Tuesday, December 08, 2009

I am very very tired.

Tired in the manner of being unmotivated and just general down and out.

Reasons why:

Life is changing, and it has happened so fast that I didn't start feeling the implications of things changing until yesterday/today (which is about 3-4 days after it started).

That change is that I might move to Vancouver for work, which means abandoning college here, means abandoning any plans I had here with my heavy involvement of extra-curriculars, and from my previous track record of things, dropping off a lot of connections I have here. Some of which I spent time to actually work in.

Now it's not going to happen immediately, and it's not even guaranteed, I'm only on the 2nd level of screening, and there's more after it. So there's still a pretty good possibility I'm not going to even get in. Plus from what I checked, I'm spending 1200 on plane and hotel to do the 2nd screening test (not even counting food yet). So it's a big gamble of all or nothing considering that's all I have left for money too.

The other thing is that I lost 15-8 to my student in a proper fencing duel. Did my best, started to panic, started to do crazy things (which worked better than some of my usual stuff, and I got reprimanded for it to not do crazy things), but basically I lost and cracked under the pressure of the fear of loss before it even ended. So what's so significant about it? Well, this duel was suppose to be at our true best, our 100%, everything we've got, and I put everything I got into it, and I couldn't change anything. The challenger did the same things over and over again, the same bad habits they were doing, that they do best at, the same weakness that I never amended. It was a match of who could poke each other closer distances, and the shorter one always wins. Well, now I've lost confidence in my teaching, whether I'll still be respected as a teacher, and I can't see anything good in me about fencing anymore, why should I stay if I can't teach that much? Why should I stay if I can't even perform well?

I feared that a non-friendly "Go all out" duel would do a number on the loser, be it my challenger or I would get hit hard emotionally/mentally from this. AND IT HAPPENED! I feel like utter shit. I never have duels, I just spar, and play around because I don't want to hurt people or myself mentally/emotionally. I've lost control before, and it has REALLY BAD outcomes as a) we know from previous posts here about me wishing death on family members, and me actually hurting people (giving cuts to people) when it was the wrong time and place for things. When I'm in tournaments, I'm still not "serious." I'm still just playing a game, not actually fighting. Which was why my first offense was using my off-hand as a tool for parrying. I was in the mindset of a true duel. I had this 1 specific duel in the name of helping my student (the challenger), and it helped them, at my own personal cost of self-esteem and pride.

Another pointer for possible bummer syndrome is fear of losing respect from that person, and losing that person as a student.

My archery hasn't changed a lot too for the past 4 months, I hit target, but never consistent on where I hit, so I'm at a plateau, and can't get better.

I haven't shot pistol in ages, and it only improves sporadically because it's like a beginner that's starting up, Going from zero to 1 is an infinite improvement.

Perhaps it is time to lay down my arms, and move to something else, whatever ordinary people do I guess, or whatever else I find that tickles my fancy.

It's a possibility I'm just taking things too seriously, or too deeply, but, if it happens it just does.

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Just another repeating bad day.

It's like watching reruns on TV, except there's no channel switch, and there's no off button.

I just finished going through my posts, and if you look at Sept 22, basically it was almost an exact rerun of that day.

-late for class (didn't miss it this time),
-usual classes
-go home, eat, wonder why all the lights are on, and the fans running. It's wasting a lot of energy ...
-get a ride from dad (big mistake), and he rages about me upgrading to windows 7
Well it was 40$ instead of the 120$
-get treated like a baby on paper, as he writes with rage on notes and notes of paper.

Why do I always get ratted out for my spendings, and I don't rat anyone else out for theirs? Because it's trivial, and we all know there are consequences later. Opportunity costs, we buy something now, we wait longer for other things. How hard of a concept is that? How come that doesn't sink into his head that I don't mind waiting for things. He wants to push an LCD monitor ($200) on me for some reason ... I don't want it. I keep saying I don't want it...

Is it not surprising I find myself frustrated about being raged on about spending small amounts over periods of time, and he wants to burst it on big items?

Now my frustration accidentally manifested itself into a murderous intent. We had our argument in the car, and right when I was getting off to go to fencing. I had to spend at least half an hour meditating and breathing to calm myself down from taking it out on students that I'm coaching. Let 1 slip up and yelled at the regulars for being slower than the beginners getting their armor on (and today was the first day for beginners to put the full suit on).

