A Different Drummer

Radiohead's genius frontman sings about the unexpected, unpredictable, massively bad things that are practically guaranteed to happen.



What will grow crooked, you can't make straight
It's the price you gotta pay
Do yourself a favour and pack your bags
Buy a ticket and get on the train
Buy a ticket and get on the train

Cause this is fucked up, fucked up
Cause this is fucked up, fucked up

People get crushed like biscuit crumbs
And laid down in the bitumen
You have tried your best to please everyone
But it just isn't happening
No, it just isn't happening

And that is fucked up, fucked up
And this is fucked up, fucked up
This your blind spot, blind spot
It should be obvious, but it's not.
But it isn't, but it isn't

You cannot kickstart a dead horse
You just crush yourself and walk away
I don't care what the future holds
Cause I'm right here now today
With your fingers you can touch me

I am your black swan, black swan
But I made it to the top, made it to the top
This is fucked up, fucked up

You are fucked up, fucked up
This is fucked up, fucked up

Be your black swan, black swan
I'm for spare parts, broken up

Today is the 30th anniversary of the Egypt-Israel peace treaty. If you measure such an agreement by a resulting lack of conflict between the two countries, it was a pretty decent deal. Arming both to the teeth seems to have been a pretty good way to stop them ever considering war again. I think Camp David and the treaty are America's best contributions toward peace in the region.

Random thoughts:

- Anwar Sadat was one of a kind, and shame on the Arab / Islamist leaders who cheered his death and shunned his funeral. From his Nobel Prize acceptance speech:

"I am convinced that we owe it to this generation and the generations to come, not to leave a stone unturned in our pursuit of peace. The ideal is the greatest one in the history of man, and we have accepted the challenge to translate it from a cherished hope into a living reality, and to win through vision and imagination, the hearts and minds of our peoples and enable them to look beyond the unhappy past."

- Avantcaire has a great post on why they are a pro-Israel Arab, well worth a read:

"surveying the middle east in the mid to late 90s i was struck by the stark difference between israel and the rest of the middle east. a reasonably well functioning democracy with pockets of real innovation in industry and academia, a press that i trusted more than any in the region. i admired (and continue to admire) the young, small country’s achievements.

i also grew up with many palestinian friends. one of my earliest loves was palestinian. i sympathized with their sense of loss, insecurity and bitterness. but that sympathy rarely translated into support for their politics. the plo reeked of the corrupt incompetence that was familiar to me from my visits to egypt."

- It is a pity that the insane war in Gaza led to relations with Qatar being frozen. A new peace treaty, this time with an emerging Gulf state, would have been a good beginning for the next decade. The UAE, which was also fairly tolerant in a dont-ask-dont-tell sort of way toward Israeli visitors, is cooling on the whole idea.

- This article in Haaretz quotes the Egyptian foreign ministry as saying that no events will be held in Egypt to mark the anniversary. It also quotes an editorial in from Egypt's Al Ahram newspaper, a government mouthpiece:

"Cairo doesn't need to explain or justify itself," read the Al-Ahram editorial. "It is clear to anyone following the mood in Egypt or other Arab countries sees that they are calling for the burial of the peace process."

Yikes.

And as you can see from this rare 2003 photo unearthed by a housemate, it was a bit of a rough year:


This was, if I remember right, the night we came home to find out electricity disconnected.

It should not be confused with the night when, in punishment for losing a particularly weird little challenge, I had to go and sing the Australian national anthem at the top of my lungs out the front of St Patrick's Cathedral:

I seemed to spend a lot of time in Dublin screaming in anguish at the top of my lungs, which can be interpreted however you want.

This guy has made his home in my backyard over the last couple of days, moving slowly from tree to tree, eating leaves and fitting in about 22 hours of sleep each day. My mum captured him in a rare moment of full, splendid motion:

Have heard this one a few times in the last few weeks, a great fit with the laid-back bliss of Adelaide in March. "Brother" by the great Perth band Little Birdy:

The view at sunset from a barbeque this evening at a friends place in the hills of my lovely hometown of Willunga. Things could definitely be worse.

I know South Australia's gleeful descent into authoritarian fascism has been some time in the making, but does it have to be so explicit?