Rock The Casbah / I Will Disappear Into the Street Parade

PART THREE OF A SERIES. PART ONE. PART TWO.

President John F. Kennedy, The COM Library, 2009

Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793, but regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty for ever.
- Albert Camus, The Rebel, 1951

2011 was by all accounts the most unpredictable year since 1989. A revolutionary wave began sweeping away the Western puppets, just as the Eastern Europeans sent the Soviet puppets to the ash-heap of history. Stability for stability's sake was once the mantra that subjugated the Middle East until the suicide of one man seemingly instigated what neither international free trade nor exiles or internal opposition could persuade. I originally intended to examine the preconditions of these revolutions, but that continues to be a work in progress if not a mystery for future historians. What I have noted, however, is that this wave that has rippled through the Middle East, and other regions to varying degrees, has for the most part been leaderless. When I last wrote a political post in November 2010, the eve of events in Tunisia, I specifically rejected cadres as essential or desirable to revolution. The absence of commanding individuals in Tahrir Square or elsewhere appears to have shown spontaneous and leaderless movements are possible - though the effectiveness of these versus the militarised rebellion in Libya or Syria is yet to be settled.

Don't Believe a Word

mirrors_2, ze1, 2003

I've always taken exception to the idea that you should do something you enjoy professionally. If I was to work as a freelance writer, for instance, I would have starved to death long ago even if I set my own deadlines. I could invoke that old Douglas Adams' quote again, but I wouldn't want to look like I'm trying to boost the word count - even though I just have without quoting it. I specifically put a 'Scheduled Posts' gadget on the blog to try and hold myself to my own weak promises and perhaps, I hoped, the Russian web crawlers that read this blog so often might demand that the Buffy The Vampire Slayer post I've been putting off and on for four years now actually turn up in January 2012 like I said on the 31st of last month. Surely that's why they keep viewing that post fifteen times a day, to communicate in the only way they can? I can't imagine it's because they like what I wrote - it's a bloody list of songs I liked last year.

Music For Your Tape Recorder

This year started with a rich mixture of contemporary releases and older hidden gems thanks to "legal downloads", until May or halfway through the list when I was recommended Trademark Ribbons of Gold. I almost didn't listen to anything else for four months until the pace picked up again when I finally purchased GTAIV and Rockstar did once again provide some well playlisted radio stations. Come the end of November I remembered to check for new releases which led to a cascade of new material for consumption. The below playlist is no longer by month as it would be pointless listing one track for each between May and September.

Running Blind Through Killing Fields, Bred To Kill Them All

First Person Shooter, rimblas, 2009

As revealed at the end of my long-simmering rant against Sony, I unexpectedly recently received a PlayStation 3 as a birthday present. The bundled game was Resistance 3. I'm not one for First Person Shooters. I never experienced the revelation of Wolfenstein 3D because it would never work on my old computer; and I never actually bothered to play the second coming of the FPS, Half Life, despite having purchased it. The last shooter to grace my shelf was Rising Sun eight years ago - the poor quality of which (save for a few interesting moments) pretty much killed any enthusiasm I had off the back of the success of Frontline. Only a particular subgenre of the FPS has ever really appealed to me - the tactical shooter.

Last Christmas I Gave You My Heart

Playstation 2 Collection, PseudoGil, 2007

When the PlayStation 2 was launched I had to wait a year before my parents could afford one for my birthday, and even then I had to go without a Christmas present that year because it was that expensive (around £250). Flash forward seven years and the old console had succumbed to drive failure. My parents bought me a replacement slim PS2 which cost only £80. With the release of the PS3 in 2006 I was hoping to follow a few series into the next generation: Grand Theft Auto IV, Metal Gear Solid 4, Gran Turismo 5, et al. As always, the launch price was ridiculously expensive and none of the launch titles interested me, so I waited and saved - every year I put my Christmas tips into my 'PS3 fund' and every year there's a new reason not to buy one.

By last Christmas I made enough to afford one, not due to lack of tips over three seasons, but because the price has barely moved. At the time of writing it appears the cheapest model has finally dropped under £200. I imagine that won't last as Sony will employ the same trick they've been using for five years - halt production, swap out the hard drives for larger ones, restart production and slap the old price tag on them. Given how bloody long it has taken for the price point to decrease, adjusted for half a decade's inflation it probably hasn't at all.

It's in the Trees, It's Coming!

missingno, bencanfield, 2010

Back in the summer I was engaged for several weeks with a role playing game. Though you don't play as any defined character, Gran Turismo has many of the elements of an RPG - just look at the grinding I had to do to afford an Audi R8. This month, however, I've got back into a proper RPG, one of the most popular of all time - Pokémon. Fittingly, I fell ill by the due date for this post as the last time I played Red/Blue was on a sick day which I spent bringing my Pikachu up to Level 100 in Cerulean Cave, which must have been at least twelve years ago. So aside from illness, why have I spent thirteen hours playing a child's old Gameboy adventure this month while on the cusp of turning twenty-five? And why am I also watching the anime?

You Could Feel The Sky

Twentieth Century Fox (suck it, Murdoch)

The past few weeks I've been starting work whilst it's still dark and stood at my window waiting for my lift. The first day I was staring out toward the hills in the distance and a light appeared on the limb and grew brighter and brighter moving right until quickly fading. Whilst I wandered what I had seen, the same phenomenon repeated itself and then I realised I was watching the headlights of cars on the road along the hillside. Similarly, the first time I saw an Iridium satellite in the sky I wanted to believe it was something supernatural, but by actually being educated in my observation I knew it was only a communications dish catching the sun over the horizon. As someone who would like to see evidence of extraterrestrial life or of the paranormal, is it not odd that I've never seen an aerial phenomenon that I was unable to identify? I've got Mulder's I Want To Believe poster on my wall for more than just X-Files fandom. Most UFO reports really are of Venus refracted through swamp gas, because most people can't identify the brightest planet in the sky.