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Wednesday, July 19th, 2006
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9:25 am - the golf of love...
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what a week....
Monday - Golf
Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday - Work
Friday - Golf
That is my kind of week.....
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rockstar: Supernova = good show
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i find some days i'm old.... working, living with my fiancee, having a fiancee, planning to get married... eeeshk
and then other days i'm dancing around my living room laughing at jokes about poop.... and i think, ahhhhhh, this is what life should always be like....
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amy and i are going to start to play tennis.... we have 2 courts at our building and last night was match 1... she suggested we take lessons, and right away i got defensive... "let me get back to where i used to be..." i said... and she called me on it. actually, she called MEN on it.... being afraid to look silly.... and she's right.... i don't want to take a lesson now, because i'm not good enough to learn from someone who is really good...
i don't get MEN..... why can't we just take a lesson in humility and a lesson in tennis
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back to work?
back to work.
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(comment on this)
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| Wednesday, July 12th, 2006
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2:11 pm - Thanks be to....
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Brad, for saying my office is Zen. By linking to my journal, I saw how apathetic I have been in regards to it, and this is hopefully (for real this time?) a starting over.
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Jared, for writing again about his life in Halifax and his Jared-isms.... (Kolb, the owner of Stir it up! in Brantford wanted your name, to pass onto her niece, who you will never run into in Halifax, but just may be looking for you! Ha!)
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Rob, for his environmental crusade of December 04?05? when travel mugs replaced coffee cups and the world was a better place. I fell off the wagon for a while (and luckily there were lots of paper cups to cushion my fall) but I'm back and I'm proudly carrying my Laurier Brantford travel mug.... coffee, environmental responsiveness and advertising? what a combo
Rob again, for his appreciation of bad gifts mailed by the big brown machine... and his attempt to eat 14 year old gum...
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Amy, for being there when I get home, when I go to bed and when I wake up.....
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Sophie, for being the best cat in the world by not waking me up at 5:18 am to cuddle, but rather doing so to Amy....
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| Wednesday, May 31st, 2006
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8:27 am - sorry.... had to take that call
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hello. yes, its me. i'm back. a minor delay my friends. and now, i have the option of trying to recapture all the unwritten thoughts from the past week?month?year?
instead, i will say the heat is oppressive.
the packing to move is exhausting.
couches are not meant to be purchased.
movers are living in their own society.
the future of university is in the hands of people with email addresses like hot_lipps69@hotmail.com and bubble__buttz17@gmail.com and i'm scared.
the words are slowly coming back to me.
things need to be said.
but not now.
work calls.
8:30 a.m.
time to clock in.
we shall meet again.
in a dark alley.
off a dirty street.
in a dreary town.
on a damp night.
or later today.
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(comment on this)
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| Thursday, April 13th, 2006
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11:11 am
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| Tuesday, April 4th, 2006
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12:20 pm
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| Monday, April 3rd, 2006
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10:04 am - oh timmy
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| Tuesday, March 28th, 2006
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9:56 am - Writing Assignment # 3 plus
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Assignment: Please tell me about the last time you felt Utterly Content - wanting and/or needing nothing. Peaceful. Serene. Blissful.
well, to be honest, it was this weekend. i had the opportunity to spend time with the love of my life. the sun in my sky. all the cheesy lines you can think of apply here. then i got to spend time with my family, both immediate and our newly added fourth. i ran a 5k road race and raised money for healthcare. i ran the race to the best of my ability without any real training and did it well. i was impressed. my gazelle of a partner ran it beside me and exceeded any of our wildest aspirations, proving herself capable of tackling any and all challenges placed before her. the sun was shining. the pavement seemed like cushioned rubber. running into Copps and hearing people screaming, just knowing that there are people supporting you without you even knowing their name. that is peace. that is serenity. that is bliss.
but it didn't end there. another day with my best friend. another night beside her. dinner with my aunt. things just kept coming up kevin. and all the need and want and desire melted away. this weekend was more than i could have hoped for. more than i could have expected. and more than i deserved. so thank you. to the around the bay. to the people who supported the runners without knowing their names. to family. to love.
*******
i was just thinking of something else as well... as i was thinking about james loney, about harmeet singh sooden, about norman kemper, and about tom fox... the Christian Peacemaker Team members who were held captive in Iraq...
i was thinking "why would they capture Canadians? we didn't support the war. we aren't killing innocent people over there. why." and then the question became not why were they captured, but "why were they there? why do canadians risk their lives to defend people who we are not attacking?"
and then it hit me. it is not about us. it has never been about us. it is about others. not in the Edward Said sense or Other, but in the not me sense. the i have an obligation as part of this world to care about things outside of myself sense. wow. to sacrifice oneself for someone who in a way is sacrificing themselves for you. that is amazing.
