{"id":5,"date":"2001-12-15T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2001-12-15T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/?p=5"},"modified":"2001-12-15T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2001-12-15T05:00:00","slug":"happy-litha","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/2001\/12\/15\/happy-litha\/","title":{"rendered":"Happy Litha!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s that time of year again, where half the country goes mad for a celebration of something they barely beleive in. There&#8217;ll be lies told to our children and drunken antics at the company&#8217;s expense.<\/p>\n<p>As a child, Christmas was a source of presents and an opportunity to light candles. On Christmas eve I would head into the city with mum and my brother and end up coming home after (or close to) dark. It was never a religous deal, I wasn&#8217;t brought up that way and would never develop an affinity for any Christian based faith.<\/p>\n<p>As a young teen, it was something that always came along. I viewed it as a time where I could get some stuf I wanted without having to save for years or really try and convince mum and dad to get it for me.<\/p>\n<p>Growing up, many of my friends didn&#8217;t celebrate it at all.  Be it because of being Jewish, coming from another country or smiply not doing it. I began to see my own thoughts echoed here. It&#8217;s not part of my religion. It&#8217;s not something I care about the Christian heratage of. I&#8217;m not into the Christian Imagery, the songs or a concept of there being one time of year when you&#8217;re meant to be nice.<\/p>\n<p>If you can&#8217;t be nice and generous all year then you should probably just walk off the edge of the world &#8211; you&#8217;re not helping it get any better. Go on, fuck off.<\/p>\n<p>One word was interesting though. Yule. What did it mean? Where did it come from? Why is there a yule log, yuletidings being brought and it&#8217;s christmas? Well, it&#8217;s not christmas &#8211; and technically, it&#8217;s not yule either. It&#8217;s doubtful that the majority of people in Australia care, they&#8217;re happy to live in ignorant bliss. Ignorant in bliss of so many other things. Blissfully ignorant of so many other things.<\/p>\n<p>With those ignorant around me, I say merry Litha. Look it up, learn something, capture something over the break &#8211; your mind. Get off your arse and think.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s that time of year again, where half the country goes mad for a celebration of something they barely beleive in. There&#8217;ll be lies told to our children and drunken antics at the company&#8217;s expense. As a child, Christmas was &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/2001\/12\/15\/happy-litha\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life-the-universe-and-everything"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5a6n8-5","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":875,"url":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/2007\/08\/02\/backup-solution-for-mum\/","url_meta":{"origin":5,"position":0},"title":"Backup solution for mum&#8230;","author":"Stewart Smith","date":"2007-08-02","format":false,"excerpt":"Dear Lazyweb, I really want a GNOME application with a big button that says \"backup\" and proceeds to ask for a series of DVDs, on which it writes out everything on the hard disk (\/ and \/home) which can then (relatively easily) be used to restore the system. I figure\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;GNOME&quot;","block_context":{"text":"GNOME","link":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/category\/gnome\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9,"url":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/2001\/12\/24\/christmas-routine\/","url_meta":{"origin":5,"position":1},"title":"christmas routine","author":"Stewart Smith","date":"2001-12-24","format":false,"excerpt":"It's not a ritual, it's a routine. Six months from the original Yule, a mile away from any meaning that tonight has to Christian folk, I trod down the stairs to participate in the lighting of the candles. Yes, every year we light candles, turn the lights out, look at\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;life, the universe and everything&quot;","block_context":{"text":"life, the universe and everything","link":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/category\/life-the-universe-and-everything\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":736,"url":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/2006\/09\/19\/wrt54gl-client-mode-openwrt-fun\/","url_meta":{"origin":5,"position":2},"title":"WRT54GL client mode OpenWRT fun!","author":"Stewart Smith","date":"2006-09-19","format":false,"excerpt":"the wireless USB dongle I had running on my MythTV box had drivers that weren't always reliable. I have recently totally decided that if I haven't had time to debug them and fix the problems by now, I won't in the near future. Today a courier arrived with two of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;cool gadgets&quot;","block_context":{"text":"cool gadgets","link":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/category\/cool-gadgets\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":366,"url":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/2005\/03\/01\/epson-c65-on-ubuntu-linux-and-debian\/","url_meta":{"origin":5,"position":3},"title":"Epson C65 on Ubuntu Linux (and Debian)","author":"Stewart Smith","date":"2005-03-01","format":false,"excerpt":"Quite easy to get going under Warty (as well as Debian Sid). Add a printer (System Configuration -> Printers, double click 'Add Printer'). Select Local Printer, \"USB Printer #1\" as the port, then, select the model as Epson Stylus C64. Works fine. I guess you can fiddle with quality settings\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;General&quot;","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/category\/general\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":338,"url":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/2005\/01\/14\/rt2500-wireless-pci-card-on-ubuntu\/","url_meta":{"origin":5,"position":4},"title":"RT2500 wireless PCI card on Ubuntu","author":"Stewart Smith","date":"2005-01-14","format":false,"excerpt":"Got the two cards today. Ordered from i-Tech (mob in Sydney, had it delivered here). Were $59AUD each (plus shipping, which was $15 for the two of them). Really painless setup! One was for the Ubuntu system my mum uses, the other for the Windows system my brother uses. Well,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;cool gadgets&quot;","block_context":{"text":"cool gadgets","link":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/category\/cool-gadgets\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":965,"url":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/2008\/01\/11\/a-few-weeks-with-new-stereo-system\/","url_meta":{"origin":5,"position":5},"title":"A few weeks with new stereo system","author":"Stewart Smith","date":"2008-01-11","format":false,"excerpt":"Just before Christmas, I bought myself a new stereo. This is something I've been thinking about for a while and one of those things that takes some care in looking at because it's a non-trivial amount of cash. I've ended up with B&W 683 speakers, an Arcam amplifier and CD\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;life, the universe and everything&quot;","block_context":{"text":"life, the universe and everything","link":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/category\/life-the-universe-and-everything\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2504,"href":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5\/revisions\/2504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flamingspork.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}