Just shut up and read this, OK?

I’m a nightmare to buy presents for. If it’s in the “affordable present” price range, and something I’m likely to want, then there’s a pretty good chance that I’ve bought it for myself already. I’m not good at waiting. My mother has been giving me grief about this for years – on the few occaisions when she can both get enough of a handle on my tastes to buy me something I’d like and actually find somewhere she can buy the thing, I’ve almost invariably already got it.

So, today’s my birthday (and many thanks for all the birthday wishes). Naturally, I’ve just bought myself the new West Wing boxed set that’s due out in a couple of weeks. On the one hand, it’s not acutally out yet, so no-one can have got it for me as a present, but it’s kind of symptomatic, you know?

“This is the point and the joy of the internet for me; whether we’re at home or on the road, I’m in the same town as my friends.” – Warren Ellis, writing in his column Brainpowered at artbomb.net. He’s not unusal in that, these days.

I love my geektoys to death. I can be online no matter where I am, as long as I can get a mobile signal. With five years, I’ll have replaced (my already-dated) visor and telephone, my camera and MP3 player with one or two devices that’ll do all these things, that will talk to each other and pick up wireless access whereever they can, as I wander. You’ve heard me say all this before.

Do you know what makes me sad about this?

There’s a generation growing up now for whom this won’t be a wonder. This won’t be special or amazing and exciting. It’ll just be part of life. They’re going to miss out on all the fun.

Scotland is no longer a Christian country says the Pope. Result.

No, I’m not makinmg a knee-jerk “I hate Christians” joke. But I find the idea that a church is bemoaning it’s lack of influence in the affairs or a whole country telling. There should no more be Christian countries than Islamic countries, or Pagan nations, or atheist states. Not only should the state have nothing to say about religion (other than “do what you like as long as you don’t break any laws, and no, no special dispensation on the basis of religious faith for anything“, but there should be such a diversity of religion in every state that it would be impossible to point to on faith and say that a country is an X, Y or Z country.

And I think the fact that a church is bemoaning it’s lack of influence is damning. Yes, there’s an argument to be made that it’s out of a sincere belief that if people don’t do things their way, they’ll got to hell, but I’ve set held any store in that. Frankly, the point at which a religion says that is the point at which I get really suspicious about what it’s leaders are really after.

Pere Ubu’s “30 seconds of Tokyo” has been in my head all day. Strangely appropriate – I was on the stop the war march today. There may be pictures later. Theme for the day: ultra-connection. Be it the media all over the march, the wireless network I’ve just got up and running again, and will post this through, the mobile phones through which we made arrangements all day, even while walking down the street on the March, or the Visor on which I found myself scribbling notes about communication drums and biology in Hyde Park, inspired by the background of the protest March as I sat on the bench looking over the Serpentine, and thought about Snakes, DNA, and time-binding thanks to Alan Moore.

I’ve been thinking about war, zero-sum games, and power institutions lately. If you don’t like the game, change the rules. It’s a hyperconnected planet. Now, more than ever, it’s a round world. Isn’t it about time we started acting like it? Hence the march. I’m seeing Grant Morrison talk on Friday, and I’m reminded of his approach to dealing terrorism – don’t fight back. Buy it off. Make Them Into Us. Give them money and blowjobs until they go away happy.

Suddenly it’s not all zero-sum.

So, Andrew’s working, Marysia’s out leading her glamorous secret life (I have no idea what she’s doing, but this seems a good bet to me) and Fin’s at a party until later. So I’m enjoying a night in on my own. I’ve just finished off dinner with a toasted soda farl, and when I went to put the butter away, I noticed something in our fridge that I hadn’t spotter previously.

Oak-smoked garlic honey.

Now normally, I’d say I love garlic as much as the next man, but it’s becoming clear to me that when the next man is Andrew, this may a rash claim.

What d’you mean, no nukes? We’ve got papers, and everything!

I firmly believe that the best way to deal with something to big to judge is to find the smaller parts to it. Don’t break the issue apart, but do spend time looking at the details. The small, human elements. They’ll give you the keys to the bigger picture.

I was screaming at the TV last night, watching the news. It was sick and disgusting. We were on the eve of war, about to be made culpable in a crime commited by governments who have forgotten that they exist to enact the will of the people, not the will of big business, and what was the BBC reporting on?

An American soldier phoning home to ask his girlfriend to marry him. In fact, they lent him a mobile so that he could do it there and the, on camera. Having made a performing monkey out of him, and beamed it into our living rooms, undre the pretext that this was keeping us informed, that this was news. I was screaming at the TV. Sure, this was a small, human story, but the things is, if you’re looking at the details, then you’ve got to be sure that you’re looking at the right ones, and, importantly, that you’re not missing other importants ones because you’re looking somewhere else.

Now, I don’t normally have a lot of time for Starhawk. I’m not sure why. I think it’s the bloody stupid name that puts me off. But I think I probably ought to pay a bit more attention, because it sounds to me like she’s got an eye for detail.

This is the stuff we have to make sure we don’t miss, because it’s the stuff that reminds us exactly what we’re now responsible for.

(link found via Marysia)

(Edit to add: I’m advised that the story is rather more complex than Starhawk’s view suggests – that Rachel Corrie’s death was an accident, and that the Israeli authorities were attemping to destroy a tunnel that was being use to smuggle weapons. Details, like I said.)

So it turns out it’s my birthday on Tuesday. This has come as something of a surprise to me. I mean, I know when my brithday is, but until I looked at the date today, I hadn’t realised it was so close. I knew it was coming up soon, what with it being March and all, but I seem to have blinked and missed the first three weeks of the month. So yes, I’m turning 26 on Tuesday. MyAmazon wishlist is here. I am planning to do something to celebrate my Birthday in May or June (more likely June) when I hope to be cheerfully solvent again. I don’t know what, yet. More details later.

In other news: gym-going is more-or-less to plan, which is to say that my aches and pains have aches and pains. War remains a bad and stupid thing.

One of my two large bookshelves collapsed last night. Died completely, just as we were falling asleep. Spilled two-thirds of my CD collection, and almost all my graphic novels all over my room. Half my life is currently in small piles all over the floor of my room.

I’d like to go a week without something breaking. D’you think we could arrange that?