empty-headed

i spent yesterday afternoon getting a handle on node.js, going crazy debugging until things i hadn't seen or heard in about a year came rushing back and producing a pretty cool little web app. i went for a run, and my zombies, run! with french podcasts (coffee break french) was definitely a good idea. i was too tired to finish the run and had to walk the last couple of hundred metres, and i got home weak and desperately hungry.

...

[pulse gd rage horror]

after our world came pretty close to ending, we went to bed early. i woke up more easily this morning, i've made progress in spite of a short nap, and overall i'm feeling emotionally exhausted and unfocused which is really not where i need to be right now. of course, it doesn't help that my artists haven't been in touch in over a week.

---captain estar goes to heaven is a short, fun and clever online graphic novel. i suggest listening to lunatic calm while reading it, or even if you don't read it because it's a brilliant album.

gearing up - part iii

[... continued]

i made some progress with the web development, i'm trying to focus on real issues instead of dealing with broken elements (the latest jquery and chrome don't want to play together). i listened to french podcasts on my way to the gym, where kickboxing was good and i was feeling much stronger in spite of some nausea that i suspect is caused by spine misalignment. badger's back, which is cool, and it looks like we might start group running on the weekends :)

...

intending to celebrate all the good news, i went to p.m. after training. gd ran really late for a variety of reasons, and by the time she arrived i was too hungry and tired to be jumping up and down with excitement. instead we drank too much sake, ate too much brilliant food and then walked slowly home, where she oversaw my stretching before bed and then my shambling into it. i was utterly exhausted.

friday:

to the point where i felt dead on my feet the first time i woke up. aside from political concerns over what's happening right now in the middle east, i was disturbed by a message from pulse asking after my health and inviting me to join her yoga class tomorrow. i haven't responded, and i don't know if i'll respond. burning bridges is something i always try not to do, but she needs to know that being nice to me and unpleasant to gd is unacceptable, and that our relationship (as friends) has come to an end.

big news, little news and attitudes

okay, the most important item first: my butt HURTS. gd dragged me along to studiotec, where she goes as a part of her back treatments; their atwater facility's comfortable and inviting, the guys were all very cool. i don't know if my levels were really good or if the instructor always says that to first-timers, but i was fascinated to feel the differences between my muscles groups (and my lack of symmetry).

i was amused that i was able to power through push-ups (i could have kept on going), and by how difficult certain basic exercises became as electricity pulsed through my arms and chest and back and legs. overall, the experience was satisfying, but while i was feeling pumped up when i walked out i found that later, after an hour of jiu-jitsu with a guy a full weight-category larger than me, i just didn't feel up to rolling or finishing with a kickboxing class.

and i slept like a baby last night, so there's that too :)

---news news

driverless car licenses are going to be a thing soon. it's sad that they're going to be so strict about it, but it's a definite first-step in the right direction!

we're going to have to keep on waiting and praying for patent reform. the situation is abysmal! and almost as frustrating for me, personally, is the fact that nobody's even talking about international copyright reform and the outrageous prices of digital books.

in good security news, microsoft won a small victory against the fbi. in really bad security news, it looks like snowden might be collaborating with the russians. it might just be a smear tactic, but if it is for real then i have to say that the americans brought this on themselves. they didn't need to treat him like a hero, but they certainly shouldn't have treated him like a traitor.

---personal news

how the hell is it friday already???

wednesday:

i slept well, and woke up to some game time. tales of honor has a bit of a learning curve, i made some progress but found myself stuck with something that i'm going to have to research online before i continue.

i resumed reading jean webster - daddy-long-legs, which i *still* hadn't finished. every time i returned to it after many months i'd have to start again; it's not very long. it is, however, beautiful. i finished it yesterday afternoon and immensely enjoyed every minute of the reading experience! ^_^

wednesday's weather was simply wonderful! it was cool in the shade, warm in the sun, the birds were singing and a fresh breeze was pleasantly gentle.
my biggest concern was how to go about taking advantage of such superb weather as best i could!

there's been a story going around about dirk diggler's dad, and i got a chance to talk to him and clear everything up. i then spoke to my mother, who's traded in her written-off car and was able to cover the cost of its replacement, so that's all good.

...

i napped, which would have been great had i not held my neck awkwardly, and woke up to rls. ???!!?
and my heel, which had cracked again, was hurting me badly. it's only just beginning to relax now...

...

i read some more, then went to starbucks thinking to get some work done on my comics. my netbook's having issues with wireless, refusing to connect to my phone's hot spot, and i ended up not being very productive. it also didn't help that a gushy couple was sitting next to me at the study table, being offensively "couple"y in arabic. that's not a pretty combination.

i was almost at my front door when i heard someone struggling to learn to play a trumpet or something. i'm so glad it's one building over!

boxing class was good, i skipped sparring and went to gd's. on the way i spoke to my toronto cousin, and i worry that i might have offended him when i ended the call... probably not, but i'm always nervous when people suddenly shut down.

gd made delicious tofu spring rolls, and she made a LOT of them. i'm not sure how comfortable i am with the process, though, because i watched and heard her burning her fingers on each one...

there was too much food, once we'd gotten through about half the batch and simply couldn't continue we focused on the pervert's guide to ideology. what a treat! then gd decided to give community another chance, and now she's in :)

---yesterday:

i was deeply bothered by rls again. and bad sinuses... AGAIN. this time i'm blowing blood out my nose, i don't know what they hell the deal is. i used a spray last night, which helped during the night but i woke up uncomfortable again. i really, really, really want to be breathing normally again. i'm sick of this!

gd began her day with a fight over the phone with a bureaucrat, she's been fined by the city for something her neighbours did and pulse - her legal counsel, that's their introduction - warned her that fighting it would only make it worse and that she should just pay up. i decided to take care of it myself, partially because she doesn't have the cash and partially because hey, if it wasn't for those fines we'd never have met!

it bothers me tremendously that she works so hard and barely makes ends meet. her work conditions are worrying (she rarely gets a lunch break and sometimes can't go to the loo for hours), and i understand that they're actually pretty good for her industry... it makes me feel privileged to be in software...

i needed to wait for gd for a while, and i sat down in java u. i was once again unable to get my netbook online, so i continued reading. we picked up lunch, then had another small coffee and talked about crossover fan-fiction until our studiotec appointment.

after the studiotec experience, we went our separate ways and i came home to finish daddy-long-legs. i did some email clearing - this is hard work! - and then headed off to jiu-jitsu.

it's been a while since i last did jiu-jitsu with someone who's an entire weight division larger than me! [i apologize in advance] i came eerily close to scoring a cauliflower ear :/
i almost laughed inappropriately: at one point he took his mouth-guard out to say something and it didn't make much difference :P

anyway, i know it's summer: most of the mat's covered in puddles. there's another thing i'm going to miss about winter...

i had my head in the clouds on my walk home: half the sky was purple and grey, half yellows and light blues. it was gorgeous!

i took my bloody sinus headache to gd's for the other half of the spring rolls and a few episodes of community. just before bed, after an otherwise perfect evening, i learned a lesson about which buttons of gd's not to push when she's tired :(

*sigh*

---friday:

i enjoyed the deepest sleep i've had in the longest time. i woke up with strained glutes (yep, still very sore) and in the mood for olive. trickle, in particular.

i missioned off to city hall to pay gd's fines, which wasn't an unpleasant experience, and then went downtown to get my french results. the good news is that i didn't get a worse score. the bad news is that i improved it so marginally that i might as well not have tried :(

shit.

i was close to popeye's and they're having a serious sale, so i stopped there. i had to wait in line outside the store for about twenty minutes! i found myself staring at shoes for most of that time. there are so many fashion victims walking around with obviously expensive, glaringly ugly footwear.

i walked out with a giant (2kg) tub of progressive's vegessential and carried it home, and have done very little with the rest of my day.

poetry in motion

gd arrived just as i finished posting last night, and we discussed the issue with pulse. it's abso-bloody-lutely wonderful to be able to talk things out properly! we'd both been uncomfortable since our earlier discussion and we're both feeling good about things now. i made dinner while we talked, and once that was ready we sat down to watch in pursuit of happyness.

what a horrible movie! no, i mean it's a great movie, and a horrible, horrible story. i realize it's essentially a true story, but a lot of gardner's decisions were painful to watch.

---today:

we seriously overslept but the sleep was soooo good... unfortunately, the first act of the morning was blowing my nose and apparently tearing tissue in my nostril. it's really hurting :(

i arrived a bit late for my appointment with clam. it's an immigrant organization that's government run, but has a definitive refugee feel to it. as in, it feels like it's run by refugees, for refugees. i wasn't comfortable with the fact that they took all of my personal info to open a file for me just to answer a couple of questions. and those answers were not answered satisfactorily: i called up the immigration lawyer afterwards to double check and she explained to me why i'd been steered wrong.

later i'd receive an email from the recruitment agency with a suggestion along the same lines as clam's... but i just got off the phone with immigration canada (after a half-hour on hold) and they told me that what the lawyer said was correct. oh, man.

so i've asked the recruitment agency to inform the employer that there might be a delay and we'll see what happens.

