So, I haven't updated this in a while.

"...Well, I do check your blog from time to time"

"... So, would you like it if I started writing it again?"

"Yes"

*****

Blogging to me doesn't feel like a moral obligation, which is why I stopped doing it. From being an entertaining way to report back to people about my trip to the USA, it became something that struggled to find its way into any kind of 'to do' list that I had post it noted to my window. However, I plan to change all this. I already use slate on my facebook page, but want to kick start this again.

In no real order, this is why I stopped updating:

• I started third year at University. I would love to sound all wise about this year and give out sound advice to the proverbial Fresher Grasshopper, but third year (despite me being as prepared as I could) has felt like I jumped out of moving bus and was made to keep running. As it has for many hours, my life has become one full of piles of books in my room, late buses home and devastating amounts of money-more like the GDP of a particularly obscure nation-spent on stationary. I do actually have a life (what with Student Radio and all) outside of the library, but it has become a rare day that I do not finish before 11pm most evenings. Apart from that, thirs year is fun, considering how much how much you try to cram into one day.

Linked to this has been...

• My Dissertation. Before third year, dissertations had always been mentioned to me by older peers as either really easy or with the same gravitas that you might announce that you are about to have a major heart operation. I deliberetly chose a topic that has a limited interest, but I have become (slightly) obsessed with it. I'm taking this as a good thing, yet feel that not everyone is as excited as me about finiding census data.
• My writing-Ha! I wish, I haven't done any for a while. I love trying to, but I rarely have any ideas about what I want to do, and I always feel that at heart I don't have anything to say in fiction (which has the unfortunate effect of me wanting to write emo like poetry). I'm rather thematic in what I write (ie: odd science fiction). However, I have a few ideas boiling away in the back of my head, and I will actually write them soon... Like, seriously!
• Reading other people's blogs. I love the website 'BoingBoing' (http://www.boingboing.net/), and spend quite a bit reading other people's blogs on there. The images and stories they find are always interesting. They also recommend really good books.
• Knitting. Yes, I knit now. yes, I knit in public. No, I don't really care that much about the public reaction-it's hardly poledancing after all. It is a past time that has really developed because I get to see my mate Beck more often through it, and also because it is a lovely way to unwind when you are tired of reading for the day (slight rant about Marxist historians; why do some use such stupidly convoluted language to convey their ideas when I thought the fundamental idea of Marxism was to represent the people? I take great joy out of summurising arguements that they have and putting them into two sentences. This when I am left wing; *sigh*). If you can see a picture at the top of this page, it is of a teddy I made last summer. it's name is Bernard.
• Student Radio. I will miss this-along with all the other opportunities I had-so much when I leave University.
• Drawing. I have had an idea of getting one of my recent ideas done into a comic strip.
• Feeling I have nothing to say. This has been slightly disproved by the length of this blog, which is pleasing.

I'm not good at keeping promises to myself, but I will update this-work, life and piles of yarn permitting. I may even put some of my writing up on here.

So, before I leave, here is a list of the websites I have liked recently (I would put down academic ones, such as the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, but these ones are a bit more fun).

I am now off to bed.

http://www.boingboing.net/

http://www.knitty.com/

http://www.superdickery.com/

http://www.atu2.com/

http://www.iwatchstuff.com/

http://blog.craftzine.com/archive/knitting/

http://wanderingscribe.blogspot.com/

http://whythatsdelightful.wordpress.com/

www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho

http://www.cracked.com/

http://www.theonion.com/

http://vgcats.com/

http://xkcd.com/

http://www.mcsweeneys.net/

Ideological preference.

Okay, so I have a blog. I look around at other blogs, and try to wonder how they have so much to say about the world, when all I do is eat, read and sleep in that particular order. I'm guessing that because I am a number of people who start this kinda thing and then wonder why, after a couple of months, I bothered. And so I am now going to use this underrated social platform (for me that is) to describe stuff I actually care about.

So, in no particular order.

1. The other day I saw a 50 second clip of the new Michael Moore movie on American health care on You-Tube. I have to admit, I find it bizarre that a country like the USA does not have a system designed to provide some kind of standardised health care for all.

