Sophistication is being able to listen to the William Tell Overture without thinking of the Lone Ranger.

…it’s that you always need a safe word.

This is a clever and comprehensive analysis in response to a question posed to a holder of a Master’s Degree in Military History, and fellow Goon. The question being, “In hindsight, was it a mistake for the Empire to put all its eggs in one basket by constructing the Death Star? Surely such an undertaking cost the Empire a lot of resources which probably could have been better used had they been spread out?” This is used without permission, though attribution is given so we’re good.

This is clearly the case, but the situation is not as simple as it seems on the surface. While it is easy to blame the Empire itself for what looks to be a gross misallocation of resources, the truth is that there were two independent problems with the Death Star Project, only one of which was the amount of resources devoted to construction. The other problem was the approach taken in deploying the two Fully Armed and Operational Battle Stations.

In addressing the first problem, some brief historiography is necessary. In the immediate aftermath of the disastrous events at Yavin IV and Endor it was widely accepted that the Empire itself was responsible for the decision to build these weapons and, in doing so, subject the economies of numerous star systems to unbearable economic stress. While this blame at first seems reasonable, it must be remembered that such accusations could very likely have been propagated by the group of freedom fighters led by Luke Skywalker. Such a situation would not be unexpected, as any propoganda tactics that would serve to discredit the Imperial government would no doubt have been used by these Rebel Scum. Indeed, over the last 5 to 10 yearsnew documents have come to light suggesting that the initial work on the super weapons was already well underway during the Republic’s waning years. It should be remembered that the former was the very same governmental body that Skywalker and his cohorts were striving to reincorporate; therefore, he and his Rebel Friends would have every reason to divert attention away from the Republic’s responsibility and place the blame squarely on the Empire’s shoulders. Nor should it be overlooked that noted insurgent leader Obi Wan Kenobi, as well as Skywalker’s own father, were high ranking officers in the employ of the Republic, and may themselves have had some involvement with the Death Star project.

Some have argued that although the Death Star’s planning and initial construction probably began during the late years of the Republic, the government itself should not be held responsible since there were numerous quasi-independent political factions operating separately from the legitimate government at the time. However, given the size and scope of the project, the Senate, if not directly responsible for the project, must have either ignored evidence of its existence, in which case they were grossly negligent, or known of its existence and given tacit consent, in which case they were complicit. Either way, it is clear that the Republican government, not the Empire itself, was responsible for either permitting or ordering the initial devotion of large quantities of capital and material to a project of questionable utility. Further adding to the evidence of Republican responsiblity is the rather curious lack of attention paid to certain common-sense safety measures on the stations, such as adequate catwalk railings or sufficiently well protected exhaust ports. Such oversights are clear indications of design-by-committee, and all too representative of a stale democratic government’s way of doing things. Indeed, it was precisely the propensity of the Senate to allow such goings-on that prompted Chancellor Palpatine to assume dictatorial powers to try and straighten out the whole mess.

While the Empire was obviously not immediately responsible for the initiation of the project, it did allow construction to continue through to completion. Why was this? There are likely two reasons. First, the transition from Republican to Imperial government structures was not immediate. It was, in fact, not until after the first Death Star had been completed that the last remnants of the Old Republic had been swept away. The length of time necessary for this change was attributed to the fact that mid-level members of government continually insisted that the local bureaucracy was necessary to maintain control. Indeed, transcripts from high-level military planning sessions suggest that even some military leaders felt this way, although the sentiment was probably not too widespread. Thus, during this period of flux, large bureaucratic programs such as the Death Star would have been very difficult to simply terminate since Emperor Palpatine had his hands full with innumerable similar problems.

The second reason would be that, given the advanced state of the project at the time that Palpatine assumed the principate, it may have been more expensive to deconstruct the stations than to complete them. Although records from the period are incomplete, it is clear from the close proximity in time between the battles of Yavin and Endor that the second Death Star must have been under construction before the first was even deployed. Therefore, its construction was also likely beyond the point of no return, so to speak.