---i'm less concerned about that than before before i got some good news - i passed the final interviews on tuesday! that's no guarantee of a job offer, but it's clearly positive and i'll hear back from them in a week. which should be more than enough time to figure out if this dream job is happening or not.

---i went to cafe l'artère to meet with rabbit, and we spent an unpressured few hours talking, criticizing and collaborating. some of the moments we shared were surreal; a couple of works she recited put me were literally stunning. i got some very interesting feedback, and what we walked out with might well be good for the finals in two weeks!

crossing fingers

okay, i'm feeling considerably less elated about the job offer i received because it sounds like the recruitment agency isn't happy with the permit application process. so while i'm hoping everything will be turn out alright, i'm also praying really hard that i get offered the job i finally finished interviewing for yesterday, because that company won't have any problems with permit applications and it's also a job that i really, really want.

---monday:

i actually spent monday studying, which was my plan. then gd came with me to muay thai. it amused me to see the look on the face of the guy who knocked me off my feet when gd introduced me as her boyfriend; he also trains at h2o and knows her from there. ahh, pride :)

the muay thai class was primarily conditioning, as usual, and gd's back couldn't handle the suicide bear-crawls followed by suicide runs. after all the exercises we'd done before those, none of us were handling particularly well even without having back troubles and by the time i got to the running i was actually wobbling. even if i hadn't been planning on taking it (relatively) easy before the final interviews i wouldn't have been able to box after all that.

i continued studying while gd made dinner, and the salad was even better than when i do it. i got through some important stuff, but went to bed feeling the muay thai class. tense back + gd + tiger balm = falling asleep in a trance.

---yesterday:

i slept really well, and woke up easily with no need to snooze. i began my day with an hour focused on the introduction to algorithms book, the one i bought ages ago and really, *really* should've treated as my primary source over the past few weeks. it's an amazing book.

i shouldn't have forgotten my kindle with the aforementioned book loaded onto it, but as it turned out i wouldn't get much time to read after leaving home anyway.

the final interviews:

i felt offline for most of the time. just... slower. it was a slow day.

the first interview was about system architecture, and i think i did well.

the second was on algorithms, and not only was it a struggle but it was only in the final moments when the interviewer told me what he was thinking that i suddenly realized that the problem was almost identical to one i'd read about the night before :S

lunch was spent with pulse's friend, the guy who put forward my resume, and was really nice even though there weren't any vegan protein options. oh, well. nobody's perfect. the conversation ran in all sorts of directions and i was comforted to hear that everyone feels the same way about the kid who made me nervous in my first interview.

the final interview was certainly not my best, but i definitely did what needed to be done and i appeared to satisfy the interviewer - although it could be that he was just being nice.

anyway, i walked out of the offices with a positive feeling and hoping that they feel the same. then i entered "what if" mode; what if they extend an offer? how do i delay them or turn them down without closing the door? that was really troubling me until this morning.

i got home, paid the rent, got a form from the bank for the recruitment agency, all of that was pleasant. then i printed out my tax forms, and couldn't make heads or tails of them. much, much less pleasant. that set off a serious headache that i took with me to jiu-jitsu.

i worked with a guy who's about 20 pounds heavier than me, and we worked really hard. i didn't feel particularly satisfied when we were done, just tired and itchy. i suspect that the latter is some kind of allergic reaction to the combination of training shirts i wear in lieu of a proper rash-guard :/

gd had eaten without me, so i went to p.m. and had their japanese tofu while reading the new wired. it was delicious and i ate too much - only towards the end i realized that it's a dish with egg in it so i'm not going to do that again :(
i couldn't find someone homeless to give the leftovers to, and then realized that giving someone something like that without utensils would be a little cruel anyway.

...

the "disruptive by design" ad in this month's wired disrupted my reading in the metro because it kept unfolding.

---today:

it was a beautiful start to the day and i left gd's with electrified emotions. i ran into pulse on the metro, apologizing for putting her in the awkward position of knowing that i've accepted a job offer but not being able to update her friend. i mentioned her to gd later and it's now been made clear to me that the two of them are no longer friends after an incident last week. i'm disappointed to say the least :(

i spoke to the immigration lawyer who helped me with my previous permit application, and was relieved to hear that a) it's better that i haven't applied for the csq without the minimum year of work experience and b) a rejected permit application won't invalidate the current one.

so that's me breathing more easily and feeling less stupid.

then i got dressed and headed down to the recruitment agency to sign papers. no papers were signed, issues were raised and a bit of faith was lost. now i'm playing that all by ear, and i'm glad i didn't cancel the interview i have in forty minutes...

long weekend goodness

we've been together for just about a week now, and already trying to imagine not being with gd seems impossible. this relationship is at a level that wouldn't seem reasonable if i were watching it in a movie. there've been so many weird little things that make it seem like the universe just wants us to be together, and it's kinda hard to ignore them even as skeptical me rolls his eyes.

just before he shrugs, smiles and silently approves. because it's awesome and fun and good and feels right ^_^

---thursday:

i was so tired that i fell asleep watching guy steele on growing a programming language, which is unbelievably clever meta-poetry that you only start to *get* once he's built it up a bit. he's doing what?? using what?? anyway, it's awesome and deserves some of your time if you're a software developer. or into poetry.

i felt awful when i woke up, suffering that ugly feeling when you're forcibly dragged from a state of unconsciousness that your body desperately requires that you be in. gd came over with her kickboxing gear as we'd been planning on heading to tristar together, but she was also exhausted so instead we spent the night introducing her to firefly and enjoying pitaya, rum, liquorice and chocolate after ascertaining that she digs my salads.

that made for a good night.

---friday:

i woke up with bon jovi - bad medicine stuck in my head after another sleepless night. i was so busy getting ready for the day that i forgot breakfast. what?!

...

the good friday crowd at the clinic wasn't too bad. i didn't have to wait for too long, but it was a bit uncomfortable being sent into a doctor's office only to have to wait for another five or ten minutes. the doctor seemed embarrassed when she realized that i literally only needed a minute of her time after i'd waited for so long.

while waiting i received a message from aaa, and i had time to finally put together a response (in french) that totally covered everything while not being offensive. she definitely *gets* it now, and i seem to have managed to rescue her ego: after she told me it was a bit of a blow, i explained that gd and me being more compatible doesn't have anything to do with her not being wonderful. did that really help? i can't tell, but that's the story i'm telling myself and i'm sticking to it.

i walked out of the clinic just in time to make it to my "poetry date" at cagibi with rabbit. the girl serving me at cagibi was very cool, and she even allowed me to keep a tab - i felt very special :)
their vegan treats were as good as they said they were.

rabbit and i spent the next hour or two talking productively, figuring out a collaborative project we want to do, and critiquing each other's works just like i'm used to from the wondering workshop. we really clicked, had a great time and will definitely be doing that again soon ^_^

newk'd and i had a bit of a misunderstanding, so instead of him meeting me at the designated time at the designated place, i headed to his area and we sat down for ndg bagels. the vegetarian options left much to be desired, and i ended up having to put vegetables on my vegetables on my bagel with a side order of salad. it was a lot, it wasn't bad but it's good that the whole thing was more about talking than eating. i'm excited for him that he's heading off to toronto next week to compete in game production!

i returned home, napped for an hour and went to the gym. boxing had been cancelled so i worked on the bags for an hour. it was mostly good, but i was feeling tired and had to take frequent rests. ugh :(

afterwards i went to gd's, we ordered indian and watched more firefly. she wanted to continue when we finished the train job but i simply couldn't keep my eyes open any more...