Now, I am fully prepared to hold up my hands and state that I have not seen the film and feel like ranting at Michael Moore because he annoys me. I thought that Bowling for Columbine was very interesting, but the failing of Fahrenheit 911 was that it had no basis on facts. The fact was, everything in it was based on an idea you could write on the back of a napkin. If you weren't willing to buy into his ideas, then you ended up like me; feeling that it was a shallow idea that only gained any form of logic because of the wars that followed it.

The problem I had with this 50 second clip of the new movie was his insistence that hospital treatment for the Brits is free. This is not true due to tax, Mr Moore. I also admire the way you seemed to pick a particularly quiet hospital in the clip. Again, maybe I should watch the entire thing, but considering his insistence that everything in hospitals is 'free'-I can't help but wonder if he will give the subject any kind of bias.

2. I saw 'Look Around You' the other day (the first series before they tried that ill-advised version of Tomorrow's World), and think the British comedy scene is doing really well at the moment. I'm hoping to watch more Peep Show and Mock the Week soon, as the humour is very unpredictable. That's what I love-jokes where you can't see a punchline coming.

3. I played my first game of chess where I can claim at least 45%of a victory in chess. I played two games this evening-the first one wasn't terribly exciting, but the second was interesting as it was described to me as we played. The problem I have with chess is that I do not see the 'paths' of the chess pieces on the board. I just see areas where pieces should go as it gives them a bit of 'space', instead of thinking of ways of attacking and defending the pieces with the most points. I sincerely doubt I will ever win a game under my own steam just yet, but the way I see it Chess is a discipline. You have to learn how to concentrate and look at the board while planning ahead, which isn't something you have to do with knitting.

Ah, knitting. I never thought I would ever say I like it as much I do. At first, it was a struggle to even hold the needles, but once I got it and saw how quickly I could knit I was hooked (haha!). I think it is because it is relaxing for me to do something repetitive without concentrating too hard, but also because it is surprisingly sociable. Chatting and knitting is rather like riding a bike (but admittedly I do not get a lot done if I am talking)I'm tempted to turn this into a knitting blog in a way, so I can tell people what I have made. I finished a phone holder today, and I have to admit that it has turned out a lot better than I expected it to be.

4. I have nothing against ID cards. I can honestly say that as I believe that my government isn't that interested in the everyday life of everyone, and if it means I can go out somewhere without having to prove my ID-say, when I go into a bar-then I don't have problem with it. Also, you have to remember that the system won't work yet does have its practical advantages. I don't believe the bull crap about them preventing crime ('Hey, you! Biometrically scan your eyeballs before you rob this bank!'), but say if you wanted to travel abroad. You already use your driving licence to prove your identity, how about having a system where your ID card was used instead of your passport? Passports are nice and official looking, but wouldn't it just be nice to swipe your card to enter a country?
While I state this, I know there might be a reader or summat who will scream at me for naively trusting the Government, and I don't. I just refuse to wipe of the idea just because of the potential of an Orwellian state we should refusing the idea. To set up an Orwellian state, you have to assume that your Government doesn't trust anyone and that people can't think for themselves. Just because you might get an extra card in your wallet (or maybe even something onto your driving licence as I suggested) doesn't mean the government is out to get you. In the 'Orwellian' argument, people seem to think that the card means that people won't use your common sense, and you will have to show it everywhere you go. They also assume that the government will bother to do millions of background checks, which I refuse to believe.
'But what about the GDR?' someone says. The GDR was a closed Communist State of about 18 million people (according to something I read earlier on boingboing.net). No-one can ever be sure because of the amount of paperwork destroyed, but they reckon that they had at least 1 in 7 people informing to the government. Firstly, as much as everyone is scared of the world we are not in that society by any way shape or form so don't compare it to it. We have CCTV, but does anyone remember the original reason why they came in?

There is always a danger of looking back through history to some mythical age where we had more freedom. However, in our past we were also more likely to die of horrible illnesses and force children to work for food. We are not losing our freedoms and should be thankful for it.
I can write this, therefore I am free. Ipso facto.

5. Call me cynical, maybe I am. I just like to think of ideas instead of hearing about a perceived threat and thinking it signals the end. In spite of everything, I am a cynical optimist, I believe everything should go right eventually. I'm not cynical about everything-I'm not cynical about Global Warming (though my 'cute animals' theory of environmentalism wonders what animal will be concentrated on next) and believe in recycling to state just two things. I just believe that you should be able to figure things out for yourself.

So, now I'm going to bed. Maybe one day I will write about funnier things, and feel less ranty. Goodnight.