Let's Get Polizzical...Polizzical

I won't ever pretend to be vastly knowledgable when it comes to politics, whether local or international. I understand a fair bit about how our system works in the UK, and thanks to the wonders of the internet I have a fairly basic grasp of how the systems work in other countries, most notably the US of freakin' A, baby! Sorry...I got carried away there, much like most of the Americans I have been reading about lately. There's some kind of middle-of-the-term vote thingy going on over there. You may understand it better than I do, but as I understand it, it's a chance to re-jiggle the numbers of representatives from each side in the main decision-making place, so that American people can have some better chance of having their views expressed where it matters.

The only problem I see with this is that Americans seem to be, at least from an outside perspective, an incredibly divided culture. Those on the far left believe in assistance for the needy, freedom for all to do as they wish (within reason) and everyone holding hands and getting through this together. Those further to the right seem to believe in protecting their assets, maintaining more traditional moral standards and promoting independence.

So who has the correct view? Well, both of them. And to be honest, that's why I like the ole' US of A. They may have spurned our glorious rule (SHUSH! We don't talk about that) but all in all, the US seems like a good place to live. As a rule, people are generally free to do as they may, and the system, by and large, works in favour of the individual.

The problem with both sides being correct though, is that they ignore the common ground and start focussing on the differences in ideology their fellow voters are expressing. And one thing the yanks seem to do well, if popular media is to be believed, is to foam at the mouth, scream, wail and mercilessly insult each other if they have different opinions on, say, how the nation's healthcare is managed. Previously innocent words and phrases such as 'Republican', 'Socialist', 'Liberal' and 'Tea Party' are flung around with the full intention of cutting deeper than a jibe about yo momma. Brother turns on brother and instead of reasonable political debate and the graceful anonymity of the poll booth, we are left with images of placard waving mentalists seared onto our consciousness.

I worry a bit (not too much, mind) that our chums over the pond will never be able to live together peacefully. The nation still seems so young when you consider how many people still identify themselves so deeply with the geographical origin of immigrant family members from only a couple of generations ago. It's understandable that such a vast variety of different inherited cultural attitudes will lead to some very different opinions on how the country should be managed politically.

So what is to be done? Well, I have hopefully demonstrated a firm grasp on all of this politics business by now, so let me explain the options for dealing with this situation:

1) Carry on regardless. Keep on screaming at each other and spend at least half of your life being dissatisfied with the actions and opinions of whoever is in power. Engage in damning hyperbole to get your point across. "Bush is an idiot and a murderer" and "Obama is a communist muslamic" being recent examples that spring to mind.

2) Put the placard away, try to forget your witty and ascerbic put-downs and try to let each other vote in peace. You are all entitled to your own opinion, and that is what democracy is for. Stop trying to force the hand of your fellow countrymen/women. They will put a tick in whichever box they believe will benefit them the most, financially, spiritually, morally, whatever. It's their choice based upon the culmination of experiences in their life, and hollering at them shouldn't change that fact.

3) If you can't play nicely, we will have to separate you. We will slice the country in half from Rugby in North Dakota down to Corpus Christi in Texas. Let the red team have the left hand side, and the blue team can have the right hand side. Never talk to each other ever again. Some would argue that this was already done once, albeit in the perpendicular plane, and the result was Canada. You may take Hawaii on alternate weekends, and nobody wants to go to Alaska, so just forget about it.

4) Fight on the playground after school. Just have another civil war and stop frontin' so much. Put up or shut up. Smackdown or back down. It's your choice, pussies (I hope this doesn't count as inciting violence. Just as a disclaimer, I want to be clear that if you DID have a fight about it, it would be your choice).

Pick one. Or don't. It's not like I live there. Just one favour though - Please don't vote one of your tea-pot people in as President, for I fear that I may injure my face when I repeatedly slam it into the table. Those berks are like Sergeants in charge of the Bonkers Brigade.

She Packed Her (cheek)Bags and Left Home

About a year and a half ago, my wonderful squeeze and I invited a small hamster into our home. It was initially reluctant to be our pal, fearing our every move and spent most of the time cowering in the corner of its cage. As we were unable to pick up said hamster, we were lacking in knowledge of its gender. Male hamsters tend to have nuts as big as their heads, and drag them around in a comic fashion, back legs barely able to reach the floor, but as this was a fairly young one, we weren't entirely convinced that the lack of comedy ballsack wasn't just a symptom of its youth. We needed a name, and it had to be gender neutral (we couldn't just go changing it later on) so we picked Charlie. In later life, this would be extended to the full respectful title of Baroness Charleston P Hamster the First. We were a happy little family, me, the lady and our furry chum, regularly spending our evenings together romping around the sofa and having a bit of a sleep here and there. Unfortunately, last week, tragedy struck...

