I should, perhaps, have written this yesterday, but what can you say when such a great man leaves us? As he did with many of us, Nelson Mandella inspired me: I took strength from his story. If disabled people are oppressed – and I believe they are, although not as overtly and to the same degree as black people were in south africa – then mandella shows us the way forward. I may rant on my blog sometimes, writing bileful poems, but I know that ultimately hatred leads only to more hatred; forgiveness and peace are the only solution. We have people like Nelson Mandella to thank for such lessons, which is why he will be so greatly missed by the world. Rest in peace, Mr. Mandella.

Events this evening make my previous blog entry utterly misplaced. Of course, I do not believe that anyone should die because of their political beliefs; my intention was to give vent to my anger at the tories. Through such art we can make people think. Although I may write about it, violence never solved anything. The greatest lesson people like nelson mandella teach us is forgiveness, after all.

May the whore that spawned you burn

May the people upon you turn

Osborne grinning with glee, CaMoron sat beside

Showing a sheer arrogance I can no longer abide

May you feel the hate

Of all those you bait.

You deserve to feel the pain

Of the benefit claimants you try to blame

Grinning from those green benches

Your worthless bodies will be flung into trenches

You arrogant shits deserve to die

For all those you murder from on high

Lying you are helping others

You help yourselves. Single mothers The poor, the disabled, are left to die.

You don’t give a fuck if they cry.

You only care about those rich pals of yours

Every one of them, crooks, thieves and whores.

So, Tory scum, I curse you all

You will pay for the pain YOU caused us all

Yesterday I noticed how the alleged killed of Lee Rigby was heard to say ”an eye for an eye” after he had committed the awful deed. When I saw the footage, I had an idea: I thought it would be nice to respond by making sign quoting the words of Gandhi: ”An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind” and placing it at the scene. It took a while to make; I was lucky Dominik found spare wood and paint in the shed, and he went to quite a lot of effort with it. Getting it to Woolwich was not an easy task either, but I felt I just had to respond to this abominable act with words of wisdom. I don’t know if it’s still there – I might check later. Part of me is simply interested to see what happens to it, and whether anyone notice it at all.

Tom Dailey apparently came out today. Frankly I don’t care an nor should anyone else. Why is it in the news? What concern of ours is it whether Dailey is gay, straight, bi or whatever as long as he is happy and can still swim fast. If you ask me, we need to escape these labels altogether; we need to go beyond categorising people. We need to forget about words like ‘gay’ ‘straight’ ‘black’ and ‘white’ and even to an extent ‘man’ and ‘woman’. These words do not signify categories but create semiotic devisions, and devisions create prejudices and equalities. Remember your Lacan: it is language that structures thought rather than the other way around. Above all we are all human and the rest is language. In short we need to get beyond categorisation and just let people be themselves.

In my own case, I love lyn, a pre-op transwoman. Does hat make me gay, straight or bi? Legally Lyn is a woman, so ours is a straight relationship, but others might see it differently. At the end of the day, however, does it matter? How does what you call it in any way effect our love? I have a Lyn, and she has a Matt, and we love each other. End of debate. In the same way, Tom Dailey is still Tom Dailey, and all other concerns are just a matter of labelling.

Although when monty python’s on-stage revival was first announced I felt a hint of caution was necessary, the time has come to lose myself in unmitigated glee. Despite the fact that tickets were apparently selling like spam sandwiches, today I thought I might as well go see if there were any left. There probably weren’t, but the walk up to the dome is a pleasant one.

I was, however, wrong, and I’m sitting here with a receipt for four tickets to see Monty Python Live (mostly) on the 20th of july 2014. Rarely have I felt this ecstatic, so giddy with glee, so pleased. The fact that the pythons are reuniting is remarkable in itself,, but the fact that I am going to see these men who made me laugh so uncontrollably as a child in the flesh is beyond incredible.

Words escape me – I don’t think it has even sunk in yet.

A good day indeed: productive, instructive, yet reassuring A parent visit day: a ring of the bell, a hug, and a long chat.

About family, about holidays, and then down to work.