---yesterday:

i slept much better than the night before but i still woke up sleepy. i thought i'd get some stuff done when i got home but instead napped for another hour, falling into that deep, black slumber that my brain so desperately needed. i woke up feeling much better but having snoozed so much that i didn't have time to draw cash or make / get coffee, so i pulled an energy drink from the fridge, hunted down a couple of bills and hurried to luna yoga.

i arrived *just* in time, and i'm now paid up for all-access for a month. i found myself positioned at the front of the class, which kinda sucked because the only person i could watch for cues didn't seem to have much of a clue either and the instructions came so fast they were hard to follow sometimes. the lesson was great, though. the instructor reinforced my sense of "living right" and basically had me grinning non-stop as i meditated on the previous week.

the only problem with the class, really, was that my arms felt soooooo weak. otherwise, everything was great and i was very satisfied.

i wanted to invite pulse out for lunch, but i didn't have my wallet with me. she was hungry and in a hurry to eat, but i got her to agree to meet me at vendôme station after she did some quick shopping. in order to make our rendezvous i postponed showering, but when i arrived i got a message informing me that she was being held up and would need another twenty minutes. i totally could've showered :/

instead, i waited in the beautiful sunshine and worked on the slam. i'm really pleased with it now, after minor updates suggested by rabbit and making some major strides in its performance. i can't wait for next month!

pulse and i took out excellent indian food and discussed the details of the previous week. i was a bit surprised to hear her complain that this isn't the first time she's successfully set up someone she's dated with someone else... i didn't need to remind her that she let me go, but something that she let slip was quite flattering and i told her how pleased i am that we're still friends. i kinda wish there was some way to help her find the right guy for her, but that's not how this stuff works...

i visited chez geeks and struggled to find an appropriate board game for vfmp's birthday gift. then i realized i could get him a gift card for them - ideal! while browsing i came across mr. card game. the guy at the store hated it so much he recommended i never try it. this guy thinks it's amazing.

huh.

---thought for the day: "where / how do blind beggars relieve themselves?"
it's bad enough to handle toilets being blind, but blind and homeless? oh, man.

---it was hard to stay conscious on the metro home, and on the metro to gd's, and the nodding off then was as close to siesta as i was going to get. we went to yuan for dinner to celebrate vfmp's birthday, our first social outing as a couple. after that we returned to manga-thé, again because getting into randalph's wasn't happening.

dinner was really good, though anything sushi sucked and there were no drinks AT ALL on the all-you-can-eat menu. it was bizarre coming to grips with the facts that almost all the items om the menu were vegan, and the fake meat items were mostly really good. the mint tofu was odd. just sayin'.
we played forbidden island again, had a wildly entertaining time of it, and called it a night once we'd won.

it was a good night. and i'm really glad that vfmp and co and gd all get along so well! :D

---today:

we were both exhausted by the time we eventually fell asleep, but woke up feeling properly rested. on a sunday morning when we could sleep in. YES!!!

we tried to have breakfast at a local spot but it was closed for easter. on the way we discovered that we both love it rubs the lotion on its skin. so that was the earworm for the morning :)

gd barters her services as a stylist, and a couple of guys came over for haircuts in the late morning. the first was a friend who i've now adopted as one of mine, we've got a crazy amount in common in addition to the fact that he's looking for people to play arkham horror expansions with. we talked for ages about all sorts of things, and he might be a good work contact as well!

the second was one of the guys who runs her gym, he was pleasant enough but gave me an odd look of appraisal when he heard i train at tristar. i don't know what that meant.

---while the first guy got his hair cut, i noticed a piece of art on the wall that's strikingly similar to f (including the textual overlay, although the theme's a little different).

"hey - who painted this?"
"i did."

jaw on the floor.

---we returned to midi 6, had way too much food and talked non-stop. i'm fascinated by how different we are on some things and how similar on others. sometimes it's quite jarring to switch from one to the other, but there's mutual respect even when we disagree and it's effortless. we argue with the same intensity and the same intention, and that's not only rare but it's extremely gratifying!

i went to godmother's for tea and a long chat. suddenly it was 5pm and i *had* to come home, because aside from posting this and tending to my apartment i'm on dinner duty so that my salad ingredients don't go to waste :P

i don't even. part ii.

[... continued]

---sunday:

i enjoyed a good wake-up, though it was a rainy day and i went through it to the walmart to pick up a yoga mat. pulse had been talking about the importance of colours, and i was amused to hear that if i want to focus on my upper back i should go with green. i have a thing for green, so that's no biggie. there was a single yoga mat left in stock. it was green, odourless (i'd been warned about chemical mats) and apparently eco-friendly. so that was easy! as i walked to the check-out i received a message informing me that pulse had gifted me a $25 discount on yoga supplies from some online source.

why was the world making it feel like my birthday?

there was a problem at the check-out with the card reader. i was so offended when, after a couple of failed attempts, the cashier grabbed my card and began rubbing the chip as if we were in the nineties. i *told* her it was the reader, not the card. before she could do any damage i thanked her for her efforts and found another counter. my card passed through first time and i left with an image in my head of the first cashier as a kid blowing into a nintendo cartridge.

i went supermarket shopping, forgetting to make change for the laundry, then hit the gym to train. i was specifically going to meet the guy who joined us for yoga last week because i didn't have his number and the instructor was coming in later than we'd agreed. he didn't rock up at all, and instead i worked on the punching bags. i worked really hard, really well and for a long time; so long, in fact, that i didn't leave myself the time i'd intended to return home, shower quickly and return with my new yoga mat. suddenly the instructor had arrived and i'd only had a few minutes' rest. we began the yoga class.

my arms and legs were kinda tired after all the work on the bags. that made the exercises particularly difficult, but i pushed through and was as satisfied as i was sore by the end.

i had a short time between yoga and horseman visiting, really just enough to shower and eat and maybe rest a bit. instead of the latter, when i got home i found a message from aaa waiting for me. oh, i thought. we're going to have the talk.

i called her up and was surprised when instead of the talk, she was inviting herself to the slam! oh, shit. i couldn't think of an inoffensive way to end things in that context, so i remained polite and unenthusiastically told her i'd see her later. i started stressing about the potential drama, already planning to take gd out for a drink after the slam to explain everything, and was discussing the situation with supertongue who's a bit of a drama expert. she told me that i *had* to call aaa back, and i'm really glad i listened!

because i took a moment to compose my thoughts, called her back and told her how i feel. i was relieved to hear her say that it wasn't just me - so i wasn't being an ass! very sweet. we agreed that dating isn't working, but that we both like each other and hanging out is cool. it was actually the nicest "we're not going to date any more" talk i've ever had and we were both laughing for half of it. that was cool, i immediately felt much better, and just then horseman arrived for a tekken session.

we played the new tag tournament, it was a lot of fun but not as competitive as usual. both our games were off but it didn't matter :)

as we left for the slam i stressed about getting dressed, and halfway there i recalled that i'd intended to shave. shave! my beard was looking a bit scraggly. and pulse's comment about presenting my poetry with respect still ran in my ears. but there was no time for that. there was just time to grab a quick bite at la pantere verte and arrive to sign up.

i'm sorry, said my buddy as he greeted us at the door: we've changed the way registration works this week... didn't you get the memo? all the slots are taken, the only thing open is the open mic.

DAMN! i was so disappointed! i signed up for the open mic and made sure he understood that if there was an opening for the slam that i wanted it instead. a slow hour would pass before he could inform me that someone had dropped out, which was an enormous relief :)

we sat down with pulse and gd, were joined by bnw and had a really good time! i was really excited when pulse gave me some insider information that the guys at the company i've been interviewing with are just as excited to have me join them - i don't know if she's exaggerating because she's being super-nice but i'll take it ^_^

we enjoyed ourselves until aaa showed up, at which point things started getting a little weird. i was sitting between everyone and the stage and pulse, gd and aaa were sitting in a row with aaa next to me; i kept thinking "past, hopefully future and present" and both myself and gd, who was being respectfully considerate, were having trouble deciding where to look at any given time.

then the evening began. i was wearing my syndicate shirt, amusingly showing "follow me until you die" to the girls because my back was to them; i was uncomfortable specifically because i couldn't keep an eye on things.

some of the open mic pieces were pathetic, one of them was a surprisingly dramatic improvement by the guy who i hated on the open mic when i judged. still not amazing, but he's at least heading in the right direction :)

...

the slam began. the first guy up was someone i quite like, though his piece left a bit to be desired. my name was announced, and i whisked my bundle of nerves up onto the stage.

1. i should've raised the height of the mic. i'm an idiot.
2. i needed more confidence. my piece deserved more confidence, and now i feel like i let it down.
3. in spite of my shaking and lack of power, i blew the first dude away, was received with heartwarming applause and the mc was so impressed he joyfully fist-bumped me as we passed each other.
4. the judges seem to like it! certainly better than last month.

everyone at my table was thrilled when i sat down, and i turned to look for the scores. as i did so i felt a pair of hands on my back - i stiffened, knowing that it was a victorious "pat on the back" from aaa and sensing that it was a lot more sensual than it should've been. that was our first physical contact after three dates and an ending, and it was totally unappreciated... especially with gd right there! after that i noticed that something was going on between gd and pulse, and a few minutes later they'd disappeared. my phone began to vibrate with messages from gd and there was far too much for me to say in such a short space - as soon as the first round was over i phoned her.

when i heard her voice i was both touched and terrified; i apologized profusely and we agreed to have coffee in the morning to talk it all over. on my way back to the table aaa passed me to say goodbye. her work was done (she didn't say that, obviously), she needed to go.

