One more today

One more for today, here's an article from the Palm Beach Post, called 'Nature Can Still Win'.
There's things to come this year...

Brassneck

Like it?

I was watching a news item on the BBC about yet more starvation in Zimbabwe. It's being at least a little reported now, which is more than can be said of the massacres in the same area - Matabeleland - twenty years ago. But, to be honest, much of Africa seems to be trying to live up to the 'basket case' rep it had a few years back. One of the great hopes, Uganda, is looking distinctly worrying with Museveni's cadre becoming unpleasantly dictatorial after all this time. In Kenya, the cops smashed up a newspaper office for daring to report that the government might be holding talks with the opposition: it was more a statement of intent than a targeted action. Zambia is also barring opposition parties, and the usual circuits of poverty, corruption, bigotry, sexism and homophobia are doing their rounds.
Then there's Zimbabwe, which is rapidly turning into the Albania of Africa, with its very own basket case at the helm. The biggest disgrace here is that Mbeki and the other so-called leaders are such chickenshits that they don't dare to go against any grain, and call a spade a spade. Mugabe is a nasty fuck, and if protecting him is what the OAU amounts to these days, then it's not the Pan-Africanism that Lumumba and Nkrumah and Garvey were fighting for.
And with all these nasty shits, I can't help feeling that in alot of the cases there's some fucking white multinational shits pulling the strings. If the population of Congo or Nigeria ever found out just how much their "leaders" were black puppets being pulled by white men, I daresay there'd be blood in the streets real quick.
And where is a Lumumba or a Nkrumah now that we really need one? Museveni and Rawlings been either a big diasppointment, or predictably dwarf-sized when measured to their predecessors. Other than them, the situation in the last twenty years, when Africa has being getting more brutally and repetetively raped than at any time since Imperialism was thrown off, and probably since long before that, has been a situation of appalling turf wars, internecine hatred, petty gangsterism and appalling genocide.
The West doesn't give a fuck - all the Live 8 platitudes and weasel-words to the contrary. The West is the rapist. Asking for some tidbits from the West's table is the same as asking for mercy from your rapist, your captor, your massa.
It's simply a continuation of slavery by other means. Berlin 1870 all over again - it's the Race for Africa. The West can look charitably pious cheaply with one face whilst gangbanging Africa for its resources and people and pray to their blue-eyed God with the other face.
The one figure in Africa that could really lay claim to be the heir of Lumumba and Nkrumah is Mandela. He's even from their generation.
And to be fair to him, he does make some radical statements, even if he's a bit keen to be seen with Bono or the Spice Girls or whathaveyou. (And, to be honest, I do sometimes have a bit of trouble understanding what the fuck he is actually saying!) But he's been safely put in a box of "Saint Nelson" now, and nobody actually listens to him anymore. He'd have to start another armed revolt to be heard, and even I wouldn't expect that of the guy.
Mandela though, is the only one around who could resist the works of the multinationals in Africa, but I don't hear diddly squit from him on that. Be clear though, it is the work of the multinational corporations, with turnovers bigger than the GDPs of the countries they dominate, who are running the show down in Africa.
The reassuring thought is that the same was - and is - true of South and Central America. And that horrific oppression through the 80's and into the 90's has produced Chavez and Morales and Marcos and Lula. Not, of course, that I would expect any of them to transform society as such - that's for people to do themselves, not rely on leaders to do it for them - but they are perhaps a symptom of some independence and a determination to fight for themselves.
A couple of times, people have talked of the winds of change in Africa. Once was Macmillan, and there was a change as the imperial powers - at least in token - relinquished their powers. The second time was in '89, '90, when the uprisings across Africa seemed to offer a new prospect, but instead only brought Charles Taylor and the Interahamwe.

There's no easy answers here. What I do know, is that as nice as it was, the expressions of concern shown last summer by the people who were listening to the Live 8 messsage, who wanted African debt cancelled, who want nice things for Africans, those concerns are irrelevant.