They’re helping me with my thesis: I have quite a bit of tidying up to do.

Yet I felt proud, sat there on the sofa,

Talking about my work as if it was serious and important.

For it is. I have, at last, written something of substance and value.

Something to be proud of.

Sat there, Lyn nearby, I realised that I had reached somewhere good

And I held my head high.

Last night was fairly good too. While out on one of my rolls earlier this year, I noticed that the Steriophonics were going to play at the o2 arena this Autumn. Now, truth be told I have never really been into the stereophonics; I just knew they were a fairly big band with one or two cool hits. As I was there, I asked if there were tickets left, and there were. With that I texted Lyn to see if she was interested in seeing them, and she was, so I bought us tickets. After all, a night out is a night out wether we knew the band well or not.

That was so long ago I almost forgot about it; at one point I worried that I had misplaced the tickets somewhere, but they just hadn’t arrived here yet. However, last night came at last, and my fears of losing the tickets or forgetting to go didn’t materialise. I always get a thrill when I go up to the dome, it’s such an awesome place, although when I mentioned that to Lyn as we waited for the gig to start last night, she cooly replied that it was tiny compared to some of the places she has played.

Nevertheless, it was an awesome night. I seem to be developing a taste for live music: I’m now thirsty to see more bands, go to more gigs, especially with Lyn. However, as epic as places like the o2, brixton academy and indeed the olympic stadium are, I think we both prefer smaller, more intimate venues, so that is the type of gig I’ll be keeping an eye out for now.

If I may make a bit of a generalisation, one could say my trip to the football last night was rather a masculine affair. Being part of a crowd hurling obscenities at twenty-two sweaty men running about a pitch isn’t exactly a delicate, feminine tea-party. Yet why should that be so? I just came across this interesting little article in the Guardian (where else?) outlining the case for gender being cultural rather than innate. As it says, why should boys wear blue and gils pink? Why do fathers take sons to football and mothers take daughters to ballet class? Gender roles are learned. I have been saying that for over a decade: the way I look at it, if we are ever to achieve gender equality, we must deliberately reread and subvert such rules. Thats why Lyn is one of my heroes. Thus, while last night I was shouting from the terraces in my new Charlton shirt (albeit with red tights under my trousers to keep warm) tonight I might be dancing around the house in my leotard. The point is we should all be free to do both, and express ourselves however we wish irrespective of oppressive social norms.

While cricket is still my main sporting interest, by no means am I immune to the allure of football. Last night, I went to the local match – Charlton at home to Doncaster. It was my aussie friend James’ idea: on our way back from seeing the cat empire, we agreed in might be awesome to go to a game. The ground is just down the hill, and could not be much easier for either of us to get to.

Apart from the fact that J was a tad late because of trouble with the trains, there isn’t much to report. After all, what can be more normal than two mates meeting after work to go see a football match? It was a great game: Charlton won two-nill with two beautiful goals. After, we just came back here and had a beer each (me trying to avoid mentioning the Ashes all the while). I was in bed by eleven, tired but happy. I wouldn’t be surprised, now we both have Charlton shirts, if going to the football With James becomes a regular event – I hope it does.

Another day, and another report of yet another ATOS related death. When you subscribe to things like the DPAC Facebook group, you get used to seeing them regularly. But that does not make them any easier to take. This company has been charged with finding as many people fit for work as possible; the governments targets demand they push people as much as they can get away with. Thus, from what I hear, even the government and the daily mail are starting to question them and the number of people they are driving to despair.

Something must be done to stop this horror. DAN and DPAC, of course, are doing their part, but petitioning and demonstrating can only go so far. But what else could we do? Back in August I came across an article written by a man with cp justifying his decision to work with ATOS, his logic being that he could help from the inside. He also concluded his rancid little article by saying he would work with anyone, if the price was right. In other words he was justifying selling out to ATOS. It was like hearing a Jewish person justify working with the concentration camp guards. Thus with every report I see, I loathe such traitors more deeply. To follow his logic through, Even if he was trying to help by working with ATOS in an effort to control them from the inside, given that they were working to targets set by the government it’s hard to see what he could achieve. In other words, this was not an effort to protect his fellow cripple but a self-serving act of betrayal of the worst kind. Those few who say we must work with ATOS are either naive or selfish: we must demonstrate; we must show the world the horror they are causing. And I’m sorry, but I can never forgive any disabled person who sides with them – my sense of betrayal grows with every suicide.