Luckily though, teaching has been one of those relievers of emotional stress. I calmed down by the end of practice, and was back to most of my usual self. I let my students pound at an obnoxious nose to the sky charade of me, and it felt good that they were able to focus themselves to defeat that charade, and with the things I was teaching them today.

Archery, I was totally off my game, because my focus had not yet come back, and didn't until the last volley. I just didn't want to go home. I was contemplating asking a res friend if I could stay at their place, but I have come home still to find that complaint paper.

Home is not a place of retreat for me, it's a place of war and battle. I am more at ease, marching through the city, carrying my education, carrying my hobbies, and carrying myself through society. I always think about the idea of camping out in the city. Why? Probably because it's the real cheapest way to live and it is the most mobile for one who doesn't own a car.

Friday, October 23, 2009

The incomplete circle of goals, success, and progress.

So it's midterm season, and I'm doing quite well so far. However, one of the main downers was last weekend when I went to competition. I didn't do badly in the round-robin matches, but my elimination round, I was practically a target dummy to my opponent and for the first time in my fencing career, defeated in less than 3 minutes.

So one of the first things that I was thinking about was just how well I applied, the different styles I learned. It works on slow people, and on dumb people that react. However, what about average people and the intelligent adversaries? We never tried things out on them, in other words we never tried things out in reality.

I realized that and was quite concerned with a more general theme where my colleagues are content with the results we got from just the people we tried it on, and just the people we were around. One of them even blinds himself to saying he's expanding it by teaching it to people in the club. I applaud his effort, but he fails to be capable of having things spread beyond him. I'll ask him later, why he doesn't compete. Why doesn't he show the larger community that actually counts and will make a difference in changing the face of fencing? I believe he stopped being competitive was because he mentioned that the competitive community is stubborn, and arrogant and not accepting. Which isn't true considering things are still changing in the community.

So I was disappointed about our lack of progress and blindness to what progress really is. We set the goals, we succeeded in achieving them, so in conclusions we made some progress. That's great, but we stopped now.

So my busy life continued, and next up came archery. 1 of the members there, she's been practicing since the start of the club, but has only begun to consistently hit the target. She was happy, we all cheered/teased. Today though I was giving pointers on things to look out for. Something to check when she's next in practice. She didn't quite understand. So when I did finish explaining it was relatively labourous. I tried something different then. Trying to get her to understand, the variability that skews an archer's aim. If she understands the difficulties, she can understand what can be fixed. What she can work on, without relying on the coach to give her a foreign concept to learn and work at.

She got royally pissed at me for being tedius, and that I should "you tell the student THIS IS wrong, you do it that way." I personally don't teach this way because

a) it insults the students frequently and not everyone can take it.
b) it spoon feeds the learning material. The student will never learn unless the coach is there.
c) Kind of a corallary to b), is that the student will never learn to think independently.

We moved on from that subject, and I warned her not to get comfortable with her achievement on monday. She can be happy, but she has to remember to not stop and keep going. It was a warning, and she took it as my assumption that she is. So she became angry again, and with all the dramatics to follow. I was consistently trying to correct her misunderstanding and apologize for my incoherence.

She became very emotional, and I gave up on trying to reason with her.

Different case, similar problem,

We set goals, we progress and achieve them, shouldn't we look towards more progress, better and higher achievements besides our immediate little world?

Like that Desjardin commercial. "Just because something's invented, does it mean we stop there? No, we knew we could do better. "

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

So I'm sacrificing precious sleep, for a post. This post I'd say is relatively important in my life.

I've actually become indifferent to the yelling and screaming, and anger that my Dad shows towards anything I do against him. This is different in that I usually take it personally, that I'm a failure, that I'm a loser, that I'm a dreamer. Plus all his arguments to corner me into admitting defeat. Usually I just get all depressed and well like last time I think that happened, I wanted to kill myself.

So what's different about today? Well let's recount the day's events shall we?


I woke up on time, but I didn't prepare the night before (Fencing blades, Bow, laptop, notes, textbook), so I became horribly late, and missed my English class. I went to my labs, had no trouble there, and I actually stayed relatively awake during lecture, when the teacher has less knowledge about polymers than I do. The subunits of a polymer are called "Monomers" not "mers ..."

