A Spaceman's Blog - Philippe Rose

Tuesday, 31 August 2004

System failure...

And the winner is... Danko Jones! My personal favourite at Reading Festival, Danko Jones pumped up the Carling Stage like no one else, pulling his sizeable tongue out and winning us all over. Watch out, this guy is good.

I greatly enjoyed Taking Back Sunday (although their show was poor), Thrice (amazing), Lostprophets (they know how to talk to the crowd) and Hundred Reasons (loved their song Unprotected).

Now the Reading Festival is probably one of the dullest Festivals I've been to. The crowd is passive and unresponsive. The atmosphere is mainstream, expensive and consumerist. The organisation is poor (directions, crowd control, layout, infrastructure). Maybe it's because this year's lineup wasn't the best (or the weather).

I don't know what security had in mind (probably nothing, judging from how sharp the bouncers looked, or maybe WMDs, stage storming and Osama bin Laden attending). But having 30 bouncers standing next to the stage behind big barriers can't prevent bored kids from chucking mud bombs and empty plastic bottles onto the stage. It was great fun - people yelled when mud hit the drums. Victims: The Rasmus played one song and gave up, G-Unit held on a bit longer.

The funniest thing in the world: signs warning people NOT to queue. Because in Britain, people queue all the time, even when not needed. In this case, people waiting for urinals didn't need to queue, only those waiting to sit down.

What will remain from my Reading Festival 2004 is basically the impression of a spoiled crowd not really enjoying themselves, too tired to jump up and down in the mud and too worried about where the closest Carling bar was located. Even in the middle of the mosh pit, it felt as if I was the only one having fun (except during Green Day maybe, which I didn't really enjoy).

So next year, it's definitely Glasto for me! (pix in the gallery)

[31 August]

Thursday, 26 August 2004

The System

Today, I am part of the system. I swipe my Oyster card every morning to take the tube. I arrive on time at work and chat with colleagues. I wait for pay day - which is today, and check the balance on my account (which was zero yesterday) at the cash machine next to the station. And I pay my taxes (an insulting 35%). I carry a bundle of cash in my pocket to make me feel important and cool. I love the system. I am the system.

Tomorrow, I will mix with the leftist crowd at Reading Festival and pretend to be part of them. Well, but how did they earn the money to pay for the ticket? I hope they stole it. (pix to come!)

[26 August]

Monday, 16 August 2004

London Induction

Hi.

I've been inducted. Or induced. Or inductionated. I'm now working in London. Chelsea won yesterday. But Everton is the good team. No? How dull.

Marcia wrote to me. Where do you live? I live in Brent East and am typing this in an Internet cafe near Kilburn station. I am hungry, too. But shops never close.

I'm going to do lots of cool things here, I like it.

[16 August]

Sunday, 15 August 2004

Relocation

Cousines devant le Jet d'Eau de Genève I am relocating to London - plain taking a job. Tomorrow I start. I look back on good things that have happened in recent weeks.

Good times with friends, such as live gigs, culinary events and messing about. Also crazy times with my cousins: escape from St. Quentin (not San Quentin prison) with Julian and his mate, and Lulu and Chacha's storming of downtown Geneva.

J'aimais beaucoup nos conversations noctures qui donnaient l'impression de pouvoir continuer pour toujours. Luluuuuuuuu! :-)

[15 August]

Saturday, 14 August 2004

Ender's Game

La voiture sort du rond-point et s'engage sur la route. Une famille avec une poussette qui souhaite traverser la route s'approche du passage pour piétons. Marchant rapidement devant elle, un enfant de 5 ans commence à traverser. Le conducteur le voit et ralentit.

L'enfant pivote alors pour faire face à la voiture. Avec autorité, il tend la main devant lui pour ordonner à la voiture de s'immobiliser. Il fait ensuite signe à sa famille de s'engager sur la chaussée, tout en bloquant le passage avec fermeté. D'abord abasourdi, le conducteur éclate ensuite de rire et attend que l'enfant libère la route.

[14 August]

Friday, 13 August 2004

My Punk Night

At the Rock Oz'Arènes Festival in Avenches, tonight, meet Pleymo, Bloodhound Gang and The Offspring. Great time with great friends! Bloodhound Gang played their song Fire Water Burn, which is used in Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11.

And for those who might say, But-but, you will miss the Olympics Opening Ceremony?!, I have this great comment from a BBC News viewer:

'I find the current Olympics very boring, watching a load of people running around and trying to evade the doping tests, very mind-numbing. Can't wait for the future 'gene-therapy Olympics', watching four legged runners, rubber like gymnasts, and not forgetting the 10 foot 'hulk' weight lifters, very exciting! After all, if this cheating continues the next step will be the altering of athlete's genes which is almost undetectable, if you ignore the extra limbs and even bigger muscles.' (Dean, UK)

[13 August]

Thursday, 12 August 2004

Perséides

Perseid showers Cette année, les perséides nous offrent un spectacle magnifique, sans être estompé par la lumière de la Lune. Ce soir déjà, il y avait 2-3 étoiles filantes d'un orange intense qui m'ont coupé le souffle. Ce qui m'a toujours impressioné à regarder ces phéomènes, c'est le silence total qui les accompagne. J'attends un grand bruit (ou au moins un sifflement), mais rien ne vient - et pourtant, chaque météore me fait sursauter.

Les périodes les plus visibles seront jeudi 12 et vendredi 13 aux alentours de minuit.

[12 August]

Monday, 9 August 2004

Involved

A few days away from relocating to London where I'm about to start in a job, I have been looking at ways of getting involved in politics. I thought I'd better check out what is going on in my future neighbourhood of Brent East. Since I know very little about UK politics, I've been looking at what the LibDems, Labour and Conservatives have been doing in the area. I've even filled in a few forms stating my willingness to do some volunteerism.

Reading their websites, it seems that much of the blame for things not right should be placed on politicians themselves (those of the "other" party). I'm going to have a closer look at all this now.

[09 August]

Thursday, 5 August 2004

Da Vinci going after the X-Prize

Space Boy - da Vinci Project The Canadian da Vinci team has announced today that it will be sending its Wild Fire VI spacecraft into space on 2 October 2004 to compete for the Ansari X-Prize. The team is thus in a tight race against against Scaled Composites, which successfuly tested SpaceShipOne on 21 July (see my post). Both crafts are using similar engine technologies and are both launched from space (from a plane in the case of SpaceShipOne and from a balloon for Wild Fire).

With the fully manned trials announced for October, affordable commercial space travel is getting ever closer! Orbital holiday? Book soon!

>BBC News Online

[05 August]

Tuesday, 3 August 2004

Education: Obliteration Of Freedom

Escape - by Steven Stahlberg Education, or learning, is not necessarily that methodized curriculum and those classified subjects in text books which youth are forced to learn during specified hours while sitting on rows of desks. This type of education, now prevailing all over the world, is against human freedom. Compulsory education, of which countries of the world boast whenever they are able to force it on their youth, is one of the methods which suppresses freedom.

One Last Time ~ by Steven Stahlberg It is a compulsory obliteration of a human being's talents as well as a forcible direction of a human being's choices. It is an act of dictatorship damaging to freedom because it deprives man of free choice, creativity and brilliance. To force a human being to learn according to a set curriculum is a dictatorial act. To impose certain subjects upon people is a dictatorial act. Compulsory and methodized education is in fact a forced stultification of the masses.

Mu`ammar al-Qadhafi ~ The Green Book

(Pictures from Steven Stahlberg)