Last night’s Doctor Who episode was indeed cool, although I must say it didn’t get me as enthused as it might have. Of course, there were one or two brilliant touches, such as the cameo by tom baker, but I can’t say it got me that excited. I might feel differently after a second or third viewing, so I’ll hold back from writing much about it today.

Instead I would rather direct you to this open letter by Sue Marsh to Andrew Marr. Marr apparently recently said that, since his stroke, he feels he has a greater understanding of disability, yet fails to press IDS on the Tory persecution of people with disabilities. In her letter, marsh points out that had marr not been in quite a privileged position he may have felt differently. It is a quite humbling, haunting yet beautiful piece of writing, asking the bbc political editor to but himself in the position of a less famous person in a similar position. You get the sense that Marsh is speaking from experience – she knows how tough thing are, and what the tories are doing through their bastard minions at atos. Above all, it is an excellent commentary I think all should read.

Here’s a somewhat random question: did doctor who fans feel snubbed that the doctor didn’t appear at the Olympics, a la 007? I was pondering this question this week, what with the fiftieth anniversary episode airing tonight. Thinking back to last summer, were I a dr who fan, I reckon I would have been miffed at the character’s near complete exclusion from the olympic opening ceremony. The who franchisee, as I touch upon here, is similar in scope to that of bond, so you could argue that he could have played a similar role in the ceremony. from what I have been reading, the were plans to use him, which were abandoned at the last minute. Indeed you could argue that, because it is made by the bbc, doctor who is more of a british icon and was therefore more suited to the role Bond filled. All other concerns aside – franchise rights and so on – why did they choose bond over the doctor? Had they done so, of course, I would now probably be asking why they chose who over Bond. I suppose I’m just curious about how such things function, and whether there was a resentment on the part of who fans over the choice as in a way it said the who franchise was not important. That’s why I’m looking forward to tonight’s fiftieth anniversary dr who episode: might they choose to do a comparable stunt to redress the olympic snub? No doubt if they do, I’ll be blogging about it tomorrow.

Sorry this is such short notice, but can everyone tune into radio caroline now! at 7, something very special will be played please

Now that I know my Master’s thesis is not the complete mess I feared it to be, and that, pending a bit more work, should get the examiner’s approval, I have began to think much more positively about continuing my studies. Only a few days ago the idea of staying in academia, after the trouble I had with my MA, seemed preposterous; yet a week and a few reassuring emails later, my curiosity and fascination for film has returned. Indeed, in his last email, Dave my tutor recommended a book which in a way articulates the very discourse I speculate about. A trundle up into town later, and the book now lies open on our sofa, and my mind is again abuzz.

It seems, then, that there is certainly room for more work, and that my master’s thesis could now function as the groundwork for something much deeper, complex and involved. The question is how to go about it.I would need access to a decent library for a start, so applying to a local university would be the obvious choice although the staff there now me, staying with MMU and continuing to do things via email seems a bit silly. Yet I have no idea whether any of the nearby campuses have suitable departments which would accept me and allow me to continue in my specific area. Time, then, to take my time: tidy up my thesis for it’s final submission; begin to play with ideas about how this hybrid discourse is manifesting itself, and start visiting university open days.

I just turned on my computer and found this report. Of course, news of a Monty Python reunion has me in my usual spastic squeals of glee, but I’m also now old enough to know I shouldn’t get my hopes up too high. That is, many questions remain: how will such a reunion work? will they jus be reperforming old material or writing new stuff? If they stick with the old stuff from the seventies they will be criticised for not trying anything new, but if they write new material for the show people will ask where the classic stuff went. Is it not better to let the glories of the past remain in the past, as memories unpolluted by the smell of a money making scheme? Then again, I felt a similar twinge of caution when they announced that James bond was going to do something with the queen for the Olympics, and look how awesome that turned out to be. This, then, is a story I’ll be keeping a close eye on: I’ll certainly try to watch their press conference Thursday. I really hope I won’t be disappointed. All being well, it won’t be too long before I’ll be pestering Lyn to go see it.

