packing up

on sunday night i watched ungrip at sq's behest. i have two things to say about it:

1. WOW. the implications are mind-bending!

2. the comments about the medical and pharmaceutical industries at the beginning demonstrate that this man knows very little about these fields and should keep his mouth shut about them. his opinions on the matter damage his credibility. there is incompetence in the industry, but everyone's working to reduce it - there's no malice and there's no conspiracy.
conventional medicine has been studying the placebo effect for years, it's not exclusively the domain of homeopathy. eating a plant-based diet, exercising properly and living in an earth-ship are all good things to do and they certainly reduce one's risk of disease dramatically, but it doesn't eliminate risk! there are genetic factors and environmental factors to contend with as well. and you might get run over by a bus.

---monday:

i tried to nap, but was too tired to really wake up. when i realized that i was sitting up and dreaming with my eyes open i put myself to bed instead.

...

it was a slow morning. i took a long walk to print the power of attorney forms, but google's printing services search failed and when i found the office it turned out to be for printing import / export. i was going to go to walmart when i remembered that i live next to a ups store, so i walked all the way back and then to there. it was cold, i was dressed warmly, my body temperature was all over the place.

the printing and the scanning were a pleasure, and i hurried back for online coffee with sq. that was the call when we agreed to go to burning man together. it must be!

i had some shopping to do, i wanted to do it at the rockland mall but stm has cancelled the 100 bus. what?! sod it, i thought, and took the metro downtown. i wasn't sure exactly where i needed to be, so instead of getting off at peel i got off at atwater and walked all the way. i entered the shop and it was christmas mayhem - i'm so proud of myself for not turning and fleeing! i found what i wanted without too much trouble (i was lucky to find assistance) and walked out feeling very brave indeed :)

i treated myself to sukiyaki lunch: how the hell do they consistently get their fast-food tofu so right?

i returned home and horseman came over for amazing tekken. there was a little trash talking, i put it down with my virtual fists.
we discussed taking pride in one's art:

1. you can't get up on stage, share your work with an audience and then say "i did it for myself". then why the hell did you get up on the stage?

2. if you're going to do something, you need to present it and present it properly. even if you know that you've got work to do to up your game. all you can do is make sure that your present work shows your best efforts, respect your audience and make sure that your following work improves upon it. don't be like phil fish who kept restarting fez every time he learned something new [i see now that he finally released it, so i just bought it. the guy deserves a break regardless! and it's on sale right now!]. or like the guys who took over the duke nukem franchise. it's better to put out what you have and then turn the improvements into a sequel. this holds as well for rhymes and painting as for games.

i headed downtown for pre-christmas drinks with the kickboxing crew. serendipity? the jolly moroccan trains in a gym across from where we were going, but had misunderstood and was on his way to another pub on the other side of town. i walked out of the station just as he was walking in and we walked to the right place together :)
vfmp joined us, but nobody else made it so until some girls the jolly moroccan had invited joined us we were three. it was a fun evening anyway, and the last round was on vfmp. he ordered rum for the table, and it's the first time he's had alcohol in years - i'm supposed to keep that a secret, which i find pretty funny.

---yesterday:

hours slipped by speaking to sq before going to bed. i woke up late - OH NOES! it was christmas eve and everything closes early, i rushed down to the natural store concerned that i'd have to travel without clif builder bars. and i was about to run out of vega one. what a relief to find them open! and to discover two new flavours to boot! i risked an entire box of crunchy peanut butter, but only took a single bar of vanilla almond. which turned out to be a mistake, because it's a great flavour :)

i got home, sq and i talked some more, and aota called me up to plan a jewish christmas dinner. those plans fell through later because her daughter had come home very sick and i'm not risking that one day before flying...

i went out for lunch and travel shopping, the approaching sunset was heart-achingly beautiful. i was thinking about this on the way back: i've been blessed to live in three great cities, cape town and montreal are so beautiful, and with tel aviv all three are filled with the beauty of arts and culture and nightlife that's exceptional for the countries they're located in.

when i got home i sorted out my mobile phone for england - bell's got pretty good deals - and talked for a while with my mum about what i need to pack and what i'll do when there. shit's getting real!

i watched most of the black power mixtape 1967 - 1975, and the footage and commentaries are incredible. i don't think i'd appreciate it as much if i hadn't learned so much american history during my studies.

in the evening, check-in opened and i hopped online and booked my seats. easy, british airways, well done! not so easy: i could download my boarding pass for montreal - london but the pass for johannesburg - cape town is unavailable. wtf?!

i spent a long time posting about the weekend, and was bombed by the time i was done. so i went to bed. now that i'm done posting this, i'm ready to pack. only a few hours to go, and then i'm on my way!

---the items that i've found interesting or absolutely mind-blowing over the past few days: warning! some of them are pretty damn emotional.

interesting:

companies caring about their employees... and succeeding

health:

cavities versus coronaries
ending the heart disease epidemic
fish and pregnancies (seriously, don't risk this!)

the voice of a child of the anti-vaccine movement

life imitating art:

if only guns shot flowers!

emotional:

wounda released into the wild
iconic lgbt moments of 2013
christmas from beyond the grave

mind-blowing:

goldfish - we come together has 3.5 million views? how have i never seen this?!
viktoriya yermolyeva - master of puppets. on a piano. holy shit!
does holland have talent? this 9 year-old girl gave me the shivers