I am sitting at Souvlaki George just offside of the Loyola Campus. 
I’ve been here no more than 2 times prior to this during my lifetime,
and in all honesty, had forgotten about it until now.  Once was during
CEGEP, when my ex was participating in a talent show here with a music
arranemgnet she had composed with friends (this was before I started
going out with her).  The other time, even further back, was back in
High School, when I was in band– I was newly promoted as the First
Chair for the percussionists in my high school band, and it was at
Loyola’s Oscar Peterson hall that I first managed the percussion team–
we took home a gold, and I got compliments from the band director
because I managed to improvise repairs on equipment that was badly
damaged (read: sabotage by previous competitors– the music world is a
highly cut throat industry, even for high schoolers it seemed) with
nothing but a pair of drumsticks, duct tape, a Gerber ‘multi-pliers’
and a hammer.

At the time of that competition I remember thinking, “What the fuck is
with this Loyla Campus place? This is a university? There’s no godddam
place to eat!” So my bandmates and I used a wide spread forager/hunter
formation, covered as much ground as we could in search of affordable
food (note that Loyla Campus food wasn’t, and still isn’t, affordable,
which i find is just lame).

And thus begins the tale of George’s Souvlaki.

This place looks exactly the same way that it did back like … wow, has it already been almost ten years?

The the place has got that blue and white motif going, and the walls
are randomly host to the fadded newspaper clippings with pictures of
the smiling owners, doing what they do best.  There’s a profile
portrait of someone of the wall in oil, and I don’t know who it is, but
he must be someone that this place loved.

I look at places like this and it gives me, in a very simple yet
profound way, a tang of inspiration.  I want to start my own business
some day… Sure, I own the racket store right now and the club.  But i
mean, something official, something real.  I want a peice of land to
myself and my family, something I can pass on to my kids when I finally
get around to having them.  The thing that’s always turned me off is
that when you spend so much time downtown, you realize that nothing is
forever– if you close down, someone will replace you, someone will
goble up every bit of every trace that you ever stood there.

I remember when I was young and my dad used to work at Eatons– I loved
going to Eatons downtown.  I could spend the afternoon with Al, who
worked in the piano department– that was before my parents surprised
my sister and I one day with a piano of our own.  It was expensive.  I
don’t remember how expensive– and if I asked my parents now, they’d
never tell me how expensive.  When I got older I’d be in the toy
department– which, back in the day at Eatons, was the entire floor.
There was a mini Lego department, there were those stands where you
could try out the all new Tetris that came with the all new Game Boy.

But all that remains of Eatons now are it’s hollowed out innards– gone
are the employees who worked their departments like their family
businesses, and who knew everything– just by how much the note of a
piano was off, or who could guess your measurements just by looking at
you over a pair of steel rimmed glasses.

Gone is all that– replaced by more clothing stores, more electronics
boutiques– the same old franchises, just with different jockeys riding
cash and shotgun as the predator who greets you with the fake smile,
judging from the way you dress just how likely you are to spend your
dime.

But then I see Souvlaki George.

Some simple things do endure.

My master plan is, to someday, after I’ve gotten somehow tired of
bouncing around the globe teaching english (or just making a general
nuissance of myself) is to open up a gym maybe.  I want to open
something where people can sit down, and I can get to know them, and
they can get to know me.

For what is life but for connections?  What is business but a tool by which people interact?

There’s got to be more to it than the uniforms, the name tags, the
income tax and next week’s shipment.  Many businesses have lost the
touch of artistry that the original owners or creators had in mind.

It can be done differently.

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The Context of the Tactics (Redux)

On the subject of “Everything you Got”

Prima facie, the idea of giving it everything you got sounds like a
good idea.  This is, after all, all the entire Rocky series was
about. And if anyone is a champion, it’s Rocky.

However– there’s something to be said, once again, about context in
which we apply this maxim.  “Everything you Got” in some
historical cases mean maryrdom, or final self-sacrifice.  While in
many cases this was the only way, in a lot of cases the glorification
after the fact is for the wrong reasons.  Is dying for a cause the
most important thing?  Or is the dying the symbolic thing?

