and then...

heather, thanks for the website...i browsed through it and got some good tips. I'm seeing the sports dr tomorrow and once I get the clear to start running again, i need some time to get my wind back and build my physical stamina (takes about 9 days) and mental stamina (never-ending) i should be off and gone again. Maybe once i'm confident enough with running (both pace and pain wise) i'll give you a shout around end of may-ish and perhaps we can do some runs...

looked into that Nike technology. Thought it really cool when it first came out. Unfortunately for me I have a severe chagrin towards Nike (one of my many amusing hypocrisies) since my teens for their tacit complicity and arrogant laissez-faire role in child and child labour exploitation blah blah blah...so i can't really fork over any money to Nike or emblazon myself with that satanic checkmark...

also i don't have a nano so it does me no good anyways...lastly (but mostly firstly since it relates directly to the first point) i wear new balance shoes so i can't really put the transmitter in the NB shoes...and yes i am aware the New Balance probably has (to a lesser extent but an extent nonetheless) use and exploited child/third world labour for bottom line margins but at this point my anger is better directed towards Nike and Reebok since the monopoly is theirs and they end up being my personal scapegoats à la Jim Cramer. Opulent isn't it?

On another note, I start a new job today and so far it just confirms my suspicions that every branch of the government is woefully mismanaged but filled with good people with the best of intentions. What I'm left with then is a merry band of civil servants leading me by hand to hell without a map or idea on how to get there. They just know the end result. Life, however, could be worse...

on that note, I offer to our dear Nam a moment of Karma or cosmic interference...I lost my cellphone. Don't know how, I know generally when, have some clues to where but all in all it is lost. See, the universe tends to right itself and God just gave me a swift kick in the nuts for my gleeful non-sympathy of your similar plight of two weeks prior.

Just for the record...God I wasn't unsympathetic or non empathetic towards Nam and his cellphone disappearance (which turned into a wholesale human disappearance thereafter)...God you know me well enough by now to know that I am a perennially absent-minded, scatterbrained headcase... I lose everything. Hell, you know My Lord that I am the same individual that lost magic mittens that were attached to my winter coat with clips and fastened string! In fact I have probably become much worse at preserving anything in my possession since I have attained adult status and if it wasn't for my wife actually coming home to me every night I might end up forgetting I was a married man. So thanks for the reminder God that you are always watching, listening and reading my every word and thought. Thanks for letting me know that that my faith in you is rewarded by cosmic jesterdom and pranks. At least I find it funny. Lastly God, I wasn't being mean towards Nam, just an ass, something I'm quite good at, something more irrerverant than cruel which is why I am a civil servant.

Nam, whatever you believe, God is on your side at the moment. Must be those Christian choir songs you were singing on the aforementioned disappearance day.

peacelovefreedomjustice

-s

Restless Souls

Here we are again.

Beautiful day in Toronto City, sun is shining, weather is sweet...all the good stuff we've been waiting for since last summer ended.

See for me, I can't imagine a better place to be than Toronto in the spring/summer. It isn't that I have a lack of imagination, there are many places I ache to go and see, but for me, this place, this town, is more than home, it cuts deeper with each passing day, I feed off this city and love it through everything. Even in the doldrums of cold winters (by metropolitan standards) I see the beauty that is Toronto and in most instances I don't want to be anywhere else.

I am however restless. As we get older, the roaring twenties of our current youth scream at us to leave, to see the world beyond our narrow borders of birth and comfort. It seems everyone at this moment wants to leave this place and maybe find their way back or appreciate it from afar. Sometimes I feel as if I cannot properly contextualize my adoration nor properly express the love I have for my city until and unless I leave it and see it from another place or another ocean, far from the lap of comfort.

Everyone wants to leave.

Waldo and nerf got the bug and then buggered the hell off to the middle east. Nick is now in the process of preparing for his Japanimation, Jason wants to leave and go anywhere the hell away from here. Bubbles has been threatening to leave for many a year, and my brother is bitten by the bug and may one day leave as well for some time.

I remain stuck.

not out of pure laziness mind you, though some of that does persist. Mostly contentment keeps me firmly planted here and a wee bit of arrogance that I will not and cannot find a better place than here. I have the bug, I've just been able to inoculate myself against for the present moment.

Complacency however can be sinful can it not?

but for all you other restless souls, the best of luck on your journeys. I say this with some jealousy as well since I am not able presently to leave without some wholesale deconstruction of what and who I am and where I want to go. Waljee you got to see London Town before I did and hell you've been to Jordan!!! (the waljee blog has been updated, no shameless plug here, just a straight plug http://waljeesinkuwait.blogspot.com/).

Nick you get to see Tokyo before I do and perhaps even Seoul and Kyoto and Hong Kong since the proximity makes it far more feasible than before come August.

Before I do however isn't a bitter statement, more a lamentation that I haven't yet seen Tokyo and London, two metropolises I pine to see and feel. It is however such good news for you guys and I'm very happy you get to do things you've been dreaming of for some time.

To the others, either stuck here or firmly planted here, roots digging ever deeper with each passing day. Home is a sweet place, a wonderful place and there is no place like this place.

Heather, I'm glad you're running that is as awesome news as any that has come my way in the last little while. I'm glad I inspire some people! Although I myself have had to stop running for the moment, got the shin splints and was advised to cut running for at least a month. My knees have been giving some trouble although they have improved considerably in the last couple of weeks.

I am grateful for small miracles. Miracles in themselves defy the description of size. All miracles are never really small.

You're running however has got me itching to get started again, the pretty weather all the more alluring to the prospect and I hope I can run a 5k sometime in the next year, that would be very cool! Heather would you be able to drop me a line and let me know what your training has been like for the 5k you're running and what the training involves? Much appreciated.

Also thanks for the opera tickets to you and Jason both. The wife and I had a brilliant time, that venue is beyond compare and the show was superb. We are now definitely looking at seeing some more opera in the future and they are doing Madama Butterfly this September so we look forward towards that.

All in all, things are great. Nam, we heard your excuse for not meeting us and all that, so you suckdiddlyuck Flanders, but the concert was also quite superb, and since you "ditched" us we got to enjoy burritos and kittens back at our house without you, so there square.

Hope to see any or all of you at some point soon. Nick are you coming to the Hey Rosetta! show next week at Lee's Palace? Can't wait for that one, and thanks again for the introduction to their music. Should be a jolly ol' time.

That's it for now, sorry for the lack of updates, waljee unmotivated and has now subsequently re motivated me!

a bientot kids!

peace,love,freedom,justice

-s