It’s Friday and it’s some kind of festive season

Merry Thingmas, everyone! I hope you all receive the things for which you wish. That’s what a happy consumerist society is all about, right?

I’m afraid we don’t have anything delicious and of substance to offer you right now. At the moment half of our loyal Arcadian militia is in the process of moving house, and the rest of us are drunk and lazy or something. Which, when you get right down to it, is what I think the spirit of Saint Nickmas is all about.

But that said: in the absence of Big Ideas and Incisive Commentary, how about a spot of Conversation? There are exciting things going on right now, that’s for sure. 2011 has been an exciting year for the world in general – the Arab Spring, for example, or Western spending cuts coming to a series of increasingly terrifying impasses, or wikileaks exploding into an incomprehensible morass of publicity. And as for the gaming world, well. I’m sure I don’t need to remind you all of just what has gone on this year. That’s what eggnog is for, right?

But here’s one thing: most of the big retailers are in the process of slashing prices to the point where they collapse the gaming market through total over-saturation; are you enjoying that? My favourite thing over the last few days has been trying to achieve the objectives set by Steam in order to win free shit. Or vouchers. Or coal. Or an accomplished sense of not having wasted one’s time. And is that not what the disgustingly racist season of Zwarte Pete is all about?

In all sincerity, I’m chock-full of holidaylicious spirit thanks to the knowledge that, over the past nine months, Arcadian Rhythms has gone from an upstart nothing to a moderately-read website with a regular selection of contributors and commentators. It provides me with a genuinely warm feeling to know that we have managed to use our platform to strike up a variety of conversations with everyone who reads the site regularly; it’s a sense of community that drives the best of the web’s offerings, and that we’ve been able to provide that – even in microcosm – is a source of great joy for me. And isn’t that what the Grinch always likes to steal?

So please, tell me what you’ve got planned for the rest of the festive season. Are you going to finally finish Skyrim? Are you busting out some classics you’ve always meant to finish? Are you abstaining from the sales and working through your backlog? Is there an idea that’s wormed its way into your brainpan and just won’t get out until it breeds? Please share your thoughts and let’s get talking… if only because I’m spending a week with my family and I crave–no, need–some scintillating interwebs conversation to get me through it. And isn’t that what an isolated Winter Solstice is all about?

(And if you’re off the mindset that demands that most delicious flavour of content which we have been known to offer… then don’t you worry. Our forthcoming line-up includes a post on Skyrim which we sincerely hope won’t tread the same ground you’ve already seen walked a thousand times before as well as a bumper update covering just how wrong/right we were with our preview of 2011’s upcoming titles all the way back at the start of the year. 2012 will be a great year for AR – not just our first anniversary but the year in which we begin to stride. Be around.)

((And if you’re off the mindset that craves excitement in your blogging reading, how about moseying over to friends-and-allies Electron Dance? There is some seriously weird shit going on there… some kind of alien takeover, if I %%TRANSMISSION INTERPOLATED; NODE AGGREGATED. 762AR198ZZ-ADDtn: EMBRACE NEW ORTHODOXY. REDIRECTION: ESTABLISHED RALLY POINT. EMG DIRECTIVE TERMINATES%%))