So i put the question forther– who gets more done?  The one who
symbolizes something in death, in that last ditch defiance?  Or is
it the person who keeps on suffering, and keeps on going?

There’s no way you could have seen it coming, but I’m about to compare Jeezus ideals to Solid Snake.

JC’s death was a matter of symbolism, in my opinion.  It’s
effectiveness relies on the propogation of the story of the
events.  Without the story, there is no effect.  A martyr who
dies without an audience loses much of his / her effect, in terms of
pure quantity.  And then you have someone like Solid Snake, from
the MGS1 or MGS2, or plain old Snake from MGS3.  Snake in these
serieses never dies– he get shot, he gets abused, he get betrayed by
his own government, he loses an eye, undergoes electrocution, stabbing,
bone breaking– you name it.  If it hurts, he’s been forced to
endure it.

Now, the difference in the situation is that Jesus was no Solid
Snake.  He’s of the pacifist sort.  The movement that he
pioneered was all about that sort of approach– to confront adversity
with everything within the limits of intelectual civility.  He was
a man with a mission– and part of that mission was to die.

Snake, on the other hand, was to save the world only by living.

Now, set aside for the moment that Snake is a fictional video game
character with over a million copies of his various games sold. 
That doesn’t weigh much against the trillions of copies of the new
testament, i’m sure.  But I’m talking theory.

---

Let me get one thing straight. Both Jesus and Snake are heroes in my book.

---

What I question is not the role models or their methods but OUR real motivations in our emulations of these models and methods.

If you give it everything you got– past the point of no return– are
you really doing it because you are on a mission like jesus?  OR,
in honesty, are you giving it all you got because you want to be the
martyr?  Because you want to be a hero?  Because you want to
go down dramatically?

---

Very few of us are kamikaze in the sense of actually taking our lives
for a greater sort of good, regardless of the purity of our
intentions.  But lets try to apply this to the mechanics of
everyday life nonetheless.

---

Today, it’s called ‘self-victimization’ and is usually used by
‘attention-whores’, though sometimes it’s used less maliciously in the
case of people who have a penchant for flare and flourish.  These
are the kinds of people who almost seem to orchestrate bad situations
for themselves if only so that they can say that they are in them, and
get some sympathy.

If you are one of these people, i command you to tape a kick me sign to
your ass right now.  Put a pre-requisite of size 15 boots, because
you deserve it.

Other people are sorta ‘hero’ types but are a lot less pre-meditated–
these kinds of people are often even very friendly people, and very
outgoing.  These may even be really fun people.

But the limitation of ‘give it everything you got’ is that sometimes,
if you’re not efficient about how you expend your energy, you don’t
survive the first round.

---

The antithesis of ‘give it everything’ isn’t necessarily ‘don’t bother’ but rather, ‘be reserved’.

This means you chose your battles– it doesn’t make you a coward to not
give it everything in some cases, because sometimes, getting into one
fight will get you so tied up that you wouldn’t be able to win two
others.

While the glory of the all out win is there– just where do your priorities lie?  And where should the glory be?

Should it go to the person who gave it their all in that one burst and
burned out that fast, or the one who more efficiently got more overal
done by working it by the books, conservative, safe, and for a greater
good?

Does martyrdom, or zeal that gets you that shining moment really worth it?  Or is it more important to see the big picture?

---

Tangent.

Maybe I’m not making a fair comparison.  Because Jesus’ effect was
mostly ‘theoretical’ in principality– he didn’t stop nuclear
holocaust.  But what he did was seed something in others that
allowed them to propogate their own benevolence, that could be passed
on.  On the other hand, Snake will go down as the unknown hero–
the everyday man doesn’t know what Snake suffered through (and
continues to suffer through in old age in the upcoming MGS4) and yet,
if it weren’t for him in the background, the world we know might not
exist.