We in the West - our wealth and our lifestyles are based upon exploitation of people in Africa and Asia, and upon a ravaging of the environment. I can't put it any plainer.
If we want to end poverty, starvation, genocide-by-default in Africa, then we have to put a stop to our lifestyle of insane decadence.
We have to stop being slavemasters.
If we want to deal with the consequences of Climate Change, we have to stop raping our environment - which means we have to stop using energy, foodstuffs, minerals on a scale way beyond any possible need.
We have to stop being rapists.

Until the people living in the countries of the West are going to come out onto the streets and demand that their governments and their employers give them *less* luxury and *less* material possessions, then the world is gonna continue going to hell in a handbasket.
Unless the Africans and the Asians are going to teach us middle class Westerners after all...

naming

The world record holder for the junior 5km skating is a Norwegian guy called Harvard Blokko.
Now who thought that was a good name for a kid? Did they have hopes of starting their own comedy stage act?

Warlock

I thought this time I'd write about Alan Moore. I've just started re-reading some of his early stuff: 'Swamp Thing', in this case, which I haven't read for a good few years.
I've been re-reading a few comics lately, and although those I've been reading - Garth Ennis, Jamie Delano and Neil Gaiman - are all very good comic writers, as soon as you read something by Moore, there's a jump, a widening of the scope. If you like, a simple difference in scale.
I think Moore's the best writer around today. And try as I might, I can't think of anyone who can match him. Of course, he's only written one "novel", so he's not going to be taken seriously as a writer generally. AT least, as a writer of "serious books' - as opposed, of course, to comics.

But that book, "Voice of the Fire", is mindblowing. On a level of literature, it is as experimental as anything Joyce did. Of course, it does operate on the "magical realist" level, which Western critics appear to think is OK for a non-Western writer, but is too primitivist when used by a "First World" writer.
Moore, who is far from a capitalist, once explained that he received 15 grand for 'Fire', which took him 5 years, so he was buggered if he was gonna waste his time for that. (I may be paraphrasing, it was something I read a few years back and I can't remember the source). Which, to my mind, is a shame, because I think that book is a quite incredible work of art; and I would hope that even in the capitalist system, there's space for him to write a few more books yet.

Likewise his comics though. He's often been credited with being the guy who made comics acceptable as literature, but I think that's a bit of a bollocks description, and does disservice to Alan and over-credits the critics at the same time. There was a time in the late 80's when comics got noticed, and foremost was Moore's 'Watchmen', which for sure was higly praised at the time, but which still is underrated to my mind, because I think it, is a work of fiction which can compare in scope and literacy with 'Bleak House' or 'Moby Dick' . And if you're not into comics, that might seem an assinine statement, but simply look at the quality of writing, and the range of themes that are being dealt with, then personally I can't think of their equal in modern literature.
For example: There's a character who is essentially suicidal, who ponders the meaninglessness of human life, but who comes to understand the miraculous nature of all existence through that temporal miracle of man meets woman, egg meets sperm, and the alchemical impossibility that is life come into being. And moves way from suicide, or in this case from isolating himself from other people. It's a simple, profound discurse, which has its equivalent only in the equally vulgar medium of the Elizabethan theatre.
Other books discuss the nature of political power, or the way historical forces shape our perception of "reality". But also the secret history of the CIA, or sheer superhuman doo-dadds for fun. His range is unparalleled in modern literature - at least to the best of my knowledge - yet the powerful writing, with its repetetive - almost musical - cadences; its playfulness with words and toying with cliches - smelting and remoulding them; its waltz up to cliche to buff and burnish and bring raw emotion to light; this writing retains always an essential voice.
So one simple message - read anything you can get your hands on that Alan Moore has written. You know it makes sense :-)

