weltschmerz

I'm sorry that it took something like this to make me update. Just a quick one to say that my family and I are ok, and to say thanks to those who enquired after us.

Interesting reactions so far:

• LSE academics.

I saw Kingdom Of Heaven (IMDb) at the cinema today. It was surprisingly enjoyable; I'd been expecting the 2.5 hours to drag on a little, but that was not the case. The fight scenes were reminiscent of those in LotR (which also featured Orlando Bloom), particularly the battle of Helm's Deep, and Gladiator (which Ridley Scott also directed).

The film has attracted predictable criticism for depicting the not-so-heavenly actions of some Crusaders, while painting the likes of Saladin in a more positive light. Scott was surely in a no-win situation here though, and overall, I think the film was pretty balanced and non-judgmental. If you care to check on the historical accuracy, which turns out to be quite good, see Wikipedia. The FT has a really excellent comment on – as opposed to a review of – the film.

Time will tell whether it wins any major awards. I'd certainly recommend seeing it; writing as someone who dropped history relatively early on in his school career, the film inspired me to learn more about events that occurred a millennium ago, but which still bear huge relevance today (unfortunately, perhaps).

P.S. In case you didn't know, the quote in the title is by the incomparable Mark Twain.

It's all over. I spent most of Thursday evening/Friday morning watching the election results broadcasts and refreshing the BBC results page. Sad, I know, but it was strangely addictive and heady.

Glad to see the Greens do alright; they failed to get an MP into Parliament, but won several seats in the local elections.

Turn away now if you don't want to read about politics. I promise not to do political posts very often, but the UK elections are happening on 5th May, and I feel that I ought to write a little about them. Guess which party I'll be voting for?

I was recommended this rather intriguing site tonight: Who Should You Vote For?. After answering a short list of questions, you're told how well the five main parties' policies represent your views. They don't pretend to cover all the issues (the list is noticeably light on the environment, for instance), but it's a useful tool.

Green 8 Liberal Democrat -1 Labour -6 UK Independence Party -6 Conservative -11 The Green Party, which is of course strong on environmental issues, takes a strong position on welfare issues, but was firmly against the war in Iraq. Other key concerns are cannabis, where the party takes a liberal line, and foxhunting, which unsurprisingly the Greens are firmly against.

The Greens won't win, I know. I don't even agree with all their policies (oh dear, scrapping university tuition fees?). It'd be nice to have a Green MP in Parliament though. And incidentally, I settled on the Greens before tonight.

If you're not up to scratch with the issues, it's worth perusing this as you go along, otherwise you might end up with dubious and embarrassing results like:

UK Independence Party 9 Liberal Democrat 8 Green 7 Labour -10 Conservative -18 UKIP's primary focus is on Europe, where the party is strongly against joining both the EU constitution and the Euro. UKIP is also firmly in favour of limiting immigration. The party does not take a clear line on some other policy issues, but supports scrapping university tuition fees; it is strongly against income tax rises and favour reducing fuel duty.

If you're into these political quizzes, I can highly recommend The Political Compass, which is very enlightening in general and also has a UK Election 2005 section.