blog.djstead.net

So you’ve seen the latest update to Facebook, and you don’t like it. Yes, there have been many more tweaks and updates in the past which you haven’t liked for a while, then got used to; but THIS ONE – THIS one takes the final jaffa cake. - Okay then. Remove yourself from Facebook. Go on. It’s not (too) difficult. Except that if you have had this thought of leaving Facebook, like I have; you will immediately be deluged by something along the lines of the following thoughts: But it’s how I keep in touch with most of my friends It’s how I observe the subtle nuances to my friends’ lives and I feel more connected that way It’s how I know what events are happening It’s how I keep up to date with all the news about my favourite artist/band/director/films/tv shows/cats And it goes on. - For me there is something inherently unsettling about the fact that Facebook has so much of an influence on how I conduct my social life; and yet I find it almost impossible...

It has recently been suggested to me that I am a Solipcist. Assuming this wasn’t some form of sexual deviancy slang, I duly nodded politely and waited for an opportune moment to look up Solipsism on Wikipedia . Now the very fact that I had to look up something that – in a solipsistic world – I must have already known and created already in my imagination, otherwise – as part of the external world – the definition can’t be said to actually exist; this is a pretty good way to start disproving Solipsism altogether. However. Solipsism has been a useful method of Philosophy for me, and is an important phase to go through (to my mind…). Originating from the initial doubts shared by the likes of Descartes, questioning just exactly what is real is an important route to the inner thinkings of Ultimate Philosophy . But assuming you have better things to be doing on a Sunday afternoon than running through a suspiciously simple set of Philosophical principles, I will take y...

The buzzword at my place of work at the moment is ‘diversity’. At least most of the time, this is referring to cultural diversity, as opposed to the dance troupe of the same name. By “ways of making our workplace a better place to work”, ‘diversity’ is being embraced – there’s a diversity group I believe that meets every week, to no doubt discuss diverse things – and perhaps the most obvious development in this area has been the opening of a ‘contemplation room’. I think it is fair to say that the predominant use of this room will be by our employees who are of the Muslim faith [and technically any Jewish employees also, as I understand they have to pray 3 times a day], as opposed to any Christian believers – largely because Christians aren’t obliged to pay multiple times in the day, and also because I think it is a fair generalisation that UK-based Christians are less religiously active more so than ever these days; certainly in an ‘actively practising your religion’...

I wrote this very early this morning, and it turned into a fairly fantastical and rambling journey into a somewhat surprising train of thought: What if I turned everything in my life so far, on it’s head? Make of it what you will – but let me know what you make of it. - I want to leave this life of mine behind. And I don’t mean that in the suicidal sense (though I can see how for a few it might) – after all I have a pretty good life as it is: My job is challenging but enjoyable; I have a mortgage and a house; and I have great friends and family who love me. But I still want to leave – and go on a big adventure. I don’t mean one of those bullshit journeys where I travel to the centre of the Congo and “find myself”. I know exactly where I am, and who I am. It’s just that I am tied down to a number of things, that means I can’t run off and do whatever I want, or be wherever I want to be. I guess it’s a natural protection that starts with your parents – they, loving...

Back in the day (when I were a lad), I used to post on internet forums – merrily chatting away on topics close to my heart back then. And then I went and said something stupid; I can’t really recall exactly what I posted, but it offended someone/some people, and I got reprimanded by the moderators. The thing is, I hadn’t meant to actually offend those people that read my post – I was simply posting in the not-quite-real-world of the internet. Some of the anonymity that the web had afforded me, had allowed me to open up my feelings and thoughts – and express ideas that I had never felt comfortable expressing before. And being reprimanded by the moderators really annoyed me. I hadn’t said the things that I said to that person’s face – I hadn’t forced them to accept my opinion using threats of real violence – all that my internet alter-ego had done was to post his controversial opinion, for other internet alter-egos to read and comment on. Despite trying to explain t...

A few nights ago in London, I got lucky. Well, okay, not that lucky – but I did get up close and intimate with a celebrity… That (lucky?) person was Simon Amstell , performing a warm-up gig for recording his DVD in Dublin in the near future: I got lucky by buying the very last ticket; I got up close by braving the front row; and intimate because – well, quite frankly, a lot of his material hit home. There was no mention of his Popworld/Buzzcocks history (through which I’m sure many of you know of him) – instead we got a raw insight into “the real Simon Amstell”, as twee and sickeningly OK Magazine that sounds. He took us through the embarrasement of approaching his first until-then-secret crush in a shop, and – instead of communicating in the usual manner that ‘normal people’ seem to achieve so well – he yelled out their full name across the shop, and – having gone that far – could only proceed to communicate with them even louder. He introduced us to his overtly ...

Up until a few weeks ago, I really could not care less about the election. For me – national politics was a joke that I didn’t find particularly amusing, or particularly offensive; it operated outside of my social circles, my circus of ideas; it was something for other people to be interested in. To be quite honest, I can’t even recall if I voted in the last national election – I know I voted locally, because that’s where I believe it matters – but national politics never seemed to matter. The amount of bureaucracy, red tape, cliches, endless fuel for the tabloids, and – above all – blandness – of political influence at a nationwide level, just seemed irrelevant: I’ve likely had the good fortune to not have to live through the Thatcher Years – but politics, particularly in England, seems stuck in the old days. The fact we’ve flipped between Labour and Conservative for the past 65 years seems akin to those years when your options on television were ‘this side or t...