of luggage, opened it, and from under a pile of shorts and undershirts he took out an Ortgies calibre 7.65 automatic. He released the magazine, looked at it, then reinserted it. He cocked the piece. Then he went over and sat down on the unoccupied twin bed, looked at the girl, aimed the pistol, and fired a bullet through his right temple.

If you can think of a more shocking ending to a short story, I'd like to know it. But what ultimately puzzles me is just why Seymour Glass commits suicide. Evidently something is wrong in his life, because Muriel's mother mentions other weird behaviour which Seymour has exhibited, including the crashing of the car. From what I gather, it seems that Seymour is fed up with modern life of materialism, and wishes for the simple naive innocence which Sybil Carpenter exhibits. His suicide is an attempt to escape. However, there are many conflicting interpretations of why he did it, so I will not presume to suggest this is the correct answer.

Free as a Bird

2010-01-31T23:57:00.007Z

Well, exams are over. Hooray. But that doesn't mean by a long shot that the actual work is over by any means. The dissertation still lurks, and the new courses of Semester 2 begin soon. I'd like to reflect on my last blog, which I put up when I learned that J.D. Salinger had died. I had decided earlier in January to write to Salinger, because I thought that if I don't write soon he might die before I get the chance. Turns out I was right. As I said in my letter, I never expected him to read it, but I wanted to write it anyway. I suppose it was more for me than it was for him. I've also been recently hunting down most of Salinger's published works, and have now read "Franny and Zooey" and recently got "For Esme - with Love and Squalor and Other Stories". I think I'll start reading that today, so you can probably expect some of my thoughts about that short story collection at some point.

I know I've said it before, but I do truly love "The Catcher in the Rye". It kills me. Yes, I am trying to purposefully insert Holden catchphrases into my life. I never did finish part 2 of my literary analysis of it. I've been re-reading it again, and it is struck me just how much I missed the other times I've read it. The bit when Holden takes Sally to see The Lunts on Broadway for example. Holden talks about D.B. in the Second World War, and I totally forgot him mentioning that. "The Catcher in the Rye" makes me laugh, because it is a really hilarious book, but at the same time in equal measure, it makes me cry. No other book I know can do this so brilliantly. I mean, I really love "Catch-22", and whilst I laugh a lot more during "Catch-22", and this is also tinged with sadness, it is not the same effect. Holden Caulfield is my hero, and I don't want to share him with anyone else. That's why when people say they didn't like "The Catcher in the Rye", I secretly am glad that Holden is still mine, and I haven't lost him yet.

Letter to J. D. Salinger

2010-01-27T22:47:00.012Z

Mr. Jerome D. Salinger,
Cornish Flat,
Cornish,
New Hampshire,
United States.

Dear Mr. Salinger,

You must forgive me for sending you this letter. It was not my original intention to disturb you, but the passage of time has compelled me to write to you. I fully expect that you will not receive this letter (the US Postal Service can only deduce so much from a guessed address), let alone open or read it. Even now, I am sure it is being placed in a neat pile of similar-looking letters in a warm corner of Cornish Post Office. Nevertheless, I hope you will permit me to continue, by explaining my reasons for writing to you. Many years ago now, you once wrote; “What really knocks me out is a book that, when you're all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it. That doesn’t happen much, though." And, since I too have found that such an event doesn’t happen very often, I have in this instance elected to follow through with the idea by contacting you. Unfortunately, since I am unable to personally call you on the phone, I have opted for the next best thing in the form of this letter.

This now aside, my main reason for writing is to simply say a heartfelt thank you, and to wish you all the best in the future.

Yours sincerely,

Gareth Brading.

P.S. A rather belated Happy Birthday! Kindly leave instructions forbidding outright any theatrical or film adaptations of any of your literary works. As you said yourself, I'm sure it wouldn’t be what Holden wanted.

And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor-
And this, and so much more?-
It is impossible to say just what I mean!
T.S. Eliot.

The Repetitiveness of the 25th Century

2010-01-19T21:11:00.006Z

It has to be said, life in the 25th Century is rather circular. Go out, shoot some bad guys, kill some bad guys, scan an area, return to starbase. I have been playing quite a bit of the Star Trek Online open beta, taking full advantage of the freeloading that entails. This is actually my first foray into an MMO, aside from wandering in a bemused fashion around Second Life for a while, were I named myself wittily as Dostoevsky. From it, I have come to believe that MMO's all work on same concept; that of level progression. In an MMORPG such as Star Trek Online, everything is geared towards the idea that you need to progress. You are desperate to get up to Captain level so you can finally get that Intrepid Class starship you have always wanted. When you are stuck in a shoddy Miranda Class and everyone is whizzing around in Constitutions like its 2271, you know you have to grind upward to be able to fit in. Frankly, the game is rather bugged, extremely repetitive and not particularly Star Trek-esque, but there is something which has continually kept me coming back. Most missions are bland, and several are broken to the degree they are in-completable. I constantly have to pinch myself to remember this is actually Star Trek, because in some missions it could just be generic spacebourne game #251.

That said, I have had quite a bit of fun from it. One mission stands out in my mind, where you must travel back in time and fight alongside the original USS Enterprise from the first TV series, and then fight original series Klingons, who look totally different to the Next Generation era ones. That quest felt really alive, and in the Star Trek vibe. It was a shame I had to grind through so many unrecognisable ones before I came to it though. I've had some great fun playing a couple of missions cooperatively with a team, twice an opened instanced team which was auto-assigned, and occasionally with a few guys I knew through GameSpot.com. This is probably where the best experiences of the game can be found, because you are doing things as a unit, and there is a collective sense of responsibility and achievement associated with any victory. There is no way I would actually pay to play Star Trek Online (you get nothing for your money in the way of a real product), but as a free experience, it has certainly been interesting. I'm sticking to my guns by viewing gaming subscriptions for MMO's and for Xbox Live with contempt. Value for money is my strong point.

P.S. Want to see for yourself what it was like when I was inside Star Trek Online? Check out Giant Bomb's final almost-live edition of their quick look of the open beta. I am present onscreen for the whole of the first half, as the character Heywood (a reference to 2001's Heywood Floyd), and help to revive and keep Jeff Gerstmann alive at several intervals. Certainly my finest virtual hour so far.

Strawberry Fields Forever

2010-01-14T21:21:00.007Z

I learned that my Godfather has died today. He was in his late 50's, and died of a heart attack whilst travelling on a bus in New Zealand. It kind of makes it feel as though he has gone on holiday and just never come back. What has just struck me is that I always thought he looked, and slightly sounded, like John Lennon. No idea why: Truth be told he didn't really look anything like Lennon, but he had this beard that reminded me of Lennon in the late 1970's. He never sang anything either. Nobody else thinks this is true in any way, so perhaps it is just a bizarre unfounded thought floating round in my head. Owen was there throughout my entire childhood. He would be there on Christmas Day, and was well known for his fiendish wrapping of presents (masses of sellotape, meaning it would take hours to get into them). I always thought he was a quite quiet and introverted man, but with a good sense of humour and contented nonetheless. For his working life he was a Chemistry teacher, but retired early to do more of what he really enjoyed: Travelling. He would travel absolutely everywhere, and yet not be a 'tourist'. He would soak into the local country. He was also a bachelor for most of his life, until the last ten years when he finally met someone who really cared for him, and he for her. They didn't get married, but they didn't really need to. They loved for each other, and that was all that mattered.

This state of affairs means that so far in my life, I will have been to four funerals and a wedding. This is all some kind of a reversed romantic comedy. My parents say I've been to two weddings, but still, the funerals are outweighing them. Not a wholly pleasant thought to contemplate. I want to go to more weddings in the future, and less of the other. But still, I will remember Owen. As a Godfather he was essentially perfect, in that he valued some good healthy exercise, normally a nice mountain walk, followed off by a good meal and a beer or two at the pub. What else do you really need to encourage a child with in life? Once they know the value of exercise and alcohol, everything else pieces itself together.

Precordial Catch Syndrome

2010-01-08T22:55:00.010Z

Disclosure: Gareth is not a trained medical professional, and the following is merely his opinion and interpretation of Precordial Catch Syndrome. If you are worried about any chest pain, first and foremost consult your GP.

Just occurred to me that this sounds like a syndrome which allows you to catch things early, but I can guarantee you it isn't. This is something from which I suffer, and it has been worrying me for a while. Now I seem to actually have gotten to the heart of what it is, it seems I don't have to worry anymore. What is the nub of this matter is that occasionally, out of nowhere it would feel as though I was having a heart attack. A very strong, piercingly sharp pain would appear in my chest. The pain emanates from around the heart, and is made worse by breathing in or out. However, unlike heart attack pain, which radiates out from the heart to other parts of the body, Precordial Catch Syndrome pain is localised to just the left side of the chest. The pain tends to last for a few minutes, during which time you don't really want to move at all, or breath heavily, for fear of making the pain worse. Naturally, when this occurs, many people tend to panic and think they are having a heart attack, since the pain seems to emanate from the heart itself. Before I discovered PCS, I too jumped to this conclusion. However, the pain is entirely unconnected to the heart. From the limited research that has been undertaken, it has been surmised that possibly nerve endings in the back are somehow involved. Although there is no cure for PCS, it is actually not believed to be dangerous. It is merely an inconvenience, as well as the worry connected to the assumption that the pain may be cardiac in nature.

Generally, PCS is rather mysterious, given the lack of medical investigation that has been undertaken. It was discovered by Miller and Texidor (thus the other name, Texidor's Twinge) in 1955, and is most usually diagnosed in children and adolescents, although it can continue into adulthood. Miller himself suffered from it. The last official report into PCS was undertaken all the way back in 1989. I myself only seem to have the symptoms once every few months, during which time I try to sit still, breath shallowly and let the pain pass. Apparently the pain can be stopped very quickly by breathing out deeply, but to do this you need to come past the pain which will intensify to the moment when there is, what can only be described as a 'pop', as though a small bubble in your chest had burst, and the pain vanishes. Again, nobody really understands what this actually is. The guess is that the nerve endings or muscle groups effected are released by deep breathing, which breaks the chain which had caused the pain in the first place. PCS usually happens during inactivity, such as sitting or lying down. I remember I once had it whilst I was reading a book in bed. It comes on very suddenly, and then afterward vanishes again. PCS is surprisingly common, but is often misdiagnosed.

I went to the doctor about this time last year and tried to explain my symptoms, but he said it was possibly heartburn, or acid reflux. He said it couldn't be a heart attack, since the symptoms didn't fit and there was nothing wrong with my heart. However, I discounted his heartburn theory because I knew that I hadn't eaten any spicy or unsettling food. I guess the doctor didn't know about PCS, because he never mentioned it to me. It was only this month, whilst sleuthing on the Internet after the latest pain, that I discovered this excellent article explaining Precordial Catch Syndrome (give it a read if interested). Now I feel rather relieved that I'm not suffering from some kind of ongoing heart attack. What irritates me is that it took my personal investigation of the condition to actually discover it. I had never heard about it until randomly stumbling upon the article. Due to the fact that PCS is not dangerous, there has been next to no investigation into its causes or cures. Even though it causes anxiety and worry in sufferers, it doesn't seem to be widely known about, even though it is many are effected. So Medical students: if you want to write a thesis about something nobody has investigated, PCS would be a good bet.

Twelfth Night

2010-01-06T16:31:00.004Z

Whenever I think of Twelfth Night now, I think of Shakespeare. I suppose I always thought of Shakespeare really. I studied that particular play a total of three times, in both GCSE and A-Level. In the end I was eternally glad when we did "Hamlet" in A2, because I was terrified we were going to do "Twelfth Night, or What You Will" again. At heart a typical Shakespearean comedy, the main drama here revolves around a love triangle between Orsino, the Duke of Illyria, who loves Olivia, an Illyrian countess, who herself loves Viola, a girl who is disguising herself as a man called Cesario, who in turn loves Orsino. There is also Sebastian, who is Viola's twin brother, and loves Olivia. It's all the usual case of mistaken identity: Olivia is actually in love with a woman, and Viola cannot tell her love to Orsino because she is disguised as a man. In the end though, everything works out alright for the main characters and they all get married. There is a rather amusing sub-plot involving Malvolio, steward to Olivia, and the attempts by Sir Andrew, Sir Toby and Feste to make him believe Olivia is in love with him, which give some of the most memorable lines of the play. "Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them." Not the emphasis normally put on the word 'thrust'. I often end the day by saying "To bed! ay, sweet-heart, and I'll come to thee." Again, there is likely a self-evident comic undertone there as well.

There is no denying it though: Shakespeare is without a shadow of a doubt the finest writer the world has ever known. His plays are just beautiful to read, and even better to watch. And to top all that, he also wrote excellent poetry. Once you get into the zone of understanding Shakespearean jargon, everything becomes clear. I mean, I still love the opening lines of "Twelfth Night" spoken by Orsino: "If music be the food of love, play on; Give me excess of it; that, surfeiting, the appetite may sicken, and so die." How unbearably awesome is that? When I was taught Shakespeare in school, at first I thought the same as the rest: That Shakespeare was old as hell and boring to boot. But after watching several performances of "Twelfth Night", one of "As You Like It" and two of "Hamlet", I was and am now fully converted to a true appreciator of The Bard. It just proves what I have always suspected: I am a Romantic through and through. In both the literary and artistic sense, but also in the more conventional sense as well. Truly what could be more romantic that quoting Shakespeare? T.S. Eliot, possibly. Maybe some William Blake thrown in the mix there as well.

New Age

2010-01-04T15:34:00.006Z

For the time being, I've given up trying to get these posts out on the time due. A warm welcome to 2010 though. Maybe for the rest of this year, perhaps I will be back to form, although I expect there may be fewer posts overall. Around eight per month was evidently proving too much for me. I think a healthy six is enough to tide Qualvista over, but not too much to exhaust myself and become so terribly out of sync with the actual time. That should really be one of my resolutions for 2010: Not to neglect Qualvista, and to keep it current. I'm looking forward to organising some of the now over two hundred posts on here into some kind of cogent fashion, so that the genuinely interesting things I have written about can be brought to light. Otherwise they are likely just to sit and do nothing useful. I don't think I'll point out the blog posts where I go rather insane though. Those can disappear in peace. The one where I shout about The Velvet Underground springs to mind. On the other hand, I'm genuinely proud of "The Important of Being Idle" (not the Oasis song, please), concerning why laziness is good and useful. That's what you get in the blogosphere I suppose: A delightful mixture. The trash and rubbish, yes, but also the finely crafted and well thought out arguments. I guess this blog is a mixture of both. Perhaps more of the former if I am to be entirely honest.

I only wish there was more to say at the present time, but the Prosecution rests.

Some Resolutions
1. Work extra hard for the end of your university degree.
2. Organise properly what is happening next year.
3. Do more exercise and eat properly.

The Uncertain Decade

2009-12-31T13:09:00.005Z

What made and broke the 2000's? Was it September 11th? Was it the War in Iraq, Afghanistan, or maybe the Boxing Day Tsunami? Credit Crunch and Recession, or Obama and George Bush? Was it rolling news, mobile phones, computer games and Internet proliferation? No. I think what the 2000's were is more complicated that a mere event or social phenomenon. The 2000's was when the world became a lot more uncertain. Nothing was as it was, and nothing will ever be the same again. In the year 2000, we were still moderately in control. Sure, we still had our wars and conflicts, and there was this rising worry about climate change which everyone was saying would end the world. There was even talk that computers would wipe us out with Y2K. But on the whole, the world was still structured, accessible, and processable. We knew when something happened there was a reason for it. If there was a war, people were fighting for a reason. The media reported what we wanted to hear, and we accepted it. We had essentially never had it so good. But from the beginning of the decade, something started to change. September 11th first brought us closer to uncertainty. We couldn't comprehend why something like this would happen, or moreover, could happen. Any justification seemed incomprehensible, and so none of it made sense. We wanted to act, but there was nothing we could do.