Last night was much better. It wasn’t really a party as such – more just gathering of friends. We talked, listened to music, ate and drank, and generally had a good time. We should have such evenings more often. This morning I got up feeling more positive about things: my problem is that, now my thesis is almost finished, my formal education is more or less over and I need something to fill it’s place. Lack of activity is making me introspective and maudlin: I start to worry again about things like my absences. Thus, while out for my walk this afternoon*, I popped in to the local school again to ask about starting to volunteer again, and they want me to help in a session this thursday and friday. I also have a film to work on, and Lyn’s biography to start. I have some busy days ahead of me, all being well, and with any luck a few more cool evenings too.

*note to parents – glasses now fixed

Yesterday was a bit of a flop: nobody came to our party. Tonight, however, is fast shaping up to be much better. When i told our PA today, mitchell, that nobody came last night, he proposed another party tonight to make up for it. He started phoning people, and things are now warming up.The music has started and dinner is being prepared. Watch this space.

It is the day before a big night. I always hate the waiting, the wondering what to do, the twiddling of thumbs. Marta and I went to ASDA yesterday to get everything we might need as well as doing the weekly shop, so we are probably okay in terms of supplies, although sod’s law inevitably decrees that we will run out of something. At the moment, Lyn is about to take her bath – she has been very busy recently, working on the release of this new track and composing a new one she has been commissioned to do. Her productivity puts me to shame.

I’m really looking forward to this evening. Touch wood, plenty of people will show up and I’ll have lots to write about on here tomorrow. Paul, our saturday PA, has very kindly made a tray of delicious-looking sandwiches; Lyn is getting the music ready, and I…well, I’m just wondering how to help. I am feeling the same sense of excited anticipation I always get before a big event. I always seem to regress to childhood on days like these , feeling like a small boy on christmas eve. I’ll let you know how it goes. Please come if you can, but if you can’t, just buy Lyn’s Night Dreaming single and enjoy it with us through the ether.

I would, of course, be a very lax boyfriend if I did not direct you here to the video Lyn made for Night Dreaming. The track is available on Itunes, but Lyn made a video to promote it (with a little help from yours truly). As I noted a couple of days ago, I think it rally is an awesome piece, and one of Lyn’s best. We are having a get together at our place on saturday at 8; please come if you can, and, if you’re a music-type, bring an instrument!

It has been a bit of a strange day, although one not without it’s perks. I decided to go to another protest up in westminster, this time against the bedroom tax. As you may know, there was supposed to be an opposition day debate over it, so a protest had been organised accordingly and advertised on Facebook. While this grossly unfair tax does not affect us directly (yet), I felt I needed to go up in solidarity, as it hits those with disabilities the hardest.

It was easy enough to get there, but when I got to parliament square all hell was breaking loose: apparently a suspicious package had been found and the place had to be evacuated. How very convenient for the tories. I eventually caught up with my fallow protestors outside parliament. They were quite pissed off – the debate had had to be abandoned and indeed Iain Duncan-Smith had not had the honour or integrity to show up in the first place. I think that tells you all you need to know about the honourless scum currently running the country.

The protest broke up un due course, giving me an opportunity. It occurred to me recently that it is about time I got to know central London; I mean really got to know it, as a local would. As a child my parents took us there quite a lot, and I’ve been living in the suburbs for three years now (or is it four?) so I’m not totally alien to the city. Yet I still don’t know it’s innards that well. So I decided to take a walk. In the end I didn’t go far: from Parliament square up Victoria street, along to buckingham palace, through st. James’ park and Horseguards and back along whitehall. I was surprised how compact everything was; it would be nice to take Lyn up there for a walk in the spring.

