2009: A Year to Ignore?

I know it seems a bit early to give you a year in review- but seeing as each of these blog entries come out on a Thursdays and next Thursday is Christmas Eve and I'm on hoilday to Queenstown, Blenheim and Wellington from the 23rd of December to 3rd January, this will be the last blog of the year.

This being my last blog of the year- brings a key point to mind- how was 2009?

At first look, this year is pretty much a year to ignore and put it into the history file "Bad Years".

The case for 2009 being one of these "Bad Years" obviously starts with economics. The word recession went from one of those square words you never say to the best possible economic outcome to 2009. I really don't need to go into in depth analysis of what a recession did to 2009-it's plainly evident in the numbers of umemployed and less money floating around.

Politically, 2009 has been a year of nothing much happening. Internationally, there is a still war raging in Iraq & Afganistan. North Korea and Iran still like playing with their nuke toys.
Closer to home, Fiji got a military dictatorship, Samoa and surrounding countries got swamped by tsnaumi.

At home, the biggest two things to happen where a smacking debate and the government's decision to sidestep the Royal Commission the Auckland Super City and Referendum on the super city (which was required by law) all in order to get in sorted in time for the local body elections next year.

While this may look all negative and such, but when you compare 2009 to other years in history 2009 comes off as quite a bland year, there have been years that make 2009 look like a walk in the park. Just think about these years: 1989, 1945, 1939 anyone?

It all probably boils down to this: If we had a bad year- then we should our best to make it better. Take the reccession example- while the effect is immense- we know the price of uncontrolled greed.

So have fun and look after yourselves,

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, the next blog will on the 7th of January at the latest.

Let's all become like Australia!

In case you haven't taken notice of New Zealand political news in the past week to month, you would not have noticed that Don Brash came out of the woodwork, spouting how we can bridge the gap between the Australia and New Zealand. The gap Don Brash was refering to is not the gap that is the Tasman Sea but the economic gap between Australia and New Zealand.

There is quite a significant idea floating around those with National and/or Act feelings, that Australia has good quality stuff that we small poor New Zealanders should strive and get, that we should bridge the economic gap between the Australia and New Zealand and that we would be just rich and powerful as Australia.

Such negativity towards one's own country really bugs me. When one country trys to become like another country, you just get a cheap imiation with a whole bunch of trouble lying not very far under the surface. I firmly believe, like individual human being, each country has their own characteristics and follibles that make that country unique and giving it an identity. If you tamper with that, you end up with a whole raft of problems. Just ask the citizens of country with a dicatorship.

I know New Zealand has some problems that we need to fix, but we should not try to to fix these problems by becoming a lesser version of country that some of us, have a love affair with.

Besides, briding the gap between Australia and New Zealand is impossible, there will always be a gap between us. Why?

New Zealand and Australia are two completely different countries. Australia has a population that dwarfs us, New Zealand has a population similar to the size of Sydney. On the economic scale, Australia is mineral based-gold, uranium, iron etc... whereas New Zealand economy has a agriculture look to it.

On the comparison front, Australia is not a good country to compare ourselves with, after all, you don't determine what's a good quality apple by using a kumara has a reference guide. You compare ourselves with countries like Ireland (they have the same population numbers, plus their next door to a dominant country and have similar policies to us) and Scandinavian countries and we're not that bad. Plus in order to be like Australia, we have to give up stuff that we hold dear. Anyone for not helping poor people or elderly?

Okay, rant's over. Bye now.

New Look

Hey People, just a quick update on blog housekeeping matters, to let you know what's up and coming.

Firstly, you'll notice the New Look. The reasoning behind this is to have something flexible that I change to suit the season or mood i'm in. So yes, in a week or two the blog will look kinda christmasey.

Now to the what's coming up bit:

Expect some social policy/ political blogging from me soon. In particular Don Brash, appearing out of the woodwork proposing that we should just be like Australia! I would've have posted that article today-but that involves research which i haven't done yet, so expect that.

I've had a positive comment from this blog's number one fan about me posting my hopefully future novel, if it's any good that is. That'll be up to you. I promise to leave you in suspense at the end of every novel posting.

That's pretty much it. Sorry for the lack of substance post. Big postings are coming. Don't forget if you have anything you would like me to talk about, i'll do so.

Have fun out there.

Sometimes you have nothing to write about it.