So perhaps the contrast i’m trying to make is also between the ‘popular
hero’ and the ‘silent hero’. And the thing I’m trying to point out
about the context of “giving it your all” is between difining ‘your
all’ as a set, final burst of effort, or as a commitment to a longer,
perhaps less glorious suffering for a greater good.

What do you think?

That was written in one huge blurb without stopping so if it doesn’t make sense, that’s quite possible.

---

Random thoughts:  Pride versus Practicality?

The Elixer

Here’s an interesting thing I feel like trying with my phone.

---

Yesterday’s badminton was quite intense.  Not any particularly difficult or challenging games (‘cept for singles at the end against Vittek) but I played enough that I was frikking exhausted.  My day yesterday began at about 4am, when my brain decided to pre-empt my alarm clock and wake me up about a half hour early to get ready for work.  From then on, worked until 2:30pm, then shuttled myself down to RsM for a day of more or less non-stop playing.

It was interesting on another level because I met a new guy finally, who I had previously had a somewhat lengthy phone conversation with, who I invted to come and try out the club. Fred and his son James.  Fred’s an older guy, but he seems pretty cool as a parent.  He’s trying to encourage his son to take up badminton, and we started having a discussion about things.  So I saw all those things– you know, the way a Dad is sorta pushing the kid, and the kit is a bit intimidated and maybe even a bit disinterested, but he’s working because he wants to proove something. It was kinda funny because he started discussing parenting with me, and how to deal with kids, and education and whatnot, but not in a sense that he was lecturing me… in fact, he was talking to me as if I was an equal, which was flattering.  Apparently I have a ‘reputation’ as being somewhat of a community guy or an educator, which is the first time I heard it from a badminton playing father. I say this is out of the ordinary because there’s a good share of badminton people who know of either me, the club, or my store directly or indirectly– but he’s a father first and a badminton player second, and I don’t get many random dads asking me for advince on how to get their kids on the ‘right path’.  Respectfully I had to point out that I don’t have any kids and I quoted some sorta maxim about how “75% of dad’s find out that parenting is harder than they thought and that 80% of dads find it’s more rewarding than they predicted.”  Yadda yadda.

---

Back to now. I’m at work, sorta aching in a chair.

Yesterday played not so intensely, but very very longly.  I mean, I played a lot, and so it wasn’t a question of too much energy in one place but playing for perhaps too long– it was really an endurance test.

After badminton I had a crazy fierce craving for fuel, so when I got home, I proceeded to eat three servings of dinner, half a litre of rootbeer, two bowls of soup and a bannana.  Then I got in bed and fell unconcious.

---

Headache is coming back. I’m off to do my rounds, then I’ll see if perhaps I can sneak in a nap somewhere.

Reminiscent of Black Mesa

Today is the first time I wear an issue white lab coat everywhere I go
about at work.  At first, the prospect of  having a lab coat
seemed empowering– makes me look professional and all that.

I have actually noticed that somehow, people are paying more attention
to me.  Someone even said “I mistook you for a doctor!”

Although, looking in the mirror, it looks terrible and I rather doubt
I’d wear this thing now for any reason other than to keep my day
clothes as clean as possible.  I feel like I’m dressed like
medical staff, but not in a good way– maybe it’s from playing too many
videogames where lab scientists wearing the exact same labcoat as me
usually end up as mutant food.

 
(Dressed to kill or be killed?)

Because I can’t sleep….

Let me tell you something about fear.

Fear is a force.  A scalar quantity.  It is not a source of
power– but it is a motivation, a quantity of je ne sais quoi that you
throw down on the floor like a broken compass.  It points the way,
and that’s the way you dance..

It is what can keep you in bed.  Or it is what can get you out of bed every day.

Those who fear too much are paralyzed.  Yet those who are numb to fear are the first to die.

And so what is fear?  What is fear but an inability to
understand?  Is fear just discomfort squared?  Or is it the
feeling of being born again, of being faced with something totally new?

Or is fear something that we have already seen, that we know has happened, and that can happen again?

And yet, to work with a certain amount of fear is to become stronger.