The second problem, that of the Death Stars’ deployment, is more directly attributable to the Imperial Navy and even the Emperor himself. That the Death Star design was out of place in the Imperial Navy is something of an understatement. Although the Navy certainly had a penchant for gigantism, it never strayed too far from the idea that their weapons of war should be simple and easily mass produced. The TIE series of fighters, interceptors, and bombers, for example, while they did not necessarily excel at local space superiority, were sufficiently ubiquitous to allow the Empire to at least disrupt, if not necessarily defeat, many Rebel undertakings. Considering the limited resources available to the Pitiful Little Band, had the Empire remained true to this strategy of gradual attrition it would significantly have increased its chances of ultimate victory. Likewise, the Imperial II class of Star Destroyer was quite capable of causing problems for even a moderately sized Rebel task force. The sudden shift, then, from widespread attritional strategy to focused annihilation is rather confusing. This is particularly the case when one considers the fact that by tightening their grip upon one star system at a time, the Imperial Navy would most likely have let many others slip through their fingers.

While the fundamental reasons for the Empire’s shift in strategy remain a mystery, it is still clear that the Emperor and his officers made some rather naive mistakes in their use of the Death Stars. In the first case, the Death Star’s attack on the Rebel Base at Yavin IV suffered from an unforgivable dirth of battlefield reconnaissance. Had even the most basic survey of the Yavin system been made prior to the Death Star’s arrival, its approach could have been calculated to come from the same side of Yavin IV as the Rebel-held moon. Instead, the lack of reconnaissance caused the Death Star to approach from the opposite side, thus lengthening the time required to position itself properly, and ultimately providing the Rebels with a perfect opportunity to drive an attack home.

In the second case, the Emperor himself made a critical error by personally overseeing the final stages of construction. Apparently unfamiliar with the dangers inherent in exposing himself to attack, Palpatine insisted on being present on the occasion of his ultimate triumph, despite objections from his closest advisors. One witness even describes the the occasion of the Emperor’s announcement, whereupon Lord Vader was said to have responded, “I have a baaad feeling about this.” In any case, the Emperor’s overconfidence was his undoing.

Yes. Me.

This is something I posted on Google+ a few days ago.

Inspired by +Paul Pichugin I went out tonight armed with my camera and tripod with the intent of capturing some star trails. It ended in complete abject failure.

In my excitement in getting away from our camp ground, I didn’t think to pack the aeroguard. So as soon as I got to my destination at Canal Rocks, I got attacked by a swarm of mosquitoes. While trying to manoeuvre the tripod legs in the dark while swatting away at the bugs I managed to painfully pinch my finger in between the tripod legs while setting up. I was lucky not to drop the camera onto the rocks.

After fussing about trying to find the auto focus switch in the dark to set it from Auto to Manual, I wondered why my hands were suddenly wet. I dug around in my pocket for my phone, and after I entered my unlock code I could see, through the phones dim glow, that my phone screen was smeared in blood!

Fearing the worst, I shone the phone screen towards the camera and saw that it, too, was dripping with blood. The tripod had opened quite a gash and the buttons were glistening with red.

Plus, all this time I’d been swatting my arms, legs and face in the dark so that most of my exposed skin was now also covered in precious blood.

What are mozzies particularly attracted to? By smearing my own blood all over myself I had attracted a swarm so thick that attempting to see let alone photograph the sky was futile.

I jumped in the car and hi-tailed it out of there. The only thing is, half the south-western mosquito population jumped in with me. I was lucky to make it back to camp alive, managing to keep the car from being wrapped around a tree or in a ditch. They had practically eaten through to the bone.

I did venture out again, after showering myself with a mixture of mortien, aeroguard and dettol. It was only walking distance from camp, and so there was traffic to contend with which means I didn’t get enough shots for star trails. But ill share some good ones when I get home. If I get home and don’t die of malaria.

Wow, almost two weeks since I posted to my own blog. Been spending far too much time using Google+ as a substitute blog.

I hate to start the new year with a downer, but I screamed at a neighbour last night. I don’t want to be accused of slander so I won’t go into all the stuff they’ve done in the last 8-9 months since moving in, but I have been very tolerant of their antics. I have not once been the one to call the cops on them, who pay them a visit at least three times a week and even three times a night at times.

But last night snapped in me.The family had been out for New Years Eve celebrations but came back around 2am and sat out the front of their house, directly opposite our house, with their car radio up real loud tuned to the local top 40 station. It didn’t immediately wake me but Suzanne stirred and we couldn’t get back to sleep.

After 30 minutes I’d had enough. I got dressed into some street clothes and marched over the road and asked them very civilly, if not in a civil tone to “TURN THAT RADIO OFF PLEASE“.  Not wanting to appear the party pooper, I suggested that they “TAKE IT INSIDE, OR TAKE IT OUT THE BACK. THE WHOLE STREET DOESN’T WANT TO HEAR IT“. I then thanked them for complying with a courteous “THANK YOU” and walked back home over the road.