Then came the fight back. We fought in Afghanistan, just like the Soviets fought in Afghanistan. We fought in Iraq, just like we had fought in Iraq during the First Gulf War. It was done, supposedly to fight Terrorism, or more specifically, the new idea of Terrorism; that which is Islamic and fundamentalist. The War on Terror was really a War of Terror, and it was our own politicians and media machines keeping us frightened. We were told our lives were at stake. These people were ruthless and killed indiscriminately, and we would be next. Thus, our fear fed the War on Terror. We went to Iraq and Afghanistan because we were frightened. Frightened of the consequences of what might happen if we don't, and what would happen when we did. Now the War on Terror has morphed into the Overseas Contingency Operation, but whilst you can change the name, you can't change the purpose: To keep the public frightened, and to feed off their uncertainty. Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq were a pretext which were we happy to accept, and when they vanished, we nervously eyed those who definitely have them. Then our economy collapsed. The banking system had been taking fat profits whilst paying hard and fast with our cash, and when the music stopped and everyone made a mad dash for the chairs, many were left without anywhere to sit.

Now we are uncertain about many things. We are uncertain about whether there is going to be conflicts, whether the economy will be alright, whether climate change will flood the planet. Uncertain if there will be petrol to power our cars and electricity to light our homes. All of this constantly playing off our most basic fears. But alongside this uncertainty comes a sense of helplessness. Apathy at the government, apathy towards political issues. These are huge processes that we seem unable to stop, and which we are caught inside. This is a thought which must be fought tooth and nail. Humanity is only as good as the actions of the solitary man. Change is possible when people work together, and nothing ever happens when people turn away. So although the 2000's were uncertain, we need not continue down the same path. Forge something new and alternative, and then surely we can agree to establish a better system. It doesn't have to be this way, if you don't like it. If there is one thing I hope for the future, then it is for renewed hope. Hope springs eternal.

The Chillax Conspiracy

2009-12-26T01:53:00.015Z

Doctor Who, Catherine Tate's Nan's Christmas Carol, Gavin & Stacey, Victoria Wood's Midlife Christmas... What do these programmes have in common? The word "chillax". I admit, before yesterday, I had never heard of this word. I just thought it was an amusing blending of chilling out and relaxing. But then it was in quick succession, randomly in several different programmes on the BBC since Christmas Eve. The word has been innocuously slipped into several differing situations, from the opening of Doctor Who (The Doctor says it) to Victoria Wood's programme, where during a sketch a gay vicar tells his congregation that God just wants them to chillax. I don't know, but I swear that this has only just become popular. It's a fad. Anyway, I've had a nice Christmas so far. Got my main present, an acoustic guitar. Cheap one, but one which I've had on good advice from a family friend that is remarkably well built as well as sounding nice for the price range. Thankfully it comes complete with a bag, strap, electronic tuner and plectrums, so I am all set to start off learning. A friend of mine who plays moderately proficiently told me that it is all about building up the strength in the fingers, so that when you try to play a chord you can hold it better, because the steel strings hurt the tips of your fingers. Play things you want to play, and don't rush it. So I hope to be proficiently strumming in a short while.

Also got some books, included an unexpected title by old J. D. Salinger, "Franny and Zooey". I've never read any Salinger aside from "Catcher", so I am very interested to see where this may develop. Apparently this novel is one of several stories which recounts the life of the Glass family, from whom each event is approached through a different perspective. I'm not sure if I'll always be wanting to hear a Holden-esque narrator though. I'm just so used to that style, because it effects me so deeply. Also have had some great food of course. Turkey was great yesterday and today there is my favourite, bubble and squeak. So delicious I almost wish I could have it every day of the week. Who would have thought simply frying-off leftovers could produce something just as tasty as the original roast dinner? Have that alongside a thick slice of real ham (you know the type, actual ham cut from a block, not that reformed or wafer thin stuff), and bread and you have a great solid lunch. No need for anything until a mince pie in the mid-afternoon and a cup of tea. There you have my ideal Boxing Day meal, which is precisely what I intend to eat and have thus eaten. Anything if not predictable.

Behind the Times

2009-12-20T21:12:00.004Z

All of these blog postings are awfully behind their initially scheduled release date. I have a feeling I will have to write and release them all in one huge batch to come back up to date with things. Never have I been this out of kilter in the past. Eventually I predict I might even be finishing writing them next April. No idea why this happened: I guess I just ran out of inane topics or suddenly got a writers block. I used to be able to ramble for ages, but no longer. I need to focus the writing more I think. It needs to be sharper, wittier, harder-hitting. Not sure how to go about focusing what it essentially a journey into my psyche though. That would be like telling your psychiatrist that you only wanted to delve into the inner recesses of your mind on the right hemisphere of your brain, but totally ignore the other half. Does that analogy even work? Not sure, but it sure seemed like a good idea at the time. So many things that seemed like a good idea at one point or another often turn out to not be the case.

I love Cat Stevens' "Another Saturday Night". It's quite unlike many other of Stevens' songs, being louder and more aggressive sounding, all about going out looking for women. It really kind of riles you up into action, if you see what I mean. It is slightly similar to "Bitterblue", but still sounds unique in its own right. I think I just enjoy the Cat Stevens sound generally. I'm very tempted to by Yusuf's newest album, which apparently sounds very similar to his older albums. I still find it slightly disconcerting that he dropped the name when he converted to Islam, but that's alright. I suppose he should really be known now as "The artist formerly known as Cat Stevens", in the same style as Prince was. Considering he put that on the front of his newest album "Roadsinger", perhaps he is considering that kind of branding. I think the issue many people didn't understand was why he had to abandon music when he converted. I'm just glad he's made a return, and a successful one at that. His voice still certainly sounds strong and melodic. Plus, it proves he can still write good folk rock songs.

I'm Not There

2009-12-18T22:17:00.013Z

With Christmas fast approaching, I would expect that I would be less prepared in present buying. Usually I happen to have half my presents still to buy on Christmas Eve, but this year all I'v waiting on is Amazon to deliver, and I'm all set. The title relates to the semi-biographical film about Bob Dylan released a couple of years ago. I'm kind of interested to watch it. Apparently feedback was rather mixed, but nonetheless I think it could be interesting. Almost anything Dylan-related has the possibility of being interesting. I think that is what makes him such a fascinating man: His life, his music of course, but mainly his mystique. Nobody is quite sure what or who he really is, and I suppose in that sense, he is still a private man. A man you'd instantly recognise if he walked down the street, but you wouldn't know what he was really thinking if you shook his hand. Everyone is certainly deeper than you initially give them credit for.

Moving to another topic. Recently realised that I have a number of Children's Bonus Bonds which are going to mature this coming February. My parents bought them when I was born, and the money will be mine to do with as I wish when my Birthday rolls around. I'm intending to invest/save most of the money, and possibly put some of it back into National Savings & Investments Bonus Bonds. I know they don't gain interest, but it's like a lottery you need not pay to enter. My great uncle wins regularly around £50, which isn't bad by any means. I wish I had more to say, but I cannot recall anything further to add. My stupid "two full paragaphs constitutes a proper blog length" rule is certainly killing me. Don't know why I find it so inhumanly difficult to fill two moderate sized paragraphs, but there you are. Evidently I'm not all there either.

The Way It Was

2009-12-12T23:40:00.002Z

Which way was that then? I forget now, but when I came to write the title of this post I must have originally been intending to discuss something important in the realm of history. Something vital that I knew I just had to get off my chest otherwise it might swallow me up. Then I would be lost in a tormented nightmare, from which the labyrinth would continue to spiral until finally I would fall exhausted, like one who has just escaped the minotaur, only to find him standing before you. Hmm, that story certainly seemed to get away from me. But that aside, I currently have literally no topic to talk about right here. I'm simply killing time to fill this posting with a rather meandering train of consciousness type thing. I doubt it will last particularly long: most of my creative inspirations have an extremely short lifespan, which then has to be harnessed very quickly if you actually want to get anything out of it. The sorry truth is that this is usually either during the early morning, or when I haven't slept and then have what I like to call the mental second wind. Unlike in distance running, where the tired runner somehow finds the strength to continue and win the race, the mental second wind is purely coincidental, and happens at random. You feel like you've drunk a huge cup of coffee, yet at the same time tiredness is creeping over your shoulder. Contradictory or what?

Perhaps its listening to The Velvet Underground that does it. I swear that there is something about this band in particular that haunts me. Alright, The Beatles are at the top of the pile, but somehow The Velvets belong to me. Kind of like Simon & Garfunkel, they have what I have dubbed the Salinger Factor. The Salinger Factor are things that remind me of or feel like "The Catcher in the Rye" by that famed novelist J. D. Salinger. On the list is the book itself, the author, New York, Simon & Garfunkel, The Velvet Underground, and a couple of other items I forget at the moment since I never wrote the list down. By feel like, I mean they evoke the feelings I get when reading the novel. This is rather complex and difficult to explain, so perhaps I shall refrain from attempting to do so at this point. All I want to say is that they just have that special something which jumps out at me and says "Yes, this is what you think it is. You're not alone." I do hope I'm not going mad again, I think that would be a dreadful shame. It would put back so much progression that has taken place. Listen to me, I'm my own psychotherapist. I don't' need no Freud: I have a Masters Degree in Realism from the University of Now. I could have even gone for a Doctorate.

The Disgusting Incident of the Dog and the Governess

2009-12-09T21:17:00.006Z

Sigmund Freud was pointedly rather insane in certain areas. Certainly he was not altogether more coherent of nature than some of his patients. The title of this post relates to Freud's lectures entitled "The Origin and Development of Psychoanalysis". In it, he discusses a woman who had a symptom of being terrified of water coupled with the inability to drink, amongst a host of other symptoms. Anna O. (pseudonym for Bertha Pappenheim) was a patient of Josef Bruer, who was a friend of Freud's. Her diagnosis marked the beginning of psychoanalysis. Anna O. was a patient who manifested many hysterical symptoms, including a period where she was terrified of water. Under hypnosis, Bruer managed to recall a time when Anna had been working at a house as a nursemaid, under a particularly tyrannical Governess. The Governess owned a small dog, and one day Anna witness the dog drinking from the same glass that the Governess had been using. Although disgusted, she was unable to mention the incident because of her fear of the Governess. Freud concluded that this incident was the indirect suppression of emotions connected to the hysteria, that of disgust and the fear of drinking water. However, he thought that this story was not deep enough to explain the entire problem. Eventually, Bruer and Freud agreed that it was Anna's suppressed love for the master of the house that had been transferred into the disgusting incident with the dog, thus bringing about the hysteria. Whether any of this is actually the case remains to be seen.

Later, Anna O. underwent a transference, where her feelings of love and lust for the master of the house were directed upon her therapist, Bruer. She believed she was pregnant with Bruer's child, and even experienced nausea and pregnancy symptoms. It was at this point that Bruer decided to stop treating her, and she was institutionalised. However, she later went on to lead a full and varied life, founding the League of Jewish Women, amongst other achievements. The story of Anna O. is just one of many case histories which Freud examined, and the problems it has are extremely common. My main issue for believing Freud's ideas is that it seems to put too much store behind coincidence. It's as though Freud is magically able to come to the nub of the matter after just a brief examination of the patient's history. He also uses hypnosis and free association without fully examining how either of them actually work, or whether it is simply a placebo effect. Nonetheless, Anna's incident with the dog and the Governess brought me down in hysterics (but not hysteria) when it was first explained to me in a lecture this month. It just seemed rather ludicrous that such serious symptoms would all stem from something so trivial, and I think Freud knew this was a problem as well.

This is Y Generation

2009-12-04T21:26:00.006Z

I'm a member of Generation Y. This is roughly those born between the early to mid-1980's and towards the mid-1990's. It is of course an entirely social construct, but it is a nice idea nonetheless. I'm not too such if these generations really have that much in common. Already there is a name for the generation after me, Generation Z (rather unsurprising I suppose, but what comes next? My guess is Generation A since we began at X in terms of lettered generations). Generation Z children are those born from the mid-1990's until today, and so are only the beginning end of it is currently reaching adulthood. Gen Y's parents are either Baby Boomers or Generation Jones, i.e., born after the second world war, but before Gen X begins in the late 1960's. I'm not really sure how much use any generational grouping actually is in historical or social terms. Perhaps you can examine trends in social movement or something in that order. It's not particularly my concern. What is my concern is that Generation Y are now reaching the age where they will soon be the main workforce. This generation will have to look after the largest retired community in history, which will probably mean everyone working longer. That's what you get when the population lives longer and longer. Not that that is a bad thing, it just means we have to think carefully about what we are all going to do. Don't I know it.

Not sure why this has become the focus of this posting, but there you go. Moving off-topic as usual now. Reading in the ever useful Schott's Almanac (literally the best one-stop location for assorted trivia and figures concerning a given year) it seems that earlier this year, voters in Russia decided there list of the greatest Russians. Joseph Stalin, the greatest mass-murderer in history (ahead of even Hitler) came 3rd. Vladimir Lenin, the true leader of the October Revolution of 1917, came 6th. In first place was Alexander Nevsky, probably the key figure in medieval Russian history. Then came Pyotr Stolypin, famous for his early 20th Century reforms. Not sure where Leo Tolstoy or Fyodor Dostoyevsky came, but I personally would rate them alongside Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn as some of the world's greatest writers. Surprising how many important figures in Russian history there are. Not just writers, but leaders such as Peter the Great and Catherine the Great. They were far better Tsars than Nicholas II or Alexander III. Sorry, my A-Level History is all coming flooding back to me. I feel I should stop before it all becomes too much.

The Dangerous Beautiful

2009-11-28T21:00:00.014Z

Roger Scruton is hosting a programme called "Why Beauty Matters" on BBC2 right at this very moment. You know; the philosopher and aestheticist who believes that photographs have no artistic value. No? Oh, alright then. Well, I do, given I had to do a presentation on his aesthetics theory last year. And, expectedly, Scruton is using the programme to further his own views on Beauty, Aesthetics and Art. He seems to be saying at the moment that Utilitarianism is the enemy of Beauty. That modern architecture, in its utilitarian style, without any real desire to be beautiful, is somehow creating urban decay. Not sure if I agree with that Roger, personally. Still, parts of the programme are interesting enough, but there are a lot of much better things on recently. QI has begun yet another series (I think this is "G" series), Top Gear, Gavin and Stacey, as well as The Thick of It. I think I have already mentioned how awesome I think The Thick of It is, but I really just keeps getting better and better. Every episode has me in stitches, and there isn't a character I ever want to get rid of, because they are all so great (and terrible) in their own right. I can feel the series is building up to some kind of crescendo, but at the moment I'm not sure precisely how and when. Maybe a two-part finish? We shall certainly see. It's made me want to see the spin off film, "In the Loop", which features the swearing Scotsman Malcolm Tucker, and one or two others from the series.