We cannot fight fear– because once you’ve become fearless, you are as
good as dead– and yet, if you cannot master your fear, then you cannot
live as you should.

So what’s the solution?

---

Absolutism is a lie– the only absolute truth is the fact that nothing is absolute.

And so yes, even fear can be your ally.

---

As I often say… run and gun.

It’s alright to be afraid– and those that say they are truly fearless
are lying. Those who you think are fearless aren’t always. 
Everyone is human after all.  Run and gun. 

You have to play Final Fantasy Tactics Advance to get it

ho ho ho. i just caught my superior playing solitaire in her office. this gives me at least one “get out of jail free” card in the event that she ever catches me slacking off.

 

---

 

   Zanshin : Huh.

   Zanshin : So…  your fears are ranked something like this: Acid > Knives > Heights > Guns.

  Jinryu : it just looks EXTRA painful

Zanshin nods at Jinryu.

  Jinryu : yeah.

  Jinryu : no wait.

  Jinryu : Acid > drowning (but not water in itself) > knives > heights > guns >fire >wild animals

   Zanshin : I assume you mean wild predators.

  Jinryu : zombies are all the way at the bottom. i eat zombies for breakfast.

  Jinryu : indeed

   Zanshin : …and yet you spend, proportionally, the *most* time on zombies.

  Jinryu : sigh.

  Jinryu : well, i can’t do anything about acid right.

   Zanshin : Well, you could carry two flasks with you.

  Jinryu : what am i gonna do? wear an acid-proof suit and get gift certificates for cosmetic surgery?

   Zanshin : One filled with a powerful acid, and one filled with a powerful base.

  Jinryu : bring aloe vera with me all the time

   Zanshin : If you’re in the presence of an acid, chuck the flask filled with alkalines at it.

   Zanshin : Vice versa for alkalines.

Zanshin . o O ( What if a witch comes at you, *with* a dog? )

  Jinryu : what do you mean?

  Jinryu : is it an acid witch?

   Zanshin : It’s a penny arcade reference.

   Zanshin : Tycho carries a box that can scare either witches, or dogs, depending on the setting.

  Jinryu : oh right.

  Jinryu : i remember now.

  Jinryu : otherwise though– he’s fucked.

Zanshin nods.

  Jinryu : so, technically, my nightmare would be a zombie dog who is on fire, can use guns, who is battling me on a high place, who may have a bladed secondary weapon, and we this high place is a bridge above a very deep body of water. and the zombie’s blood is acid.

   Zanshin : So…  acid-blooded zombie dog-man.

   Zanshin : Who is fighting with a bayonet-equipped gun.

  Jinryu : isn’t that fucking scary?

   Zanshin : Frankly, virtually any individual element of that is already bothersome.

   Zanshin : (Read: terrifying.)

   Zanshin : Well, except for the drowning.  I enjoy swimming.

  Jinryu : so we are in agreement.

  Jinryu : i’m sure you enjoy swimming. as do I. no one enjoys drowning though.

   Zanshin : I’m also not really afraid of heights anymore.

  Jinryu : know what i love about my mog theif, he can run up to someone’s face and STEAL their weapon right out of their hands with 75% probability of success.

  Jinryu : i might be afraid of mogs if they weren’t so cute.

   Zanshin : Heh.

  Jinryu : oh brave little mog. look at him– he’s gotten himself surrounded by a gang of bangaa gladiators and human warriors!

  Jinryu : they’re all trying to use beatdown on him, but, fortunately, he’s stolen all their weapons

   Zanshin : Nice.

  Jinryu : so basically they’re punching at him while he counters by stabbing them in the leg

  Jinryu : that’s so adorable.

I have worked very hard to get where I am in life.

So I find it kinda ironic when people on my team tell me that if I want
to improove, I’m going to have to specifically train, things like
drills and stuff. I know that.  Come on.  You’re telling this
to a guy who used to spend like 3 hours a day, 5 days a week either at
the gym, in a ring or on the mats.

