Just living here, for now...

A while back, it occurred to me that – with the knowledge that we are not part of this universe – perhaps the best way of looking at who we are in the context of the universe is "not a part of it, just living here for now."

I suspect that many of us have realised that we are just peering out at the world (and the universe beyond) from behind these eyes; hearing the world from between these ears; and touching those material things we encounter again indirectly and (small scale) remotely via our arms and hands. Taste and smell are similar. We aren't really 'here' in the literal sense.

Atheists really haven't a clue about themselves or anythng or anyone else, because they either will not or cannot grasp this reality, among others.

I long ago worked out that the main categories of atheists seem to be (a) those too lazy think about what life is really all about and why we are here, (b) those too dim-witted to handle even that basic a question, (c) those too evil to openly acknowledge the truth (mainly Satanic – and remember that even Satan believes in God and has very good reason to do so), and (d) the pseudo-intellectuals (e.g. Richard Dawkins) whose entire standing depends upon that false perception he propounds.

Today, after much thought, I feel I should add a fifth category, (e) those too scared to face the Big Question. I can understand this, and have been on the brink of it myself many years ago. It can be a difficult barrier to surmount.

It is for all these reasons, and for the majority of those types, that I often urge unbelievers to just go outside and take a good, proper look at the world out there. It's amazing what one notices with an open and 'feeling' attitude. I have my own, personal tales to tell on this score, and have mentioned a few occasions where my own sensitivity has come into play, reported briefly both here on this 'blog and in other places.

All any of us needs to do, though, is to think beyond just our being at a basic level, and realise that our totality is so much more – yet, for the time being, it is right and appropriate that we 'live' here in this form and in this place. It's not scary, once one accepts this and applies some intelligence to it: after all, there's nothing we can do about it anyway, so just enjoy it!

Accepting what is, rather than trying to manipulate people's perceptions into a false structure that suits one's own agenda, is a good, honest and 'clean' way to be and to live. Dawkins, Gnosticism and other wrong tracks can be avoided with a little thought and the preparedness to just look at Creation and gain at least some feel for what it is.

That's how I started, decades ago, and I have managed to avoid the pitfalls in all that time, because I used my brain, my senses, and my own 'gut feeling' of what is and what isn't. I have long realised that 'science' (meaning 'knowledge') merely attempts to explain what already exists, and creates nothing itself. Thus I never fell into the Dawkins trap or any similar ones.

It's simple when one knows how – and we were all created with that ability to discern it! I, for one, am enjoying living here for now, with all of life's ups and downs (more downs than ups for me these days, too) and hope that you, dear reader, will do so too.

Santa Fun Run 2012

Once again the Rotary Club of Medway has held its annual charity Santa Fun Run. The ever-excellent Rochester People – though nowadays without the wonderful Jaye Nolan, but still coping well despite that – covered the event, and has posted a couple of short video clips and a photo gallery. I notice some Olympic torches being brandished by several of the runners...

We here in Medway are really good at events, from festivals via national and international sporting events to 'fun runs' (including our own Medway Mile), even if not everything always goes perfectly.

Most of the time it does, though, or near enough in all but the – extremely rare – very worst cases. It is unusual indeed to encounter a significant issue, and then everyone with an axe to grind pounces on that and makes it out to be more than it really is, detracting somewhat from all the good things that we do here. I advise us all to concentrate on the overwhelmingly predominant great things we do!

In reality, we are very good at this stuff, whether council-driven or not. As the photos in this event's gallery show in particular, from the very first photograph, we have the setting: that's taken at one of our castles, with our cathedral in the background. The settings adds a 'feel' to every such event, that if you are there yourself you will feel it to some extent, even if you are engrossed in the activitity of the day itself.

You cannot help that: it's an inescapable part of not only what we do here, but how, why and where we do it. All these are interlinked.

The Santa Fun Run stands on its own (running!) feet, but it also reminds us of the special character of any event we hold here in Medway, and especially in the heart of historic Rochester.

The New Yorker

I'm not quite sure about the New Yorker sandwich I just tried (bought at Sainsbury), which comprises pastrami, Emmental cheese and gherkin mustard mayonnaise, all on malted bread – so to get in the right mood, here are the Gremlins mounting their musical number, featuring that Sinatra favourite of related name...

Pageviews

I've never been all that clear about how best to interpret pageviews figures for this 'blog, and indeed had ignored such information for most of the past four-and-a-half years that it has been running.

Nonetheless, I thought it might be an interesting exercise to watch them for a while, and report them here, perhaps weekly. As Blogger provides a handy graph of pageview numbers on a range of timescales, it seems easiest to post a suitable image here.

The weekly graph doesn't actually show a great deal, so I shall at least start with the past month's graph, which does at least look interesting and contains enough information to have some signbificance. Here it is, for the last thirty days...

Notice that I have 'good' and 'bad' days, the latter mostly on the weekends as far as I can discern. The occasional peak is less than obvious, in that it is usually nothing to do with any of my very latest posts but something a few days old that has been picked up by some popular indexing site.

Now, I well realise that next to the likes of Guido, Political Betting and Iain Dale these figures are tiny, but from what other local bloggers have been telling me about their own figures, my own are quite respectable within that sector of the blogging scene.

I find this comforting, as I put a lot of effort, thought and research into much of what I post here; and inevitably it is sometimes going to seem hardly worth all of that if it isn't achieving very much. If no-one reads what is here, the information will have no discernible effect.

Anyway, regardless on that, I plan to treat this as an academic exercise, just to see if there is anything useful I can glean from how the pageviews go over time. I haven't yet decided whether to post regularly on the topic or perhaps just to keep the bulk of the weekly data just within my own files. I'll think about that....

Baba Yetu

On a somewhat different stylistic note within the video game music genre, and as kindly recommended to me by local Twitterer Lauren Wright, here is the theme to Civilisation IV, with some interesting graphics (I was particularly taken with Abraham Lincoln and also by the space station scene), titled Baba Yetu, and is also on Christopher Tin's Calling All Dawns album.

Although it isn't quite to my own personal taste, it is genuinely good and very well composed and arranged. I gather it has won a Grammy award, the first composition for a video game to have done so...