Yes, I'm pulling that Editiors Note trick when you have nothing to write about. You write about writing you not having the ability to write something in this place.

Whenever I read Editors columns or notes I thought that writing a column about writing was a complete cop-out. While it is still invariably a cop-out, those people have my sympathies. It's not like I don't have subjects and stuff to talk about it I just can't possibly think of anything to write about.

Writer's block is my main enemy. I have some excellent ideas for stories/books/novels but the closest I get to writing something decent is one chapter, then stuff just starts fizzing out on me. Hmm...

I do have some ideas to write about, its just expanding on those ideas. Here's some ideas I want to run past you lot;

I'm seriously considering for the fun of it, gradually posting in chapters of my fiction story that runs through my head. I'd love to know what you think of them.

Plus If you have a social policy issue that you want me to investigate for you, I'll do that.

While this blog entry doesn't seem it, i would it love it for more people to read what I have to say, call it my egotistical trait, so feel free to spread the word.

Sorry about the dullness. Bye now.

Hi. I'm Stephen and I'm a Twihard.

Unless you've been living in a cave working on your diabolical plan to take over the world, you may have noticed that certain 2nd installment of a pop culture phenomenon has hit the world today. This pop culture phenomenon comes in the form of a movie titled: New Moon.

It's always a danger reviewing a massive movie that's hit the hyperactivity levels of a two-year-old on sugar, purely because said movie has a army of fans ready to devour this film, not once but several times.

In case your perplexed about this little cultural phenomenon, The Twilight Saga and New Moon is your classic romance with vampires and werewolves thrown into the mix. The Twilight Saga is one of those stories that trying to explain it makes the recipient of the explanation even more confused then when they started out. Basically it goes something like this: girl moves into a small town, falls for a mysterious guy who turns out to be a vampire, other vampires want to kill her, in order to protect her vampire boyfriend leaves her who promptly falls into the arms of a shape-shifter werewolf and saves vampire boyfriend from Vampire royalty after he believes she's dead.

Confused? If so, before watching New Moon, read the books of the saga, things will make more sense then the quick summary above.

When a movie such as New Moon, is based on a popular book of the same name, it can invariably hard to include all the moments in the book, into the film. Like its predessor, New Moon had conversations in different places from that of the book and had props and features that didn't exist like an elevator in the Volturi ( that's the 'vampire royalty' i was talking about earlier) but i'm probably nit picking.

The best bits in this film were the special effects used with the viewer being able to see the emotion in the werewolves eyes. Also, being the big boy that I am the action scenes made me jump and get right into the movie.

Rating: On my scale of 1-7, New Moon deserves a 5. New Moon would have got a 6, if it didn't rely on the movie audience having read the books. That being said, New Moon was entertaining and worth a seeing to. I'm expecting a range 2-3's in professional reviews.

Appropriate Audiences: Fans of the Twilight Saga. More grown-up from the previous movie that the saga gets its name from, so not appropriate for anybody who can't stand mild violence.

Movie Reviews: Julie & Julia

Hi all. As some of you know, maybe from reading last week's blog, ( If you haven't read last week's blog just scroll to the next one, it'll explain what i'm doing with this blog) one of my pastimes is to watch movies and then write a review about it. This week's review is about a cooking orienated dual biography: Julie and Julia.

Before I get into a review of this movie, i must explain how I do reviews because my reviews are not your typical run of the mill reviews. I like to think i do things a bit differently. While I do some things a bit differently in my reviews, I do the things that you would expect in a review- like actually talk about the movie itself. Okay, the things I do differently are....

Ratings: I don't use the normal 5 star rating. I personally think it dosen't give you a clear indication of what I think about the movie at a quick glance. I use a 7 star rating. I do this to get a distinction between good and legendary on one end of the scale and Poor and Average and the other end of the scale. So my scale goes like this; 1: Don't Ever Watch it/Bad 2: Poor 3: Only a few wierd people would like this/ Ok 4: Average/ Run of the Mill 5: Good 6: Excellent 7: A future classic-legendary.

The other thing i like to add which is not that common in reviews is a suitable auidence, i'm not talking what the movie is rated, but who would most enjoy the movie.

Ok to the movie review itself:

Julie and Julia.