General information like “train more” doesn’t help me.  I want
specifics about tactics and positioning– the technical training,
strokes, footwork, etc, is no one’s job but my own, there’s nothing
that they can do to help me in that respect.  But I suppose it’s
perfectly understandable.  In the eyes of most at my club, the sad
truth is that I’m a beginner.

Lack of time gets annoying in that respect– I don’t have the time to
train.  And it would be nice to keep up with the others, or play
at their level, but fact of the matter is that no matter how much i
learn tactics or positions, if my basic technical skills are not up to
par, there is little I can do to keep the pace.  Mental toughness
helps i suppose, but sigh.

Would I spend more time on badminton, had I a choice?

My unfortunate answer is probably no– there are other things in life
that need my attention too, so as it stands, badminton is a luxury for
me.  I am, unfortunately, just the weekend warrior.

The problem with badminton is that it requires a court to train. 
When it was martial arts, I could just train on my own– I could do so
every day and at my leisure.  Badminton is an arranged sport– you
have to wait for the circumstances to align like the moons.  Court
space. Training partner.  Free time.  Restedness.  Etc.

It’s just so damn complicated to find time to play.

But I guess if it was that important to me, I’d find time to play, wouldn’t I?

---

Tonight was a prime example of all that.  RsM beat the YMHA
17-1… that one game that we lost was one of mine, a mixed game that I
played.  The terrible part was that my partner and I were leading
11-0, and the opponents made a comeback and actually beat us. 
That was just bloody embarassing.

But you know, I can’t say I’m all that surprised– I simply don’t play
or train mixed nearly enough. It’s as if I’m falling back to basics
everytime I come into a mixed game– I play mixed games perhaps once a
month, and that’s just for LBA games.  Everytime there’s a league
game it’s something totally new right there and then– I just don’t
have the experience.

On one hand, I am quite happy that I won my other 5/6 games.  The
YMHA is the team that beat my partner and I for all the mens doubles
games the last time.  This time, the tables turned– my partner
and I beat them all the mens doubles games.

---

I think a crossroads lies in front of me.

I think i’ve reached a point where my game is not going to
improove.  It’s a point where I have as many tactics and positions
and maneuvers as I can possibly have, coupled with infinite willpower
to win– but it’s not enough.  The weakest link, is, as always, a
technical one.  I don’t have the technical ability to back up what
I want to do with the bird, and it frustrates me.  Think of it as
having spider sense, but not being fast enough to dodge the pie coming
to hit you in the back of the head anyway. Or seeing that million
dollar lotto ticket that flew out of someone’s hand that no one else
sees– but being unable to get to it.  The awareness, I think, is
there– the ability to capitalize is not.

The chain follows– I need to practice more, but I don’t have time, and I cannot make any more time. Sigh.

---

Now, this may all sound that I’m depressed with my performance. 
Incredibly, no, I’m not– because I can make the logical link.  My
performance is a direct result of my training practices… and as such,
I expect no more than what I put into it, which isn’t much.

I suppose the only thing now, now that I’ve exhausted the evolution of
my other domains of badminton skills, is just to train my damn
techniques. Sigh. How tedious that sounds.

But I guess, I owe it to myself, and I owe it to my team.

Rereading what I just wrote… I am no stranger to hard work.  But
then, perhaps I do deserve to have my teammates tell me to practice
more– after all, knowing what hard work is and not doing it is just
hipocrisy right?  Sigh.

So lets get this on with.

---

The beauty of writing is that if you write xangas the way I do, it’s a
very linear process.  I very rarely edit the beginning of my
xangas, everthing just comes out as a chronological blurb of thought as
I write it.  It helps me to place myself, really– so when I do
reread it, from start to finish and to my current though, the process
actually helps me sort out what I really think.  It helps me calm
down.

I was pretty pissed for various reasons before and after the games
today, and i might’ve written about that… but it seems that a little
tour of MSN and chitchats here and there, and being able to write down
my thoughts, well, it’s sorta made the problem just dissasemble into
parts that aren’t actually problematic.