With that I caught the bus home, reflecting on the fact that I live in a vast, wonderful city, the capital of a nation currently being run by people completely without honour, compassion or kindness.

I would be a very negligent fiancee indeed if I didn’t direct you all here. Lyn’s new track,Night Dreaming, is now available on Itunes. It’s a good one – L seems to be getting better and better song by song. We are going to have a launch party for it on saturday night, so come if you can; if not no doubt I’ll be blogging about it on sunday. Meanwhile, listen and buy!

Poppies grew where men once fell, in fields once drenched in blood

Life goes out, in a blink, after the cannon’s thud

There they marched, line by line, doing what they thought was right

And they fell, one by one, nothing to a mortar’s might.

”To war!” they had cried, ”to war, to war!” making promises wholly hollow;

And so they went, those doomed few, food for cannon to swallow.

Episode vii might be more interesting than I thought…

[img description=”undefined image” align=”centre”]/images/princess vader.jpg[/img]

Here one can find something much better, balanced and sourced in the Huff about disability issues. It is a fairly hard-hitting piece by one Alan Wyllie, proposing that the government is targeting people with disabilities deliberately because we are in less of a position to fight back. Well, fight back we must, and we will. Through organisations like DPAC, we crips are uniting for a battle which seems to be heating up; it is on the pages of publications like the huff that we do battle, exposing the injustices currently being imposed upon us.

I Suppose the problem with what I wrote yesterday, calling for civil disobedience and so on, is that as a disabled person I rely on various social structures to live. I need the council to administer the direct payment system; I need to keep receiving DLA. If I am honest, I don’t want a revolution – despite my romantic notions, it would be the last thing Lyn and I need. One can’t afford society to stop functioning when you need a PA to turn up to work every day*. The problem is, now I’ve ruled out taking back the means of production and overthrowing the bourgeoisie, what can I do? I suppose I’ll have to wait for the next election, but with people dying, things getting wore by the day and no guarantee of change, that is a very dismal prospect indeed.

*Reading that sentence back, though, Part of me accuses myself of being too comfortable, too complicit, to be a true revolutionary.

I can’t help feeling that yesterday afternoon was a waste of time. I decided to go to an anti-cuts protest on Westminster Bridge – there’s no point me constantly writing ‘down with the government’ on here if I just sit a home and don’t o anything about it. It was a fairly nice affair, calm and well organised, noisy but not rowdy or violent. But that is the problem: after an hour, the protest broke up and people went home as calmly as they would after a day at the cricket. We are too nice too obedient in this country. What’s the point? Such a protest will just be ignored and the shits in government will just keep cutting.

We need more cajones, more of the gall of our continental brothers. People are dying because of these cuts, because of ATOS carrying out CaMoron’s dirty work. I just read that their reforms to ILF have been declared unlawful – good news indeed, but more has to be done to stop what is happening. At least now we have legal backing that what they are doing is wrong. We should have stayed on westminster bridge las night, no matter what the police told us; we should have blocked central London and not left until we saw CaMoron’s resignation letter. The time has come for proper direct action, proper civil disobedience, rather than jut a load of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

The email I had been expecting came yesterday morning. I would like to have said it was good news, but I can’t. Then again it wasn’t the bad news I had feared: my thesis had not passed, but it hadn’t failed. The examiners had sent it back to me for a few corrections – I have a few quotes to tidy up, a few things to clarify, but that’s all. True I have work to do, but overall it was pretty positive. I can’t decide whether to feel positive or negative about it, but most of all I just want to get it done.

Short though it is, I’d be negligent as a Python fan if I didn’t direct you to this short video. It is just the five remaining pythons sitting, discussing ”The Meaning of Life”. Granted, they aren’t being particularly funny, but it is just marvellous to see the old boys together again.

