The blog of Steve Root

  • The Dark Light Years (Brian Aldiss)

    Printed 6 years before I was born, the jacket of this book showed it’s age in the second hand bookshop. On the plus side, if it’s been kept that long it can’t be too bad. There were also several other books by this author which I’ve found to be a good sign. Lots of old books by the same author seems to mean the stories were successful enough to be printed in large quantities, so that many copies survive to stand tightly packed in the limited shelf space of second hand book shops. I bought this and another couple of them to read over the summer holidays.

    Onto the story, and for me this is a classic piece of science fiction. Think of the future as it would develop from now. Imagine it going the way we wouldn’t like it to, on a social level. Imagine war pushing the development of space exploration, in a way that only war can create a technology growth spurt. Imagine then discovering intelligent life on another planet. This story eloquently describes this situation, an intelligent extra terrestrial species that mankind isn’t intelligent enough to recognise. The book makes you ask a fundamental question; How do you define intelligent?

    It’s a really good read so perhaps it’s not surprising it’s still in print. Rootie Rating: 4 out of 5

  • Sunday European Campaign – on target so far…

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    Two weeks in, the “Sunday European Campaign” is going well. The SEC, as it’s been shortened to, is an event within the game of Aces High 2 where players from all over the world virtually fly world war 2 aircarft and virtually kill each other. The irony is that this (and many other online games like it) are bringing people together from all over the world. The group of online friends I fly with are mostly German and it’s great to know we’re at peace now when playing a game recreating a war just 60 years ago.

    Anyway, when our squad moved to this new game from warbirds a year ago, we missed a regular event on Sunday nights where we flew historically based missions over 2 hours. Different to the “main arena” style of game play, these events would encourage a foundation in history, tactics and planning, and very careful flying, given only 1 life per hour.

    After some encourage among the players, I had a list of 80 or so players who were interested in the idea and the support of the game creators. Some players volunteered to run the event (on the server setup side), some for future event design too. The big question was would they actually turn up to play?

    I’ve just finished playing the 2nd frame of the first event (3 frames = 3 Sunday nights per event) where 100 players from all over the world joined in! Last week we also had just over 100 players, so it looks like there is a genuine interest for the events to continue.

    The picture on this post is what’s left of my Hurricane during the first frame. You’ll notice (ok, you’ll notice because I’m telling you not because you’re looking closely) that it’s missing both ailerons. For those with a love of flying, you’ll know the ailerons are the important bit that lets the plane roll and therefore turn. You might also know of the “secondary effects of control”, where using the rudder will roll the plane. That and a little use of elevator meant I landed safely, just, with a fuel leak and other damage too. The screen shot was taken by Odee, a player from Virginia USA. The game has a recording facility and he replayed from my view point to get the shot. Thanks Odee <S>

  • Rotary – Charter Night

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    Jumping back along the time line for a bit, I’ll tell you about ‘Charter Night’. Charter night is different from Inauguration. I think inauguration is the formal welcoming into Rotary whereas Charter night is more of a celebration of the new club joining the Rotary family.

    Our Charter night was June 21st 2008. I confess I had nothing to do with the organisation of the event. In fact, not many in the club did – it appears mostly the work of our first President, Jarle. We used a large room at Kent County Cricket ground for a formal meal. Rotarians from all over the district came to join us along with the President of Rotary Internation in Britain and Ireland, Allan Jagger. He gave a very entertaining speach welcoming us into Rotary and set a challenge I think we have no hope of achieving. He joked that ‘your club has in a single swipe halved the average age of Rotary’, the challenge is that in 10 years time we keep the same average age as now. Our club was given gifts by other clubs of things that a new club will find useful. Chains of office for the President, President Elect and Tresurer, a table lecturn, a bell (I assume that Rotarians are generally rowdy and need calling to attention by bell) and lots of pennants.

    The event was also used as a fund raiser for Odyssey. A gambing area was set up on the floor below. For a donation of real money you got some tokens to play with. At the end of the night if you had lots of tokens left you might win a prize that had been donated by a member. The crupier (or whatever they’re called) told me how to play roullete. I’ve decided I’m still not a gambling person.

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