It's been a bad day

As the song goes. It's been a bad day...
Well, not really. But if I have to work on Saturday, at least let the upgrade go well and not have to be rolled back. (Guess that's the 21st Century IT Blues?)
Lots of things on my mind tonight, all competing for consideration under that general anger and annoyance at a wasted day. I wanna spend my weekend at least with my family, and to have that wasted is very annoying.
The Winter Olympics is on - good for Aamodt, a shame for Ahonen who deserved better. And let's be honest, Davis and Cheek were better.
Twat Sharon almost died again the day after my last post, but had his stomach ripped out or something and still lives on.
26 people at least have died in 24 hours in the cartoon riots, although they've tended to get a bit broad in interpretation now. In both Libya and Nigeria there was other shit really going down. Still, more annoying shit from the god-botherers.
Meanwhile the Neo-Con god-botherers in the States have been ramping up their "attack-Iran" bollox. I think it's time to watch part two of RIchard Dawkins' attack on the assininity of 'religious faith'.
So, in the interests of spreading a bit of optimism, here's someone: Nellie Johnson (that's her up there in the left-hand corner). Can't say I know an awful lot about her, but she was a lifelong activist, old Socialist, on eof the activists of who grew up in the 20's and 30's, and I can't help having a weak spot for those old buggers. They might have been traditionalist old Stalinists in some ways, but someone like Nellie Johnson who stood up and was counted deserves recognition and appreciation.
Of course, I was heavily influenced by that scene - Sinclair Lewis, John Steinbeck, Ralph Ellison et al. Reading's good for you, especially at 16 and you want to find out that your thoughts aren't unique after all!

Evil fuck lives on

But you've got to think he's not really enjoying it!

The article here.

Feeding tube treatment for Sharon

Doctors have inserted a feeding tube into the stomach of Israeli PM Ariel Sharon, who has been in a coma since surgery for his stroke on 4 January.

Doctors said the latest procedure - carried out under general anaesthetic - was successful.

Israeli TV has reported "positive signs" in that Mr Sharon, 77, responded to commands to move his eyes and a hand. He remains critical but stable.

That's 10 days ago and we haven't heard of him since. I guess we can only hope that when Thatcher's strokes start kicking in more that she suffers as much?

Or is that being unreasonable of me?

Perhaps we should just hope she kicks the bucket quick and get busy with building the disco and the public urinals on her grave?

That's Magic!

Thanks to the power of the net, I've managed to start rereading 'Hellblazer' without starving the children of food and depriving them of clothing. I'm even going to finally read the last part of 'Rake at the Gates of Hell', which I never found anywhere in treeware in 10 years of searching.
If you know it at all, 'Hellblazer' is about John Constantine, a modern magician. (Not Constantine as in Keanu Reeves, even though the film wasn't as bad as I feared).
He's a character invented by Alan Moore, who is perhaps the greatest living writer. And Moore actually claims to have seen Constantine twice. Moore also, after his 40th birthday, became more involved with magic.
I was quite involved with the magic scene 20 years ago. I've had a few very unusual experiences. I guess I've kept out of it since because those experiences were nearly uniformly unpleasant. Not surprising, considering the environment I was in. But possessions and dead kittens are not really the sort of stuff to appeal to a guy approaching middle age!
I guess I missed the ecstatic side of magic mostly, and even when I did get that lovely flow of synchronicity running, I felt mistrustful about it back then.
Of course, it never leaves you entirely. There's still an appeal, even if these days I tend to be nearly as suspicious of that instinct as I am of all the damn god-botherers in the news these days. And I sometimes wonder what I still retain, even at work I might find myself in a meeting and catch myself using some of the techniques in basic magic - which are not so much magic really as a sort of self-projection. (Meaning people see you the way you want them to see you - glamour, it is properly known as).
We all seek meaning, they say. Personally, I think I've actually found meaning, and I try to live to that, and probably fail abysmally :-)