Somebody forgot to close the cage door at bedtime. And by somebody, I mean me. OH NOES!

Little Charleston escaped from her boudoir and, ever the inquisitive little mite, she went roaming. That was on Wednesday. It is now Monday, and despite carefully laying food in every room of the house, as well as erecting cunning hamster traps all over the place (basically just some apple in a bucket) we have not seen hide, hair nor evidence of her hanging about since.
It seems most plausible that she has left the house, as we have turned the place over about twenty times now. Unfortunately, the world is a hostile place for coddled hamsters with no learned sense of fear. It's been frosty lately, there are cats about, foxes and owls live in the park behind our house, and there are giant spiders in our garden. It is sad, but we have accepted that the worst has most likely happened.

What gets me most is how the whole escapade has been lacking in finality. With little rodents like hamsters and whatnot, you are always aware that they live for only a fraction of the time that humans live for. They rarely get much over two years in which to complete their various projects. I had always assumed that one day I would find Charlie in her cage, having passed away peacefully in a safe, warm, loving home, wanting for nothing and having all that a little hamster could want. Instead all we have now is an empty cage sitting on the living room floor with a sad little trail of yogurt drops leading to the door, and a feeling that our relationship didn't end as it should have done. I imagine that this feeling is some fraction of what a parent feels when their child runs away from home. You worry for them and kick yourself for not having done more to make them want to stay. Children are a bit easier to communicate with than hamsters though.

I would like to think she might still be out there living it up in the park, having made herself a new home and new friends. She might be leader to a pack of wild rodents now, or off on some wild adventure. If she isn't still going though, I hope very much that she wasn't too scared at the end.

Poor little hamster. If only she wasn't so mindbendingly stupid.

Was I procrastinating? I'll get back to you...

I had barely even begun my blog when I went and got bored of it. My last post was six months ago. SIX whole months! That's half a year! One twentieth of a decade! Over 0.017 of my life ago! Well, it seems slightly less bad then. In truth, not a lot happened. I got a tiny bit older, did a bit more to the house, visited a few places. All in all, a pleasant time. Anyhoo, on with my thoughts...

When I was a wee scallywag, I absolutely detested reading. When I say reading, I mean reading for leisure as opposed to by necessity. Obviously I was able to read signs and school stuff, because otherwise I would now be monumentally under-educated or dead from a failure to comprehend messages such as "Danger! High Voltage!" and "Do not stick your head out of the window of a moving train". Anyhow, reading for pleasure was not for me, as I did not find the act pleasurable. Call it a lack of patience or a symptom of today's youth and their inability to carry out a task in which gratification is not instant (although as I near the age of 30, referring to myself as "youth" seems somewhat optimistic).

After several years of failed coaxing from my mum, with such literary gifts as "Around the World in Eighty Days" and "The Neverending Story" (of which the original written version is far superior to the film, I must say in retrospect) I finally discovered the works of Iain Banks via his somewhat darkly disturbing novel, The Wasp Factory.

Holy cow! Books can say swears? Books can deal with odd people doing weird things? Now things were getting interesting. After reading this, I realised that books are actually pretty fun, and I felt all rebellious, because surely my teachers/parents etc had wanted me to read solely to improve my moral and ethical worth as a human bean. Instead, here I was reading stuff like Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and The Dice Man. Morally reprehensible, every last page.

After a time, I got to thinking that I should probably try to read proper books too. I greatly enjoyed futuristic ponderances such as 1984 and Brave New World (two sides of the same coin, I have always thought), sober classics, world fiction, Booker prize winning stuff. My mind expanded and I felt very smug with myself. I could now reference things in conversation in the manner of the smartest of arses.

And then one day I got bored of it all. Nobody is actually impressed if I say I enjoy early 19th century Russian literature. I do enjoy it, but stating this fact fails to have the desired effect upon my audience. They are, quite selfishly, not swept up in a wave of adoration and respect. Ultimately, personal experience led me to realising that a lot of people attach a lot of their intellectual self-image to the books they have read. War and Peace? Read it in a weekend. Byron? I shit it, mate. etc etc.

This is now a pet peeve. Why should I be impressed by a person's reading list. It's not like they wrote it or anything. I've read things before and thoroughly failed to get the point, and I'm sure everyone else has too. It took me years to figure out that Animal Farm was all about Communism. I figured it was just about some unruly pigs.

So in conclusion, I no longer care so much for highbrow books. They are often a difficult waste of time. And that, my small group of readers, is how I have justified purchasing twenty second hand Deep Space Nine paperbacks in one go. If you're going to read, it might as well be something you enjoy.