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| Friday, March 24th, 2006
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12:02 pm - damn odds.....
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2/4.... alas, i'm coming back to the real world with 50/50 odds... sheesh
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| Monday, March 20th, 2006
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7:31 pm - writing assignment number 2 (with a twist)
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so, someone asked me to do another writing assignment a while ago and to be honest, i've been too busy to write and i've been dreading this one... the topic is great, the assignment is great, the actual execution is tough... so i'm spinning it a little bit
that being said, a day from the eyes of a child
I don't want to get big.It seems like big people never smile like I do when I'm watching cartoons or playing ball or when I make a funny noise from my body. They always have something on the go which seems to mean they don't have smile time.
Some scratch their head. Some say bad words that I'm not allowed to say. Some squeeze their fingers together and then run them into things. Some just don't have the energy for any of the above.
Not like me. I have lots of energy. I run all day. I eat all day. I throw the food I'm supposed to eat all day. I spill. I fall. I run into things. Things don't always go my way, but I'm still happy. I still get to be a kid.
But I know some day I'm not going to be a little kid anymore. I'm going to have to make decisions. I'm going to have to make money. I'm going to have to spend all the money I make just to live. I'm going to be away from the people I love for long periods of time. I'm going to have responsibility. I'm going to be big.
So until then, I'm going to be little. I'm going to throw food. I'm going to run into things, spill, nap, cry, smile, drool, laugh, poop, pick my nose. I'm going to enjoy it. But not all of it. I'm going to save some of it for those days when although I'm big and I have big people things to do, I still need to find a way to have fun. And be a little kid at heart.
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| Saturday, March 18th, 2006
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8:38 am
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| Wednesday, March 15th, 2006
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1:44 pm
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| Monday, March 6th, 2006
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7:51 pm - Roll up the rim to win.....
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| Thursday, February 23rd, 2006
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11:05 pm - writing assignment number 1 - for ms. wright (submitted february 23, 2006)
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the junos. that oh so canadian celebration of artists and creative mavens which light the way to cultural nirvana north of the 49th....
or not? you disagree that bands like nickelback, default, theory of a deadman, and whatever other long haired, bad-attituded group of less than talent monkeys they've churned out this week are the best we have to offer?
the best what. who is judging. who is not judging. and who cares. we are not so far removed from kelly clarkson beating paul mccartney, and people being more upset that she beat gwen stefani (don't get me started on her issues).... our society, our group consensus about art and culture comes from the masses.... mass media is a capital phenomenon, not an artistic one
so while you may doubt the validity of awarding kalen porter and chad kroeger for their apparent lack of all things artistic and talent related, look to what the event is .... a chance for ben mulrouney to get all coked up, put on his lipstick and kiss some unfortunately canadian ass in places like winnipeg for the love of pete.... isn't it bad enough we are trying to pass off lake winnipeg as the red hot canadian version of california? it is the coldest place in canada, but its hot on falcon beach? please.
culture as a whole is divided into two, very uneven, very unfair pieces. the commerical crap, which gets a big slice of the pie, makes the money and people like because they are told to. and within that slice, there are two smaller subdivisions. the crap that actually isn't bad, but is far from good. it is these pieces of culture that we feel guilty liking, but do it anyways. almost to spite that part of us that tries to regulate how snotty we are. and the rest of this subdivided crap, is the stuff that you just can't like and get up in the morning, look yourself in the mirror and go in with your lives. but you do. you must. and do you know why? because the radio plays it. you listen to the radio. you are too lazy OR your fingers are too fat OR you aren't really paying attention OR you can't believe it is really that bad, but for whatever reason you don't change it. raine maida whines to you about the latest sad story him and his band have leeched onto, and you are supposed to care, because before you gained your adult tastebuds, you ate it up and drank it down.
the other slice of the pie, the little one that you get when you are on a diet that just won't stick, and you can restrain yourself if you only have the little slice, the tiniest slice you can cut, that barely visible, highly edible piece is actual talent. served fresh, nothing tastes as good as an ARTIST playing music the WROTE, in a voice that is TRAINED about experiences they HAD. it goes for books, movies, television, conversations, photographs, presentations, arguments. it is real. its is good. and that is why people can't like it. because it is better than they can do.
i think at the base of the juno awards is something very canadian. the feeling that if we give awards and accolades to people with no discernable talent, it is like giving it to everyone.
so canada, hoist your juno proud when nickelback takes home the award for most average performance by a bunch of guys with no talent, no clue and no stylist.