Philosophical Psychology has been interesting recently. We've been doing quite a bit of Friedrich Nietzsche, and we are soon moving onto Dr. Sigmund Freud. Nietzsche's theory is quite evidently ludicrous, but Nietzsche was a genius, so he can be forgiven for that. He basically thought, within his "On the Genealogy of Morals" that modern society was based upon a slave morality, founded on Judeo-Christian values which are weak-willed and based purely upon revenge. He thought that some time during the Roman Empire, the master morality was in charge, because the masters (Romans/Greeks) believed in strong-willed people, with health, personal wealth and power. However, at that time the Jews were their slaves. Nietzsche imagines that somehow, the slaves convince the masters that their morality is unjust and evil, and so the masses corrupt the minority, and the slave morality, which values the meek and mild who praise God, was exchanged for the master. Doesn't make a whole lot of logical sense when you think long enough about it. If the masters were really masterful, surely they could have been able to stop the slave revolution. Of course, Nietzsche may have meant it all happens gradually, but that still leaves the question of why nothing has changed in over two-thousand years of the evolution of society.

Giving Thanks?

2009-11-26T19:49:00.003Z

Thanksgiving is a holiday I know very little about, being British and all, but I have endeavoured to examine for a short while. It's a harvest festival, but the last harvest festival I celebrated was in Primary School. I do know that Thanksgiving is usually a bigger deal in the United States (and Canada) than Christmas really is, because they have two holidays where they are supposed to eat Turkey. So what usually happens is the proper Turkey happens for Thanksgiving, and then they just have Chicken or Duck for Christmas. Of course, we string Christmas out. There is no Boxing Day in the US, but it does exist within other Commonwealth realms such as Canada and Australia. An interesting note about Christmas is that in England and Wales, it is actually illegal for large shops to open on Christmas Day. The Christmas Day (Trading) Act 2004 prohibits shops with a floorspace larger than 280 m² from opening. The idea of the Act was to keep Christmas Day as a public holiday for everyone. Smaller, privately owned shops may still open at their discretion however. But anyway, back to Thanksgiving, since it is that time of year, and not Christmas just yet. According to legend, the first Thanksgiving took place in 1619, some years after colonists arrived at Jamestown, Virginia. However, the holiday itself is celebrated for when the Pilgrim Fathers at Plymouth colony had a similar service in 1621. Massachusetts Bay, where the Puritans landed, also celebrated their own Thanksgiving in 1630. It seems that out of this hodgepodge, the practice just slowly grew.

I suppose all holidays begin like that. Someone thinks something is a good idea, and slowly it becomes customary. Since most public holidays are an excuse to not work and relax and eat food, I don't really see that as a bad thing. Anyway, I will be glad when I finish my essays and term ends, since then I have a chance for a short respite before I have to focus again on my dissertation and January exams. Still, it's not all bad news. Have some nice Christmas meal socials to look forward to before then, which should be good. Bizarre to be thinking so much about Christmas in late November, but since term ends on 11th December, everything gets pushed earlier. I've made a deal with myself though not to start playing Christmas music until at least 10th December. I don't want to fill my last.fm scrobbles with "I Believe in Father Christmas" and "Stop the Cavalry", despite how good those songs are.

Reborn of the Ocean

2009-11-24T00:46:00.006Z

According to the BioShock 2 t-shirt I have, "we will be reborn in the cold womb of the ocean". Interesting stuff. Not entirely sure what that means, but hey ho. I'm interested to see where that game goes, but there is a place for discussing that, and that blog is notoriously undermanned as it is. Mustn't steal topics from GameSpot time when Qualvista has amble opportunity for every other topic under the sun to satisfy my desire to ramble meaninglessly. Not sure why though, I invent these rather ridiculous rules for categorisation. I suppose I do it because I think it makes everything easier to read and understand, but I think the real reason is that I like the regularity and uniformity of a system where you know what you can expect to find on each site. Qualvista is your catch-all general blog of goodness-knows-what, whilst GameSpot is dedicated to those game-related journals which might be interesting but then again may be pointless. And the Mentioner? Well, let's just say the Mentioner has essentially died by this point. It was, and still is, a bastion for total pointlessness, not just the semi-pointlessness that populates this particular blog. If I thought something might be funny or Hitchhiker's Guide related, it would go there. No longer though, since that blog has more or less come to the end of its life.

But shall the same be the way of Qualvista? Of course not! I refuse to allow this blog, cultivated for now going towards three years, to fall by the wayside. It would be a personal disappointment if that happened, and you can't have too many disappointments at the same time. They effect morale. They breed distrust. Therefore, it is my impassioned goal to continue to update, even if the updates are in the spirit of brevity and clarity. Sadly, it appears that this particular update has become neither brief, nor particularly clear. Goodness, I start at one point and I work backwards over the mountain. No, I don't know what that means either. Keep up.

The Song Remains the Same

2009-11-21T23:16:00.015Z

On 22nd January 1973, Led Zeppelin played a gig at the Old Refectory, University of Southampton. The 22nd January gig was not originally scheduled on the 1972/73 tour, but the date after the tour poster had been printed. The Students' Union Events committee issued tickets costing £1.00, and all attendees had to show their union cards to be able to get in. The Old (now called West) Refectory is not a large concert venue: If anything, it is more like a small sized Church hall. Led Zeppelin had played their once before, on 11th March 1971. However, along this time at the concert was a soundboard; an full-scale mixing console, from which the entire concert was recorded in pretty excellent quality for a live concert. The idea seems to have been that the recording could have been made into a live album, but in the end "How the West Was Won" was released instead, and the recording at Southampton University fell into obscurity. That is, until 2007, when it mysteriously reappeared. Several bootlegging companies have issued their own remasters or remixes, but the quality of the sound speaks for itself. At the beginning, it is evident that the band are rather tired. They had already done a concert the previous night at the Gaumont Theatre in Southampton for about 2,500 people. But there was something about the cosy, intimate nature of the Refectory that energised the band into a thoroughly rocking performance. In terms of bootlegs, Live at Southampton University has to be one of the best sounding there has ever been, but I've fallen in love with it for a much simpler reason. Being a Soton student, it makes me feel closer connected to the band. It just makes me lament that things like that don't happen nowadays. I agree totally with John Clark, writer in the university newspaper Wessex News (now Wessex Scene, of which I am an Editor); "The Old Ref. concert was just fantastic. There’s no other word for it. They enjoyed it, and we enjoyed it, and that’s what matters."

Listening to the bootleg album, there are some interesting tidbits of information hidden in amongst the songs. Robert Plant says the audience is 9/10th's male, which is unsurprisingly given Led Zep's image as as the forefathers of heavy metal. He also dedicates the "Whole Lotta Love" medley to Alan Whitehead, which receives a big cheer from the audience, because he was SU President the previous year. Today, Alan Whitehead is Labour MP for Southampton Test. Plant also joked that it was lovely to play in Southampton again after all this time, since the last time they had played there was just the previous night. The crowd manage to coax the band back for a long encore, comprising of John Paul Jones improvised Mellotron solo, "Thank You", "How Many More Times" and "Communication Breakdown". The performance also had a half hour long, improvised rendition of "Dazed and Confused", alongside the other long song, the "Whole Lotta Love" medley of about six other songs. If I were to pick my favourite tracks, I would suggest "Heartbreaker" and "Dancing Days" and "Over the Hills and Far Away" are definitely some of the highlights. "Thank You" also has a brilliant extended version. But of course, the whole lot is awesome by definition, since it's Led Zeppelin. It all being recorded and performed so long ago at my university just works to make it that extra special in my eyes.

"And it's a thoroughly knackered Good Night!" Robert Plant.

Livin' in the Future

2009-11-14T19:44:00.006Z

Rhino Records normally means fantastic reissues for old albums. To give an example, I have a copy of The Velvet Underground's "Loaded" as the Fully Loaded Edition, which was released by Rhino. It definitely is a huge improvement over the original, and what with the meticulous way the reissue was put together (making a holographic cover with smoke that seems to move, luxurious linear notes, etc.), it makes me wish more record companies treated their back catalogues with such respect. Sad to hear then that the record company has been blighted by many layoffs (although with regard to that article, I don't personally care about The Cure or Depeche Mode). For some companies, it is evident that they just care about shovelling out the old music whilst concentrating on the new artists. So much of the music industry these days cares very little about what music they are actually putting out has actual quality of staying power. It is clear that the genuinely great music lasts and persists: Just look at all the classical symphonies, Jazz and Big Band from the 1920's and 30's running into Rock 'N' Roll and the sounds of the 60's. This music has proved itself worthy to stand at least forty years on its own feet, and still be listened to. But how many albums these days are we going to be listening to in 2039? I would predict very few, especially given the state of the charts.

But the bigger question is, how will music itself develop? Today, there are easily the greatest variety of musical genres ever, but will this expansion continue or grind to a halt? Difficult to imagine, but I suspect that growth cannot continue at the present rate, especially given the fact that stagnation is relatively common in music. There are periods of growth, and then periods where not much changes. I personally foresee musical development going backwards slightly, before any tangible progress is made. Already 2009 is sounding suspiciously similar to 1999. But in the quest of greater riches, perhaps we are overlooking what music is really about: Enjoyment. I listen to music because I enjoy it, and people tend to make music because they enjoy it, not to make money. Of course, the money is a nice incentive, but I'm sure that if The Beatles had never achieved critical fame, they would still have enjoyed playing "She Loves You". Some of today's musicians just don't seem to be in the industry for the right reasons, and that is what bothers me. Care, and attention to detail are evident for a band who are having fun, but a superficial, computer processed track will always be produced by a group who are just running in the rat race. Bizarre. I hadn't intended to critique the music industry, but there you go.

A Great Day for Freedom

2009-11-09T22:19:00.009Z

On the day the wall came down,
They threw the locks onto the ground,
And with glasses high, we raised a cry, for freedom had arrived.

Today is 20 years since the Fall of the Berlin Wall. I'm pretty sure my Dad has a copy of "The Independent" from 9th November 1989 up in the attic somewhere, which he kept for posterity. I can't remember it. Afterall, I was only 9 months old at the time, so I'm afraid I wasn't up to examining important political and social events. The Iron Curtain divided Germany and the Eastern Bloc from the rest of Europe from the end of the Second World War, until the collapse of the USSR in 1991. There was something incredibly revolutionary and moving about the wall coming down. I suppose it was the division that was the most shocking, and so the reunification was all the more wonderful and dramatic. I still haven't seen the end of the German-language film "Good Bye Lenin!" which is about an East Berlin boy whose strongly Socialist mother falls into a coma, and awakes from it after the wall has come down. Attempting to keep her happy, he tries to pretend that the East Germany still exists. It was hilarious when I first saw some of it, and I really want to finish it some time. I think that this week is one which has strong themes of both war and peace. In peace terms, we have the Berlin Wall coming down, and we also have Armistice Day on Wednesday. But in war terms, we have Afghanistan, which has definitely turned into another Vietnam, and Modern Warfare 2, which is probably the largest game release of the year. I personally find it rather ironic to release a game which revels in war the day before Armistice, but that may be just be.

I don't understand why war continues to rage. It isn't necessary, and it isn't glorious. "Catch-22" spells this out extremely well, I thought. Games such as MW2 show that war is exciting, dangerous and fun, but in reality it is none of these things. Such are my rather mixed feelings towards most shooters. I enjoy playing them, but I worry about the consequences. The War in Afghanistan seems to be just an elongated repeat of the Soviet-Afghan War of '79-'89. In just under a decade, the USSR didn't manage to achieve victory, so I don't see how the NATO coalition can hope to do any better. John Simpson, the BBC's World Affairs Editor, seemed pretty convinced in a book of his that Afghanistan was a country which simply couldn't be conquered. The longer the war goes on, the more people will inevitably die, on both sides. I'm no pacifist, but I really don't see or understand the reasons behind this war. If it were originally in retaliation for September 11th, I think we have already responded in kind. At the moment, we just seem to be staying there in order to prove the point that we haven't 'lost'. The United States is terrified of loosing two wars at the same time, and since Iraq has disappeared from the picture, some are anxious to get out of the whole region. I don't know what President Obama is doing, but I hope he makes up his mind soon.

Tongues of Fire of Idris

2009-11-08T21:25:00.005Z

Although only a quarter Welsh, I am quite proud of my Welsh descendence. My Dad grew up in Barmouth, which is this small seaside town in North Wales district of Gwynedd, close to Harlech. I sometimes visit semi-occasionally, and I am always struck by the rugged beauty of the landscape. Snowdonia National Park starts right behind the town, and it always feels very windswept and wild. It isn't really a place I'd want to live, considering the rolling hills and pleasant sunshine of the Cotswolds, but I do like it nonetheless. My great aunt used to live in this fantastic house on the hillside overlooking the sea, which had a secret staircase hidden behind a tapestry, I kid you not. She also had a billiard table. For a child, it was definitely a magical kind of house, because you could invent games concerning the staircase or the billiard table. Sadly she had to move out of the house to one in the centre of the town, since she was unable to make the long walk down the mountainside to do shopping each day. I also grew up listening to the fantastic stories of "Ivor the Engine", from Oliver Postgate and Peter Firmin, about a small steam engine that worked for the Merioneth and Llantisilly Rail Traction Company Limited in the top left-hand corner of Wales. This location seemed to fit perfectly with that of Barmouth, and so I liked to imagine that Ivor's trainline was that which ran across the bay between Barmouth and Fairbourne.

Anyway, I was reminded of this when I was travelling back today listening to the Remembrance Sunday service in the car, and one of the songs the band at the Cenotaph played was "Men of Harlech", a very stirringly patriotic tune. Recalls when Harlech Castle was defended for seven years whilst under seige, or when Owain Glyndŵr defended the castle against Prince Henry (who would later be Henry V). In fact, Glyndŵr was the last Prince of Wales to actually be Welsh. Afterward the title has always been given to members of the English Royal family. "Men of Harlech" was also part of BBC Radio 4's "UK Theme" music they used to play, before they axed it in 2006. My favourite Welsh song is a hymn the name of which I can't remember, but it is very pastoral and peaceful. It is kind of like the Wales National Anthem, but slightly different. Harlech Castle itself used to be right by the sea, but the rising coastline has meant that it is now almost a mile inland. Anyway, Idris is a giant or dragon from Welsh mythology (as well as the name of a mountain), and the opening line of that song. I think that's probably enough of this before I drown in nostalgia.

Deep in the Thick of It

2009-11-03T20:36:00.009Z

I once thought that no political comedy could be better than "Yes Minister" and "Yes, Prime Minister". Well, "The Thick of It" comes pretty close. A new series is current on BBC2. It surrounds the fictional Department of Social Affairs and Citizenship (DoSAC), the Secretary of State and the higher ranking civil servants in the department. In the first series, the Minister, Hugh Abbot, was played by Chris Langham, but after his conviction for downloading child pornography, he was naturally dropped from the programme. In fact, this even for a while became a bit of an in-joke, where during several specials he's apparently in Australia, and the other characters would mention his conspicuous absence. At the beginning of the third series, there is a Cabinet reshuffle where Hugh is replaced by Nicola Murray (played by Rebecca Front). It it wall to wall hilarious, and I think all of the characters are great. Some of it is part improvised, and I think that is what makes it feel quite realistic. In the episode that has just gone, someone at the department accidentally wipes the immigration records for everyone who had arrived in the country in the past six months, and the Minister and her staff have to deal with the political fallout, whilst also attempting to pacify the abrasive Director of Communications Malcolm Tucker (vaguely based on Blair's spin doctor, Alistair Campbell). Filming-wise, it is done in a style similar to a fly on the wall documentary, lacking any laughter track or music.

Anyway, been reasonably busy recently. Lectures, naturally, but also the amount of time spent on extra-curricular activities I participate in seems to have increased. I haven't actually taken on more things, it's just in each of the positions I volunteered for previously I've been elevated to greater responsibility. Going for a short visit home this next coming weekend though, so that should be nice. Again, I wish I could pad out this second paragraph a bit more, but at the moment I am really running out of inspiration. Monty Python were right. It is difficult to pad these things out to thirty minutes (well, in my case, a few minutes reading time, or two full paragraphs). Oh, I just remembered: "To Kill a Mockingbird" is fantastic so far. If it keeps this up it's winning a sure fire place in my favourites.