Plot: Like I said previously, Julie and Julia is a dual-biography movie, about the lives of two women- Julia Child- the famous and one of the first celebrity chefs and trials and tribulations she goes through in getting her first french cooking book written and Julie Powell- who wrote a blog about making her way through Julia Child famous 1st recipe book and the trials and tribulations of achieving that goal.

While saying ' trials and tribulations' makes this movie sound like a boring biography angst driven movie, both biographies are done with such humour that makes your sides hurt as though you've run a marathon, so in fact this movie is actually- comedy/ drama. A dramedy if you like.

Normally, a movie would have a dull point in which they would need to have a montage or something of the like to move time along, however with Julie and Julia there is no dull spots, by the end of the movie, one is devouring the what the real person has done/is doing now information.

Ratings: Julie and Julia is 6. Excellent, but I don't think it would get an academy award, maybe a Bafta- the brits understand comedy a bit better.

Appropriate Auidence: While Julie and Julia is centred around cooking and the trials of cooking, it dosen't just cater to just the foodies. Julie and Julia does an extremely of making the movie enjoyable for everybody- when something was funny- the whole movie theatre was cracking up. With this in mind- an appopriate auidence for Julie and Julia would be for everybody, although kids may not find it neccessairly too entertaining- so for an adult family.

I'm not very good at this.

No this is not an attempt at a sob blog entry. I've just realised its exactly 4 months since i last updated, which is bad of me, for which i sincerly apologise for.

Enough apologising more action. I think the reason behind my lack of blogging is not the fact that i'm busy or that that i'm too lazy to enter a blog entry in my own blog, its finding something to write about. Finding something to write about is harder that what you think it is. After all, the purpose of writing a blog is to write something that people want to read and simultanousely trying to write something that you really want to write about.

After thinking about this subject long and hard, this blog will essentially consist of five elements, to talk about and interact with you about.

The first thing that would be immediately obvious to you, is the poll at the bottom of this blog. ( If you can't see it, just scroll down to the bottom, it should be there). As a challenge to myself, i have added what i call a zaps poll. What this poll does is that everytime i don't upload a blog to this wonderful blog of mine, you get a chance to zap me. For each zap i get i will extend my next blog by the number of lines i have to do in my next blog after the poll closes.

The second, third and fourth elements of this blog denote what i will write about. These roughly correspond to things i like to constantly harp on about: Political stuff- like the ACC Reforms happening at the moment, movies and cooking.

The last and fifth element is my interactive element- if you would like me to research something and write about it or just randomly write a blog entry on a subject your interested just leave a comment on the current blog and i'll do my best to write about that subject. However, if find the suggested subject objectionable in any way or it'll just look like a bunch of words that looks like this: um economics um it involves money, then i will not write it, just common sense really.

On a final note, (i'm realising this is probably a long blog entry so this will be quick) i will attempt to have a blog entry up and running at noon every week on a thursday.

Have good one, tell me what you think.

Stephen.

Weekly musing: Sperm donation

I know the title of this blog sounds dodgy- but this is a random musing of myself- brought on by an article in the sunday magazine in last weeks sunday star star times. In this article, they talked about the drought of sperm in fertility clinics nationwide. Intially, being a guy- this subject had the potential to perk my interest- a chance I could use to help someone. Except there is a huge sticking point here. I'm not talking about the task at hand- it seems relatively easy. Its what happens after which is causing not many men to partake in the seemingly easy task of giving the task. Its the fact, that after your donation- you don't remain anoynmous. Sure there are privacy laws etc... but a kid and therefore in somecases the parents of that child can contact the donor. There is a case of allowing this to happen in case you have a genetic disease which could get passed on, however, wouldn't be simpler to allow that info. on when donating?

Ok, enough of musing, tell me what you think, if that wasn't too random for you.

I know, I know I'm a bad boy

Hi all to those who attempt to read this blog. I'm sorry, i have made a second blog entry. I keep forgetting. I know its not good enough, i'll try to rectify that right now.

Introductions

Hi. You've managed to make it onto the official blog of Stephen Houltham. While this blog is brand spanking new and only has this one blog post attached to it, it will also have blog entries ranging from the political - is the New Zealand government power hungry to more mundane things like putting graduation photos of myself up on this blog.

For the first time in my checked history of blogging ( i may have a few graveyard blogs out there somewhere), I promise to at least have a blog entry per week. So keep watching this space, something will pop on shortly.