Bussed it back to York, talked to Kendo, watched Defying Gravity (not sure I want to continue, because there were things I wanted to ask about. Such as why would someone tell a story about their experience with an alien object instead of explaining detailed specifics of it during a Mission Briefing?) on his laptop since he offered, and then went to go teach fencing.

Made an awful mistake during footwork by asking Jeff (during the practice instead of off practice) what he thought of the new suicidal maneuver that Fred was teaching. Eventually, though Fred explained to me why he was showing it, and that his emphasis was on recognition and adaptation, and not usage. Simple enough, got complaints from Fred that Jeff is teaching stuff that students aren't capable of. I was teaching 1 student that was asking for help in certain maneuvers, and then before I knew it, 3 hours flew by like nothing. Strained my right ankle a little, but other than that I'm fine physically.

Archery practice was cancelled to my dismay, got fencers to sign up and check off a preferred day, and got 1 old member to come back. Talked to Suke about the area, how it functions, and he was amused, but already committed to fencing. "Not a problem" I said and thought. Packed up, and well marched my way home for the last leg of my Journey (with a lot of gear) for the day. March as in a light leisure but rhythmic walk.

I get home, and dad is cleaning a spill he made in the oven. Basically he was making roast beef with a roast too big for the dish and it spilled everywhere in the oven when it fell over. Oh well, it happens when we're unprepared, and he cleaned it up. He went to talk to me about all the options there are to eating food, in orders, in whatever. He saw the monitor box, and asked what it was. I told him the plain truth, he raged, he yelled, he insulted. I simply understood what he was saying, or commanding, did the switch back to my old one, and well ... it just hit me after the storm.

I didn't feel bad. I knew it was coming, I knew I couldn't explain circumstances (last one in stock, it was cheap, its from FactoryDirect). I just let him rage, leave, and I continued to do what I was doing, made the fix.

Indifference is what I felt. I didn't care about most of his rant. Simply did what he asked, and went on my way. I know it's a bad thing, especially because he's my biological father that did take care of me. I've been told that Indifference is the opposite of love. It's something my dad expressed to my mom awhile back when the first charade fell, and that big fat nuclear bomb exploded known as divorce. Neither of them are going to, they care too much about something that we have now to risk breaking it.

However, when your kids start having the same indifferent feeling for their parents. Isn't that dangerous too? My parents are more foreign to me than my acquaitances and friends. I think I might just drift away, dissociate from them like I do people I don't spend the effort to see anymore.

It's different from the conflicts of my relatives. They all ran away from a significantly large conflict. Dad and grandpa for career conflicts, aunt and cousin because of some big argument and she simply picked up and left. Those are the only 2 circumstances I can think of right now. Otherwise, the families have been together for the most part. Dad and sister though keep our family from heading to outings with the rest of the family. I know it's because those 2 fight everyone else, and the extended family. It usually comes down to what my sister portrays as jealousy, my dad as attitude, and well I think is just their stubbornness.

As Cherry told me while I write this,
"i think there are some fundamental differences in thinking and you've tried to explain to them and it didn't work and u tried again and it still didn't work no choice but to let them be sometimes"

You know what, I think I started a bit of that today.

Thursday, September 03, 2009

Lacking sleep sucks,

I'm grumpy, and a little more frustrated than I usually feel.

a) Info about OSAP for first timers I didn't know money was being wired to my account. I thought it's just being mailed like tax credits. I'm glad I came prepared though.

b) High tension with parents because that happy dandy last post was a facade, which collapsed really badly. Now they're putting up obvious acts and charades to each other so they don't get on each other's nerves with their real selves.

c) My teacher for Chinese sword is biased towards his "realistic" fighting for survival context vs the sport fencing context. I tried speaking to him about the good things that have come about by introducing some of the techniques of his training that worked in sport training. Worked so well, the fencers enjoyed it and voluntarily decided to work on it for themselves. Even though they still view fencing as a sport or as for fun, he scoffs them off as being people he can't help, and that they're warping the "true" ("spirit" was my interpretation) meaning of the techniques. I was appalled that he didn't have anything good to say about their growth. It's all because of the arrogance of "I do this to survive" vs "I do this for fun. " I don't think I'm going to use a sword in a prepared combat situation, I think my pistol and rifle training have more application than that.