The passing of an age

My first real blog was about the death of Rosa Parks. A few days ago, Coretta King died, and today, the passing was announced of Betty Friedan, on her 85th birthday.
It's hard for anyone these days to truly appreciate the magnitude of what these women did. The generations of women who came after stood on the shoulders of giants - and these women were some of those giants. They came from a time when women were not so much thought of as inferior by men, as casually dismissed with a sneer - the idea of a woman having an independent life of value was in itself so absurd an idea as to be radical.
That was the basic concept of Betty Friedan's book 'The Feminine Mystique' . Which, I must be honest here, is sat on my bookshelf but I've never got round to reading the whole thing. And to give you some idea of how times have changed, that's largely because my free time is spent busy with the children, and not reading as many books as I might like!
The women of her generation seemed staid and 'square' just a few years later afterthe revolution they started had kicked in. Betty Friedan became seen in some quarters as an old reactionary. To be honest, I don't know the truth of this. I know she didn't like the lesbian separatist domination of the women's movement in the late 70's, early 80's. That effectively fucked feminism for a long time - and women today seem to me less radical than the women in the early 80's when I was growing up.
Strange, me & Es were talking earlier tonight about the way that men back then were trying to be 'New Men', trying to "get in touch with their feelings". I said that I found it quite insulting to women, because they seemed to equate "being in touch with their feminine side" as being weak and pathetic. Which are not feminine traits as far as I'm concerned.
It's hard, looking back, to understand how the radical feminist scene was then. I was almost one of those guys who became exclusively gay in solidarity with the lesbian feminists. The principle being, if women said that it wasn't possible to have a relationship with a man because there was too much cultural baggage of oppression, then I would restrict myself to relationships with men.
There were so many flaws in this logic, I can only say that it wasn't purely my logic - it was pretty common back then!
We talked about what women and men see in each other, as genders. The whole protection, child-bearing, nurture, alphamale stuff.
But I basically stick to my principle: the differences between any two individuals dwarf and common differences between two genders. Generalisation is the work of weak minds, and whether it is founded on oppression or ignorance, to guide your understanding of humanity on the basis of the gender of a person is an act of oppression in and of itself.

Busy

Shit man, I've been busy lately. I must have 15 or more projects on the go at work, and I'm juggling having to do the technical shit on them right now, and zipping to management meetings. So little chance to blog, or do much at all.
And I'm trying to find from somewhere the energy to get back into finishing the first draft of the book. Only about a third to go, and then I can start all over again, now that I'm sort of getting the main plot arcs and themes nailed down a bit. Not that I can do that now - I don't like to write seriously with a few beers in me.
Poor old kids must be feeling kind of neglected. Last weekend they were away at Oma's for the weekend, which at least gave me & Es the chance to chill - and party, to be honest. Took a while to recover - I'm not used to a hard party weekend anymore!
In fact, Christmas was 2 weeks with the kids, because I knew I'd not get a break for a good while, and since then I've also had to calm on the drinking during the week, 'cos Christmas was pretty intense! Well, it's good to know I'm not an alcoholic, despite some years on the verge :-)
There's not a hell of a lot happening in the world outside that's really inspiring me to write a blog either. Climate - well, it's been cold in Russia this winter, so not exactly a surprise there. Hamas won the Palestinian elections, but not really a surprise there. And Bush yesterday announced in his State of the Union address that America must break its addiction to oil. Which probably just means that Haliburton has moved into nuclear energy.
Stupidest story at the moment, and big news everywhere, is that some cartoons in a Danish newspaper have now led to riots, boycotts, and all sorts of shit with people getting there nose out of joint.
To be honest, the cartoons look pretty shit stuff - the sort of "swarthy Arab" stereotype associated with violence and intolerance - that is basically just racist tosh. But the reaction of the fundamentalist god-botherers (or, I suppose, Allah-botherers in this case) is as usual full of hypocrisy. They go around insulting gays, women, Jews, and gods-alone-know-who-else. So - if you can't take it, don't dole it out guys.
Don't the self-righteous just bug the shit out of you?
So, in the interests of humour, here's a funny cartoon, from these guys, and I hope they forgive me for reposting:-)