A couple neighbours popped their heads out of their doors with “Thanks, Brian” and clapped in applause, so I knew I’d done the street a service.

Was I too harsh? Should I have allowed these guys to continue partying in their front yard, especially given that it was NYE? Or was I right to ensure the rights of the neighbours to a good night’s sleep?

Regardless, I’ll need to watch my car, plants, and letter box for a while as I suspect they will be targeted.

Brian: Gone in 60 Seconds

Suzanne: The Hours

Ashton: Soap (the entire series)

Jett: Don’t Go Near the Water

You may remember, from about a year ago, Jett’s horrific facial injuries sustained while performing his rite of passage into manhood. Or rather, you may remember that he fell off his bike while learning to ride. But to Jett, I guess, it was a bigger deal because after the tribulation he never got on his bike again. His bike has been sitting in the garage in pristine condition, unused since that fateful day. We’ve tried different techniques like praise and encouragement, threats and intimidation, promises of rewards or punishment, and ridicule and derision but he has never budged.

But last week he finally cracked. He’s a stubborn little bugger, I’ll give him that. We had to start from scratch in teaching him to ride and he fought us every step of the way. I got a sore back from leaning over trying to hold his bike up while he gained balance and confidence, but flashbacks of the pavement rushing up to smack him in the chops would come back to haunt him and turn him into a blubbering, frozen mess.

It took about a month but we finally got there. In baby steps we got him to ride from one neighbors house to the other. Then, all the way to the corner (one way only, he wasn’t about to ride all the way back). Then, in one bold, ambitious expedition and with the help from a couple neighbours kids we made it all the way round the block!

Then this week I came home and he was proud to tell me he rode all the way to school and back on the new bike track to pick up Ashton with mum. For some reason he was too unwell to attend school himself that day, but that wouldn’t stop him getting some peddle time on his bike. It turns out it took about an hour each way to ride 2km but hey, it’s a great achievement.

Jett and I had a boys day out on the weekend. Jett had it in his mind, for some unknown reason, that he wanted to go to the Art Gallery. I think he heard Ashton telling her story about how she set off the alarms when she touched a painting and the guards came running. Jett would have still been in the pram at the stage so it’s understandable he had no memory of it. He was talking about it all week and was excited to go.

But first thing to do after making the trip up in the train was to have lunch. We weren’t going to have the normal McDonalds or Subway during this cultural excursion. No sir. This special event required special food, and the most special food Jett knew about was to be found going round and round in circles on little plates. We were headed for a Sushi bar!

We’d walked past this place a couple times, and Jett had seen the plates moving by themselves and, without being able to actually see the mechanism, imagined that the plates were being taken around the track behind a little train. All he wanted to do was visit the place that had the Sushi Train.

So, Sushi it was. We were seated and Jett was mesmerised by all the little plates rattling by. The plates were different colours and cost different amounts of money. I told him to mostly eat yellow and red, and try to leave the orange and brown as they were $10-$12 per plate for two little bits of Sushi. Sure enough, the first plate he took was brown. I could feel my wallet trying to scamper away and hide. But after that we stuck the the lower price cuisine which was simply delicious. I’m surprised at how adventurous Jett was, eating from many different plates. We had the freshest of fresh sushi, taking a plate that we had seen the chef prepare no more than 5 seconds earlier and place down in front of us. It was great!

Then we spent about an hour at the Art Gallery of WA. They had a paid exhibition of 15th to 17th century “treasures”, mostly tapestries and clothing and whatnot which I convinced Jett wasn’t really worth spending money or time looking at. We were here just for the paintings and sculptures. I tried to ask him what he saw in some pieces, what he thought the artist was trying to “say”, why he thought the painting was done this way or that. He had quite an imagination and came up with some good answers.

One thing we both took away though was how “dumb” some art is. There was one display of four completely black panels. Nothing else. Four black panels in a row. We couldn’t for the life of us work out why this was considered good enough or important enough to hang in an art gallery. The one below at least had a gold border, but it was still just a black panel with a thin gold border.

There was some spiel about the artist, and how the painting was exposing inner turmoil and struggle and blah blah blah. Neither of us could understand what he was getting at, even with Jetts hyperactive imagination.