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| Monday, February 20th, 2006
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7:11 pm - damn power outages
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yes, this post in a shorter, more irate incarnation was half to 5/8ths typed last week, when a freak lightning storm crashed my computer and ruined your reading pleasure
so may i present, the automatic millionaire, redux:
yes, i just read the automatic millionaire. now that i'm officially thinking for two and planning for a future, i had to turn to the experts... and my friends, the author of the automatic millionaire is that.... but not at what one might think.... while i respect mr. david bach's ideas and writing, he is not a sound financial advisor... he is a sound and talented pilfer-er and thief... you see, he stole the ideas of people who came to see him, which sounds in the book like they were showing off, which i hate.... but all he did was take their idea that they told him, wrote it down and has become a millionaire automatically (oh, the irony) by selling their idea to us, the masses while they are just living life and telling their friends, oh, that couple in the book.. that's us.... well big friggen deal... he took you to the cleaners by stealing your intellectually financially and statistically brilliant theory of applying COMMON SENSE to MONEY and sold it to the world
brilliant.
on a side note, and much happier too, i almost cried today. when i watched canada's elite women hockey players crying with pride of their accomplishment, it made me happy. and hungry. to do something better than everyone else in the world. a lofty goal to attain. but, you are what you eat. and i've got a hankering for success.
Appendix 1
this weekend, i decided i don't write enough, mostly because i can't think of anything to say things about. so i've asked amy, and now i'm asking you: give me writing assignments. ask me questions, suggest a topic. i will write about it within a short (less than a week?!?) period of time, and when complete i will move on to the next one.... sometimes even opinion needs booster cables.
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| Wednesday, February 8th, 2006
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10:17 am
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sorry that took a week.
i'm resolving not to make any more resolutions i can't keep. which seems to be most of them. for a while at least.
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(comment on this)
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10:07 am - the impoverished state of media coverage of the poor
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yesterday i listened to a reporter, who actually covers the poverty beat mind you, defend the media's coverage of poverty issues
i also listened to a poverty activist cry for more media coverage, even though more media coverage leads to the closing of loop holes in legislation that helps his organization and the thousands of people they help
the thing that stuck with me the most however, was how the journalist defended the media by saying that "we the people" don't need "them the media" to get the message out. how because of the internet explosion, people can do what i'm doing right now and get the message to the masses.... well, how many masses read the globe and mail every day? and how many people read the hamilton spectator everyday? and how many people read www.blurty.com/users/burntoshine everyday? i think you see my point. yes, i can reach a few people, who can share it with a few people, who can share it with a few people, but the globe and mail reaches all those people at once... timeliness is a buzzword in media, and the internet is a medium, and it doesn't always have that if it takes time to reach the people
with all that said, i do believe that my voice here, and yours over there (www.blurty.com/users/makeyourself) and yours (www.blurty.com/users/underthewaves) and yours (www.blurty.com/users/rollingalong) are great things. but we don't have the reach of the globe. or the spec. and that is not going to make THE BIG difference.
for more:
http://www.wlu.ca/news_detail.php?grp_id=37&nws_id=1225
and
http://www.wlu.ca/news_detail.php?grp_id=37&nws_id=1217
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| Wednesday, February 1st, 2006
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10:11 am - found this on my laptop... who wrote it?
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so i found this on my laptop a little while ago and it has been driving me crazy... because i don't remember writing it... but who knows?
As the sound starts to fade back in, he realizes he hasn’t exactly been listening for the past who knows how long. He shakes his head to rattle the dust which has settled on his frontal lobe like fresh snow. Somehow, no one notices as the glassy blinds are yanked back up over his eyes and he snaps back into reality. If you can call it reality. Sitting around a coffee shop which in its attempt to be cultural and almost European looks like the set of a movie with a $20 budget shot on a Super8. Oh shit. He realizes they are looking at him, and as the mouths start to slow down, start to come to a stop, form the words which indicate the end of their time and the passing of the conch to him for his enlightened speech bordering on diatribe which seemingly always occurs, he is left grasping for something. Like a child toeing the end of the diving board before he chickens out and just cannonballs like the other 26 times he’s been here, there is a moment of silence. The eyes of his friends start to widen as one can hear the wheel in his head turning and churning, ready to produce the hydroelectric storm of emotion which is about to rush down the banks of his head and pour out of the mouth, his mouth. As ritualistic as ever, he turns his mug so the handle faces him, he begins...
“What I think is,” he begins hesitantly. All the education one could ever want has left him structured, disciplined and essayistic in his speech. If he bothered to gather with the unintellectual this could be cause for concern, but luckily for all involved the walls to which he and his friends (ha, friends. more like classmates. acquaintances at best.) surround themselves are not for the weak of heart, nor the simple of mind.