Dichotomy

It's one of the strange things about the cultural baggage - or heritage - that the West has inherited, that we perceive the world as a duality. This is attributed to Rene Descartes, but of course he was only giving voice to an existing perception.
In philosophical terms, the most famous of the dichotomies is the mind/body split. I forget which of the old Greek dudes - Euclides perhaps? - who pondered on what actually occurs between the thought of moving your arm and the arm actually moving. The existentialists followed this up - Camus and Sartres both wondered about the gap.
But to me, the biggest dichotomy these days is the gap between perception and action. And it's not merely a philosophical fancy - it's actually crucial to the survival of the species!
Take it on a global level. We know our actions have fucked our climate. We know we are using finite resources with increasing speed. We know our lifestyle is not sustainable.
Yet our actions continue unrestrained.
We even talk about the world we shall leave to the next generations, as though they will do anything other than curse our name for the blinding mess we leave them.
On a personal level, this is perhaps easier to identify and understand. So I retain all the old anarchist understanding of the world - I'm still for a violent overthrow of the ruling class, and all the shit that that entails. But the reality in its day-to-day form is that I'm not even working class any more! Even by the standards of the West, I'm earning a decent wage as wage slaves go. By the standards of the rest of the world, I'm very rich. My children will be raised as middle class, even in this country which is one of the richest in the world.
And anybody who tells you that that doesn't matter are themselves middle class. Because if you think it doesn't matter, you're ignoring that you're one of the privileged few to have the means to access this webpage. And I can imagine myself in a few years' time explaining to my daughters all the deprivations that I've spared them by providing them with a fat income.
And this is the dichotomy at the heart of the crisis in our so-called civilisation. In order to live reasonably, certainly in a comparative and competitive society, you have to have certain abilities. Those abilities are not related to the intrinsic value of what you can do, but to the value they are assigned in this particular society. So being able to make a great and comfortable and beautiful chair, for example, is considered of minor value when compared to the ability to interpret bond movements and quarterly statements.
Yet most of us know which we consider to have the highest intrinsic value.
So I'm in the lucky position that I'm able to do some stuff. Most of my adult life I've been either broke, whacked out, or working in labouring jobs - on building sites, docks and the like. Because I was only looking after myself, so I didn't want to get in the rat-trap of work.
But now I provide for 3 other people too, and those people can't be in a dodgy old squat, but need a decent place to live, with certainty that their electricity bill is going to be paid, and that the kids can relate to their peers as equals.
And I am in the system. Bought and paid for it appears.
Still, I'm doing my best to make sure that I'm the one selling the illusion, and not that I've bought into the illusion. There is - at least - a plan. To get out of here, to make our lives different and elsewhere.
And of course that is the key to the dichotomy. Now, much of my effort, that isn't given over to working for the multinational devil, is dedicated to trying to get the best possible life for my wife and kids. And it's well thought out enough that I'm even trying to minimise the impact of climate change on my family, to offer us the best possible future, to maximise our survial chances. Pure evolution in action, in other words.
But that's evolution at a very base level. If there's one thing we should have learned by now, it's that as a species, we're strongest when we work together. Until we really learn that, and stop splitting up the world into 'us' and 'them', into black and white, into haves and have-nots, into - ridiculously - 1st worlds and 3rd worlds, until we stop doing that, then there is no future beyond survival at its very basest level.
So, just a simple thought. The people who are worst equipped to survive in a world that gets down to the most elemental survival, are precisely the people who are profiting most from the current situation. Because when money doesn't matter any more...




btw - picture comes from here in case you like it....

Apocalypse Now

In today's Independent, James Lovelock writes that it's already too late; that severe climate change is irrevocable; that we are entering a hundred thousand years of hot weather; that civilisation as we know it is at an end.
I'd tend to agree. Whether the climate is 5 degrees or 8 degrees hotter, whether the sea level rises 3 metres or 10 metres, the devastation is only a question of degree. The real issue is how will 'civilisation' as Lovelock calls it, react to the change. In this, he has a much different perspective than I do. His 'civilisation' is Western culture, which over the time that it's been destroying the planet through industrialisation, has also been responsible for the deaths of hundreds of millions in war, genocide, slavery and imperialism. The issue to me is not whether we can parachute Western civilisation to a safe landing, but how quickly we can replace it, adapt to a changing environment - a world where borders must be meaningless and resources shared - and where the challenge is not replacing power sources for consumption, but reducing consumption to conservable levels.