If that makes sense.

---

So, i’ve proceeded from slightly frustrated and annoyed to feeling, okay. I’m gonna do this.

Damn, if I’m not superman, i don’t know who is!

All you gotta be: The contradictions of the self

There is a lot of power in words, and this is whether you are an
english major or not.  There’s a lot of power in words because
language is one of the most fundamental things that we take
forgranted– it is our method of communication.

The big contradictions come when we start beleiving in
definitions.  In general, for example, in western thought there is
the idea that having ‘nothingness’ means something negatie.  The
connotations are generally that to have ‘nothingness’ is to have
‘nothing’, and to have ‘nothing’ is to be poor and unfortunate, or at
best, ‘lacking’.  Things are often described in terms of
abundance.  An abundance of wealth, hope, faith, good health and
fame are a few to name.  In eastern thought though, the words for
nothingness from culture to culre vary in importance– because
nothingness is also associated with those broad (and in my opinion, now
abused) concepts, such as tranquility and simplicity.

I’m digressing.

My point is that though we use language as a communication tool– and
more.  When we get used to certain definitions for words, we,
after the fact of describing ourselves loosely and broadly, actually
begin to subconciously act within whatever definitions we’ve fabricated
for ourselves.  This is bad enough to begin with– it is bad
enough that we are limited by our physical bodies.  Worse still
then, and woe to he who is limited by their own perceptions.

Worse still if we have ‘wrong’ definitions, not only of ourselves, but of the terms by which we want to describe ourselves!

The real moral of the chicken and the egg has nothing to do with who
came first– but that we are circulating beings.  It is, in some
sense, a closed circle– in other senses, it’s like the creation of a
bagel, where the circle is constantly being reformed. Bits can be added
on, bits may fall off– but all the while, the kneading process changes
that whole by the second, and there is no real end.

The only thing with an end is a moment in time.

I look at the Olympics and it’s a perfect example– people talk about
the dissapointment of getting 10th place here or even 4th place. 
But this is because as a society we have collectively decided to agree
that there are only three kinds of medals, and that everyone else is
just in the background.  The fact of the matter is that despite
‘low rankings’ in the olympics, most of these athletes could kick your
ass at whatever it is that they do.  How high or how far from the
podium one stands depends, yes, on how the game was played– but more
importantly, how the game was played that day.

And so the emphasis, I think, cannot necessarily be the accordance of
fame to moments, or even a 90 minute game.  No, excellence is not
demonstrated in a game, or even a few– it is demonstrated on our
lives, every day.

Because if we cannot be content with doing our best at every moment,
then we cannot honestly say, without hipocrisy or contradiction, that
we deserve to be ‘the best’.  Just what is ‘the best’?  Is
the best the one who beats everyone else, or is the best everything
that you could have done for yourself?  Are we so petty that we
must rely on the failure of others for our own demonstrated strength?

---

If you are dynamic… in a sense, if you just constantly strive to grow, then this is all you gotta be.

A lot of people defeat themselves– it is true.  There are some of
us who will never become olympic athletes no matter how hard we
try.  There are many of us who will not attain our dreams. 
There are many of us who will fail, who will live lives of regret.

But that doesn’t have to be the case.  I am not saying “lower your
standards”.  What I am saying is set yourselves incremental
goals– you need to know that every now and then, you are
succeeding.  What I am saying is not to fall into the definitions
of others– do something, be someone because it is who you are and not
because you have decided to do or to be.

Existence isn’t a concious act, neither is honesty to oneself.  It’s deceit that takes effort.

---

 
It has been one of the constant occupations of my mind to consider just
what ‘being the best’ means.  After all– I’m no world class
anything.  But these are definitions extraneous of my being. 
The only thing I can really be good at, the thing that i have the best
potential of becoming, is myself.

---

Aren’t we ourselves by default?

Nope.

I’ll leave you to think about that.

---

We do not become champions by striving to be champions.  We do our
best, and then, when we stop caring, when we have truly worked out or
hearts in good cause and lay exhausted on the field, the champions become us.