Let me get this straight: andrew mitchell is accused of calling three police officers ‘plebs’ when they refused to let him enter downing street on his bike. However, he later demonstrated the officers to be liars by recording a later meeting. How does that absolve mitchel of the initial crime? I see no evidence that he did not use the word pleb, so as far as I am concerned he is still a snobbish prick who thinks he has the right to look down on cops. To add insult to injury, The tories a now acting as if they are the wronged ones, and that mitchell was somehow stitched up by police trade-unionists disgruntled over the cops, and thus deserves his job back. Bullshit! The tories get what the deserve: they are the ones lying every week in the commons; they are the ones claiming expenses for their houses and cars; they are the ones forcing very ill people back into work. Every morning I turn on my computer and read of yet another injustice these unelected arrogant little scumbags have inflicted. Enough is enough: it’s time to force these pricks from power. Mitchell does not deserve to be allowed back into government, and his party does not deserve power either.

I am sure I’ve had this idea before, and may have even blogged about it a year or two ago, but last night I decided to write Lyn’s biography. Lyn is a fascinating person whose tale is worth telling, ranging from the early days in the sixties to achieving her independence to becoming a musician and performing at the paralympic closing ceremony last year. I think this is the concrete project I have been looking for: my idea is to write it in prose first (say about 30,000 words) and then adapt it for stage or screen. It will be awesome. The question is, while I know roughly how source-based history works, never having written a biography before I don’t know where to begin. This might take a while.

I keep worrying about my thesis: last friday I was fretting over whether I had made a valid point in equating cinephilia to Casetti’s notion of ‘filmic experience’ today I was suddenly struck by the thought that the structure might be entirely wrong and that it needs rewriting entirely. The problem is I’m in limbo until my examiners get back to me. The nights are drawing in, too, which doesn’t help my mood. I think that’s why I’ve been so agitated recently – I need something to focus on, without which I keep flitting from website to website, loosing my temper at the smallest thing. I still find many things interesting, yet I cant seem to settle down on just one of them. I have a pile of books to read, but the second I do so I tell myself I should be reading something about film, which sets me off fretting about my thesis again. I think I need some kind of job, or project to work on: hopefully I’ll soon have a film to work on, which will then lead to other things. But before then, and before I get the email from my examiners (an email which I’m also dreading) I’m left in limbo, feeling I should be doing something but wondering what.

Question: what is the best way to counter the argument that disabled people should work more and rely on benefits less, and not to do so is a betrayal of our hard-won freedoms? I have come across the notion, in various places and in various forms,, that by choosing to stay on benefits we are shirking the responsibilities we got when we began to earn equal rights in the sixties and seventies. After all, the argument goes, if we are citizens we must participate in society.

That is no doubt true, and many of us would love jobs, but the situation is rather more complicated: various barriers make having a job in it’s usual nine to five job impossible. In the case of someone with severe CP, for instance, many adaptations to the workplace would need to be made; tne employer would also need to employ two people: the person with cp, and a pa to assist them. On top of that there’s also the dilemma that, once we have earned over a certain amount we loose our right to benefit, meaning if the job falls through we are stuck. That, and a range of other barriers mean that this is a case of practicality rather than shirking responsibility. I do think this hurtful harmful misconception needs combatting before it is used as an excuse to cut benefits even further.

I know I’m being childish, and I know it’s all part of life online, but the fact s I’m angry beyond words. Two days ago I came across this tract of baseless hatred and bile directed towards me. I know I have been highly critical of stevens recently, but I have always tried to base my criticisms on evidence, holding back from the puerile name-calling he stoops to here. Tell me: did I bring such vitriol on myself?

I find myself asking, what would my heroes do? What would Mr. Attenborough or mr. palin do? what about Hemingway or tolkien, or other fine men of learning and lore? The answer, of course, is nothing: they wouldn’t waste there time on such nonsense, and nor should I. Stevens’ words speak for their selves, their baselessness sapping their authors credibility letter by letter. The guy is hoisted by his own petard. If anything I should pity him. Trying to debate with the man, as one would anyone else, is extremely frustrating: you put evidence to him, attempting to explain why the disability community object to his views, and he accuses you of abusing him and ‘hating disabled people”. I am not alone in this position: as one commenter on the DPAC facebook group put it, ”’But having tried getting him to answer my questions, he just accuses me of hate speech. It’s like playing chess with a pigeon; it knocks over the pieces, craps on the board, and flies off thinking it’s won.” The guy quite obviously has mental health or learning difficulties.