d) explaining to my brother the way things are, vs the way things are ideally suppose to be. Also explaining the idea that people think differently, have different perspectives, they don't think like him, they believe in different things. I'm annoyed that his mind is so very narrow that he can't fathom or understand why a person wouldn't believe in God. Or our ability to identify with characters from let's say an anime. He criticized so much about the differences between the anime's reality of physics and astronomy compared to our reality of physics and astronomy (of which a lot of his babble on astronomy I keep reminding him is JUST THEORY, and not confirmed). IT'S A PIECE OF ART! YOU'RE GOING FOR LIBERAL ARTS AND YOU CAN'T understand that it is fiction and it has been made different from our world to add that fantasy element of "hmmm I wish I could fix my clock with just some scribbles on the ground and a clap of my hands? "

Anyways my babble is done, sleep is good!

Monday, August 24, 2009

The Doctor is like life.

1 bit of time things are all fine and dandy, the next there's chaos and destruction and hate everywhere! Also who's to say that "bit of time" has a specific regimented separation, it could be decades, years, days, weeks, minutes, even seconds with no particular value besides let's say x for any number in the real number system!

So anyways not too much to blog besides the following:

I hate York: They fail to inform you properly until you hand stuff in, wait 3 weeks for a letter saying "RE-JECTED GeeGee!"


Before Dad went on vacation from work, he was an absolute ass. Now he's just fine like he's a completely different person. That's not all, mom changed too, and it feels like they're not my parents anymore. They're actually respectable ...

New year is about to start, and guess what? Execs take off ... WTF? You take it easy NOW?! If things were nice and settled beforehand, we wouldn't be tired now when our most crucial time of "put on our happy face and grab people" is upon us.

SO! Instead I went to go shoot crap, forget about the worries of my exec positions and boy was that fun as ever!

Monday, July 06, 2009

My body is suffocating,

There's pressure within me that needs to be released.

The most appealing way I know how right now to do that is cutting or shooting or puncturing holes in my body.

The other alternative is to break the internal structures that create this pressure, or numbs the feeling.

As most people know, I'm not the suicidal type, but I'm serious about cutting or shooting myself.

Here's why too:
For some reason, pursuing dreams in this family is a problem (Self-esteem shattering).

Taking risks in unknown areas of humanity is a problem (Self-esteem shattering).

Saying "I'm planning blah" vs "I'm thinking about (same) blah" mean entirely different things (ESL communication problem). For some reason I'm the one with the communication problem even though English is my FIRST language ...

If plans aren't implemented the second one complains, nobody's going to believe you ever (isolate).

Always have to compare myself to those around me that are "succeeding. " We will always fail to someone else, there is never 1 top person because there is imperfection in every individual human being. A guaranteed losing situation.

Hearing the failures of my parents not achieving their dreams has to be restated over and over and over and over like a broken stereo system (Not my problem, but they're making it my problem).

Information, trends, and society from 15-20 years ago are suppose to be 100% accurate and valid now and today, and anything I say about a change in society is false. This is really what builds that pressure because of the stupidity that I'm putting up with in my face. I've never met anyone so ... blind before.

Who has perfect memory? Nobody ... to have perfect memory, means you won't forget anything. However, we do forget somethings, thus memory is not perfect. I have to put up with "No, you're not remembering things correctly. "

I am being coerced to walk a single narrow path, much like a church singer I know. However, I suppose the only difference right now is that I'm not accepting this path. I know my path is not to drone at figures, not to drone at spreadsheets and accounting statements. My gifts, my mission is not this fucking shit that leaves society stuck in its tracks from progressing. No, I've been fighting it for a long time. About 5 long years of fighting, 5 long years of some rest, and then a massive beating to cooperate, every time reminding me of my shackles.

I'm tired, I'm in so much pain that I know I'd feel better without a head. However, that denies why I was born. You said I was born to persevere, and I am doing just that, except it's not through a wonky physical body, or a changing education system, or a ruthless society. No, I'm persevering through your stubbornness, ignorance and failures.

I will go where I want eventually, unlike my friends that travel now backpacking, or flying on their own only to come back home. When I finally leave, I will never come back.

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Forgive the swearing in this entry, but who wouldn't be frustrated to the point of doing so?

I'm fucking 1 credit off from graduating ...