#$@!. couldn't she have left first?!

...

during the break vfmp and his boyfriend showed up to take the girls' place. much less dramatic :P

mc june went up as the feature for the night. his hop-hop's all french, but even though i could barely follow the words - never mind the poetic meaning - the man was enthralling. the performance was amazing, powerful, obviously clever, and his beatboxing partner who joined him at the end was just brilliant.

moments before the feature, i was informed that i'd made it through to the second round. score! i was thrilled ^_^

i'd prepared the quebec immigration song for the second. i'm really, really, REALLY lucky that i was called up towards the end, because after hearing the first two poems i knew that it wasn't nearly strong enough. fortunately, i still have advice memorized and i decided that it would have to do.

about a minute before my name was called i felt something in my chest harden. it was something akin to anger; a sense of purpose, and rightness. my nerves were blasted away by it and i jumped onto the stage, reset the mic's height and cleared my head.

oh - my - gods. i have never commanded an audience before, but i now know what it feels like. i stared into the darkness and emptied myself into my words, each one flying out precisely. there were laughs in the right places and finger snaps, and the response when i finished was overwhelming. what unbelievable elation and pride! what a reward for finally getting my shit together on stage!

i took fourth overall (when that was announced there were actually a couple of boos, and not from my table ^_^ ) and a couple of the established poets not only made an effort to catch me to introduce themselves but one of them was excitedly talking about us hopefully going together as a team to the nationals. i hope, i hope, i hope that i've made it into the finals next month!!!

...

it was pouring with rain when we left, bnw and i headed to the metro together and stopped halfway at a cool bar to dry off with a couple of drinks. we had a fun time telling hysterical stories and discussing the evening, and when the rain relaxed and we'd finished our drinks it was time to go home.

---from the moment we said goodnight, i couldn't stop thinking about gd. i was practicing speeches in my head and fretting about all the things that could possibly go wrong, planning apologies and explanations well into the night.

all this was wrapped in ecstasy, a very real high off the evening that was so strong it was shocking!

---monday:

sleepless before a date with destiny [i wrote that on the way there]. i picked up my laundry, it was the most beautiful, warm, misty spring morning that would turn into a hot - over 20 degrees hot - sunny day. a fantastic day for extremes, i thought, and i couldn't imagine how right i was at the time.

gd's name is the french version of a character out of greek mythology; i wasn't sure if looking up her story was a mistake or a treat, but it was definitely educational.

...

we met at her metro station, and walked and talked for a while until we found a good place to eat. a sweet, cozy diner-type deal, there wasn't anything vegan on the menu but the waiter managed to sort out a huge, delicious off-the-menu special anyway. the coffee was good and we were having a lot of fun, though a lot of our discussion was decidedly inappropriate and the waiter wasn't embarrassed to chime in every now and again because he could hear everything we were saying. i would've been offended but the attitude was totally good :)

we took a semi-romantic walk down to atwater market and around the area, then to her apartment. we talked for ages there too, culminating in a first kiss that,

quite frankly,

i will never forget.

[continued...]

i don't even. part i.

i'm actually high right now. actually, properly high on life to such a degree that this morning i found myself wondering - on a couple of occasions - if perhaps i'm dying and this last weekend has been a final hallucination in which i imagine what heaven is like.

...

i suddenly recalled the couple of unpleasant things that prove that this all has to be real, and that drew me out from my reality-anxiety reverie in a fit of giggles.

---friday:

firstly, i have to mention an amazing piece of software that's really exciting: it's called firechat, and in a nutshell it allows android / iphone users to create ad-hoc networks when there's no connectivity. the first, most basic use i could think of was to chat with people on the metro; it's an environment with lots of people avoiding all forms of contact, and i think the ability to communicate with people in the same location and situation anonymously could have really interesting potential.

...

i wasn't going to be able to make boxing in the evening, so i went early to work on the bags. i did some good work, but then i became frustrated as my shins got tender and i managed to hurt my ankle (slightly) on a side-kick to the wrong bag (like kicking a wall, that one). at least i finished feeling looser, and while resting on the pull-up bar i realized that after all this time i'm actually able to hold it with my feet flat on the floor - stretch success!

i went to the tattoo parlor opening that pulse had invited me to. it wasn't too difficult to find, i'm not familiar with the area but it was a beautiful evening and on the way the view of the city was stunningly dystopic. i arrived... on time, and pulse was going to be fifteen minutes late. hesitant to enter alone, not knowing anyone and being pretty bad with strangers, i looked in at the window and decided that i was rather under-dressed. this was no regular tattoo parlor! shit, they'd turned the main area into a gallery and the tattoo artist's paintings were on display, there was a table with wine and cocktail-y stuff and my first impression was that it was packed with pretension.

i opened the door and a beautiful woman jumped forward to welcome me, i automatically assumed that i was talking to one of the proprietors and politely introduced myself before attempting to enter the throng. a small room, packed with people, it was a throng. and everyone was standing and talking in such a way that it was practically impossible to squeeze through to see what was further inside, i was even uncomfortable approaching the table with the refreshments.

i sneaked between the lines-of-sight of the snap-happy photographers while i inspected the artwork: the pieces were all fantastic, the artist has a really cool style and some of the work was really gripping. so there was that.

just as i was staring at a particularly intriguing canvas, i felt a tap on my shoulder and whirled around to find pulse standing beside me. what a relief! she introduced me to her friend, and then re-introduced me to gd, the girl who'd greeted me earlier. the curtain was drawn back, the crowd regained a level of reality and we all proceeded to enjoy the evening together.

there was something special about gd and she basically told me what it was* when she eventually caught me alone; she left with us which gave us an opportunity to chat on the way to the metro. it was immediately obvious that we were going to be friends and we swapped details as we agreed to meet up sometime.

* no, not sharing.

i got home to a message from her that ended in a chat in which we discussed the fact that we were both attracted to each other and the fact that aaa and i were a potential thing. she was happy to respect that and still come see me perform on sunday, and everything was cool. very cool. that is to say, our chat excited me in a way that i haven't been excited in a very long time.

---saturday:

i slept better, but that wasn't difficult to achieve. i read an article on sensory deprivation that sounded suspiciously like using technology to achieve the goals of a yoga exercise pulse had been describing the night before, then went to old montreal to join her for yoga.

if one of the aims of yoga is to relax, then i was halfway there just by walking through old montreal on such an incredible, sunny morning! gods, that area is gorgeous.

the yoga class: pulse had been going about how amazing her instructor is, and while at first i was a little skeptical i really warmed to him over the course of the class. some of the things he says are a bit preachy, but considering some of the conversations i overheard from the other members of the class it was probably quite necessary. speaking of which, the class was completely full and we had to play a form of yoga mat tetris in order to squeeze everyone in...

... the class was awesome, extremely challenging, mentally stimulating and shamefully sweaty for someone using pulse's spare mat (of course i cleaned it afterwards, but still).

pulse and i had a great time visiting atwater market, the highlight being my finding a large tub of marmite. hooray! on the metro, pulse made a comment about using the poetry slam as an opportunity to vet aaa. i thought that was pretty amusing.

after a good lunch, i went to a java u to meet aaa for coffee before going to hear the university of montreal's orchestra. i was trying and failing to speedily learn the slam in the hope that it'd be ready for the following evening. yeah. not so much.

the date: coffee was nice. we travelled to the university, which is pretty impressive, and found our seats. i wasn't sure how i'd feel about a classical performance, but here goes: the first piece was composed by a man in the audience, it was interesting. the second piece appeared to be showcasing a very talented dude with a flute, it was pretty cool. then there was an intermission, and then the main piece.

dimitri chostakovitch, symphony no. 11. ho-ly crap. there were parts of it where i felt like i was in class trying desperately not to fall asleep, and parts filled with heady, powerful stuff. i guess i could say it was equal parts thrilling and somniferous. i couldn't believe how long it was, my mind was reeling trying to fathom how everyone, from the conductor to the guys on the bells, were keeping it together. when i described the experience to my mother i told her that it felt like i was watching the soundtrack to a movie, and felt quite validated (and cultured :P) when she read back a review that basically said the same thing!
the experience was also similar to some of the more advanced psy-trance pieces where the dj brings in recurring themes in different contexts. it was mind-numbing, intoxicating stuff. i was left speechless and a little shocked by the time it was over.

now for the other side of the experience. the entire time, i found myself comparing between how i felt spending time with aaa and how i felt spending time with gd. i'd spent mere minutes talking with gd, and there aaa and i were on our third date with no spark apparent and not even an indication of a desire for physical contact. i felt like a real heel, thinking like this and comparing between the two, and i continually wondered if i was unfairly letting gd influence the way the date was going.

the word for the evening was "dispassionate". i wasn't interested in continuing the date and i gallantly waited with aaa for her metro, during which time a very strong nothing happened. i hopped on my metro thinking that that felt like a "no".

marmite, then bed. i had a big day to prepare for.

