So, what do people think of the new look?

Thought I'd finally get to grips with the new design features on offer. Not sure I'm totally happy with it yet, still a few things to iron our. I'm just tinkering at the office during my lunch breaks at the moment since my home dial up connection is utter shashpaps.

Speaking of work I've had the most stressful day today. So many things to do, and almost all them urgent and vital. Managed to get out of there relatively early but once I'd got home and finished off half a joint from last night I was spark out on the sofa.

Woke up a few hours ago but still don't really feel awake. Anyway I woke up with a new angle on an old idea and couldn't be arsed to carry it all the way upstairs to bed, so I'll dump it here with you guys instead if that's ok.

The last time MSM and I, and a few others, were adding to our long standing discussion about the nature of consciousness etc, I wrote about the human brain. I outlined how I felt the common feeling of distinction between the physical and non-physical self could actually be our way of perceiving the distinction between our brain stem and frontal lobes.

The brain stem, I suggested, was what we perceived as our physical selves. It makes our hearts beat and lungs breath, it also houses our 'instinctive' knee-jerk reactions. Now at the time I was looking at this in terms of the relationship between different parts of the brain. Tonight however I was inspired to think about this part of the brain in isolation.

In one of the very first issues of Adbusters I ever read there was a phrase I have never been able to fully forget. I can't remember the context, or even the exact wording, but the concept is still clear: 'you find yourself crying at scripted TV shows and adverts but unable to feel anything when considering your own real life,' The mindset this describes felt uncomfortably familiar to me at the time of reading.

Anyway, I was flicking in and out of Big Brother earlier and found myself watching the contestants receiving letters from home. As the letters were read out it became apparent that one of the contestants' mothers has cancer, but this was just the most powerful of a barrage of tear jerking moments.

Now I think, to be fair, there a far worse examples of this, I just happened to see Big Brother tonight. Anyway I found myself getting a bit choked up but also found that I felt uncomfortable about it. I realised that I wasn't really engaging with the show at all on any conscious level, but that this emotion was being evoked directly from my subconscious.

I felt ambushed by my own emotions and vaguely annoyed that the TV seemed to have a direct line to the back of my brain. They are real people I suppose, their emotion was genuine and unscripted so it could, i admit, just be a case of human compassion. When I saw a Lebanese guy burying his wife and all his kids on the news the other day however, it didn't feel like this.

So this thought was bubbling away somewhere when I noticed that 'Lost In Translation' was on Film Four. I'd wanted to see it since it came out but i heard a lot of conflicting views on it and never seemed to get round to it. In short, (because I want to go bed,) I have to say I really liked it. It was almost a pretentious piece of crap but two fantastic lead performances gave it the innocence to be great.

I found it to be a genuine emotional journey. Somehow the emotions, positive or negative, felt more honest than the drama of BB. I felt more comfortable being moved by more the complex feelings portrayed in the film.

Now I've written this I'm actually unsure as to which of these two experiences demonstrates the Adbusters quote and which denies it. I thought I had it sussed before I started writing this, but looking at it now both experiences seem to work both ways.

Oh well, the idea is to explore the different paths to the back of the back of the brain. There's the direct approach, straight to heart without consulting the head, or taking a considered stroll through the higher functions to finally settle into experience.

In both cases I made a conscious decision to expose myself to the media that evoked these reactions and was aware at the time of what was happening. Thinking about these two however I, as always, came upon a third part to the puzzle.

I had another experience earlier today that, in retrospect, I now recognise as being relevant. In the course of busting my ass at work today I was on the phone to a colleague trying to sort our various problems that no-one else in the council would touch, (welcome to my working world.)

Eventually we managed to sort things out and I hang up only to receive a bollocking for being on the phone too long from our department manager. I was informed afterwards that he was just in a mard over various other problems and I happened to be in his way when he blew, at the time however I didn't really see it like that.

At the time it felt like I was being accused of slacking off when I was actually grafting. A second later I found myself on my feet telling him, albeit in a politer tone, to bite me. Now this particular route to the back of my head, to anger and confrontation, definitely passed through the higher functions but it was not the ponderous amble described above.

This was more like rational thinking being overwhelmed by point blank ignorance and simply defaulting back to basics. Interesting no? Well don't worry, we can tie these ideas back into the real world to give them some more earthy credentials.

Take your traditional left and right wings of politics. It could be argued that the reactionary right demonstrate use of the first route described. Straight to passionate action without wasting cognitive time. What's left, is the left: Careful consideration leading to considered outrage at first but then frustration at the inability to communicate with the right leading to the defaulting to passionate action.

Just idle thoughts from a tired mind but. Looking at yet more highly emotionally charged and horrific shit kicking off in the world however maybe some more time spent thinking about how people are driven to the actions they take wouldn't be such a bad thing.