The 7th Dimension

2009-10-28T17:44:00.005Z

No, not the sci-fi, fantasy and horror segment on BBC Radio 7 (although that is good). Windows 7. Well, it looks different from Windows XP, I can say that much. I've never used Windows Vista except on the occasional computer at the university, so it is an interesting jump in terms of complexity. So far I have been impressed. The only thing I would say is that I have noticed an occasional flicker in sound when playing a song in Windows Media Player, but this may simply be because the system need defragmenting. That, and if a program closes strangely it will simply say "A program has stopped working", which is a little annoying, but it will try to reopen the program. Nothing major, but it wasn't there in XP. There are a lot of plus points though. For one, the computer can now support DirectX 10 graphics, which means I can finally see those volumetric smoke effects in World in Conflict. The first game I have reinstalled is Fallout 3, which I am now very slowly re-downloading all of the DLC for. I plan to start a new game again, but also try to continue playing my way through the original Fallout at the same time. Anyway, the thing which has most impressed me about Windows 7 is that it is smooth in performing almost all actions. Nothing really takes a particularly long time to bring up, and the system runs without using a whole lot of background processing power. It is useful that there is a manager to stop programs automatically starting up in the background, so those useless processes can be halted. I hate it when you install a program and it starts a random background process which seemingly does absolutely nothing, except use valuable system memory.

Started reading the seminal "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee. It is one of the books I have on a growing list of novels I have yet to read. I've been enjoying it so far: It has a vaguely Mark Twain feel to it. Funny, but serious at the same time. Also, I feel ashamed for not realising for a while that Scout Finch was a girl. I put down "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" again, because I feel it is one of those books I will need to read on and off to be able to get through. It seems to move at the speed of a coasting motorcycle. I was pleased that I finished my short essay/commentary on Heidegger though. Heidegger does the same thing as Kant does: Uses 90 billion words where 5 would do. But worse than that, he inserts words of his own devising, or uses common words with meanings which he has invented. Here is a sample sentence from "Being and Time": "Being-in is thus the formal existential for the Being of Dasein, which has Being-in-the-world as its essential state." To understand that sentence alone, you need to know what he means by "Being-in", "existential", "Being", "Dasein" and "Being-in-the-world". Don't panic, I'm not going to explain them here; if you're interested go and look them up yourself. Dasein in particular crops up in almost every other sentence. It feels like trying to decipher some kind of an ancient text.

And Another Thing...

2009-10-23T12:36:00.015+01:00

In the increasingly inaccurately named 'trilogy' of "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy", there has recently been released a sixth book, despite the fact that author Douglas Adams sadly died in 2001. If I were to expect anyone to manage to write from beyond the grave, it would be Adams, but not even he has managed to do that, yet. "And Another Thing..." is written by Eion Colfer, the children's author renowned for his excellent Artemis Fowl series, and continues the story beyond the end of the last novel, "Mostly Harmless" and I've just finished reading it. I think for the most part, there are two types of Hitchhiker fans. On the one side, you have the raving maniacs: Those who believe that the work of Adams is the divine gospel, and that anything else is heresy. Then there are those, like me, who believe that the inconsistent and almost self-contradictory nature of the entire Hitchhiker's franchise, through the radio series to books and to film, means that it is in it's very nature to be played around with. Adams certainly wasn't one for making sure his stories fit neatly together, and my very blog, both here and The Siderial Daily Mentioner, embrace the chance to play in the Hitchhiker universe. So, down to my review, and I warn now of spoilers abound. I very much enjoyed the book. It's not Douglas Adams, but it is a great book nonetheless. For a start, I think this is a good thing to continue the story beyond the current ending. "Mostly Harmless" was easily the most depressing of the Hitchhiker novels. Everyman hero Arthur Dent has lost the love of his life, Fenchurch, and along with that the Earth is destroyed (again) and all of the main characters (including Arthur) are killed along with the Earth.

It is therefore nice to know that Dent and the others are not vapourised with the new destruction of Earth, and once again, the probability axis and a certain Infinite Improbability Drive come in handy. There are part of the book I really enjoy, and others which aren't as good. For example, for the most part I like the character development. The novel is a lot more of an ensemble production, with a lot of time dedicated to characters who had previously been given less development, such as Trillian and Random. There are also some old minor characters who are given more important roles, including Thor the Thunder God and Wowbagger the Infinitely Prolonged. There are also some funny asides here and there to the radio series. For example, one of Trillian's imagined memories is that they all escaped from Earth to Milliways, which is precised what happened at the end of the "Mostly Harmless" radio series. One of the funniest references to Artemis Fowl was twice, Zaphod Beeblebrox called Arthur 'Arty', which several characters likewise call Artemis Fowl. Some of the things I like less are the Guide Notes. The problem with them mainly is that there are too many, and they, well, aren't funny enough. Some of them are minor asides, in the style of the radio series, but occasionally it will have a rambling story, very similar to Adams' style, which doesn't have a particularly good punchline at the end. Also, the genuine main character of the series, Arthur Dent, along with his companion Ford Prefect, who really should be at the heart of the book, are mainly sidelined. Arthur's love with Fenchurch is explored but only superficially, and Ford doesn't seem to do a whole lot (although, come to think of it, he never has). It is evident that Colfer much preferred writing about his own characters and those who had minimal characterisation, and found it less easy to write about those with complex backgrounds.

Overall though, the book has significantly impressed me. It isn't, and never could be Douglas Adams, but it also brings something new and interesting to the Hitchhiker universe. The brand new character of Hillman Hunter (another car related joke, most likely), an Irish multi-millionaire who took the super-rich off Earth prior to the demolition to a small planet named after his grandmother, is a great addition. Parts of that entire plot line reminded me strongly of the mad thoughts surrounding Scientology. Similarly, Hunter's interviews with prospective Gods, including Cthulhu and Gaia, is great. Zaphod essentially is the star of the show here (what would you expect from Beeblebrox?), and his witty charm and banter with Ford Prefect come across well. There was also some great imagery, such as the section when a vast and ancient spacefreighter had travelled for millennia to deliver some rubber bands. Another lovely idea was to develop the Vogons personalities, by having one (the new character of Constant Mown, Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz's son) show compassion. In the entire book, I only noticed a single mistake, which was adapted from the radio series. This was the idea that Vann Harl and Zarniwoop, who are two totally separate characters in the novels, and one and the same person. This only occurs in the radio series, because Jonathan Pryce voices both of them. In the novels, Zarniwoop works for the Guide in the earlier books, but is abandoned with the Ruler of the Universe, and Vann Harl is the new Editor of the Guide once InfiniDim Enterprises take over from Megadodo Publications. And of course if people didn't like it, they are more than welcome to pretend the whole thing is a SEP and finish at "Mostly Harmless". In the end though, a worthy addendum to the series. 4/5.

Cloudy Knight

2009-10-21T22:52:00.013+01:00

My thoughts are scattered and cloudy.
They have no borders, no boundaries...

Finally got around to seeing "The Dark Knight", by borrowing my friends DVD. Overall it was certainly a great; if not probably the best Batman film there has yet been in the long series of adaptations. All of the main cast excel, and although Christian Bale seems to be varying between his characterisation of Patrick Bateman from "American Psycho" and the true Batman, everyone else is just stellar. Of course kudos goes to Heath Ledger for his unstable Agent of Chaos portrayal of The Joker (which is so good you don't actually realise it's Ledger), but I also really enjoyed Aaron Eckhart's performance as Gotham District Attorney Harvey Dent, who I thought was overall the most interesting character. Dent's fall from grace as Gotham's "White Knight" to become the randomly insane Two-Face has got to be one of the more interesting developments here. Both The Joker and Two-Face also raises some interesting points concerning the nature of humanity and chaos, and whether everything really is just based on chance. Gary Oldman is also allowed an opportunity to shine as GCPD Commissioner Jim Gordon. Holding it back slightly was the plotline, which is a bit ragged in places where you are left unsure where it is going to turn next, but for the most part it steers along nicely enough. Action scenes are visceral and not too common, preventing things from falling into banal territory. The music is involving and dramatic, and the visual effects come across with good style and panache. Gotham itself is slightly less comic book and more real-life Chicago, but that just points to the darker developments in this film. Perhaps it is slightly too long in a few places, but this is a minor point at best. All in all, for a blockbuster action film it is definitely right near the top of the pile.

Superhero films have always been ten-a-penny, so it was nice to see one that broke the mold. I thought that was what held the Spiderman trilogy back: it was always banking on the tried and tested formulas, which meant it felt dated. By "Spiderman 3", a train wreck of a film if there ever was one, you are utterly bored by it all. I definitely don't want to see that particular film again, that's for sure. Anyway, moving onward. "The Daily Show" is really great at the moment. I've become quite a fan of watching it on 4OD. Even though the interview takes up half of the show, and this is normally the more boring half, I'm glad they have it. For one, I can imagine Jon Stewart enjoys that portion of the show the most, because he gets to improvise and just ask questions he is interested in. The first half, where they talk about the news, is usually more scripted but just as insightful. I adore the frequent show ups of the true colours of FOX News, and some of their more insane presenters. Oh, and just as a side note, have you heard any of Bob Dylan's "Christmas in the Heart"? I love Dylan but seriously, it's just awful! I realise the album is for charity and all, but I think more money could have been raised in a different way, rather than forcing Dylan, a Folk and Rock man, to do covers of Christmas tunes. Pretty excruciating listening. But hey, Dylan was never one to stand still. His fervent Christian era in the 80's took a lot of people by surprise, and alienated many of his fans. That's just the way he rolls.

Our Redesigned World

2009-10-17T19:18:00.007+01:00

Well, the redesign has finally come to Qualvista. I hope you like it, even if it isn't as Web 2.0 as I might have first liked. I'd initially imagined a three column page, but in the end I couldn't figure out what I would put in the third column, so I dropped that idea. One thing is for sure: I'm certainly not doing that again in a long time. Getting a rough template I actually liked was havoc, and then fitting it out so there weren't adverts left right and centre took a bit of HMTL editing. Finally, changing around the colour scheme and editing a few of the images and other hypertext things was rather tiresome. I'm definitely not redesigning The Siderial Daily Mentioner for a few weeks yet, and when I do I hope it's not going to be as complex. I need a rest after Qualvista. It drained me, perhaps emotionally. I'm just glad it looks relatively snazzy now. The last thing I may do is add a banner image of some sort, but that can wait. The main advantages of the design change are 1. we are now slightly wider (sadly not properly wide yet, but wider than Twitter and about the width GameSpot deigns to be considered "wide"), and 2. the inbuilt comment function, which instead of having a page devoted to comments, can now be found underneath the article page in question. I know I don't get many comments, but I thought that was a useful feature nonetheless. During my arduous task of the redesign, I discovered some free website templates by this freelance designer (I forget his name), one of which would be perfect for this choir website I'm supposed to be putting together. So I am definitely going to pursue that option, since I've found I'm alright-ish at HTML editing. I don't think I can code from scratch yet though.

I debated about whether or not to have the Blogger navigation bar visible, but in the end I decided to keep it. I like being able to click the "New Post" and "Customise" buttons on it. Anyway, moving to a different topic for the latter half of this posting, I just pre-ordered Windows 7 Professional Edition. I'm currently running on Windows XP, and most of the time it has been good. I also have an unopened, boxed version of Windows Vista that I won in a competition, but have never opened it because of all the negative things I heard regarding it. However, recently noticed that Microsoft were having a promotion for people who had recently bought copies of Windows Vista, where they could upgrade them for free to Windows 7. After calling Microsoft and explaining to them my situation, they said that the offer was only for recent purchases, and since I had won my copy some time ago, I was not eligible. However, I did discover that Microsoft are currently offering Windows 7 at a highly reduced (I mean, over £120 less) rate for students. So, being a student for not a whole while longer and wanting to savour the moment, I went ahead and pre-ordered it. My reasoning for doing so is that I can hopefully sell my boxed Windows Vista and try and break even overall. Windows XP is coming to the end of it's life, so I decided it was time to jump on the upgrade train. The downside to all this is that I have to do a clean install for my computer. Luckily I have a second hard drive to which I can copy the files and programmes, but the tutorial on the Microsoft website said that upgrading could take several hours. Ah well, there's no gain without strain.

Ordering of Time

2009-10-15T21:45:00.003+01:00

"For they give justice and reparation to one another for their injustice in accordance with the ordering of time." Fragment B1, Anaximander.

The above line is the first documented fragment of Western Philosophy. Or at least, we think it is. It is included in a transcript by the 6th Century philosopher Simplicius of Cilicia, whilst writing his commentary on Aristotle's "Physics". The line stands out because it is unlike Simplicius's style, and seems more like a quotation. However, do not be mistaken by thinking that just because Anaximander is the first philosopher to have documented writings, he is not actually the first philosopher. This honour goes to Thales of Miletus, who was probably Anaximander's teacher. None of Thales own writings survive, but several later philosophers claim he believed the entire universe began with water, and that all other elements were by-products of water. Anaximander was slightly different, thinking that instead of a single element, the universe came from an endless infinite mass known as apeiron. This was a surprisingly advanced theory, and he was drawn to it because the problem with Thales conception of water being the governing element was that water could only ever be wet, and so the dry elements could not come from it. Aperion, being an infinite, indivisible mass, is able to account for all of the differing states in the world. Anaximander's pupil, Anaximenes, took a step backwards slightly in terms of complexity and suggesting that the governing principle element of the universe was air. The reasoning he gave was more complex than that of Thales, by stating that since air can be compressed and expanded, if it were compressed enough it could form solid objects and liquids. The key with the trio of the Milesian school of Philosophy is that it marked the point when mythological explanations for worldly events (such as those envisaged by Hesiod or Homer) were replaced with more logical thinking. Modern scientific and philosophical thinking had begun.

After skipping over the Pythagorean school (Pythagoras, Alcmaeon etc.), another renowned Pre-Socratic philosopher is the great Heraclitus. Occasionally known as "The Obscure" or even "The Weeping Philosopher", he has many fragmentary quotes here and there, several of which are still highly quotable. For example, it was Heraclitus invented the idiom about not stepping in the same river twice, quoted as stating; "We step and do not step into the same rivers, we are and we are not." Most of Heraclitus's writings are in a poetic form, where he uses much in the way of riddles and contradiction, meaning that most are open to much interpretation. What are we supposed to think when we read the cryptic, "Death is what we see asleep, sleep what we see awake?" Heraclitus seems to suggest that he believes the originating element of the universe is fire, by saying; "Fire will come and judge and convict all things." He also did impart some more simple words of wisdom, such as the truthful, "A foolish man is put in a flutter by every word." Many were confounded by his confusing sayings, such as Heraclitus the Stoic (who was probably named after the latter) writing exasperatedly; "Everything he says about nature is riddling and allegorical." At least we should be thankful that we have some of Heraclitus's writings: It is only because of the dilligence recordings by scholars and theologicans that any Pre-Socratic texts have survived at all.

The World is Multiplayer

2009-10-10T22:19:00.007+01:00

I'd like to talk today about people I respect. Respect is an over-used word these days: we can respect people for their dress sense, their gait, or even for just being the person. Yet this isn't real respect I would suggest. I see genuine respect as that feeling you get which suggests that if you actually knew the person, you'd get on really well and probably be good friends. Below I list four such people.