[continued...]

upper morning

okay, so after a good night's sleep i woke up to a couple of messages from pulse apologizing for last night, confessing unprompted that her instructions should have been more precise and explaining that her phone had died. so it was the universe making a fool of me, not her... an easier pill to swallow, and i'm glad to be rid of that "twilight zone" feeling.

i finally previewed eminem's new album on itunes. some of it's pretty good, some shamefully bad. not on my list of must-haves.

i've finished reading this month's wired: the features are all interesting, but the pieces that are particularly exciting are on sailing drones and theranos's blood tests. good stuff!

my next task is to collect proof of everything i've spent on "charity" this past year - probably not that much, i don't think humble bundle purchases really count - and then head off to get this tax monkey off my back. speaking of monkeys, i've been reading mac hall: volume whatever on and off and enjoying it immensely. i'm glad i didn't shell out for the really expensive version. [to be fair, you can read it all for free at machall.com, but i feel the commentary was worth throwing them some cash]

---thought for the day: i realized this morning why i don't like capital letters. for me, they're just regular letters wearing button-shirts and ties. totally not my style, unless i'm trying to get or keep a job through them.

what would jesus do?

it's gonna be weird writing this while i'm feeling so incredibly lonely that i don't actually feeling like sharing with anyone... i'm writing in my journal and exposing it to the world at large. rational behaviour?

---i shaved before i left, which meant a quick shower (i always manage to get little hairs on me, that's one disadvantage of using beard trimmers over blades) during which i wondered about this article on immersion improving cognizance that i read last night: aside from archimedes' discovery, apparently women do their best thinking in the bath. so it kinda makes sense...

it was so cozy on the metro, and i was so relaxed. as if i haven't stopped being relaxed since sunday's yoga lesson, like something really did get aligned properly and an emotional artery unblocked.

it's really cold tonight. absolutely freezing, primarily attributed to a mean wind that's been slapping everyone around since the late afternoon. pulse told me the place was on sherbrooke, google told me rachel. i decided to walk from mont royal station past rachel and on to sherbrooke. first, that's a much longer walk than i'd expected. second, google's definitely wrong. third, i couldn't find it on sherbrooke, either. we were supposed to meet at 8.15pm; i called at 8.20, and then at 8.30 and both times heard it ring until i got through to her answering machine.

how would you feel?
i sent a message with my frozen fingers briefly explaining what i'd been through and ending "... i'm going home. bon appetit!"

i pressed "send" and then realized that that could be construed as majorly passive-aggressive. then i thought about it some more, and figured that it would be appropriate nonetheless. i mean, what the hell? you invite me out to dinner, to a place which apparently isn't so easy to find, without specific directions and without making yourself available?

i feel like i've been made a fool of. whether by pulse or by the universe in general, i don't know. but i'm decidedly upset by this. i feel like shit; for this i skipped boxing? am i the asshole?

i didn't feel like stressing over dinner so i headed to la panthère verte at guy-concordia to sit and somberly eat a falafel. the traditional techina dripping out the bottom of the pita seemed to be mocking me.

i've returned home and i'm feeling sad. i've felt like this before, for sure, but right now i'm feeling it pretty keenly. i have friends and family here but i don't feel like it. i love it here and i've been extremely fortunate and all but i guess tonight's incident has sparked off some latent homesickness, and by home i mean cape town.

...

the only positive in all this was the violinist i walked past. there're a lot of homeless about tonight, but this dude was sitting on a corner in the freezing cold playing beautifully, and i tossed him a doubloon for his troubles and was glad to have been there to do so.

---while writing this i was listening to the radio, with a francophone interviewing an anglophone speaking in french with an atrocious accent. gods, i don't ever want to sound like that :S

required reading

what an odd day! and it's not over yet, but my boxing time has been cancelled so i may as well share what's on my mind right now...

1. pulse invited me to dinner with her friend who put my resume forward. she then informed me that "her friend" will be coming too, saying that she didn't want me to be surprised. does that mean that she meant "boyfriend"? i'm not sure how i feel about that, but whatever. it looks like a nice place to eat and it's a good excuse to meet someone who i hope will soon be a co-worker.

2. my yoga instructor noticed that i don't distribute pressure on my feet correctly, and suggested that i try using toe separators. so i went to the pharmacy to buy some, but being an uninterestingly straight male i didn't even know what to look for. the woman who helped me was shocked and amused that my girlfriend or wife would send me out on such an errand, and i didn't feel the need to correct her :P

3. i went to the ups store to print out and photocopy all the documentation i'll need to take to the guys who'll handle my tax returns for me. doing the math, if i don't get back more than $120 none of this will have been worth my while.

4. i was next to starbucks so i sat down with a large coffee to work on my comics. while i was learning that there's a rather lengthy book in middle english that i'm going to need to read from cover to cover before continuing*, something made me look at my phone and register, too late, that my netbook's clock was an hour behind. curses!

* i just realized that there's an important character who'll need to be defined well, even if he'll only appear in two panels of the first issue

so i missed boxing, i don't even have time to go and wail on the bags for a bit before going out. not the end of the world, but still...

... in completely different news, i haven't spoken to fp in more than a day and even then it was a couple of basic sms updates over a span of about three days. i get the feeling that whatever we had or didn't have has petered out...

quick burn monday

i tried to wake up early this morning. i guess i succeeded, but it required a snooze or two. i was so comfortable! not even sleepy, just... comfortable.

that turned to discomfort as soon as i got up, my throat's screwed again. this sucks. and my stomache wasn't too impressed with me either. i felt a bit woozy most of the morning.

when i walked past my calendar i was horrified to discover that i'd written down my mother's surgery date correctly but remembered it wrong! i remembered tuesday, by the time i sent her a message she was already prepped and didn't know what day it was. either, my aunt gently chided :$

i played with java and algorithms until the cleaning lady called me to tell me she'd be bringing a few french movies to vendôme metro for me, so i headed down there to meet her. she told me she'd been the victim of a rather sophisticated phishing attack this weekend, and while she's dealt with the credit card fraud her computer's still compromised. i told her what to do and i've offered to help her re-install her system on the weekend... at least she appears to have learned her lesson :/

i returned, ran laundry and continued practicing, then went to the language meetup. gods, the more i spoke the more difficult it became and i ended up feeling utterly useless. ohshitohshitohshitohshit.

---i picked up some flowers and took them to godmother's, where we had a really nice dinner. delicious, and uncle hate was mostly being pleasant. my aunt in cape town kept trying to call me on skype when only my phone was logged in (i don't allow calls on 3g, and it only alerts me when i get messages), so godmother explained all the details and it sounds like my mom's all clear (crossing fingers anyway). i'll get to speak to her tomorrow, at least.

the one thing that bothered us both is that my mother didn't tell us anything earlier. my mother's always saying how silly it is not to discuss things when one needs support, and suddenly she's guilty of the same behaviour? but then godmother said that yin had told her that she'd probably behave the same way, and i guess that's true of me too to a degree.

---during the afternoon i'd been speaking to pulse, and after dinner i went over to her place for a cup of tea. what i understood from the bus driver's rapid-fire french was that if i want to know when to get off i should keep my eyes peeled. thanks, buddy.

the half hour i spent with pulse was nice, but i feel friend-zoned. that's not a big deal, but i found myself a little too self-conscious while we talked.

the snowstorm i walked out into was unbelievable. mesmerizing, i was listening to tool and watching the flakes spin like little disco balls in the street's light in swirls like a screensaver that could have been an underwater scene or a space one. i had to keep forcing my attention back to the street so that i wouldn't miss my bus.

it was chilly in the metro. i've never noticed the giant vents above the tracks that stream air from an area visible through giant glass panes - tonight that air was cold and we all had to stay covered up.

i've done some more reviewing of my friend's book because i was reading on the metro. there's nothing more frustrating than a fantastically good set of ideas executed with less than fantastic commitment. some of the issues are so ridiculous that it just seems like he got lazy, as if he knew what he wanted to say and got bored trying to share it coherently. i wonder if i'll ever be invited to critique him again after this...

---at godmother's, we watched a bit of the news.

the situation in ukraine is really sad.

the malaysia jet is still missing, but it's not the first to disappear mysteriously. what the hell? shouldn't we be doing something to fix this?

snowden's still on the run for protecting the americans from themselves but speaking to sxsw? cool, but sad too.

ah-ha! a positive drug story. colorado reaping the benefits of legalization

distractions - part i

i watched the last two episodes of freaks and geeks last night. how does a series go from "harmless fun" through to "insanely brilliant" so quickly?!

and then just end???

i may have narrative closure, but i feel like i need to re-watch the whole thing. i really am sad that it's over.