Four Hills

One more post today.
Most people don't care of course, but the Four Hills tournament had the most amazing climax. Janne Ahonen won the Bischofshofen jump, 2 points ahead of Jakub Janda. And Janda had been 2 points ahad of Janna going into the final hill, 3 points ahead even going into the final jump!
It was great stuff, if only for a limited audience!
So the end result was, that the two of them shared the tournament victory, the first time that had happened in the 54 years of the Vier Schanzen Tournee. And Janne Ahonen, the greatest jumper of his generation, has now equalled the great Jens Weissflog as sole 4 time winners of the 4 Hills.

Ponting

Ricky Ponting today became the only batsman ever to score two tons in his centenary match. Aside from the fact that Ponting having played 100 tests makes me suddenly feel old, there was something else. He was also the top scorer in both Tests and ODIs for 2005. Which is truly amazing really, when you think that he had a total arse of an Ashes.
So - great player that he is - sorry, Ricky, but statistics don't tell the whole story. And I guess the same is true of England losing 2-0 in Pakistan. A good reminder perhaps, but to be honest, I don't think the English players really cared enough about winning or losing that series. They were still coming down off beating the Aussies, and more importantly, they came straight out of visits to the scene of the disaster following the Kashmir earthquake. I'm not saying they threw the game, simply that their passion to win, to give the country a bit of good news, was less than the home team's.
BTW - in case you think the Pakistan earthquake was part of the par-for-the-course Asian disasters, then think again. To the best of my memory, there hasn't been a big quake in Pakistan in something like 60 years; and a 7.7 quake like this one - which isn't especially huge - hasn't happened in recorded memory. In other words, the surprising suddenness of it is similar to a big quake suddenly hitting England; the preparedness is simply not there.
Sorry, I can;t think of any respectable way of tying up these two subjects - that's just the way it is. Fun, sport and celebration exist alongside death, destruction and tragedy; and that's one of the few things that won't change.

Good riddance

The old war criminal fuck Sharon is almost dead. And tomorrow or the day after will be lots of weasel words about what a great man he was and what he did for the "peace process" in Israel/Palestine. Well, the truth is he was an evil fuck, who even the Israeli parliament found guilty of criminal acts verging on genocide.
For years he was the Israeli hard man, lined up against that other nasty wee shit Arafat. Well, within hours, they'll both be gone and maybe there will be a chance to make peace away from that twisted generation. And a good place to start would be to call the lie to the weasel words that are going to come out in the coming few days.
Here's the BBC on the massacres at Sabra-Shatila refugee camps. Obviously, the truth is out there.

Zeta!

Just for the record. I thought I'd check in on the National Hurricane Center today, to see if they'd issued an annual overview yet, and what do you know: TS Zeta formed on Dec 30th and is still out there mid-Atlantic.
Beyond weird this year.
ANyway, we got to SprookjesWonderland today. Now, a few beers this evening, a day of real rest tomorrow, and back to work on Wednesday. My mate from work is sick in hospital. Es' mother is uncontactable in Morocco. Fingers crossed everything is gonna be OK for the new year.
We're supposed to do alot this year. Buy a house. Get pregnant. Learn to drive. Finally have a holiday. And loads of work shit. So - we'll see.