For UofT students, that's 1/6 of a full year 1 credit course.

This has stalled my previous application for that 42 week accounting training.

Which means stalled my process to get a job (if it's not guaranteed, then that's another year of my life gone).

Now I know what it feels like when "shit hits the fan."

I wasted 600$ on a course that didn't count because 3rd time course retakes don't count for shit. In other words my final year at York, literally cons me of my piece of paper called a degree, AND 600$ of money I paid out and didn't get the product out of it.

Going to spend the next week arguing about letting me get off the forsaken lands that are York University.

I'll still go in the direction to York but sort of like a barbarian in Diablo 2 that ventures into Baal's throne room in Act 5. Fighting and killing (not literally) with my swordfighting/fencing and archery and grinding my abilities to higher more outstanding levels.

That last paragraph actually calmed me down.

Tuesday, June 02, 2009

If "A break at last" is a bit too long for you (4 pages single spaced), here's a shorter bad rant.

So today was a kind of recovery from Sunday. How do I recover from being mentally and emotionally beaten so much in 1 time?

I do 2 things, I either teach others skills that people want to learn, or fix equipment. Since I'm not armoury officer anymore, I'm not exactly authorized to go on a fixing spree. Also it's kind of unhealthy to mole myself in the armoury when I have friends that want to help me out of this rut. They also tried using the technique that I knew helped prop me up. That is to teach them something I know, and they want to know (eventually). So I gave them a lesson, and it was an improvement up from the totally down state, but I had accidentally hurt one of them because they were getting a defense, and then loosened up too early and let me in. Which caused the face whack. Not good to injure students, but 1/2 well taught students helped a bit.

Fencing practice solved the other bit, as 1 of the newbies picked up targeting so quickly, she was better than the regulars! The other was learning, although not so skilled, and I encouraged them to practice in transit (bus surfing).

I felt good knowing that there is talent, and that there is hope for someone's dream team, and vision to progress closer.

So a good hop, skip, and jump all the way home. Until I get on the computer...

In the past 4 hours, 1 person was irresponsible enough to not work on something they were suppose to finish earlier. Another backed out of the executive meeting, the 3rd got kidnapped by her sisters to the USA, and the irresponsible worker somehow put a typo in a copypasta...

Anyways, one of the things to piss me off is that after we've worked so hard to get our times booked, our shit together, all of a sudden, my colleagues don't take this seriously anymore. They were going to waste a practice to be selfish. It ended up that the whole bloody practice got cancelled because you know you can count on the people returning when you bail out. If it were the regular membership I know you'd have come. So we're premature in starting people up. We have enough equipment.

Unless the space gets wider, we're not going to need more bows. We got more than enough ammunition for each person to fire half a dozen arrows all at once. We make our finger tabs. The only thing we don't have are the targets. and the extension nets, and the secondarly backstops. However, these are all frills for next year. We can keep our membership going this year still through the summer. So you got to spend money to to school commuting, SO DOES EVERYONE ELSE! That's not an excuse. Car, bus, train, it all costs money. We all dole out to move our arses places. You worked 3 years for getting this started, and now you're just going to come in "oh sometimes, maaaybe, not sure if I can today" You're worse than your membership. They got the commitment to show up on time, as scheduled, EVEN help out and socialize. It is the club you always wanted, a tight nit community. Or one that has promise to be that, but people are still getting to know each other, people are still only meeting on the basis of well ... archery. To feed more socializing, you have to bring them together more.

And you can't do that while you sit on your comfy butt in that comfy home, and whine with pessimissim. You fit the stereotype all too well of being a rich, and whiny suburbian. Being pessimistic is fine, but not doing a damn thing about it isn't.

A break at last!

Or so I thought. So my plans changed, a bit drastically too in just 1 weekend.

It's the first time in maybe 2 months since I came back up to Richmond Hill. Yeah, it's not far at all from Toronto, but if you've got closer places to live and less time traveling, that still equates to more time being productive.

Got home, and things were ok for 1 night, except for the fact that my room was cleaned the night before to hide the mass amount of saw dust and dirt and trash can mess in my room from my brother and mom. Also finding out that my brother totalled his bike again within a month. However, they were corrected, so I didn't mind those things happening because one can move on when there is a correction.