---

Edit: I was browsing the web to add things to my ever expanding arsenal
of anti-zombie purchases, and so I put it before you before deciding:

Do you think Christopher Walkin (shown here in action, a-la-Walkin’-Walkin) would make a fine or terrible addition to my Zombie-Invasion Survival Team?

Is he the proverbial weapon of choice?

Chewing

CDL vs. RsM: The Stupidity Continues.

A while back, I mentioned a badminton team called CDL.  The first
time, when we went to visit them, they didn’t have enough players and
forfeit.  The second time, which was a rematch we offered them for
the first time, they showed up and we slaughtered them 17-0 because
they sent a team of squash player to play us.  We would have had
18-0, but I didn’t count that last game that they just forfeited
because they ran away.

---

We had a game scheduled against CDL this weekend.  They forfeited in advance.

Now, this isn’t an official RsM publication, so I can say whatever i
bloody well please.  But I hate CDL.  I hate the fact that a
bunch of assholes with money who can open up a beautiful gym and who
always try to put down my club cannot put their money where their mouth
is.  Or, I guess that’s not fair of me– there’s nothing wrong
with squash players, nor squash players subbing in for badminton
players. THey were all nice people.  Once again, it’s the
management.

---

When you enter your club into a league, it’s a contract of sorts. 
It’s a contract that says that you are entering this league because you
are prepared to fight.  You enter into higher divisions because
you think you can take the challenge, and because you want to better
yourselves either as weekend warriors, casual athletes, or just as
human beings.

But, I am under the impression that since CDL (Clube Sportif
Cote-De-Liesse) just opened their badminton department, they only
entered an LBA team into the league as a formality, sorta like an
advertising ploy to get their name on the League’s website.

I find that despicable.

I do particularly remember an instance when, when CDL came to RsM for
the rematch that we so graciously offered them, that the CDL manager
said to me “Wow.  Your gym is so… outdated.  We should have
played at CDL.”

At that very point, my mind aborted itself to the astral plane where it
was murdering that man over and over.  I don’t mean killing him,
resurrecting him then killing him again– I just mean killing him more dead every
time.  First of all– We were playing this rematch because you
were too much of a terrible manager to have your team ready when we
carted our team across the island to play you, and this rematch is only
because we don’t feel like winning games by default.  Secondly–
what right do you have to come to my gym and tell me that my facilities
suck?

I can take criticism pretty well.  But the fact of the matter is
that it’s not criticism if it’s obvios– RsM is not the nicest gym on
the block.  But there are worse.  That’s not even so bad–
everyone talks about opinions when they visit another club, it’s part
of evaluating factors that might give the home team an advantage.

But then he went the final straw, and he started talking to some of my
players trying to get them to Try Out CDL’s Gym, And Their
Comparitively Superior Facilities.

---

So right, about this weekend’s ‘forfeit in advance’.

While it is true– there is no point in playing against vastly stronger
opponents (at a certain skill gap, you just won’t learn anything), I am
needless to say not impressed.

On one hand, I’m grateful that they don’t show up– I won’t have to
make small-talk with their manager (I’m exceedingly polite when it
comes to business, even if my ID keeps on showing me these violent
flash cards on the sides as suggestions) and I’ll be able to have some
actual court time for my own players.

---

Seriously though– CDL does have a pretty nice gym.  It’s clean,
it’s spacious, they have at least twice as many courts as RsM. 
But still.  Where are your players?  Where is your
team?  Where is your self-respect?

Why are you even in the sports industry if you do not understand the basics of a sportsman’s spirit?

It is not in my nature to be violent, but there are times when I do
wish that this were not badminton, and that this was kickboxing, and
that I could take their manager in the ring and drag out his existance
for a few rounds.

But this is the worst kind of frustration– the kind where nothing you
do, including beating up the source of your frustration, will make you
feel better. In fact, it would likely make you feel guilty.

No, the only way to deal a problem in humanity is not to fight
it.  Sometimes you can fix it– sometimes you can’t.  So all
you can do is let it go, and not let it drag you down.