“Well, to be honest, I’m done thinking. What I really want is to feel. To emote. To have an opinion not based on the recent briefing from the Journal of Intelligensia, not an academic opinion argued by others and regurgitated to the point of indecipherability. What I want is to actually, passionately, without reason and remorse, without thought or think, have something which stirs my soul and shakes my heart. I want to be able to affix my name, sign my seal onto something which makes people feel what I’m saying. I want to do it loud, I want to do it proud and I want it. It. I want it. Me. I. It. Me with It. Do you know? Have you ever realized that we sit around talking abstractly about things with no reality? We talk about arguments made thousands of years after arguments were made, and when, please God tell me when, was the last time had an original thought? When was the last time someone ordered a sentence with words which were new, fresh, original, different, dissimilar, huliwaking? Academia is the paper walled prison in which we are all serving life sentences waiting to be executed by the fatal flaw. Academia is the place in which we are all proud to reside, where the dominant forces within tell us we are happy and we tell the happiness we have that it is real. Nothing is real. Not our happiness, not our thoughts, not even our breaths. Everything we do has been done and everything we will become has been. It is time to step outside the ordered, programmed world which we reside, learn to walk on our hands and speak only with our feet. It is time to read not for what is hidden in the text, for what is implied and suggested but for what is not there. Rather than implicit homosexuality and latent patriarchy, let us find an explicit absence of heterosexuality and the maternal figure which has created the need to dominate her and her beliefs at every turn. It is time to realize that real is possible. That real is hiding. That real is not a simulation of the unreal. If there can be unreal, simulations of what we do posited and polished as real, than the real real is real. It exists to exist. It is hiding in hiding. Find it, hold it, love it. Be real to the real and the real will be real for real. Do not fear it, reaf it. Do not hate it, etah it. Do not forget it, tegrof it.
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| Tuesday, January 31st, 2006
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8:53 pm - what is it i do?
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a job description should be a road map of your day in a way right. it should illustrate your responsibilities and what it is they pay you for.
but it shouldn't be a road map for every day, right?
right now, i'm frenetic at work. i'm all over the place. and strangely, i like it. i like being so busy doing some very extreme things. like planning an open house. talking to people on the phone about courses. going to career fairs. writing media releases. answering e mails. updating websites. generally being busy.
my job description is broad, all encompassing and diverse. so is everyone's at laurier brantford. it is what we do. we are more than one person at other university campuses, due to the fact that we don't have 2 people in most places. we have 1.
so my day tomorrow is going to be a lot like today. except not at all. and thursday? well, don't even get me started. but as long as i go in with a smile, and leave with a smile (and some financial restitution for my work in between), what do i care what my day looks like? some day i'll look back on this as the best job i've ever had. the most unpredictable, non-routine job of my life. and then i'll get up from my desk at the same time i always do and i'll get coffee like i always do and then i'll sit back down like i always do and think about this time in my life like i always do and i'll start to cry like i always do and become bored like i always do and always always always.
do what you do when you are young, so you can remember it fondly when you are old and always.
current mood: delayed trendy (see music)
current music: The Arcade Fire (so 2005... geez)
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| Sunday, January 29th, 2006
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8:42 pm - does age equal maturity? or vice versa?
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the subject of age arose today. of mid-twenties, of old age... and i had to stop. stop and ask myself where i think i am, where i thought i'd be and where i think i'm going.
i think, therefore i am.... 26 and 3/4 years old, employed on a full-time basis in job which somedays is challenging, somedays is not and is always good to me. i have a wonderful group of friends, as spread far and wide as they may be, and a solid grasp on life, love and the pursuit of happiness.
i thought i might like to be ..... pretty much where i am. depending on how far back you go. if you want to go back to the beginning of time, the annals of my mind recall my wishes and hopes and dreams putting me a either a professional athlete or a garbageman... alas, those dreams died about the same time.... i was an amateurish amateur athlete and garbage, well, its garbage.... kudos to anyone who has the fortitude and compassion to deal with all that....
where i am slowly going crazy.... 5....4..3..2.1.. switch.... to my next life... the one where the person most important to me gets to be with me more, where we are in the employ of people who recognize we are doing them a favour by granting them our services and to more of the same... to coffee all day and thinking all night.... to books to discuss and discussions to write.... to happiness ruling all and rules being happy
so as the dawn of one year and the sunset of another come ever closer, closer, closer still, i am where i am, i be where i be, and i go where i go
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| Thursday, January 26th, 2006
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8:41 pm - bounce around like a ....
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i saw michael clemons last night. pinball if you will. he is a great speaker. off stage more than on it, when he talks about winning at life, you see someone who clearly does that everyday
he was amazing... the humour, the passion, the genuine interest and excitement for what he does, amazing... and rather than ruin pinball's talk for me and for you by trying to recreate it here, i say this
go see him. hear him. then we can talk
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