Next day, I wake up for lunch because I've been sleeping well, and sleeping late. I come down, sit down, and well start eating. Complimenting and thanking my family for the good food. Things are going well until mom asks if I've enrolled in "Intermediate accounting". I told her I have to take the introductory first, and then go into the intermediate. I was setting up for the Schulich program which requires you to take the pre-reqs, for the next level course. She then promptly blew up in a fit of anger asking me how long is it going to take to get my courses done. I told her 2 years because I can't take courses together, or I'll a) get kicked out of courses, or b) plainly fail them because my background in this field is shoddy.

She then starts yelling at me that I'm always in school, playing playing playing, not studying, not doing anything for myself. She kind of calms down for a minute, and asks what I want to do with my life.

I told her the same plan that I told my dad. I'm going to finish with a major in Biology, a minor in accounting, and then go to college for robotics. With this set of knowledge, I can work in pharmaceutical manufacturing, or as my research friend likes to add an example, build a spectrometer that can read and decode proteins. An engineer has good knowledge of physics, practicalities and making instruments, but he lacks background information in biology to know what he's builiding this for. A biologist has that information, but doesn't know enough about instrument techniques and scanning techniques to think from that engineering perspective. So why not have the education for both? There's got to be use for that. My dad likes this, and told me to go for it. He was quite anoyed about the missing part of "accounting" because he wasn't informed that it would take a slightly longer time to achieve than he thought, but otherwise he was very encouraging.

From that point, my mom was ranting this (it's paraphrased because it lasted an entire 5 minutes) "Who's going to take a college student who has basic engineering, when they can take a university student with better knowledge. Do you think, they'll let you build their billion dollar machines? No, they'll want Doctors (PhD) to do that, they'll want university graduates. Not some silly non-reputable college student. Your chances of achieving this dream are zero. Take something easy, take something that will let you do your stupid hobbies. Take accounting."

Dad sided with her because the idea of getting a degree from college is an unknown concept to him. He was under the impression that I'm getting a technician designation which also does lead to a pretty limited prospective. However, he didn't say to not continue my plan, but to be aware of its limitations, and try to look for something that sounds more prestigious.

Either case, I got a double-shot of gank at the lunch table before I took my meds, before I had even taken 10 chewing motions. I eventually replied that this is the best way I see to achieve everything that my parents want, and what I want. Mom promptly complained that by the time I finish, I'll be 30 years old with no work experience, and that nobody wants a 30 year old with no experience and only a bunch of undergrad degrees under his belt (Who wants a 50 year old with no RELATED work experience, and no degree related to their field of work?). I didn't reply with that because, this isn't about her, it's about me. It's a bit true I thought, it is late for a person to train that long and have no work experience. However, isn't that what Masters, and PhDs are? They're forever students, studying and researching for the embetterment of mankind and their own egos sometimes.

This is where things became heated. I was trying to drill into her head and my dad's head that I can't go any faster. That after my major+minor, I'm going to look for work in accounting related positions, and fund my own further education. It's just going take longer than I expected. It's not the strike's fault, but the fault of the change happening when? In bloody April when I gave up looking for work in every possible spot in the government of Canada. I was told by both of them, to stay in school a bit longer to weather the recession in comfortable isolation at university. It sounded like a good idea. 1-2 more years of school, and then I'm free right? Well apparently that's too long, and there's a better alternative. I can get a designation in Seneca, and it's only 42 weeks long, and I only need to be enrolled in the intermediate accounting course, and I'll get a placement at Canada Revenue Agency.

My thoughts at the time that I didn't express:
Hey ... why wasn't I told this ... IN FUCKING MARCH OR APRIL DOUCHEBAG! When I was talking about changing in that direction? I told them I want to do this quickly, I hate accounting, it's boring, and an utter waste of me to do such a thing. I'm only doing this because I need to survive. Once I've found something I truly like (my own business, a place that uses my other degrees), I'm out of there faster than you can say "Fap?"