And everytime a human does this, the bottom border of humanity drops by that much.

I need a hero

  Zanshin : Chuck Norris has never written a book. He simply stares at a blank page until the words assemble themselves out of fear.

  Jinryu : When Chuck Norris has sex with a man, it is not because he is gay, but because he has run out of women.

  Jinryu : Chuck
Norris’s girlfriend once asked him how much wood a woodchuck could
chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood. He then shouted, “HOW DARE YOU
RHYME IN THE PRESENCE OF CHUCK NORRIS!” and ripped out her throat.
Holding his girlfriend’s bloody throat in his hand he bellowed, “Don’t
fuck with Chuck!” Two years and five months later he realized the irony
of this statement and laughed so hard that anyone within a hundred mile
radius of the blast went deaf.

   Zanshin : Heh.

   Zanshin : Uhhh.

  Jinryu : We could have a Chuck Norris awesome-a-thon.

  Jinryu : What else you got?

   Zanshin : The chief export of Chuck Norris is pain.

  Jinryu : If you can see Chuck Norris, he can see you. If you can’t see Chuck Norris, you may be only seconds away from death.

   Zanshin : When the boogeyman goes to sleep, he checks the closet for Chuck Norris.

  Jinryu : When
Chuck Norris plays Oregon Trail his family does not die from cholera or
dysentery, but rather roundhouse kicks to the face. He also requires no
wagon, since he carries the oxen, axels, and buffalo meat on his back.
He always makes it to Oregon before you.

  Jinryu : *ALWAYS*.

   Zanshin : If Chuck Norris ever had to fight himself, he would win.  ALWAYS.

  Jinryu : To
prove it isn’t that big of a deal to beat cancer. Chuck Norris smoked
15 cartons of cigarettes a day for 2 years and aquired 7 different
kinds of cancer only to rid them from his body by flexing for 30
minutes.

  Jinryu : Beat that, Lance Armstrong.

   Zanshin : Chuck Norris can turn diamonds back into coal, simply by tugging on both ends at once.

  Jinryu : Scientists
used to believe that diamond was the world’s hardest substance. But
then they met Chuck Norris, who gave them a roundhouse kick to the face
so hard, and with so much heat and pressure, that the scientists turned
into artificial Chuck Norris.

   Zanshin : Brokeback Mountain is more than a movie.  It’s also what Chuck Norris calls the pile of dead ninja on his front lawn.

You laugh.

  Jinryu : One
time while sparring with Wolverine, Chuck Norris accidentally lost his
left testicle. You might be familiar with it to this very day by its
technical term: Jupiter.

I was watching the Olypics for hockey yesterday, Slovakia vs.
Russia.  I’m not actually much of a hockey fan. In fact, it’s the
first time I’ve ever watched an entire game of hockey in all my
life.  But it was actually pretty fun.  My girlfriend was,
all the while, explaining terms which I didn’t under stand such as
“hooking” and “power play”.

I had often dimissed hockey as a worthwhile sport because every time I
heard about it, it was either for the NHL lockout, or those times when
hockey dads accidentally punch eachother to death, or when some play
chops some guy in in the throat with his stick.

But I wonder what small kids beleive in nowaday.  I haven’t been
the the library since i stopped working there– used to be tons of kids
there, or at the petstore where I worked at before that.  Now that
I work with a hospital, I feel i’m losing touch with small, bite sized
children, since all I deal with are people on the opposite end of the
age spectrum, barring some of my co-workers who are a few years older
than me.

So what is it? Harry Potter? Totally Spies?

When I was a kid, I wanted to be a Jedi.

But what now?

Maybe i’m thinking too much in a commercial sense, in a sense of
someone with ‘cool abilities’.  What about leader figures then?
People have been pointing at Lance Armstrong as of late. Dunno. 

I’m not sure if I have heroes– and maybe this is a good thing. 
But a good example is always nice, cause we all wonder if there’s a
‘better way’ at times.