I feel so angry though, and so lost. I do not know what to do – an hour ago I was considering getting legal advice. In my mind the words of Ahab ”He tasks me, he tasks me, and I will have him!” compete with those of Gandhi: ”An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.” Part of me refuses to let this lie, and to not rest until his reputation and career are utterly destroyed, but I can also hear Dad telling me to stop being stupid and to go do something useful.

At the end of the day, stevens isn’t worth it: I have written on here before about his lack of credibility, and there is a lengthy list of articles by others objecting to his tosh here; he has also now shown the would just how childish he is. The guy is a joke and everyone knows it. I refuse to be drawn into his tit-for-tat slagging match.

I though I would make this short video today, mainly as a result of certain events I’d rather not detail now, but partly as an experiment. I have always liked Kipling, although I daresay my computer’s electronic voice doesn’t quite do it justice.

Following on from what I was rabbiting on about yesterday, today I was pondering what it is about certain films and franchises that inspires so much creatively in fans. I must admit I didn’t reach the firm conclusions I wanted, having become distracted by side-issues, but I think certain narratives possess an epic quality: that is, they are so big, so detailed, so sprawling that some people feel the urge to enter into them. Star Trek is, of course, a prime example: here we have a series of stories, built up over almost half a century, with so much detail that it is almost tangible. People want to feel this world, to enter into it. They can’t do it physically, as the world of star trek does not exist in reality,so they create their own art work and narratives instead. Tolkiens Middle-earth is another good example: a created world so saturated with detail that people feel the urge to escape into it. It was this idea of world-ness that I began to ponder today: what is it? why do people get so enthusiastic about the tiniest of details concerning such fictions? Is it just harmless fun, or might it betray something darker – an urge to escape the real world and live in other, safer, ‘realities’? How tangible can such worlds get?

For several months I haven’t thought very deeply about film – not as deeply as I used to, anyway. Yet today, all of a sudden, something clicked back into place. I was casually browsing the internet when I thought I’d check for news about Star trek: I came across reference to Star trek Renegades, an online production directed by Tim Russ, staring some of the original cast. It occurred to me that there now exist three types of Trek the tv series, the filmic extensions, and now the semi-official online incarnations. Questions arose on my mind: what delineates all three? what precisely are their aesthetic differences? are they merging? Just as francesco cassetti points out that ‘filmic experience’ is expanding or changing to embrace new forms of film consumption, is film itself changing to embrace new media? Just as the viewer is becoming active and participatory, are we, in effect seeing narratives go beyond their traditional boarders? Look at the recent ‘marvel’ comic phenomena, where the production company is releasing multiple interwoven narratives on all three platforms. Might this be a response to the rise of the fan-filmmaker, taking existing narrative as the basis for their own work? Indeed, inasmuch as Renegades is not canonically accurate, it could be seen as a type of textual play, as Henry Jenkins describes. As I wrote here a few months ago, it seems like the line between fandom and the mainstream is blurring; this effect is deepened by the growth of semi-official, made for internet films, as well as websites like netflix which make their own programmes. The question is how might we account for this? Today I set about trying to establish the aesthetic difference between the three media: how, precisely, do they differ in terms if the image? There is the size, of course, and the quality; but what about the mise-en-scene and the type of shot used? Is there a difference in terms of shooting style? of course there is a big difference between cinematic and televisual aesthetics, but is there a third, concrete, online aesthetic emerging, mirroring – or perhaps even as a result of – the emergence of what I call the hybrid of the discourses fandom and cinephilia?

That is the question I set myself today. What I need to do now is get two similar shots, one from a star trek tv series and one from a star trek film, in order to compare the two. That way I can illustrate how they differ stylistically, before going on to examine how they both differ from the online incarnation. At first glance there is a vast difference: the online version was made on a far, far tighter budget, but could such aesthetic differences be a result of directorial choice as well as economics? Frankly I find it fascinating to examine how this new hybrid might manifest itself.

