I’m feeling musical again today, but this time we’ll go for a specific song rather than an entire musical oeuvre. Our mashup of the week is “Stairway to Heaven” (original) by Led Zeppelin. Now, I’m no Led Zeppelin expert, but I read that song as describing some significantly transformative events. I’m pretty sure the lady in question is making bad, materialistic choices. And I think we have a few Tolkien references. Seems like that ought to be enough to work with. Ladies and gentlemen, start your engines.

Happily, Game WISH (original) is back. Today’s question: Talk about a few characters you had to stop playing before their stories felt finished. Where do you think they would have gone? It’s kind of a hard question, because I don’t tend to think of characters in those terms — so when I say I’d like to play Paul or Clarice more, it’s not because I think their stories were unfinished per se. It’s because I want to find out what happens next. In Paul’s case, I’d like to see him leading an adult superhero team. I’d like to find out if he can continue to be the force for good he thinks he could be. And I like playing him. In Clarice’s case, well, she’s just fun to play. I guess her story is about done; I like thinking of her hanging out in 1850 training a bunch of little genetically engineered Ascended ninjas. ...

For quite some time, England has lived with the reality of IRA terrorists who would like to see various important Brits dead. London knows a lot more about living under that sort of threat than we do. That’s a simple statement of fact; 9/11 was of much larger magnitude, but England’s been dealing with this sort of thing for decades. In all those years, they have somehow managed to keep the Prime Minister and the Queen safe without shutting down the London Underground. One wonders what sort of a cowboy is afraid of risks the Queen of England takes on a regular basis. ...

There’ve been a lot of DoD press releases (original) about deaths recently. They’re fairly abstracted, which I think is appropriate. This one (original) reports the death of Robert A. Wise of Florida. His friend Trueman, who is currently recuperating in a hospital in Germany, gives us his account of the attack which killed Specialist Wise.

Others have made this point, but it’s a good excuse to link to a funny comic, so I’m gonna make it again. Tom Tomorrow isn’t saying you don’t have the right to comment on war unless you’re enlisted or a veteran. He’s saying — well, read the second panel. “I’m waging war on the Islamofascists — on my blog!” He’s saying that’s a really stupid thing to say. Now, that might seem like hyperbole. Who says stuff like that? Perhaps the irate blogger is really meant to represent some other class of bloggers. Warbloggers in general, maybe. Maybe he’s saying all warbloggers are stupid. ...

I have a strict quota on links to Flash animations. This year, the coveted slot goes to The Elements, by Tom Lehrer. (Via Rick Jones.)

Juan Cole has the scoop on the new plan for transferring power to an Iraqi government. I could meander on but I think he nails the implications, pros, and cons.

1&1 is offering free Web hosting for three years, which certainly seems too good to be true. But hey — Metafilter confirms that it’s a valid offer. Apparently these guys are a huge European hosting company, and they want to make a splash in the US. So it seems safe to go wild.

And Larry Niven thought you’d need teleportation to get flash crowds. The Washington Post ran an article about the crowd dynamic created by cell phones. Yet another example of the information revolution hitting us in ways we don’t expect.

The Guardian lists the 40 best directors and is fairly good. David Lynch should be swapped with David Cronenberg, however. Also, Ridley Scott is missing from the list (he ought to be somewhere between 30 and 40), and Peter Jackson’s absence is wholly inexplicable.