the ghost of christmas future

tuesday:

on tuesday night i tried watching hajime no ippo; it's nice that so much anime is available for free, but the quality of the experience is so bad that when i couldn't find the second part of episode one after two minutes i just gave up. besides, my "standing desk" made my legs tired and i was kinda irritated by the slow eating thing. it's still happening, i don't know what the deal is.

---yesterday:

i tried not to let my phone snooze, and instead what i ended up doing was snoozing manually and by longer stretches. i think it might be defeatist. either way, the last half hour of sleep was crucial, and absolutely heavenly!

i met up with vfmp and i spent our striking time coaching him on stance and basic boxing. i enjoy coaching. a lot. and i totally empathize with the frustration of having to unlearn bad habits... for the ground half vfmp taught me escape techniques, which have come in handy a lot sooner than i expected! but there was so much cool stuff he showed me and it's so hard to keep it all together :(

after we were done i punched myself out of breath on the bags, and was so warmed up when i left that i needed neither tuque nor gloves and it was -7 :)

the big realization of the morning: it's the last week until christmas! and i'm not ready to leave yet! i haven't snowboarded enough! i haven't got everything i need!

after i got home my french partner informed me that out of desperation (he's having trouble finding work) he's cancelling our meetings for a while. that's a bummer, i'm going to need another partner... speaking of people bailing on me, i was expecting the cleaning lady all day and she never came. later when i asked she was embarrassed to admit that she'd completely forgotten, so she'll be in after i've left. it does make it more appropriate timing for leaving her a christmas gift, and it means that i'll definitely get home to a clean apartment :)

it was a day of gaming and psy trance. i've begun the original fallout, which happily isn't far behind its sequel :)

i headed to hertz to check out their rental options, and walked from the plamondon station. after walking through such a jewish area, with its yeshiva and schools and lots of hebrew lettering everywhere, i almost bumped into somebody and had to swallow an "excuse me" in hebrew :P

so the man at the rental agency had bad news for me, the company raises its prices for the holidays beginning this weekend. but boy, what an interesting man! he's a muslim indian with the most interestingly healthy views on life, the universe and everything, he's well educated and well-travelled, and has some fascinating stories to tell about the different communities living in montreal. not least of which was hearing his skinny on the jewish communities, and hearing him on the phone asking if his customer wanted to daven first and then come pick up the car amused me no end.

we talked for a long time, getting along like a house on fire and neither of us with anything much better to do. eventually, when i left, he offered to try to help me out if possible. nice!

as i walked into the metro saiko-pod tron came on and put a big smile on my face and a bounce in my step. the mood has remained. i don't want it to go away ^_^

when i got home i used the generic car rental site to reserve a car from alamo, deciding to abuse their no-risk cancellation policy by finding out later whether or not the car has enough space for our snow gear.

i spoke to aota for a bit, and was informed that megaman's last day was nigh. her description of the current state of things makes it sounds like a good time to ask for my job back. it's merely a question of tact...

i headed out to boxing, the short jog in the snow had me out of breath but then i managed my longest set ever with the jump rope! my arms hurt a little but boy, was i feeling good about myself :)
i finally understand shadowboxing, and that i've been doing it wrong all this time. when you begin it's about technique, but once you have that down (more or less) it becomes about visualizing your opponent and their moves. that's tough to learn!
it was a good class and badger and i followed it up with excitingly good drills. aside from cutting my toe on something (a callous, though, so it's tender but it didn't bleed) and a bit of pain in my ankle from checking, my knuckles were hurting on each punch - it seems like i've worn through the padding on my gloves. they're really good gloves, so it's kinda surprising (and very disappointing) that they're wearing out after eight months even if i have been using them every weekday and for all the activities. i'm going have to see if there's some kind of warranty, but i doubt it.

the bruise has finally begun to go down! it's left an interesting outline and a sensitive and almost egg-sized lump has been revealed. hmmm.

i watched the men who stare at goats to re-rate it because i'd missed some of it the first time. i didn't criticize it very well, then - it's a good movie, but it has a definitive slant whereas the book smells of journalistic integrity. they also focus on so little in order to provide narrative that you don't get to see any of the really crazy and incredible stuff!

oh, that reminds me - correction: what we saw on monday night was an advanced screening, not a premiere. did they care if we applauded or not?

---today:

some more manual mega-snoozing.
*sigh*
pg contacted me to remind me that the israeli tax authority is after me - which is completely ridiculous. so i know what i'll be doing at stupid o' clock on sunday morning :(

i picked up my ski jacket and am pleased to report that they did a fantastic job!

my body felt oddly stiff and i walked a lot slower to the metro than i'd have liked. i found alamo without too much trouble and the woman behind the counter was a pleasure to deal with; she tells me that if we can't find a car on saturday that fits our equipment we can cancel with no charge. nice!

i was on my way to eat when i walked past the cinema. and the hobbit was playing. and i thought to myself "why fight the inevitable?"
and i bought a ticket. and had a delicious tofu lunch (i love it when fast food gets tofu right!). and i watched the movie.

*SPOILER ALERT* [highlight the following text to read it]
peter jackson has turned one of everyone's favourite books into a disney ride. it was marvelously entertaining, but beneath it all lay the disquieting sensation of over-commercialization. it's not as bad as the matrix trilogy, of which i couldn't bear to watch the third installment: i'll watch the third the hobbit. but i'm going to re-read the book, too, and i know i'll enjoy the book more.
*SPOILER ALERT*

i wanted to buy a gift card into which i'm going to insert money for the cleaning lady. gift cards are stupidly expensive. like, cost-of-a-meal expensive [fellow south africans: R100]. like, it will constitute a sixth of the total cost of the gift i'm giving. and it's so hard to find an appropriate one! the gift card holders are just tacky.

i got home and spent an hour or so on the phone checking auto-insurance, mobile / internet bills and planning saturday's rental. everything was a breeze!

i spoke to aota, who i'm going to meet tomorrow - she had to fire newk'd today. even though we know it's good for him in the long run, it's not a nice thing for her of all people to have to do.

jiu-jitsu; i didn't totally suck! i joined the beast and a large, powerful spanish guy, and i managed to get most of the steps right ^_^
i didn't do amazingly well with the kickboxing afterwards, but i finished feeling really good: my breathing was *much* better. i hope this is me recovering!

i almost went out for dinner, then remembered that i'd eaten out for lunch and i had perfectly good frozen meals in the freezer. so i did that instead.

online dating:

1) a positive interaction seems to have gone sour after i was asked to elaborate on the current political situation in south africa and i complied. i should save the diatribes for face-to-face encounters, i think.

2) the site is supposed to show me local matches only, not long distance! i'm currently enthusiastically engaging an attractive woman who lives in los angeles. and she's talking about one of us visiting the other after i invited her out without realizing she's far away...