---friday:

i installed eclipse to play with java - which i haven't touched in a while - and did that for a while. i did some more of the book review, hitting a short story that's absolutely wonderful but suffers such a huge plot issue that i've actually offered him big suggestions; i hope he's not too offended :P

i went shopping, and was pleased to discover that using the points card i've already earned myself a $20 discount. that card *is* worth it.

boxing class was good, i partnered with a guy i know who's really tough and experienced and we worked particularly well together. when it was time to go hard on the punching bags, i was letting it all out and that included my breathing; "totalwaste, shut up!" shouted the coach, "you're not even hitting it that hard!"
that pissed me off, the combination of being told that and the possibility that he might be right. i hope he was wrong :(

impact was a treat, we both consistently scored solid liver shots but were both supportive of each other. and that dude hits hard, that did my confidence some good.

a couple of us talked about work until late, i rushed home for a quick dinner and headed over to vfmp's. on the way i set up two dates, one for sunday and one for tuesday, which was cool. then i got off the bus two stops too early and felt like an idiot. at least the weather was comfortable :P

we watched a decent episode of house of cards and played a great game of carcassonne, but there wasn't much conversation and i got the feeling his heart wasn't into it.

when i got home i felt lazy as usual. i totally spaced out playing another case solved (i really am addicted, its meta-game is really that good), then used book reviewing as an excuse to consume lots of junk food before bed.

i went to bed with a big toe really hurting. the air's been really dry in my apartment the last few days and it's messing with everything; cracked skin's no fun :(

---yesterday:

it was a gorgeous, warm-ish, sunny day!

i enjoyed a slow, late wake up right until i realized that i needed to rush to get to la panthère verte on time :$
bnw and i went over the script, everything looks good and she's ready to rock. awesome!

we sat there long enough for two coffees and lunch, about a third of that time involved the comics and the rest talking about everything. she and her husband are going through a weird phase and i really hope they get their shit all sorted out...

the girl sitting about a metre away from me for most of the afternoon looked so remarkably like pulse that it was uncanny. i caught her eye once and she didn't respond to my smile, so i assumed it wasn't her but i couldn't shake the feeling that it was and that she was pretending not to know me... the only explanation for that being that she thought that bnw and i were on a date. when she went to the washroom for a minute i asked her friend if she's who i thought she was, and her friend gave me another name. it was enough to make my head spin!

i didn't try the maple taffy on our way in to the metro, but i really must. apparently, spring has arrived :P

i was completely bombed on the metro, i was slipping in and out of consciousness until i got home.

---i spoke to my mum, and the more i think about it the less patient i become to hear good news from her post-op. i'm sure she'll be fine, but i think i finally understand what she goes through whenever something happens to me. we're really far away.

---i sent a message to pulse regarding the earlier non-incident, and was surprised to find myself in a long, really positive text conversation. we talked about all sorts of things, to the point where it just seemed right to invite her to the slam tonight. she said she might come, which would make things super dramatic if today's date goes well because if it does i wouldn't not invite her to the slam too! i'm laughing at myself right now, i think this is hysterically stupid of me.

ssso got in touch with me on facebook - it's been more than nine years! how good friendships disappear... it was nice to catch up, though.

i went to watch the jolly moroccan fight last night, and discovered that muay thai fights have been banned or something so these were all defined as amateur exhibitions...

[continued...]

positive start

okay, so... i slept beautifully - so much so that it was really tough getting out of bed - and traded rather pleasant messages with pulse, which is kinda weird but whatever. i didn't know what to expect at 11am, so i was a little nervous... but the call i got was simply to explain the interview process and it doesn't sound like anything i can't handle. plus, unlike the disaster interview i did a short while ago, i'd actually have a heads-up on what's expected of me.

so i know which skills to brush up on. the same ones as last time. that's cool.

...

i just stopped posting this to speak to my mom, who's just informed me that she's having an operation next week. i pray everything'll be fine.

---this response to anti-vaxxers is excellent, though i could have done without the drunken typos... but penn and teller at the end of the page? i love those guys.

easy like a monday morning

well, i'm feeling sensitive today! i just watched another couple of episodes of freaks and geeks and i'm totally in. it's been light and fun, sometimes a little off, but overall its characters are absolutely wonderful and their development is sneakily subtle.

---i woke up this morning from epic dreams in a final fantasy world. odd mountains and oceans and guns and magical creatures. very cool.

i woke up this morning to an sms from sq telling me about a french movie i should watch that reminded her of me. i just saw the trailer for it, it looks interesting. i wonder what the connection is?

the first thing i did when i got up, as i knew i needed to go outside, was check the weather app. apple ui fail: i accidentally pressed on the temperature and discovered that THAT'S how to get all the details! why would i intentionally press on the temperature?! it's a display, with no indication to the contrary. if you can tap somewhere to get more detail then it should be clear. or there should be a tutorial.

i felt horrid on my way out, kinda dizzy. as if friday night's events hadn't totally finished with me... but it was gorgeous out, minus the evilly cold wind. i came across a postal van decorated with superman: so they think superman's 75th birthday is cool enough to celebrate with stamps? when i was a kid and stamp collections were a thing, i never saw this coming :)

i drew the cash i needed, so suspicious that the machine hadn't given me everything because all the notes were so new that the wad felt too thin. i looked around to make sure i was alone and quickly counted next to the machine, which is something i know not to do. nothing bad happened, but i still felt ashamed.

i was on my way to walmart when i recalled the homeless pirate and suddenly the comment i made then concretized. as of now i'm only going to refer to toonies as "doubloons". or "doubloonies", at a push. and it makes enough sense that everyone will get it, just like everyone calling the two shekel coin "shnekel" (shne is "two" in hebrew).
ooh, an opportunity to share stephen fry making a marvellous point about being a guardian of language.

i was freezing by the time i walked into walmart, the wind being bitter and mean. my mission was simple, i found thick glass cups quickly and easily, loaded up on some builder bars and then headed out to subway for lunch. or second breakfast. what the hell?! it really is only my local subway that doesn't do falafel. bastards!

when i got home, i paid my rent and finally sorted out the piles of papers that have been accumulating over the past month. i found my caq... which appears to be locked in to my previous employer. oh, shit. maybe it doesn't matter. whatever.

i plugged in my leap motion controller and tried getting the sample code to run - i thought it was broken, but it needs to be set up in a specific way that's not explained in a readme file. why not?!

i went shopping before heading out to the french meetup as a pretext to acquire laundry coins. the experience was efficient but i forgot the damned coins, and it was so bloody cold...

the meetup was cool. by the time i arrived both tables were full, and beginners were being tutored on both sides of me. at least there were oreos. i forced a conversation with the guy across from me, but he gave up at some point, and shortly after the guy next to me took a break from tutoring and we started talking. he's slightly more advanced than i am, but we had stuff to talk about which was nice. i ran through one of the canned role playing exercises with someone else, and overall i think it was a good experience.

i also found out about tv5.org, which godmother had been telling me about. nice!

i've been reviewing a friend of mine's book pre-publishing, it's a pdf on my kindle. so... i've finally found a use for highlighting things :P

boxing: i've become one of the guys, it appears. and i don't think the girl said anything to the coach about my dancing. i was partnered with an older woman who's been allowed to join the advanced class but needs a ton of work to get up to speed... i'm starting to sense a pattern, a flattering one in which i'm the goto guy for technique. i was happy to do it, though it didn't give me much opportunity to practice. fortunately, nobody minded switching partners for impact and i went with a guy who hits pretty hard. after that, a sparring partner i haven't seen since the beginning of winter returned and i joined him and a buddy of his for muay thai in the octogon.

i was completely gassed by the end of the last round with them, i'd gone three or four and my left leg and foot are quite banged up. i would've preferred being better than "you're much better", i certainly wasn't in control and there were a few times when i just stood in front of my opponent and took punishment - having said that, it wasn't bad at all and i'm really glad we're back in action :)

army brat came past as we were finishing up and i harassed her about her technique. i tried to work with her on one of the bags, and suddenly realized that her punching and kicking is completely irrelevant in light of the issues she has with her stance. i love figuring out the causes! our coach laughed when he saw the exercises i was making her do, exercises i had to do for taekwondo thirteen years ago that made a world of difference. once we'd established what her homework was, i was ready to head home.

after showering, i finally went back onto the dating site and got back on the horse. pulse has been relegated to "miss february", and it's march now. after that, i discovered that the slam on sunday is only going to be two rounds. oh, shit! well, i'm prepared for four, and while it's usually not easy to cut pieces i knew exactly which had to be relegated to the following event.