Tonight I just want to flag up this really quite astounding interview between jeremy Paxman and Russell Brand. Between the rambling and facetiousness, brand has a coherent, well-thought-out leftwing message. Beneath the comedian there is an obviously very intelligent man; a man who I find myself supporting. After watching this, I can’t help thinking, quite seriously, that Brand is the way forward.

One of my favourite Cat Empire songs is The wine song. As usual it is a song about having a good time, yet on sunday night I couldn’t help but reflect on the poignancy of some of it’s lyrics.

[quote=”The wine song”]In summer the bushfires rage and rage and rage on such beautiful days and we fight them with water that runs through the cracks water we’re desperately trying to save

[/quote]

I thought then, as I’m sure anyone else would, of the terrible reports of the fires currently burning in the Australian outback, of my trip to that amazing country almost seven years ago, and my friends there. I hope everyone is okay.

Two or three weeks ago lyn fell out of her chair after our PA had gone home. I tried to get her back upright but I couldn’t. Panicking, I pt out a cry for help on facebook, before giving in and pressing the emergency. The alarm women came, and to cut a long, stupid story short, got Lyn up. A short while later, though, we had another knock at the door: my Australian friend James, whom I know from the cricket club, had seen my message on Facebook and had come to see if we needed help. I felt embarrassed, humbled and grateful, so a few days later I invited him over for a beer to say thanks.

When he came round, of course we chatted about this and that, and the conversation eventually moved on to music. James mentioned he was from Melbourne, so I automatically chipped in that my favourite band was from there too, and asked him to guess who they were. James mentioned two or three groups i’d never heard of, before correctly naming the Cat Empire. I yelped with joy, and again after Jame adde that they were one of his favourites too. The cherry on the cake, however, came when James added that they would soon be playing in brixton, and offered to try to get tickets.

That is how, at about five last night, James came to be pushing me through the tube. The only problem was, I was feling tired: the truth is, the night before Lyn and I had gone to see Orb, an electric music group. Vodka got involved, and we had only come home at seven that morning. It had been an incredible night, but on route to the second gig of the weekend, I wasn’t feeling quite myself.

Fortunately, and to my astonishment, a beer and a burger put an end to that. We stopped in a whetherspoons on route to the show in order to wait for James’ girlfriend, and as soon as that beef, cheese, bacon and bun hit my stomach, I suddenly felt much better. And then it hit me: I was going to see the cat empire, the band Charlie introduced me to, the band of my university days, the band of a thousand amazing nights. This was going to fucking rule!

On the was in to the venue, I found myself wishing charlie could be there. Lyn had chosen to stay home – the cat empire not being quite her thing – but I wished both women were there. It felt slightly wrong to be there without C, popping my Cat Empire gig cherry without her, but then, there would be other gigs. There will be a next time, when lyn will be forced to come and Charlotte will be kidnapped from Liverpool, and we’ll all go together.

My melancholia was broken by the music. First there was the warm up act, who were ok but nothing special. Then, after a bit of a wait, the most awesome thing happened. As soon as they started to play, I felt overwhelmed with excitement and joy and emotions I cannot name. There was I, watching my favourite band on earth, with a guy who had taken me there out of pure kindness, who had fed me, pushed me, and paid for the whole lot. I never thought I would find a soul as kind as charlotte jones again, Lyn notwithstanding, but here was one: humanity, for all it’s barbarity, is redeemed.

What else can I say? It was one of the greatest nights of my life: they played some new songs which I didn’t recognise, but they also played their old stuff, the songs I first heard in Charlotte’s room as we got ready for the wednesday night disco. As soon as they started, I was on my feet dancing like a maniac! Highlights included ‘Hello’, ‘How to Explain’, and a version of ‘Sly’ which referenced Paradise city. I was in heaven when I heard that. I got home at about twelve (a relatively sensible time) tired, but thrilled, and feeling lucky to have so many good friends and such a great life. Without a doubt, it had been the greatest weekend ever.