Beginners guide to politics-by a fluffy toy

Those enlightened among you who are already subscribe to The Very Fluffy Diary of Millenium Dome, Elephant (elephantfeed)^[1] may be interested to know that he has written a beginners guide to British Politics over at libdemvoice_fd, and rather amusing it is to, here's an exerpt:

Mr Lord Deputy Stephen has asked me to explain to him about POLITICS, and I can understand why he is confused! It is VERY complicated!

There are THREE HUNDRED and EIGHTY-FIVE political parties in Great Britain (at least according to the list at the Electoral Commission) but thanks to the way that the voting system works, there are only THREE that really stand a chance of having enough votes to make a difference.

It's perhaps not as incisive as some of his Doctor Who articles but is still fun. Actually, on the subject of Lib Dem Voice, the members forum is a little busier of late than it has been, might have something to do with the new moderator who volunteered to help out in a moment of insanity, can't think why anyone would want to do that sort of thing. You need to be a party member to register, but once you are, nice little gated forum.

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[1] And if not, why not, damnit! I've met him donchaknow, and got a congrats message from him on last weeks news...

State of the Mat

Contentment. Really. People reading the journal for more than 6 months are probably slightly confused by the complete lack of cynical bastard Mat that you've sort of got used to.

People that actually know me have seen me smile, randomly, at something that I've thought about. No prises for guessing what that normally is mind, but there y'go. SB's been in a bit of a weird mood this evening, and also isn't feeling 100%, but seems to have cheered up now that shrublette has stopped grisling and started being bouncy again. She's exhausted though, Shrub tells me she's asleep upstairs, so I'll be off to check in a bit. We played Eye-Spy earlier, although Shrub's spelling isn't quite up to actually getting things right yet. Very cute though, and seems to be very happy seeing us both together, which is good.

I was in a bit of a strange grump yesterday, not actually upset with anything, just a bit meh with the world; seems to have shifted today—got a fair bit of work done (although I've got to finish coding the site tonight) and have cheered up a fair bit (and Shrub's just come to say hello as I type this). Being cheered up may have been helped by her returning from shopping with a big bottle of Jameson's and a box of organic Thornton's truffles. Y'know, the type of thing she used to love before she developed the "eating these could kill you" caffeine allergy (and a few sips of a cherry alcopop Friday night did knock her out quite badly, quite scary really).

So, yeah—getting used to a major change in my life, and, well, accepting it. Details to work out, things to plan, but overall?

I'm happy. Just, well, wanted to tell the world really.