A moment of rest

So, Christmas has been and gone again for another year, New Year's nearly here, and I've found myself with surprisingly little time to write anything. This is the first day since Christmas Day that we haven't had people staying over. Even this morning I was up at 07:30 with the kids and one of Willow's friends who stayed over.
In fact with all the visits and parties; being a bit under the weather; the need to cook and clean and drink too much, there's been very little time so far to actually do anything. Or rather, I should say, to do nothing. Because that's one of my great pleasures - putting my feet up and doing nothing for hours on end! Or sit here at my computer and listen to music and write nonsense perhaps.
Tomorrow we're supposed to go to Sprookjeswonderland, which I've been promising to take the kids to for ages. But I'm a little wary of the weather alarm that has been put out for tomorrow afternoon, so we'll make a call on that in the morning I guess.
Frankly, I feel like sitting here and drinking a couple more beers. I've just upgraded this box, so it's running more pleasantly - and quietly - than it has done in ages. (I used to have a ATI 7500 Radeon All-in-Wonder in here, which was quite a reasonable card for its time and price, but made an unbearable fucking racket!)
Well, I don't have to get up super early - I daresay I can manage an hour ot two yet :-)
After all, the coming six months is going to be a fucking hard slog - unless Es wins us that lottery money she's already dreaming about...

WinMX

I know it's not as quick as torrents, but there's two reasons I'm still smitten with WinMX.
Firstly, it's a passive, patient application: it rewards those who are willing to wait and encourages an open sharing of files. I like that, rather than the frenetic ratio-counting world of torrents.
Secondly though, and mostly, it's so sweet because it's now completely autonomous. Since the RIAA shut down WinMX in September, it has been revived by its users. It's now got no centralised body at all for RIAA to attack. (Theoretically, they could go after users, but as a) it's pretty difficult to identify users with WinMX and b) they would be using an application they claim is illegal to track people anyway! then that seems unlikely.)
The users have taken over the means of production, it's a little bit of true online anarchy.
It's a beautifully distributed, example of Out of Control software. So it may not be the best application in the world, but it's showing us the direction of the future!

2 more thoughts

Good luck to the NY Public Transport workers on strike!
You might have heard that this is happening, but you're buggered if you can actually find anything in the mainstrream media about *why* they're actually on strike.
So, on the principle of supporting striking workers, I wish good luck to them and a happy christmas without crazy drunk people and working bad shifts when everyone else is off work; and I shall try find out what the actual strike's about! This picture on the left gives at least a hint.

And, I see the Dutch have finally agreed to join the British assault on Afghanistan scheduled for next Spring. Sorry - hadn't you heard about that? It's been planned for almost a year now.
Basically, the Yanks are pulling out, not being into this whole nation-building deal, and NATO, led by the Brits, is going to try expand its control to the entire country, starting, if I remember correctly, with Kandahar province.
Should be fun and games and blood and guts. Makes you wanna party like it's 1842. So carry on up the Khyber chaps.

Yule

So Iwas trying to explain some of the idea of Yule to Willow today. Basically, I want to get across to her the idea that Christmas is not a Christian holiday, but a deeply pagan one. I think this is our most important holiday, the resonances of feasting in the face of potential famine, of death and rebirth, of rest and recuperation and escape from the industrialised timeclock, of blood and redemption, and of giving and receiving, are so deep and profound that even in these shallow times the archetypes swim and swirl around us.
If you want a look at the whole history behind Father Christmas, or Sinterklaas, or Santa Claus, or however you know him, this book is well worth a read. A bit of a dry historical-anthropological text sometimes, but it might make you believe again :-)
Of course, the real excuse that our ancestors had to party at this time of year, before the christians came along with their birthday party, was the Winter Solstice. And that's today - a couple of hours ago, as I write. So, as we go into winter, we are in fact, moving back towards the Sun.
And then, there's the real reason that the folks long ago partied at this time of year, and it's beautifil in its simplicity. Just that, there wasn't much to do in the fields at this time of year - all the harvest was in, and the ground would freeze, so no need to do anything there. Perhaps animals would need taking care of, but there'd be no young and no shearing. So it was a time of relative relaxation, and if you were lucky enough as a village to have some supply from the harvest, you'd have some idea by now how much of it you could lash out on a party. Probably the mead with the year's grains had fermented enough by now too :-)
I guess lots of kids got born in the autumn back then.
It's one of the main things I love about this time of year still - that even this nasty, narrow-minded capitalist world is brought to a halt. Not as effectively here in Holland as in England or Germany perhaps, but there's even here a bit of space for silence and contemplation.
So kick back, take a glass of whiskey, and enjoy another Christmas special on TV.