Sir Ken Robinson
Ken Robinson understands the true nature of education. Nobody else I know has ever managed to convey the complex but at the same time ultimately simple goal of education, in a funny and engaging way. Plus, his voice sounds slightly like Micheal Caine, which is an added bonus. His style of lecture is personable and friendly, and he can explain something in such a way that it just sounds right. Hopefully you should of seen the talk he gave at TED a few years ago, "Do schools kill creativity?" If not, watch it now on YouTube. There are also a couple of other great lectures which are available to watch out there, such as one where he investigates what is the key element to finding passion in life, and how education should improve the chances of finding passion, and expanding individualisation and creativity (but, of course, currently does not).

Dr. Randy Pausch
Surely you must have seen "The Last Lecture: Really Fulfilling Your Childhood Dreams"? If not, you must surely go and watch it this second, without delay. This is a man who is simply inspirational. Dr. Pausch was diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer in 2006, but he didn't let this fact stop him. He decided to use the remaining time he had to inspire people to do better, and achieve what they really wanted to achieve. The Last Lecture, and other events, were part of this movement. He was a man with a brilliant outlook on life, in that it may be all over tomorrow, so you have to live every moment for today. It is an outlook I wish I could emulate and carry with such positivity. He died in July 2008, aged 47.

Jon Stewart
One of the best comedian journalists there has ever been. But more than that, Jon Stewart doesn't just tell jokes (although he might like to beg to differ). He manages to weave serious themes and complex thoughts through humour. I can't really think so many things which are more satisfying to see than for Stewart to simply, and precisely explain what is wrong with something, and make me laugh every second. Be the topic the War in Afghanistan, healthcare reform or national defence, Stewart and his scriptwriters can create something which isn't just amusing, but hits that nerve of being emotional as well. There is only one thing I wish they would change in the programme, and that is the correspondents piece to camera. If Stewart is ever interviewing one of the Daily Show correspondents at his desk, they always look directly into camera, reading from the autocue. I wish they wouldn't, because it breaks the facade of a improvised news programme.

J. D. Salinger
If only for "The Catcher in the Rye", and general services to literature. I have no idea if Mr. Salinger is anything like his character of Holden Caulfield, but all I know is that I wish I could just sit down and have a plain conversation with him. Ask him what inspired him to write in such a magnificient way. I have resolved to write a letter to Salinger in the near future, and although I doubt he will read it (even if I get the right address), it will still serve some kind of cathartic purpose. Salinger being aged 90 at this point, he really has achieved the mantle of being a living legend, if anything for his reclusive tendencies since the 1950's. I imagine that part of him wishes for a quiet life where he had never written the book, but I'm afraid cannot allow him that, because Holden has done more for the world that could have been thought possible.

The Hearing

2009-10-03T13:32:00.004+01:00

This is utterly ludicrous. That is the only way this can be described. I awoke this morning and talked on the phone to my grandmother, as is custom on a Saturday morning. I then went downstairs to get a drink, and picked up the post on the way. Lying on the mat were four letters: one was a letter to a previous tenant who left no forwarding address, and seemed to be from the Houses of Parliament, whilst the other three were identical in appearance, and were for myself and my housemates. I assumed, since it was the beginning of the university year, that these letters were merely receipts of Student Finance or something like that. Anyway, I got my drink, returned to my room with my copy of the letter, and opened it. It was not a receipt of Student Finance. It was actually a letter from Southampton City Council Taxation Services, stating, unequivocally; "You are hereby summoned to appear at Southampton Magistrates Court to answer the complaint by a duly authorised officer of the Council that sums shown below have not been paid, due from you being a person liable to pay the Council Tax on said property." There was then a date and time of the hearing, stating that if I did not attend, "You will be proceeded against as if you had appeared and dealt with according to the law." Apparently, myself and my housemates owe over £800 in Council Tax, (plus £70 now for the cost of the summons) despite the fact that 1. We are all full-time students so we are exempt and 2. We have a Notice of Exemption confirming this from the very same Council that is now issuing court summons against me, for non-payment of a tax I do not owe.

Naturally, upon discovering that the Council have started proceedings against me, I am still rather flabbergast. There had been no warning letters whatsoever stating that we hadn't paid the Council Tax, and beyond that, we are exempt from it in the first place, and had applied for an official exemption by due process. The Notice of Exemption gives no indication of when our exemption might expire, only stating that it commenced in April this year. Beyond this, it is impossible to currently contact the Council to explain the situation (the included information with the summons even states that we shouldn't attend the hearing if we are students), because Council offices are closed all weekend until Monday morning. I can only assume that this entire fiasco is the result of some kind of clerical error, but even so, you would have thought that the Council would have checked that they were doing the right thing before issuing a summons. The bureaucracy is undeniably ridiculous. So, bright and early on Monday morning, I am going to march down to the Civic Centre and sort this out, face to face. And after it is sorted out, I will complain in the strongest possible terms to Southampton City Council for the inconvenience. If they don't listen to common sense, then we may have to think of a different strategy. I outright refuse to become a star in a rendition of Kafka's "The Trial".

Turn to the Rain

2009-09-29T21:33:00.015+01:00

I've recently discovered a collection of CD's hidden away at the bottom of a cupboard with have some British 60's music on them. I'm not talking about the great music of the 60's, like The Beatles and The Rolling Stones. I'm talking about such unknowns as Edison Lighthouse, or The Rockin' Berries. There is some good music peppered amongst the abysmal, such as Donovan and actually a really nostalgic song from Mary Hopkin. There's also the weirdly brilliant New Vaudeville Band, whose style of music can only be described as vaudevillian. The worst song there has to be Leapy Lee's "Little Arrows", which is just utterly cringe-worthy. I do actually really like the four songs included by Herman's Hermits, such as the classic "I'm into Something Good" as well as "No Milk Today". This collection just goes to show that the 60's were not awash with brilliant music: There was trash here as well. October very soon; a rather intermediate month I would say. Not like December, or July which are kind of in the centre of things. October is the tail end of Summer and the middle of Autumn. And sadly, I have run out of anything to say for my second paragraph, so I will grace it with a poem of my own composition instead. I don't kid myself on its quality, but I actually like this one quite a bit. Not actually sure what it's about though.

The Worker

Inside the pod,
Down on the outside,
Seeing nothing but anything.

I Am the Worker,
Union, stoker and barrel.

Our Revolution throws
Paper airplanes
Through the sun-kissed air,
On spidery afternoons,

From the abandoned skyscrapers.

Zen and the Art of Sleeping

2009-09-28T20:36:00.008+01:00

Sleep is wonderful, is it not? The problem is either sleeping too much, or not sleeping enough. I need to regulate my sleeping, and I believe some kind of Zen may help. Not sure which kind though, so I've resolved to try and read Robert M. Pirsig's "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" again, but properly and not give up after a third of the way through. I realise the novel tells you very little about Zen Buddhism, or for that fact, very little about the maintenance of motorcycles. But it is a popular philosophy novel, and it deserves to be read, along with "Sophie's World". I managed to successfully finish "Robinson Crusoe", and that novel was written in the early 18th Century. Do you know Defoe's original full title for the novel? "The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner: Who lived Eight and Twenty Years, all alone in an un-inhabited island on the Coast of America, near the Mouth of the Great River Oroonnoque [sic]; Having been cast on Shore by Shipwreck, wherein all the Men perished but himself. With An Account how he was at last as strangely deliver'd by Pyrates [sic]". Well done Daniel Defoe; you just managed to give away the entire plot of the novel on the frontispiece! Something I didn't know was that Defoe wrote a sequel; "The Farther Adventures of Robinson Crusoe". Naturally, this also a tremendously elongated title, but I will not reproduce it. No idea why old authors had to have such perplexingly long titles. Philosopher Thomas Hobbes did it as well. His book "Leviathan" has a full title of "Leviathan, The Matter, Forme and Power of a Common Wealth Ecclesiasticall [sic] and Civil". At least that is somewhat manageable when compared alongside that of "Robinson Crusoe".

I have started to try and do some Yoga though. Wii Fit managed to inspire me. Don't know a million and one poses yet: Just the Tree, Palm Tree, Sun Salutation and a few others which I have memorised from the aforementioned game. Hoping to learn more as time progresses. Not sure if it is having any major effect: the main difference I have noticed is that I find it easier to stand on one leg for extended periods. Maybe with more practice it will improve general wellbeing, but we shall see. At least it is reassuring to know that I don't actively dislike almost all forms of physical exercise, and that some of it I actually do enjoy. It's rather life affirming, in a bizarre sort of way. And I think this is an excellent time for a cup of refreshing Green tea to finish off with, so I will go and brew it now.

Bi-Centennial

2009-09-22T18:53:00.005+01:00

Welcome to the 200th post on Qualvista! Celebrations and congratulations to everyone, especially you, my dearest reader. I've already mentioned in the past that I'm going to have a redesign of both this blog and The Siderial Daily Mentioner, so you still have that to look forward to in the reasonably near future. I notice that there has been a new series of "The Choir" recently. If you remember from about a year ago, I wrote a post about how the choirmaster Gareth Malone had tried to get together a boys choir at a school where there had been no singing for a decade. I enjoyed the series because I'm in a choir, and can sympathise with the difficulties of, at Primary and Secondary School and even older, encouraging boys to join choirs. If I recall correctly, my Primary choir was easily 90% girls, 10% boys. Singing apparently isn't 'cool', but I disagree. Anyway, the charming Gareth (of course, he would be with a brilliant name like that! Alright, so I like my name...) is back again, this time trying to get the town of South Oxhey to form a community choir, in order to rejuvenate a sense of community in the area. I haven't really watched this series; as happy as I am that choirs are being popularised, the bits of this series I saw seemed very similar to the old series, going over much of the same ground. So if you are interested and missed the last series, go and give it a watch on iPlayer. Something you should definitely watch on iPlayer, or even on television as a matter of fact, is the film "Brazil" directed by Monty Python member Terry Gilliam. I've read in the "Radio Times" that it is being broadcast on BBC One late on Wednesday night, and will be repeated for a week on iPlayer. Often films are excluded from iPlayer because of distribution rights, so it is a blessing that this great film is available for repeat viewing.

If you haven't watched the film, the basic premise is that it is set in a world where the government has become a huge, ineffectual and oppressive bureaucracy, kind of similar to Orwell's "Nineteen Eighty-Four". The plot is set in motion when an insect accidentally falls into a teletype printing machine, causing a mix up of arrest warrants leading to an innocent man being wrongfully interrogated and killed. Junior Ministry of Information employee Sam Lowry (Jonathan Pryce) is tasked with attempting to sort the mess out, whilst chasing the love of his life who he has seen within his dreams. I adore the juxtaposition of an absolute bureaucratic nightmare, and a surrealistic dreamscape: Lowry has these wild, sweeping dreams of beautiful cloudy skies, and then awakes to work in a chaotic world run by paperwork, where you can't move without filling out the appropriate forms. What makes the government frightening in "Nineteen Eighty-Four" is that the system works, "Brazil" is equally frightening because the system is so haphazardly confusing, you can't escape it. One fantastic idea the film raises is the idea of what is dubbed Information Retrieval charges. In other words, if someone is arrested and tortured, they must pay for their own interrogation. Yet when the wrong man is arrested and dies in custody, they issue a refund cheque in an attempt to correct the 'mistake'. It is Kafkaesque in the style of "The Trial", and I do not use that word lightly. If there was ever a word overused, it was Kafkaesque. Kafka himself would be appalled.

Be Young and Shut Up

2009-09-18T19:50:00.005+01:00

Sometimes the younger generations are viewed as a inconvenience by those who are older. You have to pay to raise them, feed them and clothe them, before they will be educated, grow up and finally stand on their own two feet and make a living for themselves. Once they are settled int the routine, they won't cause any trouble. One such time the children refused to play nicely was Paris, in May 1968. Across France, there was the largest wildcat general strike in history, students forcibly occupied the Sorbonne, and the country almost ground to a halt as a result. It was organised partly by disaffected university students, who thought that the old-world conservative ideas of Charles de Gaulle (who was President at the time) were holding back the development of a liberal new order which would be fairer for everyone. The students criticised Capitalist consumerism just as much as Stalinist Communism; a consumerist lifestyle was not bringing happiness to the masses, and neither had a Communist society. Conservatism advocated religion and patriotic duty; Liberalism wished to embrace sexual liberation and equal human rights. Many of the ideas were extremely anarchistic and implausible, but even so, the idea of a populist Revolution which wasn't about any particular ideologies or party political reasons, but simply about making a better world, is one which I have identified very strongly with. In the end, May 1968 was a complete political failure: the French Communist Party backed de Gaulle and the labour unions, and after two weeks most people just returned to work under their own steam. When the new elections were held, de Gaulle's party was re-elected by an even larger majority. However, the social impact of May 1968 resounds clearly to this day.

France itself still lives with the memory of the unrest of 1968. The 2007-2008 demonstrations and rioting in the Paris suburbs harkens back to that time, with the young people just as disaffected by the world they live in today as they were forty years ago. My favourite part of the revolution has to be the graffiti. Across France, many inspirational slogans were daubed on walls and buildings, invoking that the time for action was at hand. They are extremely Philosophically interesting, and also thought provoking. A website with many of the slogans can be found here. Some are totally anarchistic, whilst some just want to do away with our consumerist lifestyle and suggest green ideas which were totally unheard of. Today, I find myself wondering if the world could not be changed so radically. I believe that conspicuous consumption ("Keeping up with the Joneses") is very slowly eroding our sense of self-worth. Eventually we may just be dying of comfort, and spend the remaining time amusing ourselves to death. I guess all I am saying is that just because the world works one way, it doesn't necessarily mean it is the best way for it to work. It can be changed when enough people work to change it, and imagine that it can be changed. I don't know the way the world would operate if Capitalism and Communism were abolished; it might be chaos. Every preceding generation has longed for a better world which they have carved; now we have to carve out ours before we lose it forever.

Down with Socialist Realism. Long Live Surrealism.

Who Knows Where the Time Goes?

2009-09-15T20:01:00.008+01:00

Across the evening sky, all the birds are leaving,
But how can they know it's time for them to go?
Before the winter fire, I will still be dreaming,
I have no thought of time.
For who knows where the time goes?

Time seems to roll around quickly when your putting together a newspaper. In the words of Kane, I did it because "I think it would be fun to run a newspaper". Or at least, help to run. Everything must be done to a strict deadline, and whilst this is usually relatively straight forward, it sometimes has to be done with rather quick fingers and feet, if that makes any sense. When you finally think of a headline that fits and moderately works, you don't question it, you just run with it. Such is the way of the news, even if the pun is pretty awful (this is nearly always the case). You also must be ruthless at cutting out the excess. If something doesn't fit, it must be cut down, and in a merciless fashion. This might be unpleasant with your own beautifully crafted piece of which every word is golden, but it has to be done. Although I have no reservations about the qualities of my own writing (by all means, read any of the previous blogs for a flavour!), it is somewhat easier to edit something someone else has written. I think I'm pretty adept at cutting down anything though. Occasionally articles will be too short, but their are some relatively easy methods to solve this. First way: add a picture. Second way: use pull quotes (you know, those boxes which quote the article and use a larger font in order to fill more space). And if all else fails, make the headline bigger. You must truly subscribe to Charles Foster Kane's well reasoned advice; "If the headline is big enough it makes the news big enough." There, now you can try to run a newspaper as well.

