“We are Forerunners. Guardians of all that exists. The roots of the Galaxy have grown deep under our careful tending. Where there is life, the wisdom of our countless generations has saturated the soil. Our strength is a luminous sun, towards which all intelligence blossoms… And the impervious shelter, beneath which it has prospered.”

Friday T&A: Winter Blunderland Edition

Friday T&A: Winter Blunderland Edition

It is officially the first day of winter, and frankly, I’m already DONE with the season. The ONLY good thing about winter, is Christmas – and, when I lived in Australia (where, as we always say around here, EVERYTHING WANTS TO KILL YOU AND EAT YOUR EYES...
Friday T&A: Butterball Turkey Edition

Friday T&A: Butterball Turkey Edition

Doubtless my American friends are currently groaning their way out of the severe indigestion and food comas that inevitably follow a Thanksgiving feast. Having attended my share of such events during my time in the FUSA, I sympathise – though I never indulged to...
Friday T&A: Belgian Waffle Edition

Friday T&A: Belgian Waffle Edition

For those of you who have some historical awareness, you will know certain countries exist ONLY so that other, larger, more powerful countries can use them to sort out longstanding differences. Poland, for instance, is effectively a place for Russia and Germany to...
Friday T&A: All This and Brains Too Edition

Friday T&A: All This and Brains Too Edition

What a week, eh, lads? As usual, this is one of those where everything seems to happen all at once. World War III is well and truly underway, though it is so far a regional and localised series of conflicts in the broader context of a titanic clash between superpowers...
Friday T&A: Calm Before the Storm Edition

Friday T&A: Calm Before the Storm Edition

By some miracle, we appear to have made it to the end of another week, and the world is still more or less kind of sort of intact. Whether it stays that way, of course, is a rather different question. Yet, I think we have good reason for optimism at the moment. Hassan...
Friday T&A: There Goes the Neighbourhood Edition

Friday T&A: There Goes the Neighbourhood Edition

As I write this, we are seeing news streaming in about a possible major Israeli ground incursion into the Gaza Strip. This may – or may not – finally be the start of the great big ground offensive the Israelis have been threatening for two weeks now. They...
Friday T&A: Babylon’s Burning Edition

Friday T&A: Babylon’s Burning Edition

I know I have been saying this for a couple of YEARS now, but it is impossible to escape the firm conviction that we are lashed down to an out-of-control trolley headed straight into the maw of Hell itself. The world is on fire, and there appears to be little anyone...
Friday T&A: Triskaidekaphobia Edition

Friday T&A: Triskaidekaphobia Edition

The long fancy-pants word up in the title apparently translates into English as fear of the number 13, which is of course highly apropos, given the date. For those of you interested in the cheesy origins of this most unfortunate of days – and it IS unfortunate,...
Friday T&A: Stormy Petrel Edition

Friday T&A: Stormy Petrel Edition

If you are wondering about the title of today’s poast, it has to do with the announcement just yesterday by the Neo-Tsar at Valdai, that Russia has successfully tested the 9M370 Burestvenik (Бурественик – literally, “Stormy Petrel”)...
Friday T&A: Always Be Closing Edition

Friday T&A: Always Be Closing Edition

Once again, this instalment of everyone’s favourite series for the site is late, and once again, there has been a complete lack of new content (which shall be addressed today, by various devious ways and means). And once again, yer very ‘eavy, very...