I think this is a good thing. In fact, personally speaking it’s the best possible outcome for me – of the possibilities that we had, realistically speaking. I didn’t want Labour to win, I didn’t want the Conservatives to win (although not as much as I didn’t want labour to win), and realistically speaking the Lib Dems were never going to win. A coalition government between the tories and the Lib Dems will hopefully yield something positive – their pledge looks good, so we’ll see what happens.

Either way, though, the next few years aren’t going to be easy – apparently we have the highest unemployment rate since 1994, and the economy is still spiralling out of control. The words “poisoned chalice” were used, which I think is probably accurate. Still, on the bright side, maybe good things – such as electoral reform – will come out of it.

Anyway. Totally changing the subject… I forgot to mention: we watched “Up” the other night, on Blu-Ray. It was a really nice film, I can see why everyone I know who’s seen it has had nothing but positive things to say about it. A while back we watched “Revolutionary Road”, which was a pretty depressing kind of film. Well, “Up” started out with a similar plot line to that film – except that it was far more uplifting! It was, in fact, the polar opposite. Very moving story, beautifully told, directed, and generally well worth watching.

The primary consideration I have when voting at the moment is “it can’t be labour”: one illegal, immoral war which well over 50% of the country were against would have been enough, and then there’s the small matter of the financial crisis (have we really done away with boom and bust Mr. Brown? Have we?). And then there’s ID cards, and so on. But apart from that, I’m pretty open.

That said, two things are annoying me about the way people are talking about the election. Firstly: what the heck is wrong with the Conservatives? Everyone I know seems to hold them up as being the joke party, i.e. “I’d never vote for them in a million years” kind of thing. Why? I just can’t see the reasons myself. Sure, OK, there was Margaret Thatcher. So what? It just seems that to look back at the past and say “I’m not voting for this party because of what happened in the 80s” is disingenious to say the least.

Especially given that someone who knew a lot more about politics than I did once explained to me how a lot of the issues of that era, i.e. the recession, were caused by factors either outside the government’s control, or would have happened even with a labour government. But I’ll come back to this in a minute.

The second thing that annoys me is people trumpeting the lib dems as the saviours of democracy. Now, I do agree with some of the Lib Dems’ policies… but they’re far from perfect. As far as I can tell, a lot of people are voting for them simply because “they’re not labour or the conservatives”. Which is probably a bit cynical on my part, but still.

The real issue here is this: politics is complicated. really complicated. Can you imagine what it takes to run a country? There are thousands of different things going on, and a government is responsible for all of them. To be honest, I don’t think labour have done a bad job over the past thirteen years. Yes, they did do some terrible things (Iraq War, finance crisis, ID Cards, police state etc), but as a country we’re still here, and I honestly think it’s debatable whether we would genuinely have been better off under another administration.

I don’t think this country needs another government. I feel this country needs accountability. If the people had a way of actually forcing the government to be accountable – while the government were still in power – that would actually make this country truly democratic. The current system is basically only a democracy once every four or five years – and the first past the post system means that even that is mockery!

Which is why I feel like saying “the tories are evil”, or “the lib dems are our saviours” is … well, ridiculous. It’s simply not true. Without a crystal ball you can’t see who would be best. I don’t know, you don’t know, no-one does. The factors are too complicated for even the most brilliant mind to understand it all. These quizzes that ask you to answer questions to be able to choose your political party – for the same reason, I find them bizarre. “What do you think is the best thing for the financial crisis? Increase spending now, etc.”… I don’t know! I’m a programmer for goodness’ sake, not an economist. This is why we have a government, so they can consult people who understand this stuff and make the best decisions. I’m not qualified to do it.

So, to bring this rambling mess to some sort of point, this is what I’m trying to say:

I don’t think any one political party is the “best” option. Because I don’t think it’s possible for anyone to really know that information. The days of people believing in a political party such as labour or conservative because they represent their outlook on life are gone.

So I honestly believe the best option for this country is:

1. A hung parliament. A coalition government will be forced to work together for the good of the country. At the moment I feel too much that politicians work for the good of the party. Would ID cards have survived with a coalition government? Perhaps, but I think it would have had a much tougher ride. Would the Iraq war have happened under a coalition government? Again, I think that’s even more doubtful.
2. Electoral reform. We need to be able, as a democracy, to ensure that our government is accountable. This can’t be done at present to any meaningful degree. This needs to change.

Just a few thoughts, it’s getting late so they may not make very much sense ;)

Anyway, after I went off to university – nine years ago – my parents moved to Ipswich. But they didn’t sell the house, the rented it out. Anyway, my Dad is retiring next year, and they want to sell the house. So, they gave the tenant notice, and she moved out last month. The past couple of weeks they’ve been spending a lot of time at the house trying to get it into a state where it can be sold.