Have you ever noticed that in adverts for those zit creams and facial blemish removers which are aimed at men, the guy showing them off always looks rather weird? I'm not meaning in the sense that they act weird, but they always look unnatural. Not like real people. I suppose that many people in advertising don't look like genuine people because they all have to have that perfect quality which makes them seem as though they have stepped out of Pleasantville. If I were in advertising, I would want to take a more realistic or surrealistic approach. I haven't decided which. It would be amusing to advertise toothpaste or vacuum cleaners with some kind of a multicoloured kaleidoscopic freak out set to Rock music. Halfway through "Robinson Crusoe". I think that because I'm managing Daniel Defoe's vaguely old-fashioned style of writing pretty well, I should try to read some other classics as well. Maybe I should try to read Thomas Hobbes' master work, "Leviathan" again, since it was around the same time. On second thoughts, I think I'd prefer something slightly closer to home and lighter, say "Moby-Dick" by Herman Melville. Not sure if we have a copy sitting around anywhere, but I would expect so. All these books which we all vaguely know, but never take the trouble to read. I have resolved to actually read them. I suppose I'll have to add them to that list I had some time ago.

Catch the Wind

2009-09-12T21:40:00.007+01:00

Back temporarily at university for approximately (no, well, exactly) five days, for newspaper training. After the burglary the house still doesn't feel as secure, even though the back door and my room door have been mended. We still need a proper security door between the utility room and the kitchen. If I were the homeowner instead of merely a tenant I'd do it at a shot. I'll still sleep well though because I'm quite tired, and have to wake up early Sunday morning. I think early rising, especially on a Sunday, shouldn't be permitted except in times of national emergency. Unless the sky is falling, I don't want my Sunday morning disturbed. The Velvet Underground didn't write their song claiming that "Sunday Morning, brings the rush in." It's a time for relaxation, contemplation and reflection. Anyway, travelling today was interesting. I often find that when travelling, or just generally on certain days, things seem to happen in a kind of out-of-body type way, in that I am merely observing and studying everything hustling and bustling about me, which I merely act out my role which I have been given. It's difficult to explain. I was sitting there in the station waiting for my train, whilst the 12:07 to Ealing Broadway pulled out, and everything felt rather... clear. I was the extrospective observer. I wasn't thinking about anything except how I'd be the perfect voice for those automated announcements in the style of; "This is the twelve, fifteen, CrossCountry service to Bournemouth. Calling at Reading, Basingstoke, Winchester..." Yet I felt unimportant and almost invisible in the grand scheme of things in the station, with all its other passengers. Trains sliding in and out all day long; people moving frantically but quietly from Point A to Point B. The same thing happened when I had arrived and had lunch in Southampton. I sat down there in the heaving busyness of Above Bar Street and placidly ate my lunch, whilst this teenager sat on the bench along from me trying, almost desperately, to look cool and sophisticated in dark Wayfarer-style sunglasses and neat shoes.

He was there listening to something on his iPod and nervously tapping his neat shoes on the pavement in rhythm to the beat, and I steadily ate my tortilla wrap. It jumped into my mind that this guy's appearance was practically a modern version of Holden Caulfield, but instead of a red hunting hat, he was wearing a pair of dark, slightly too large sunglasses. It was the kind of look which Audrey Hepburn does in "Breakfast at Tiffany's", a kind of disinterested and apathetic boredom, although nowhere near as beautiful. In a few minutes he got a call from someone. Whether he was speaking to a girl or boy I wasn't entirely sure, but the tone of voice, the effort of the neat shoes and the sunglasses seemed to suggest to me it was a girl he liked. Evidently one or the other was in the wrong place, because the guy agreed to walk up the street towards the caller. So he hung up, pocketed his iPod, and then slouched off. Yes, slouched, with overly hunched shoulders. The image of this guy as Holden Caulfield vanished from my mind in an instant: he would never slouch like that. Neither, in my mind, would walking like that succeed in getting the girl. Then I finished my wrap and some other people came and sat down in his place, talking about the good weather, and the moment was gone. I'm still not sure what it was, but it happens quite often. I suppose I am attuning my extrospective abilities.

Revolution 9

2009-09-09T14:17:00.005+01:00

The remasters and the Rock Band game of a certain band are out today. I suppose I should feel excited about that, but I don't really. It's not like we're getting anything genuinely new. Just a newish sound on old songs. I wish Apple Corps would release some of the outtakes and rarities which you have to get on illegal bootlegs. That would cater to the fans. Alright, we've got the Anthology series, but there are still unreleased tracks out there. The experimental and mystical "Carnival of Light" for example, which is reputably over thirteen minutes long, and has never been released whatsoever. These are things which I would appreciate from them. That, and re-releasing the film "Let It Be" on DVD. I would actually buy that at launch, rather than hanging around in this uncertainty concerning the remasters. Anyway, I will now rant about loyalty cards. We all have them: I've got one for Waterstones as well as Boots. I was meant to apply for a Tesco Clubcard, but I never got around to it. Anyway, what gets me with these things is that some stores charge you in order to get them, whilst others give them away for free. Waterstones, Boots and Tesco all offer their cards without a price attached, yet HMV, GAME and now Odeon cinemas think that they can charge for their loyalty cards. Naturally, I've refused to purchase any such cards: there is little point in shelling out for something which others offer for nothing. The most bizarre thing is that at one point, you could get a HMV student loyalty card for no cost, yet this was quietly dropped some time ago. I find the concept is like trying to open a stall selling newspapers whilst a guy stands outside handing them all out free of charge.

And sadly, I have nothing else to say, so this posting is going to be slightly shorter than the usual obligatory two paragraphs. This paragraph isn't going to be one at all; just a kind of grouping of a few sentences whilst I try, hopelessly, to pad out this ending to the best of my ability. I don't know why I don't just give up and admit the fact that the posting will be slightly shorter, but I guess I'm a perfectionist. On second thoughts, I've worked out I'm Mark Corrigan. Uncertain, rather officious, and self-important. Yes, my life can be summed up by a sitcom. I don't know whether to laugh or go over into a corner an cry over my cup of green tea.

Paradise for Hire

2009-09-07T15:21:00.006+01:00

I've finished "The Great Gatsby". What a curious book. Certainly it is a incredible book; I expect I may eventually rate it as one of my favourites. Nonetheless, it is curious. If you haven't read it yet, I suggest you go and do so post haste, for I shall discuss some spoilers most sinister in the sentences following, reader. It is a portrait of the Jazz Age, and many elements continue to exist and be just as relevant even today. The plot outline is quite complicated, but humour me. It follows one Nick Carraway; a young, single bond salesman from the Midwest working in New York. He lives out on the Long Island Sound coastline in West Egg, a town of 'new money', in a rather conservative bungalow situated between two mansions. The mansion next door is the biggest house in the area, and is owned by the exotic, mysterious man-about-town Jay Gatsby. Across the bay is East Egg, where the 'old money' resides, including Tom and Daisy Buchanan. Daisy is Nick's second cousin once removed, and he also knows of her husband Tom, who was an American Football player whilst at Yale. Daisy is now bored and restless, whilst Tom has taken a mistress, Myrtle, who is the wife of a poor garage owner, George Wilson. Nick attends several parties hosted by the Buchanan's, and is then unexpectedly invited to one of Gatsby's parties, which are known for being the biggest and most extravagant in Long Island. Upon visiting the party, he discovers most of the guests know very little about Gatsby himself, with many wild rumours flying around. Nick then meets Gatsby just as unexpectedly, not thinking he would be so inconspicuous at his own party. Quickly, Nick and Gatsby strike up a friendship. Gatsby then reveals that he is in love with Daisy, and has been ever since she treated him during the Great War. He even moved to West Egg so that he would be just across the bay from her. He asks Nick to set up a meeting between the two of them, to which Nick agrees. Daisy is shocked to learn of Gatsby's existence, having not seen him in several years. However, she confesses her love for him as well, and the pair begin an affair.

Events come to a head when Tom, Daisy, Nick, Jordan Walker (a female golfer, with whom Nick has a short lived relationship) and Gatsby go into New York for the day. It is here that Gatsby reveals the affair, stating the Daisy never loved Tom. Daisy however is in two minds, saying that she loved Tom once, but also loves Gatsby. Tom accuses Gatsby of meaning nothing to Daisy, and reveals that the source of Gatsby's wealth is the illegal bootlegging of alcohol. Realising he has won Daisy, Tom asks Gatsby to drive Daisy home, with himself, Nick and Jordan following. However, on the way home, events take a turn for the worse. Gatsby's car is involved in a hit-and-run with Myrtle Wilson, Tom's mistress, who ran out into the road. George Wilson is distraught with grief, whilst Tom claims that he had nothing to do with the crash (Wilson had seen Tom driving Gatsby's car on the way into New York). Later that night, Nick learns the truth from Gatsby: Daisy had been driving the car when it hit Myrtle. Nick comforts Gatsby during the rest of the night, stating that "You're worth the whole damn bunch of them put together". The following day, Wilson threatened Tom Buchanan with a gun at his house, and learnt of the owner of the car from him, before he travels to Gatsby's mansion. Finding him relaxing in his swimming pool, he shoots him, before committing suicide. Nick and Gatsby's gardener find both bodies in the garden. Despite all of Nick's efforts, only a tiny group of people attend Gatsby's funeral, including Nick himself, Gatsby's father, some servants, the Postman, and an "owl-eyed" man Nick had once seen admiring the books in Gatsby's library. Gatsby's mansion is stripped of it's belongings by many mysterious people, who just help themselves to anything they fancy. Nick decides to return to the Midwest, lamenting Gatsby's lost dreams and the nature of history to repeat itself.

What strikes me about the book is the way that all the characters are very insular, and self-composed. Gatsby, a famous man who appears in the newspapers, is not really known by anyone. He is a powerful businessman with numerous shady connections in the criminal underworld, owns a massive mansion and drives a beautiful car, but he is no happier because of any of it. Nobody attends his funeral, and he has no real friends except for Nick. Despite having huge parties which the great and good attend, nobody ever learns the truth of who Gatsby really is, and neither do they care enough to attend his funeral following his murder. Similarly, Nick is very alone. He mingles in circles with the Buchanans and others in high society, but he feels isolated and solitary. Even from the start of his relationship with Jordan Walker, he knows it will not last. This is very much connected to the idea that society's obsession with monetary wealth and material possessions were slowly corrupting the nation. Gatsby has noble dreams of love's labours won and conquering all, in that he will marry Daisy and live happily ever after. He accumulates his wealth in the hope of wooing the woman he loves, who has always lived with money and expects nothing else. Yet in the end, neither the woman nor the money, the parties, the cars, house or the fame bring him any true happiness. The American Dream died to the sounds of the popping of champagne corks.

The Dancing Plague of 1518

2009-09-04T23:38:00.009+01:00

Sometimes known as the Dance Epidemic, this was a widely reported outbreak of dancing mania which occurred in Strasbourg, France (at that time, part of the Holy Roman Empire) during July, 1518. What caused the hysteria is not known conclusively, but hundreds of people began to dance, leap and hop for days if not weeks on end, often without any rest or time to eat and drink. Many involved are reported to have died from exhaustion, heart attack or stroke. Documents from the time report that in mid-July, a woman by the name of Frau Troffea stepped out into the street from here house, and began a wild dance which lasted upwards of four days. By the end of the week, another 34 people had joined the dance, and by the end of August, approximately 400 people were dancing wildly and uncontrollably around the city. The dances seemed to have no common feature, all sufferers having their own unique dancing movements. As more and more people were overcome by the dance, many in the upper classes and ruling elite of Strasbourg consulted the local doctors and physicians for solutions to the epidemic. After ruling out most astrological and supernatural causes, the Strasbourg medical community agreed that the dance was a "natural disease", which was caused by "hot blood". At the time this was a common conclusion; orthodox physic (or medicine) suggested that too great a flux in the blood could overheat the brain, leading to madness, anger or hysteria, which was associated with erratic movements. Normal solutions were usually some form of bleeding or a cooling of the blood, but in this instance, the physicians suggested neither. The answer: more dancing. They claimed the symptoms could eventually be lessened, and the victims minds restored by allowing the dancing to continue without pause.

To this end, the establishment in Strasbourg cleared two guildhalls and the main grain market, as well as erecting a wooden stage nearby to the horse fair. Those afflicted with the dance could be taken to these locations, were they could dance freely and without hindrance. As well as allowing the dancers space to move, the authorities even hired a group of musicians and professional dancers to lead the afflicted in their endeavour, play music and keep them constantly moving. They believed that the rhythm of the music could help heal the body and soul, and so stop the irrational dancing. According to eye-witnesses, whenever a victim slowed or tired or even fainted, the musicians would increase the tempo, and the hired dancers would keep them up with the pace by physically holding them in dance. According to one person; "They danced day and night with those poor people". However, after a few days of nonstop dancing in the guildhalls, the authorities realised their cure wasn't working, as the old, those with weak hearts or people prone to stroke, began to die with exhaustion. They now decided that the dancing had nothing to do with the blood heating the brain, but instead was a curse sent upon the city by an angry saint. Thenceforth, prostitution and gambling were banned, and those deemed to be of ill-moral worth driven out of the city gates. Those afflicted with the dance were taken out of the city to a shine of St. Vitus in the Vosges Mountains, where they were to pray for divine salvation. It is recorded that in the weeks that followed, the dancing subsided, and those who had survived until this point managed to regain bodily control.

So what caused the Dancing Plague? According to Dr. Justus Hecker (1795-1850), in his book "Epidemics of the Middle Ages", he believed that the dancing was a form of mass hysteria caused by either religious or social anxiety, which caused; "A convulsion infuriated the human frame... Entire communities of people would join hands, dance, leap, scream, and shake for hours". He also claimed that music did seem to have a curative property, writing; "Music appeared to be the only means of combating the strange epidemic... lively, shrill tunes, played on trumpets and fifes, excited the dancers; soft, calm harmonies, graduated from fast to slow, high to low, prove efficacious for the cure." Earlier recorded instances of dancing mania are known as St. John's Dance, and claimed that those so afflicted were possessed by the Devil. More modern medical explanations include Ergotism, contemporarily known as St. Anthony's Fire, which was caused by ingesting bread infected with the fungi Ergot. The mold is psychotropic, and can cause hallucinations, delirium and seizures. Another idea is that it was Sydenham's chorea or St. Vitus' Dance, which is a disease mainly afflicting the hands, feet and face, which causes rapid, uncoordinated movements. The disease can be present in epilsepy and a number of other nervous system disorders. Due to the fact that St. Vitus is the patron saint of dancers, this can explain why the disease was named after him, and why the sufferer's of the 1518 plague were taken to his shrine for cure. So there you go: the Dancing Plague of 1518. Thought you'd like to know.

The Day I Appeared on National News

2009-08-28T21:10:00.005+01:00

Twice. Yeah! Count them. BBC News channel (formerly called BBC News 24), at 9:10 and 15:15. First, My left arm and half of my torso appeared at ten past nine this morning, before edging out of shot, and my entire self walked across the screen for several seconds in the background to an interview at quarter past three. Both of these appearances were from the BBC South bureau in Southampton, where I had a some work experience today. The camera faces out across the main Newsroom, and when I arrived at nine, there was a live interview to camera going on about the new head of the British Army. At the time, I was being introduced to BBC South Today's producer for the 18:30 programme. The second time, I was coming from Graphics to the 15:10 meeting for the evening news, and had to walk across the back of shot in order to get to where the meeting was. Anyway, overall it was an utterly fascinating day. I learnt so much, I wasn't really able to digest it all. I was shown almost every aspect of the newsgathering and production side of putting together regional news, aside from Sport. I even offered some advice for the assembly of weather pictures (only one of which was used). During the morning, I was trained in the use of ENPS (Electronic News Production System), which the BBC uses to assemble all of their news from all over the world, with running orders, scripts and programme details. I also got given a tour of the building, and saw the set of BBC South Today. Then I went to News Planning, where the correspondent was very friendly, and I actually got to do some work by phoning some people (all of whom were answerphone messages) about the 20th anniversary of the Uppark House fire. From there it was on to News Organisation (Newsorg), where a deputy Producer assembles all of the news coming in, and works out what is relevant and what isn't.