---brainbug - nightmare came on on my way to the french meetup, and i daydreamed about the first time i heard it. i was about to write about it when i realized that i may have done that before. oh gods, i'm repeating stories on my blog, just like i do in real life. oh, no...

reading over writing

thursday:

i spent the remainder of the night going through course material (mcgill's chem181), and went to bed wondering if strange markings on my right bicep were the beginnings of a rash. [apparently not, but they were pretty bizarre. and almost cool.]

i dreamed a very strange dreams that ended with a car not slowing down and careening through a red light, almost slamming into a crowd that had to jump out of its way; i woke up able to recall the license plate that i couldn't find anyone to report to.

...

i woke up thinking that regardless of second chances i had to explain myself, so i did. i spent most of the rest of the day doing duolingo lessons and reading harry potter. now that i have the dictionary, i'm almost reading at my regular pace and i'm absorbing new words at what feels like a pretty good rate! i hope it's not too late, my exam is in six days...
(O_o)

match.com gave me quite a scare! i signed up months ago to give it a try and quickly discovered, to my chagrin, that it's a sucky service and not at all worth throwing money at. not only was there a sunk cost for the initial membership, but they *automatically* renewed my membership with no warnings, options or permission! $100 to maintain an account i don't want? no thank you!
i was seriously stressing until i got through to an online assistant, who speedily organized a refund and apologized for the crappy experience. i deactivated my account immediately and i hope never to hear from them again.

in the late afternoon i went to get exam photos taken at the photo labs adjacent to walmart. i got out at the namur metro station and realized that i had forgotten my wallet, so that was annoying. when i got back home and picked up my wallet i saw that i'd left a half a glass of water in a cup and realized that i was thirsty, so i tried to quickly down it and ended up choking so badly that i threw up. that didn't improve my mood much :(

what did improve my mood was coming across a beggar with blue-streaked hair holding up the following sign as i left the station:
"jack sparrow stole my pirate ship - need gold doubloons"
the big smile on my face was totally worth a loonie - the golden single dollar coin ;)

the photo labs' picture taking service? it's a PORTRAIT taking service. like, for families wanting to do kitsch. they don't do standard sizes other than passport photos, which didn't help me. i couldn't stop the girl in time from writing their contact details on a flyer for me, i didn't want the damned flyer and i will not be guilted into taking one. why the hell aren't the contact details already printed on them? why do people have to waste so much frikkin' paper?!

i had less than an hour to get to the gym to meet kgb, so so much for getting the task done. fortunately, spending an hour working with kgb put me back in a good mood. kickboxing was really tough, so much so that one of the new guys almost passed out and had to be bought a powerade and have a friend called to pick him up. bummer...

most of guys in the class were francophone, so i hung around to listen to the chatter before going home for dinner and tekken.

---yesterday:

i was in an odd mood before bed, and managed to burn more than an hour going through poetry that i'd like to use for slam and timing it.

...

the day was ugly: warm and rainy and icy. that meant slipping a lot and either getting soaked or having to carry an umbrella, which was most inconvenient :(

my morning consisted of heading downtown to get my exam photos done - this was handled in french from the moment they understood what the photos were for. i bought more of my breakfast shake powder and had a decent lunch reading, then paid a visit to the hairdresser. who was watching hockey, i suspect the meh-ness of my haircut might be related to my disturbing his experience.

i dropped everything at home and went to starbucks for coffee and more reading, printed out my "convocation" for the french exam (whatever the hell that is), did the shopping (thinking a lot about the discomfort of carrying said shopping with an umbrella in hand) and was disappointed to discover that my ski jacket wasn't ready to be picked up from the cleaners (i spilled the last drops of an energy drink in an inner pocket :( ).

i filled out a survey that could theoretically win me $5000 - any port in a storm, says the unemployed man.

i enjoyed a glorious, too-short nap and woke up to some pre-class harry potter with a cup of tea. it's totally sucked me in again! and this time i'm paying attention to the hectic foreshadowing...

boxing: my jump rope experience is usually partial, for various reasons, but yesterday i got the full one. i was impressed that i still had use of my arms by the end of it :P
the first round of pads was hardcore, the guy holding for me is a beginner and has no sense of pacing. this turned out to be perfect because while the round wiped me out, once it was done the coach pulled me out to work with the new (very cute) girl and teach her the basics. while i was distracted the whole class burst into hysterics because he said something funny about me, and later i'd find out that the laughter was mostly shock that he'd actually paid me a large compliment.

it was her first impact training, obviously, and so (after explaining what it's all about and how to manage the strikes) i began with punches so soft that i was sure she'd know i was exaggerating - nope! she improved noticeably, though, and by the end was handling most of my punches. then it was her turn, and when a couple of the other girls saw this they decided to step in and take turns demonstrating what impact's all about. one hit me decently, one flailed about pathetically... that was army brat. she's very "gangsta" when she punches - she makes a lot of effort and does very little because her technique sucks, just like when a "gangsta" holds a gun sideways and shoots all his bullets off the mark.

anyway, i couldn't figure out if the cute girl was apologizing afterwards for not hitting me or for actually getting the hang of it towards the end :P

the guys invited me to dine with them at canda, so i rushed home to shower and change and joined them soon afterwards. overall the evening was fun, although army brat got more boring and annoying as the night wore on, as did the shitty service and the fact that there weren't many vegan options, what they did have was iffy and nothing i had justified the insane $35 buffet cost. at least everyone else had brought decent wine and the company was mostly entertaining, though my enthusiasm for sitting on the french side of the table lessened as the time passed.

---today:

i got home around midnight and spent the next two hours reading and eating skittles. then i went to bed and dreamed. in the second-to-last dream uncle puberty suffered a third heart attack [out of zero, weird] while driving just ahead of the post-party bus where my nice and only nice clothes for work the next morning had been hanging but disappeared. the last dream was an overly-detailed dream about dreaming. very inception.

...

i stayed down for a long while enjoying that glorious feeling when you're so comfortable lying in that the last thing you want to do is get out of bed... and you don't *have* to ^_^

...

i got up after a phone call from horseman and an email from pulse. the former was an invitation to meet and practice french, the latter was to let me know that a friend of hers in a well-known company has seen my resume and will happily put in a word for me. very cool!

i spent some time catching up on my rss feed - i've been neglecting it for the longest time - accumulating some crazy linkage (but i have to go now, you're spared for the moment), then met horseman on the plateau. the day would have been stunning if not for the wind, so checking out parc lafontaine was a mistake. we went underground for the next couple of hours, then came back to my place for tekken before i kicked him out so that i could post, do laundry and eat before going to the village to watch ufc 170.

it's time!

attempting to clear up misunderstandings

i woke up stuck on pulse getting me all wrong. i put together an explanation, not to a potential partner but to a fellow human being, and here's most of it because it's a fairly good summary.

first and foremost, i think human beings are amazing and wonderful, mostly individually but with the potential for unimaginable greatness on a large scale. i don't think we'll ever be perfectly peaceful and loving, but there will always be enough peaceful and loving people to keep the angry ones in check. our current age of extreme individualism is a perfect example of how much kindness and care exists even in a society that's wired for self-absorption and consumerist greed. that doesn't mean that i don't believe it's possible for us to achieve perfect peace and harmony, and i certainly believe that we should strive for it!
i may at present only be an armchair activist (i'm not proud of that, but i'm not too clued in on what's going on here and i'm quite frankly concerned about jeopardizing my ability to stay in canada by being vocal against authorities here so i limit my endeavours to increasing awareness and debating with people), but i have been protesting-active in israel regarding human rights (like freedom of speech, including for groups whose actual speech i don't appreciate) and social justice and no matter how disappointing the results may have been i'd never stop fighting for what i believe..