You may have guessed that the tenant didn’t exactly leave things in a pristine state. If I’m honest, it was actually pretty awful what she did. She removed a lot of the work surfaces and units from the kitchen, she ‘painted’ – badly – various places, the whole place was filthy… I could go on. On Saturday Phil and I spent most of the day helping Mum and Dad to get the place cleaned up. Phil went into the garden to do some tidying, and I spent the afternoon ripping out a rather badly installed network.

I think she must have had someone come in to network the house (why she didn’t use wireless I don’t know – I think it was available in 2001, but I would guess these network points were installed well after that). Firstly, there were holes all over the house to allow the cables through the floor and up into the loft. Then the cables were basically run across the walls, i.e. there were a boatload of cable clips keeping the cables in place. Unfortunately in some places the cable clips had broken, letting the cable basically droop down! In other words, it was a mess.

So anyway, I basically ripped out the whole lot, leaving a large number of small cable clip holes – but at least it was better than leaving it there. I don’t think anyone else would have wanted it to be honest!

It was quite funny to see the old house to be honest – my room still had my old desk unit in it (which my Dad and I designed and built), but apart from that there was no furniture there. It’s been so long since we lived there that I do feel like it’s not really home any more, but it did bring back a few memories! Good times. Still, live moves on.

That took up most of our Saturday afternoon. Then, after that we went round to Anne-Marie and Sarah’s to watch Doctor Who. It wasn’t a bad episode this week although I don’t think it was exactly a classic. Then we watched the next couple of episodes of ‘Blackpool’ (really enjoying it, only one more episode to go now though!). Oh, and I should mention that ‘Ashes to Ashes’ was also good on Friday night – still so many questions, but I’m really looking forward to the next episode though! Phil says it’s kind of like old school Doctor Who, where they did six part stories and you were kept on tenterhooks until the next week!

On Sunday we weren’t at church in the morning (unusually), so we did a bit of gardening and the like. Then we went round to Jo and Evie’s and spent the day in the park with them, which was a really pleasant way to spend the afternoon. Then we went to Sunday@6, and afterwards watched ‘Young Victoria’. It was a fairly entertaining film but not one I’d really want to watch again to be honest – not my cup of tea!

I managed to get it inside (the sub came in a huge box which I wasn’t capable of lifting – I basically had to walk it all the way inside!), and then unpack everything. The system is basically an HK Audio package from Thomann (based in Germany). I bought an amp from them before and it was pretty decent, so I didn’t have any issues with buying from them again.

The last time I had a PA system, I had an amp with a couple of speakers. This time round I wanted to get an active (powered) system so I didn’t have to lug an amp round as well – basically it’s a bit more hassle-free. The package consists of one active 300W subwoofer – which contains all the electronics (and is why it’s so heavy!) – two 150W satellite speakers. Also included are speaker stands, cables and carry bags (a pretty good deal for the price). I also bought a Shure SM58 microphone for live work, and some cables to connect up my mixer.

I tested it out yesterday – at pretty low volume – and it all sounded good. Nice balanced sound, not too overpowering, and generally quite well rounded. Essentially what I’m saying is, I’d make a terrible audio engineer but it sounded good to my ears at least!

So I’m really happy with it. The first proper usage of it will come at my sister-in-law’s wedding in June, and I think it’s easily up to the job! The idea is that after that, I might be able to do the odd wedding gig here and there, I don’t want to loads of them but it might be a useful money earner from time to time.

Anyway, in other news, Phil and I went to see the Assistant DDO (Diocesan Director of Ordinands) on Tuesday evening. He was very nice and we had a good chat about my application and how the process was going to work. It’s quite exciting stuff actually, I have a few things to do. He even recommended that I started looking for colleges – which hadn’t really even crossed my mind! So I’ll definitely have to start doing some research. So, watch this space for developments on that front!

I probably won’t update much about it here from now on ;)

Last Friday was the last 21 of this term, as there’s a youth event called ‘JOY’ this Saturday, and then after that it’s Good Friday. After Easter we have the week off work (take four days off, get two thrown in for free! – bargain).

Anyway. On Saturday, Phil’s parents came up in order for us to put up some trellis. We went to the garden centre in the morning to buy it, and then came back home – only to find that we couldn’t put it up! The reason was, the posts supporting the back fence are far too unstable. I think we need to get the back fence replaced, unfortunately, so we had to shelve the trellis idea. Still we did manage to have a productive day – we put in a couple of new plants in the garden, and bought a new standard lamp.