I then went and watched the lunchtime news bulletin from the gallery where the Director and his assistants gaze at a wall of TV screens, each broadcasting something different. It really felt like an operation to launch a rocket. Everything has to be done at precise timing, so much that one person is there simply to keep time and count down. When the national news ends, the regional news flips on, and then must be totally on time so that when the programme ends, it merges straight back into the national broadcast. After that was lunch, so I was able to sprint to the Royal Bank of Scotland across town and talk to them about accounts and transfers, eat some food and then come back. The afternoon was spent at Graphics and then at the Hub. Graphics encompasses everything which could be considered graphical, including those static images which sit behind the presenter, and the moving images which sometimes illustrate what someone is saying. I helped to chose a freeze-frame (or a grab) from a piece about diving, and also watched as the weather pictures where assembled. Apparently, most of the people sending in weather pictures are regular contributors. After that, to the Hub, which is where all of the footage and film is assembled, edited and processed into the servers. Apparently nothing was going on, because the woman I was with was uploading a documentary on film noir to a DVD so she could watch it later. We talked for a while about classic films, and then it was back to the gallery for the recording of the weather forecasts. The later evening weather forecasts are recorded in advance, and played back when necessary. A quick jaunt over to the set, where we all sat on the red sofas and had another meeting, and then it was back to the gallery. I could see the main presenters arriving on the set, the mini-rehearsals of the main headlines, and then they went live. It went almost without error. There was one problem which concerned the cricket scores not correctly moving on, which led to a short blank screen before it cut back to the studio. And that was the day. The thing I most took away is that, by a large part, the news you watch at 18:30 has been planned and prepared since 9:00. Only if something big happens does it get slotted in somewhere. I would guess the same is very true for the national news as well.

Robinson Crusoe

2009-08-27T19:16:00.011+01:00

After I finish "The Great Gatsby", this is the book I plan to read next. Daniel Defoe's classic novel is one which I've never actually taken the time to sit down and read, yet know the basic story is of a man shipwrecked on an island, where he must survive for many years, isolated and cut off from civilisation. I vaguely remember there might have been a children's animated TV series about it when I was young, but I may have been imagining it. "The Great Gatsby" has been interesting so far though. It has certain qualities which "The Catcher in the Rye" exhibits, but it also overlaps in areas concerning the lack of concerning amongst high-society with points of "American Psycho". Jay Gatsby is a complex character; a charmer, an industrialist, and an unknown personality all at once. Anyway, I'm feeling rather tired at the moment. Recurring theme; either I sleep too much, or not enough. That, and a combination of poor amounts of exercise. Good health requires constant vigilance, that you always work and strive for the best possible outcome. Not an easy path to tread with all of the modern conveniences, which are supposed to make our live easier, actually making them less healthy. Of course, the fabled Crusoe didn't have to live with any of this: he just had to survive at any cost. Given the wilds of the world and being stranded alone in a foreign land, without hope of rescue, his is a hard fight for survival. Many of us no longer fight to survive every day. Life is fragile, and it's easy to forget this.

You know, I read in "The Times" that the incredible music documentary of The Rolling Stones 1969 tour including the infamous Altamont Free Concert, "Gimme Shelter", is finally going to be released on DVD very soon. If it is, it just again shows it is high time for "Let It Be" to be also released on DVD. I'd buy it over and beyond these remastered albums, that's for sure. I think I must be starting to suffer from Writer's Block with these blog posts. Sometimes I just seem to find a total lack of topics to talk about, without recovering old ground. I go for hours just leaving the blogging window open, adding a line here or removing a word there, before in the end giving up for the day and hoping that when I return tomorrow I'll have enough to write to finish a decent sized paragraph. I shouldn't have to feel any compulsion to write these ramblings; it's my choice. I suppose the reason I want to stick to keeping them up is that I've never stuck at anything for so long. This is the third consecutive year of assorted and jumbled nonsense that I've written here. The Siderial Daily Mentioner is for the truly silly stuff, and I only update that very infrequently. So I really just want to keep up appearances I guess. The same goes for my GameSpot blog; although devoted to just video games, I want to keep at least a post a month there. I'm just trying to keep my customer satisfied, which is me.

The New Beatlemania

2009-08-25T14:04:00.006+01:00

It's back. It's not as big as it used to be back in 1963, but it is still back nonetheless. Who is on the front cover of "Mojo" magazine? Who is on the cover of the "Radio Times"? Who has a dedicated bank holiday weekend on BBC Radio 2? Who has a week of programming on BBC Four? Yes, you're right, it's... The Beatles (you thought I was going to say The Rolling Stones didn't you?). They are everywhere at the moment. I suppose it is all build up to 9th September, when The Beatles: Rock Band is released, and when the remastered albums come out on general release. Not sure about either, truth be told; I'm just revelling in the atmosphere. Part of me wants their game, but another part of me reasons that I already can sing my way proficiently through all of their songs, and I don't need a game to tell me I'm good at it. I suppose the drums and guitar are interesting, but it's not like actually playing the song for real. Anyway, BBC Radio 2 has a plethora of radio shows which are probably going to be worth listening to. The Beatles at The Beeb is going to be a collection of the many recordings and interviews the group did with the BBC, much of it from the album "Live at the BBC" (one of the only official Beatles live/compliation albums I am yet to own). There's also going to be a show called Bigger Than Jesus, which is the infamous story of how John Lennon indirectly claimed that the band was more popular than Christianity. Naturally, that caused quite a stir in the United States, where people took to burning Beatles albums in public bonfires. Not the highest point of their career, alongside the Charles Manson murders. Anyway, I'm definitely planning to listen to some of these, as they could be fascinating. Maybe these remasters will turn out to be fantastic. Who knows. Who knows anything?

Music has really bloomed into something I hold important in recent years. When I was about 13, I listened to hardly no music whatsoever. All I knew was some limited Classical stuff and some selected hits by the great Rolf Harris. Aside from that, music had never interested me. I listened to audiobooks and the like, rather than albums and songs. Then one day, my parents were playing The Beatles compilation abum "1", and on came "Paperback Writer". Something about that song just clicked in me; it was like hearing something amazing and totally foreign for the very first time. So that set the ball rolling, slowly but surely. Sadly, I hadn't yet appreciated the brilliance of Pink Floyd by the time of their final, brief reunion at Live 8 (I recall thinking at the time that the music was dull), something I rather regret. But things have moved on leaps and bounds over the past six or seven years. I suppose that is just testament to how much people can change. Anyway, onward. Playing "The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion" over recent months has made me become quite interesting in the universe of Tamriel, where the game and its predecessors are set. It is quite amazing how detailed the backstory of the game is, and most of this is brought across because of the dozens of readable books which are placed throughout the game. Tolkien-esque doesn't really cover it; it's pratically a Tolkien substitute. Just felt like mentioning that.

Counterculture

2009-08-23T21:09:00.006+01:00

Well, we got The Ashes back again from the Australians. Almost through sheer good luck at many points, frankly. I just wanted to mention that. Onward into the night! What is counterculture today? Difficult to say really. I mean, it evidently isn't what it meant in the 1960's. If anything, that counterculture idea is rather cultural these days. In dictionary terms, counterculture is whatever is against the culture of the day. So, does that mean to be counterculture today you have to be an anarchistic technophobe? Possibly. Seems rather a let down if anything. You can't access counterculture without being a part of something which is both weird and on the fringes of reality. Not that I was actually wanting to be, I was just thinking about it in an abstract way. It has occurred to me that I am gradually nearing the 200th posting on this weblog in three years, which I regard as something of an achievement considering that when I first started writing on this blog I only did so because I wanted to have a place to ramble aimlessly. I notice that little has changed in that respect. The main problem facing Qualvista is twofold: 1. Lack of motivation on my part to write new postings and 2. A sense of stagnation. To this end, I am proposing what I have dubbed the Great Qualvistan Redesign, to occur some time in the next two months. From it, Qualvista and The Siderial Daily Mentioner shall emerge into the bright sunlight of a design makeover. Still not sure what style I am going to be aiming for, but I think the main point is to adjust the layout to be wider, rather than the old-style narrow band. That, and the colour scheme is starting to look very bland. There are a lot of more interesting colour schemes out there which would work equally well at home in Qualvista.

So there is that to look forward to in the future, as long as I actually get around to sorting out the redesign. I'm sure I will in the long run, because I've also got to assemble a website for the university choir I'm in (since I'm the Webmaster), so that should give me some more experience in that general area. How long until robots within our homes are commonplace? Probably a very long time I guess, because the biggest problem facing Robotics is that a robot cannot adequately evaluate its environment. To illustrate, humans are able to see a picture of a car, and then see other cars, and understand that all are cars. A robot can only understand that one particular vehicle is a car, but when it sees another of a different colour or make, it cannot infer that this is also a car. An interesting dilemma in artificial intelligence. A synthetic mind would require infinite computational power, which is immersurably beyond current technological standards. Maybe we should try to design something which has more basic behaviour, say a Sheep. I would think that it has more basic systems which could be replicated easier. Yes, I only used that example so I could then say "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?", I admit it.

Time Passes

2009-08-20T17:47:00.006+01:00

My sister got her AS-Level results today, as did the rest of the country. She did well, so I'm glad for her. Sadly she's dropping History (my professed favourite subject, despite taking Philosophy at university, a decision I still speculate on whether it was right), but she did do the worst in it so it makes sense. Sadly, I'm rather behind on this weblog as of late. Must be a kind of writers block, seeing as I'm behind on updating my GameSpot blog as well (Point-and-Clicks and more to come in the future). I'm trying to get out around eight posts per month, and so in order to meet that I've been starting some and saving them as drafts, ready to revisit and then publish on a later date. So you might see blogs slipping neatly behind others in the future. Strange that Blogger decides that the date of a post should be when it was created, not the day it is published. Still, I'm not complaining. But I should really try to finish a posting in one sitting every once in a while, and stop relying on the drafts to be finished at some point. On another completely unrelated note, I kind of enjoy it when aircraft from the nearby Air Force base fly over my house. I think I've mentioned this before way in the past, but my house is situated directed over the approach path for landing runway, so every so often some kind of military aircraft zooms over the house. It's never woken me up: once you live nearby for a little while you get used to it. It always makes me think of the end of The Beatles song "Back in the U.S.S.R." I guess people who live near the North Circular get used to the noise of that as well. Given enough time, anyone can more or less get used to anything.

Watched the film "Cloverfield" again recently. A second viewing did not do the film any favours. I still appreciate the great way in which it is filmed, but all of the characters are extremely superficial, and the plotline is really unrealistic. I mean, why would anyone keep filming through such a disaster as an alien monster attacking New York? Nobody is that dedicated. You also have to hand it to the production team for some really subtle product placement which is slipped in rather inconspicuously. For example, the main characters take shelter in a Subway maintenance area, and there is a Mountain Dew machine in the background of many shots. They obviously thought it out well, as to not make it blindingly obvious. I should have watched "The Usual Suspects" instead, because I haven't seen that before and it's supposed to be great. It was either that or "WALL-E", but the DVD of that film was much more expensive, and I didn't want to splash out. Is it me, or is there a postal strike at the moment? I ordered something (alright, CD's) from Amazon a week ago and it hasn't arrived yet. If it's not here this next week I'm going to email and start asking questions. I hope they're not going to jump another one of their "pricing errors" on me, because I really won't stand for that.

Twenty-Four

2009-08-18T21:08:00.002+01:00

I have been a fan of "24" for some time. It's overall an extremely clever series. I'm currently watching Season Six on DVD, having never wanted to watch it when it plays live, for risk of not seeing it from the beginning. I first watched Season One when I was on holiday in Ireland quite a few years ago, and it hooked myself and my parents entirely. It was fast-paced, exciting, dramatic and unpredictable. I still maintain that Season One was probably the best of the lot, since nobody knew the way it was going to pan out. For example, at the end of the very first episode in Season One (12AM-1AM), the head of the Counter-Terrorist Unit is killed. For the rest of the episode, it looked like he was going to be a principle character, but he was dead by the end. There are several unrealistic things about it though, one of which is why characters never seem to get tired. Series One took place over 24-hours from 12AM, which all the major characters already having been awake for the previous day. Yet only once, at around 2PM, does Jack Bauer, the main hero, feel tired or express exhaustion. None of the other series have ever shown that happening, even when having varying time frames. The current series begins at 6AM, yet everyone at CTU was already at work, and they are still at work going on 4AM, apparently without any breaks to eat or sleep. I can understand it's supposed to be high-tensioned and there isn't a lot of time, but people have to eat and sleep to survive.

The major issue it suffers from now is that it has become predictable. In the first few series, there were quite a number of times when we cried out with surprise when something happened. So far in this Season Six, it's only really happened a few times; for example when a character was killed randomly and when a character did something unexpected. Apart from that, I have grown rather adept at expecting the unexpected plot twists. Still, a lot of it is great. The real-time part usually works really well, because when normally broadcast, it is done as though time continues to progress when the adverts are on. So someone might get into a car just before the ad break begins, and then when the adverts end they are either still travelling in the car, or have arrived at their destination. Sometimes, as Morecambe and Wise would say, "you can see the join", but usually it's executed quite precisely. Not really sure how this series is going to end, but I predict it will end on some kind of climax, to lead into "24: Redemption" and Season Seven. Seeing as Redemption was a TV-film I can probably just rent that and return it, rather than borrowing the DVD like I am at the moment. Woah, I managed to sustain a topic for a whole posting! That actually might be a record.

We watched the tragedy unfold.
We did as we were told,
We bought and sold,
It was the greatest show on Earth!
But then it was over.

Out on the Weekend

2009-08-16T16:00:00.005+01:00

Just had a nice Sunday Lunch, and am now relaxing in the aftermath by watching "The Daily Show". Why are so many Americans still so afraid of Socialism or Liberalism? You'd think this was 1957, there is such hatred for anything even mildly Communistic. The proposed healthcare reform has really enraged the frankly ill-informed Republicans, who claim that any introduction of a state-run healthcare alternative will wholeheartedly destroy Capitalism/private healthcare and instigate so-called "death panels" to decide who will get what healthcare. This is naturally ludicrous. Of course, most of, if not all of this is being manipulated by those sly dogs over at Fox News, and the rest of the right-wing media, and the Republican Party itself is happy to jump onto the bandwagon. It's like a new Red Scare. They are terrified that by having a Public healthcare option, they are suddenly going to be transformed into the United Socialist States of America; and that the Hammer and Sickle will be raised over the White House. Please, haven't we come past McCarthyism and all the associated negative thinking? Talking of the Soviets, I love that segment from Top Gear when they assess whether the Eastern Bloc ever produced a good car. The answer was basically no. The Communists didn't really have enough money to build good cars. They were too busy mainly slaughtering their own people and spending the proletariat's hard earned money. That kind of Communism didn't work in any way. Lenin wouldn't have been happy.