...

when i used the word "conflict" i used it in an academic sense, what i meant is that we're wired to make things narratively interesting. if you're complacent, you wouldn't get anything done, and a prime example of that is actively trying to right wrongs. we could never be truly happy without overcoming difficulties and adversity; that doesn't mean that we wouldn't be able to get everyone playing the same game by harnessing and redirecting our narrative energies for good. equality and environmentalism is a good place to start, but perhaps ultimately we'd take our narrative needs into a virtual plane, or direct them in artistic endeavours. but that's just, like, my opinion :P

exploring space is something that i feel is a critical part of our evolution. when we talked about it it was in a rather specific context; in a short-term view, it's important for us to maintain a pocket / pockets of humanity living off planet, even in orbit, just in case. not because i don't have hope that we're going to sort all our shit out down here, but because we don't have any guarantees that we'll sort it all out. and the potential for species-wide destruction doesn't only come from humans, we have environmental risks (such as global warning, or asteroids hitting the planet) and even if they're relatively small (no need to panic just yet) i strongly believe that humankind, with all of its incredible discoveries and rich history, including all of our little lives and the things we do that we believe give us meaning, is 100% deserving of surviving whatever the universe can think to throw at us.

and all that is just the short-term view. in the long term view i think it's our destiny to explore and create and populate the universe. my comment about sending off ideologically different groups in different ships was cynical and snarky, i suspect it might happen to a degree but that's not how i envision us evolving! what i see is the different groups, however they're formed, developing in different directions as they travel through time and space, and in my opinion that's a beautiful thing!

there's a reason i self-identify as a hippie, even though i'm philosophically in a very meta space. as i told you when we discussed paranormal things: i don't have answers to everything, not even how i personally feel about everything, but i want to understand everything because i'm philosophically and psychologically curious.
i don't judge others' realities unless i consider them harmful (ask me why i get upset if someone uses "the secret" to explain that a girl who was raped is to blame because of her negative thoughts). and i love being exposed to ideas i don't necessarily agree with because if there's one thing that will get us all on the same team, it's cognitive contamination :)

principles

so, like, wow. firstly, pulse: she sent me a long, obviously well thought-out missive explaining her position, the only real issue being a complete misunderstanding of my views regarding some fundamental things. i'm surprised and saddened by that, but not shocked because i realize precisely what the source of confusion is and i accept that it's my fault. which kinda sucks. so here's hoping for a redo...

secondly, i feel like i'm back in action regarding my training. i did muay thai and boxing this evening, it was tough but i powered through and feel totally solid. unfortunately, along the way i banged my ankle (not too seriously, but it's aggravating), managed to slam my wrist into somebody's elbow and i think that during the first (of two) impact training one of my ribs got slightly bruised :/

there was some serious weirdness with the girls; i think i made it clear to army brat that i'm only interested in her as a gym buddy but then the girl i gave the valentine's day chocolate to gave me a vega chocolate in return. anyway, they're both good for my french, and while we were talking i met a palestinian who runs a software house here and is looking for talent. cool :)

---i've now watched a couple of episodes of the good wife, and i'm enjoying it. it's kind of formulaic and kind of not? whatever.

i played a lot more tekken last night than i'd planned. shit's addictive.

...

i woke up from a dream in which i was watching tv outside in the rain, some kids came through and stole all sorts of shit... i caught them, beat them enough to get their attention and then lectured them.

i've been reading harry potter using the kindle app and not my actual kindle because the french / english dictionary i found was no good. but the kindle app's only french dictionary is french / french, so if you don't read french it's really tough to make heads or tails of things. i have a good french / english dictionary app as well, but switching between it and the kindle app causes a resync every - single - time, which is insane, so reading has been particularly slow going. and also not particularly good for my eyes, but anyway.
then i suddenly realized that i can read the book on my kindle and use the dictionary app simultaneously - that worked much better but was still far from comfortable. so this morning i decided to look again for a better dictionary for my kindle.

merriam-webster's french-english translation dictionary, kindle edition has some shitty reviews, but i couldn't find a better-looking option so i bit the $8 bullet... and lo! it's an excellent dictionary and now reading in french has become a pleasure. nice one!

so that's mostly what i was doing today. in the afternoon i took my kindle to starbucks for a change of scenery, but that's about it.

when i got home from training it was to a message from newk'd about an art evening at foufounes électriques, so i hurriedly gobbled down my super-salad and headed out there. they have a weekly competition to produce large pieces, and voting is done by placing sponsored beer cans into provided bins. very clever... out of about six or seven pieces, there were two really good ones and one had better finishing, so that's where my tin voice went. there were four of us and we all had a great evening :)

---be wary of unnecessary x-rays: i'm now even less happy with the trigger-happy dentist who fucked up my mouth, but at least i know better for next time!

the rekindle candle is absolutely brilliant. i want a couple of those.

there's a kickstarter happening for a kill shakespeare boardgame. i didn't know there was a third volume out, so i'm thinking of backing at the $15 level as i'll probably buy it anyway.

hard body

i went to the gym early to work with kgb. he can't make the beginner classes so it's up to me to get him ready for the advanced ones; we covered a lot of ground today. he has a problem with one of his shoulders, which he can use but cannot rotate, so a couple of the strikes needed a bit of improvisation. when i took him to work on the appropriate bag, one of the professional teachers came over to correct the improvisation, apologizing profusely when we explained the cause. what was extremely gratifying is that the exact expression he used was "look carefully at what he's showing you, you need to be doing that."

it's nice to be appreciated ^_^

after spending an hour with kgb, i did jiu-jitsu and then kickboxing. we had a guest jiu-jitsu instructor who said some very interesting things and gave us some fun (and very difficult) exercises to do! the girl she demonstrated on had a beautiful tattoo on her foot, which i was under the impression was a tricky thing to get right - perhaps my idea for a second (and third, i guess) tattoo isn't so far-fetched after all? anyway, both the instructor and the girl are sexy enough that i had to keep checking myself so i'd know what was going on :P

afterwards i rolled with vfmp for a round, which was tough, and then with a stranger which was even tougher because the guy had good technique AND was heavier than me. i was completely worn out after that, i'd expended so much energy it was ridiculous - but i definitely learned a lot from the lesson and overall i've improved dramatically after the past few months. as physically demanding as it is, it's even more of a mental game and i'm at least starting to think right.

it was not a good night for the gym: someone took a hard knee to the nuts without a cup during sparring, and a real fight almost broke out between one of the big boys and a fiesty beginner. a lot of us would have happily watched those two get in the ring together, but actual street-fighting is totally uncool :/

kickboxing was great - it didn't really matter that it was beginner's and not advanced. the girl i worked with learned quickly, i taught her how to hold the pads for me and she worked me hard. the coach added a few crazy exercises to the usual ones and wouldn't let us quit, and considering the workout i'd gotten prior to the class i was well impressed with myself for not being dizzy at the end. i was exhausted, but feeling good!

---the day was spent reading harry potter and doing french lessons. and napping, at some point i just couldn't keep my eyes open. and it's not like i'm not sleeping full nights. hmm :(

this mornimg i prepared a farewell email for pulse but decided to save it and see if she really wouldn't get back to me. when i returned from training i sent it as an sms, to which i got a response that was positively indecisive [ambiguity intended]. i don't know how i feel about that, so i'm not thinking about it.

broken valentine

as i mentioned last night, i ran into pulse on the bus to godmother's, and she was polite. polite. that's not at all what i was expecting. i didn't know what to make of it, but this morning she sent me a message so i figured things might be fine... but then she ignored my response (which included a question). later i wrestled with an email letting her know how i feel (i put way too much effort into it not coming across too heavy), and since then i haven't heard a word from her. i feel like i deserved something back, at least. even something negative. i don't know what i did or didn't do, but this is obviously not working. which makes me sad, because aside from whatever the hell's going on (or not?) she's awesome. but not so awesome that i'm okay with being ignored. nobody's that awesome.

---the hours flew by pretty quickly today, i spent most of them on french and some on random shit. including reporting a phishing attempt to bell that's apparently been driving them crazy: an sms with a link to a legitimate bell.ca url that's been hacked to steal account data.

i spoke to somebody today who seemed positive about employing me... that felt good.

i went to the french conversation meetup, and was far more confident! i also learned some helpful things. and that i have lots more to learn and practice.

i took my frustrations with pulse into boxing class with me, which i knew wasn't cool, but managed to offload them quickly enough. or put them aside, at least. i worked with army brat, and we did impact at the end of the class. she seemed to be hitting me pretty hard, and expressed shock at how much tougher i am, but i didn't really feel much even when she hit my soft spots (solar plexus and liver) and i can't help but question if it's me who's tougher or her who's weaker. and then i felt super embarrassed when i hit her so hard that she apparently peed a little.

*sigh*

i chatted with her and the girl i gave the chocolate to on friday after class, mostly in french. i suspect that the girl who got the chocolate might actually have taken it as a serious romantic gesture. that would be awkward!

i've been working on memorizing the first two poems that i posted last week, and i'm quite pleased that they're already feeling ready to be shared on stage ^_^

i chugged a protein shake and went to vfmp's to watch another episode of house of cards. vfmp, his boyfriend and his brother are all 100% vegans, and it was most validating to hear them enthusiastically agreeing with me in response to their reading my vegans unite! post. it seems we are united!

episode seven of house of cards is a clear improvement and i feel like the season is almost back on track.

---scrapper has introduced me to the idea of chess boxing. certainly not for me, but interesting nonetheless. hmm. perhaps if tekken replaced chess...

this video gives a little perspective on the bds movement.