On Sunday, apart from church in the morning, we spent most of the day revising! We did go out to the park with Jo and Evie and have an ice cream, and then fed the ducks! It was a lovely day, would have been a shame to waste it by staying inside for most of it.

So that’s pretty much the weekend. The only other thing I have to report is that I have arranged a meeting with the DDO (or, to be more specific, the assistant DDO) for 13th April. So my application is moving on slowly! Exciting stuff, even if my going into ministry is still (a) to be decided; (b) even if it is, a long way off!

That’s all from me for now anyway. I’ll probably just be revising the rest of this week, it will be so good to have the exam all out of the way on Saturday!

I started learning the intro to ‘I bet you look good on the dancefloor’ by the Arctic Monkeys earlier and actually seemed to pick it up pretty quickly. So obviously the work I’ve been doing has somewhat paid off – even if the intro is actually pretty simple! And I’ve started working on my power chords as well which I’ve never really had to use before, but think might be useful.

Oh, and I’ve started an exercise about finding notes on the fretboard. So, in general there’s about a million and one things to do, but I’m getting there!

I didn’t post anything up at the time (the official start date was 4th March) but, on reflection, I’ve decided to take up the challenge. Here’s my TYSIC:

I’ve always lacked discipline when learning an instrument. At the piano, I always used to (and still do) learn things up until I can sort of play them… and then stop. I’m finding it the same at the guitar as well: I learn things up until I can “sort of” play them… and then stop. Well, no more. My aim is, over the next ten years, to try and get actually good at playing the guitar. (I say guitar, I didn’t want to be too ambitious and I already play the piano to an extent I’m relatively happy with … I might extend to the piano as well depending on how it goes).

So, from now on, when I practice guitar – and I’m going to try and do at least 10-15 minutes every day – I’m going to be doing the things no-one really likes doing: scales, finger exercises, and generally playing solos really really slowly to make sure that I’ve got them perfectly. We’ll see how it goes, but I started last night and felt better as a result!

I thought as well that it would be better to do this as TYSIC rather than just an aim of mine, because the TYSIC community will hopefully keep reminding me of this!

I’ll update here from time to time with my progress.

Anyway, I’ve just read a very interesting article which deals with a similar theme. The general idea is that our culture seems to believe that feminism has done its work – women have equal rights. In that kind of society sexism can thrive because it’s seen as ‘ironic’ or something like that.

Because women are now “equal” and the battle is over and won, we are now free to embrace things we used to see as sexist, including hypergirliness. In fact, this is supposed to be a relief.

Thank God girls and women can turn their backs on stick-in-the-mud, curdled feminism and now we can jiggle our way into that awesome party. Now that women allegedly have the same sexual freedom as men, they actually prefer to be sex objects because it’s liberating. According to enlightened sexism, women today have a choice between feminism and antifeminism, and they just naturally and happily choose the latter because, well, antifeminism has become cool, even hip.

It’s well worth reading!

Aaaaanyway. I thought I would do a bit of “Live Blogging” from the conference. Live Blogging, as defined by me, is blogging when you’re actually at the event, rather than looking back at it afterwards. That’s not the normal definition of live blogging. I don’t care. Talk to the hand…

So. As Wayne from “Wayne’s World” once said, let me bring you up to speed. I had the day off today (as I have the past couple of days). After lunch I headed over to pick up Quinlan, who I was travelling to the weekend with. Unfortunately I was about 25 minutes late (due to roadworks and getting lost, don’t ask), but we eventually headed off in his VW Beetle. Which I was driving. I think he quite likes being chauffered (he is a world-famous architect after all…) and so I drove. It was the first time I’ve driven a Beetle – new or old (this is an 04 model) and it seemed pretty nice. Standard VW really – drove well, steering felt light, decent engine. I did miss my Saab’s 2.0 litre turbocharged engine though – it really eats up the motorway miles and is pretty efficient. You could virtually see the fuel guage move on the VW!

Anyway. We got here at about 17:50, which gave me ten minutes to find my room and get to the first meeting. I managed to get there but stupidly forgot my Bible, notbook, pen, programme etc… looked over someone’s shoulder for most of it. It was OK though! The first session was from Adrian Reynolds on Ezra chapter 1, which was very interesting. Then we had dinner (Beef Chilli, nice, and some sort of chocolate cheesecake, also nice).

And then we had our second session, which was by Christopher Ash on Old Testament Narrative. I really enjoyed it actually, it gave a good taster of what we’re going to be studying this weekend. Won’t go into it now though as, well… if you’ve read this far you’re doing well.

Think that’s about it to be honest. After that I just chatted with some random people and started writing this blog… exciting stuff! To be honest I don’t have much else to say right now, so I’ll say ta-ta for now. We have some free time tomorrow aftenoon so I might update again then.