And now, stupidly, horrifically, the Right-wingers are claiming that the policies of healthcare reform are Fascist, or Nazi-like. How thick can you get? Right-wing is closer to Nazism than Communism! Communism is extreme Left-wing. Alright, so maybe they join up at the other side, but still, it's utterly insane. Jon Stewart knows how to speak sense. I'm glad that he has large audiences, because at least he can be relied on to talk plainly, and non-partisan. The same goes for Stephen Colbert, even if he disguises his feeling behind faux-Conservatism. Anyway, moving onto something else. I've been having a Monkey Island resurgence recently because of the Special Edition of "The Secret of Monkey Island" which was re-released on Steam and I bought. One of the first games I ever played was "The Secret of Monkey Island 2: Le Chuck's Revenge". I can't remember if we had the floppy disk or CD-ROM version, but I do remember that you had to use a code wheel to access the game in the first place. It was somewhat confusing for a young child. Unfortunately, we must have given away or lost Monkey Island 2, because I don't have it. What I do have is "The Curse of Monkey Island", long held to be the best of the Monkey Island series. It was released around the same time as "Grim Fandango" which sadly I haven't played but I want to. Playing through Curse again has been great fun though.

Anarchy in the UK

2009-08-07T23:58:00.007+01:00

According to "The Times" (a newspaper I am gradually trusting less and less), nobody much was actually running the United Kingdom today. We were rudderless, leaderless; lost in an ocean of mismanagement. Frankly: is it different any other day? Apparently, there had been a mix up with holidays, meaning that Gordon Brown had gone on holiday but his stand-in, Lord Mandelson, hadn't returned from Corfu. So Number 10 was left hanging in the breeze as Mandy attempted to direct the government via BlackBerry before he got on a plane to come back to Westminster. Good to know the country is in capable hands. The government really isn't having a good year, in any sense. Anyway, completing altering course; the title aside, I've never really liked Punk Rock aside from The Clash. The Sex Pistols were ridiculously anti-establishment, probably to too large a degree in my opinion. At least The Clash had a reason to be anti-establishment, because they felt that the music industry was milking them for everything they had. That's what the song "Complete Control" is all about. Maybe I'd like the Ramones, but I've never had the opportunity to listen to any of their songs. Besides, they were an American Punk band, and I've always felt that Punk was a rather British thing. Maybe I'm wrong; according to Wikipedia it originated in the UK, US and Australia. Anyway, the Punks of the late 70's and early 80's really brought back the original problems there had been between Mods and Rockers in the 60's, so that was a negative effect of the movement.

Onward and upward. I have decided that my favourite piece of classical music at the moment is "On the Beautiful Blue Danube", or the Blue Danube Waltz by Johann Strauss the Younger. I still have a great fondness for my former favourite, which is "The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra" by Benjamin Britten. It's still a brilliant guide to anyone who wants to know how an orchestra works. I think it should be mandatory listening in Music lessons. Ah, now there was a subject that taught me hardly anything. I learnt to play piano a tiny amount, sang a few songs I already knew and had sung in Primary School. I didn't learn anything of music's history, or the evolution of popular music throughout the 20th Century. That entirely took place under my own steam. Perhaps the reason people don't appreciate classical and older music is that they feel it is somehow foreign or elitist, and that they have to make do with the modern alternative. I mean, even music from the 1990's is now getting on, and can't really be called modern anymore. If you only listen to modern music, you have to ride on the crest of the wave all the way, never allowing yourself to wallow in the shallows. Returning to the beginning, I think I would guess that my most respected newspaper at the moment is actually The Onion, "America's Finest News Source".

Tumbling Dice

2009-07-31T17:41:00.012+01:00

The Hôtel du Cap-Eden Roc is somewhere I haven't visited, but I kind of want to (even just for a quick glance). This is probably the most exclusive hotel on the Riviera. For years, until 2006, the establishment wouldn't actually accept credit cards as a form of payment. You had to wire cash instead. It was the place where authors such as Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald used to hang out. Was hoping to see it, but I haven't so far. Nevermind; at least I've heard about it. As I mentioned briefly last time, I've now finished reading "The Dice Man" by Luke Rhinehart (pseudonym). Distinctly strange, and frankly amoral book. The main idea is that the main character, psychiatrist Luke Rhinehart, is bored with his life in Uptown New York. He has a stable, respectable job, a loving wife and children, yet he feels unrelentingly bored and irritated by how normal and stable his life is. So he decides to start living what he coins as "The Way of the Die". For any decision in his life, be it large or trivial, he makes six alternatives, and whichever the die says he should do, he follows. As he puts it; "Not my will, Die, but thy will be done". Of course, living in this fashion is totally amoral; it suggests that life is completely random and that any decision can be made with the roll of a die. Thinking logically, the reason I think he does it was because he wanted to remove his ability to make decisions himself, and wanted it transferred onto a third-party. This 'Dice Life' leads to some amusing and downright frightening consequences (beware of minor spoilers, dear reader), such as his ejection from the Psychiatrists Association of New York, his murder of a former patient, the alienation of him from his friends, family and colleagues. In one very funny scene, he shifts between six different personalities every ten minutes, leading to much confusion at a dinner party he is attending. The book was a good read overall, but I think that everything it suggests should be viewed humorously rather than seriously.

Speaking of Ernest Hemingway as I did earlier, after reading "The Old Man and the Sea" quite recently I was rather interested in his life, so looked him up on Wikipedia. I never knew he committed suicide, and in such a gruesome fashion (he put both barrels of a loaded shotgun to his head). I wondered why he did it; maybe he had gone rather mad by that point, or maybe his illness had made him angry and depressed that he was no longer able to enjoy life as he used to (by going off round the world travelling and writing, et cetera). He'd also been undergoing electroconvulsive therapy, which could have contributed to his poor mental state. Some have even speculated that he knew he was going to die slowly, so he reasoned that the sensible and courageous thing to do was commit suicide. I also was interested in what his last recorded words were, but evidently they can't have been interesting or recorded, because the Internet has failed to find them. It only notes that the title of "Across the River and Into the Trees" comes from the last words of General "Stonewall" Jackson. There is one great story though, which is possibly apocryphal. In the 1920's, someone bet Hemingway that he couldn't write a complete and somewhat meaningful story in just six words. He apparently wrote; "For sale: baby shoes, never used." Thus he naturally won the bet.

Take It Easy

2009-07-26T19:09:00.010+01:00

"Well I'm standin' on the corner in Winslow, Arizona,
It's such a fine sight to see.
It's a girl! My Lord, in a flatbed Ford,
Slowing down to take a look at me."

Even though I'm in France, it seems I'm able to listen to all of the BBC iPlayer radio shows online. I'm a bit unsure why international users are able to listen to radio shows for free, but I'm sure it's something to do with the World Service being available for everyone. The Now Show seem to have a bizarre recurring theme this series concerning seagulls stealing allen keys in Alvescot. As is evident from the title of this posting, I've been listening to a bit of Eagles. The French family whose house I'm staying in have a large collection of CD's with some great music, some of which I am surreptitiously ripping onto the laptop and then storing in the manually accessible Recordings folder of my iPod, until I can get home and sync up with my computer. Some Eagles, naturally, but then also the fantastic Dave Brubeck Quartet, who just take improvisational cool Jazz to a whole new level. Then there's also a solitary song from The Who which I've never heard of before, called "The Relay". It's pretty good, sounds like it's from the "Who Are You" era, with a few synthesisers hidden in the mix. There is also some Latin music I would never normally listen to, yet I have become strangely affected by. Especially the song "Tiki Fiesta". Extremely catchy, yet mainly unremarkable.

The south of France has been excellent so far. The weather has been fantastic, consistently in the low 30's Celsius. I've been to the centre of film festivals, Cannes, which is moderately pretty, although the Palace of Festivals is an ugly concrete structure crashed onto the front, ruining the views from the Majestic and Splendid Hotels. The quaint and winding streets of the old town are rather pleasant though, and there was a quite impressive view from the top. Otherwise, I've been spending some of the intervening time swimming in the house's pool, which has a good temperature once you start to move around, along with reading (BBC World Affairs Editor John Simpson's book "Tales from No Man's Land" as well as "The Dice Man" by Luke Rhinehart; more on him later), relaxing and watching a film or two. Trouble is, they are mainly Rom Coms, and once you've seen a few Rom Coms, you've mostly seen them all. However, I have watched "Night at the Museum" and Pixar's "Ratatouille". The first was rather silly; if anything it's just one long advertisement for the American Museum of Natural History in New York. However, it's definitely watchable. The latter was much better; a great animation style, likable characters and a funny, if highly unrealistic plot line. I know Pixar films require suspension of disbelief, but I thought the amount required was maybe a bit high here, when mingling rats who are great chefs with humans who can understand them. It's not as good as "Finding Nemo" or "WALL-E", but it's still great. Now, off for a spot to eat I think.

A Rather Tiring Day

2009-07-20T17:59:00.005+01:00

Well, the first day of our holiday on the French Riviera has not been as relaxing as expected. We nearly missed the aeroplane, my sister was sick innumerable times, and when we finally arrived at the excellent house, my Dad clipped the car against a post. Due to the fact that we were house-swapping with this French family (they were coming to our house and we were going to their's), we couldn't stay in our house when we woke up and my sister wasn't feeling well at all. Less than fifteen minutes after we had started out, we had to pull into a layby for my sister to jump out and be sick over her shoes. We then spent another fifteen minutes deciding whether to stay or go (with The Clash playing in the background, naturally), before getting back into the car and going on. Another stop in Thame, and we finally made it to Luton Airport on time. But then disaster struck again, and my sister was sick on the concourse at Luton. It wasn't pretty. The thing was, we knew she didn't have Swine Flu because none of the symptoms matched, but she probably wasn't in a fit state to fly, even if it was just an hour and a half. We got inside the terminal building and through Security without incident, although when we arrived in Departures the flight had already been called, so we had to zip through quickly. The flight was uneventful, and perfectly reasonable for EasyJet. When we arrived in Nice, it was hot, but not uncomfortably so.

It's got to be said, the house itself is just wonderful. It looks like an old country farmhouse-style villa, but is actually just ten years old. There's a medium-sized outdoor pool, a beautiful garden with a badminton net and a trampoline. It's situated nearby the large science park called Sophia Antopolis, and only has a few houses on either side. As we arrived and were outside the house, my sister was sick for the third time, and it was around now that my Dad clipped the car against a post coming into the drive. So all in all, it was a rather tiring day. Still, we are hear now, the house it excellent and the weather is great, and they have a brilliant selection of music to listen to. At the moment I'm enjoying the various delights of the Pulp Fiction Soundtrack, with all of that surf rock. Not going to do a whole lot tomorrow, just kick back and relax. For once in a while there is nothing much to do. I am being rather bad though; I discovered I can still watch the Giant Bomb Persona 4 Endurance Run on this AZERTY French laptop, so I intend to try and keep up to date with that for the next two weeks (yes, I'm addicted). I'll probably also try and write a couple of blogs, since I don't want one month to fall behind the others on the number of updates each month has got. But for now, that's it.

The Loudness War

2009-07-16T23:41:00.005+01:00

Raining gently at the moment. I like a gentle rain; not to walk through, but to gaze at. It's something which is strangely relaxing. I'm not entirely sure why; maybe it's because of the soft sound which the rain makes against the roof of the conservatory below. When the rain comes down heavier, it always sounds a lot more raucous. At the moment, I'm rather divided concerning the remasters of The Beatles back catalogue. The point is, should I search out the remaining two albums of the old, 1987 versions which I have yet to collect ("Beatles for Sale" and "Yellow Submarine", respectively), or should I just get the boxed set of the brand new, 2009 remasters which will have everything in it anyway? The first option if cheaper, the latter much more expensive. The reason I am cautious before committing to buying the 2009 remasters is because I am worried that The Beatles may have become victims of the Loudness War. In essence, this is the slow death of High Fidelity sound. To illustrate: imagine you have a CD released in 1987; as The Beatles albums on CD originally were. In 1987, the overall album sound level was lower; if you wanted it louder, you had to crank up the volume yourself. This meant that there were greater differences between soft and loud noises in the mix. However, year upon year, the music industry has had this unending compulsion to raise the overall volume of a album, by digitally compressing the dynamic range of the music. If one band puts out an album that sounds loud and hard-hitting, a competing record company feels compelled to release its artists albums at similar volumes. If you were to compare the album version of "Something" on "Abbey Road" to that released on the 2000 compilation "1", you would notice that the version on "1" is much louder overall. This is especially noticeable during the bridge.

Whilst this isn't always a bad thing, it normally can ruin the original dynamic range of a song. There are many examples of this in modern music. You might have listened to the first album by the Arctic Monkeys, "Maybe People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not". Ever wondered how the vocalist and the rest of the band are able to keep up the hectic pace without ever drawing breath? The answer is the songs have been digitally compressed. At first, this makes the songs seem more punchy and catchy; our attention is drawn to the noise. However, after a few minutes of constant loud noises, it starts to just get irritating and monotonous. With limitations to the dynamic range, all you are left with is a flatline in the sound. In the words of the great Bob Dylan; "You listen to these modern records, they're atrocious; they have sound all over them. There's no definition of nothing, no vocal, no nothing, just like... static." When there are no real 'quiet' sections, there can be no actual 'loud' sections, since everything is the same volume. One real victim of the Loudness War was the Red Hot Chilli Pepper's 1999 album, "Californication". It was digitally compressed to such an extent that many deemed it unlistenable due to the range clipping that took place on all the songs. On balance, I think I might finish my original collection first, before beginning the new one. Cheaper, yes, but also I feel that it's safer banking on the older music for the moment. The point can really be summed up like this: if you want your music loud, turn the volume up yourself. Don't let a record company do it for you. What killed High Fidelity sound? The answer is almost always mp3.

Lost for Words

2009-07-14T17:51:00.006+01:00

I've been burgled. Yeah. I really don't know what to say. Thinking about it, I don't really thing it's the stuff that's been taken that matters; it's the fact that someone has broken into my university house, kicked in my door, and then rifled through my belongings. Someone I have never met, who wanted to take my things for personal gain. Someone who has no concern for my feelings or my belongings. The house just won't feel safe anymore. They smashed in the Plexiglas back door (I always knew that was going to be the weak point of the house) then opened cupboards and drawers in all the rooms, took the spare keys from inside the living room and used them to open the interior doors. At the moment, it seems the only thing actually taken is my stereo system, but I would expect they have also taken my computer games I'd left behind. Thankfully I am insured for personal property. For some reason they don't seem to have taken my CD's, but that might be because it was music which the burglars thought wouldn't sell for much (The Who, Pink Floyd etc.). Currently my friend is there, and the Criminal Investigation Department are going to come over to take fingerprints and photographs. I'm going to phone him back later to see what they said about the incident. But from the sound of it, my bedroom door has been actually smashed, not merely kicked in. So that, along with the broken back door means there is some damage to repair. I'm hoping that our estate agent will step up to the plinth and pay for all the damages, as well as funding a new back door. I bet that is what attracted to them to the house in the first place.

The other problem is that the house is right next door to this dark, unlit alleyway, where there has been graffiti in the past. There are garages down there, and not many people walk by at night. It was the perfect place to position a vehicle to be able to jump in and just drive away. I am still shocked it has happened. I really am going to push hard for a new back door between the utility room and the kitchen, because a Policewoman from CID apparently said that there should be a proper secure door there. If the Police are recommending it, I really don't see how they can neglect getting it done. I'm going down tomorrow to check out the house and see for myself the damage. I'm going to be taking the train for the first time, since now it is actually cheaper to go by train than my coach with National Express. Also, you've got to admit, there is something a little more sophisticated about travelling by train than travelling by coach. The coach was quieter, but more tedious because of waiting at Chieveley Services for 40 minutes while the driver had his lunch. The train goes direct, via Reading, Basingstoke, and Winchester (and, I suppose, Southampton Airport Parkway), and only takes an hour and a half. We'll see which gets higher marks I suppose.