So I apologized for being confrontational, and I apologized for delaying. I thanked them for helping me do my plan faster, more efficiently, and less painfully. I did repeat 3 times to my mom that wouldn't shut up about my bad initial plan (Dad was sort of sporting the greatness of engineering at this time, and he stopped his bombardment a long time ago when I said the following the first time) "I didn't know there was this way of going about it, now that I do know, I'm going to take that direction. "

All the whole time, I was breaking down inside, all the whole time, I was using every fibre of my body to control my emotions and actions, reminding myself "You just haven't taken your meds yet, it's just the lack of them right now causing this. Think about the content of the information coming to you, not the emotional reckless response. "

So I finished my food ... finally, and it was perhaps the worst tasting good food I've ever had. It physically tastes good, but my mood, and concentration was on myself and the damage control to calm down. In other words I did not have any other focus to actually taste food. Only fibres and objects in my mouth to go down into my digestive system is all I felt. Mom then promptly said "Let me show you where to go! " In other words dictating exactly what I should do. I told her I wanted to look myself, but she refused and replied that it'd be faster if she showed me. I didn't argue, and accidentally let out a snap kick to the air because I needed something to shake my tension off, Dad was trying to calm me down and help me up at this point as he could tell I was beaten up pretty badly.

So I was showed the site, wonderful, bookmarked, and done. Sooo what am I going to do now? It's sunday, looks like we'll just have to wait for things to occur, when it's all done. I shut down my laptop pack it up, and try to find something else to do. I'm at home, I should do something with my brother, and around the house that I can't do here at the apartment. So I dawdle around, clean a little, do nothing for a bit, watch my Dad fix the totalled bike with my brother helping to repair what he's broken.


Then I go back up to my room, and turn the computer on to go apply for the programs. Mom promptly comes into the room and starts yelling and ranting at me that all I do is "Play, play, play! Can't you do some real work? You're a loser!" I'm continually bombarded by this, and I interrupt her in the middle of the rant to tell her "I'm applying for the programs, that's all I am doing on the computer. Now can you please calm down? " This doesn't stop her though and she continues her assault about that I play too many games and starts interrogating me on how many hours I spend playing computer games. It's actually recorded now, and it's about 3 hours a week (Freespace 2 research). She refuses to believe that, and I correct her, I'm teaching fencing 6 hours a week, I'm at archery 4 hours a week, I'm sword fighting 2 hours a week, that's where my time is. "It's value that is not tangible or measureable, " was my statement to her about how I use my time. Funny how there's a lot of that in the Macroeconomic models that we leave as a leniency.


She changes the topic to try and stop me from applying... Trying to ask me and convince me that "I should not do this if I am really unhappy doing this, but I need something that makes money for me". I jokingly restated "something that makes money FOR YOU! " She promptly denies this, and goes back to rambling about me spending too much time on my hobbies. It's only stopped by Dad coming in to intevene and start changing the topics and basically being a diversion for her screamfests at us or my brother, or him. Things dissipate because Dad just plays the fool until she gives up on trying to convince the "fool."


I get a longer break this time, and eventually start remembering things I was planning to do at home. One of them was looking for a cheque that my brother told me 2 months ago had come in from York. The cheque itself is an expense payment for me buying armoury equipment for the fencing club. I look around, and I timidly ask "Did you by chance receive anything from York in the mail? " Mom asks what I am expecting, and I tell the truth, "A $1500 cheque to pay for the armoury expense that I incurred. " Mom says no, and I replied saying "Hmmm that's strange, brother said it came in, I'll ask him when he comes back in from fixing the bike. " Mom explodes in anger for a 3rd time today, she starts ranting that my brother is irresponsible, about why I would put the responsibility of him telling me correct information to him. He's a minor and shouldn't be trusted. I should ask her if something that important came in. He doesn't check the mail, and if he does, he dumps it in his backpack, and then dumps the entire pile on to the living room. She's the one that opens the mail, the only thing that comes in for me are bill bill bill bills. Rinse and repeat that 10 times now, with the sound speakers blasted as loud as you can. At the end of the first round of that I told her, "Well, he's my brother, he's family, why should I distrust him? What reason does he have for lying to me? If it's not here, then it's probably just still in the paperwork pile at York. We're dealing with buffoons at York. They take 4-6 months for anything to be filed properly. Just calm down, it'll come in eventually. " She repeats her rant above. 2nd round through: "This is why I don't like coming home. It's always painful to come here, either you're fighting with dad, brother, or me. " She kind of calms down and asks me if I have ever done anything for myself. My reply is vague, because I'm not really sure what she means. "I would hope that all that I do is for myself. " Then she sighs, and goes back to why I shouldn't trust my irresponsible brother, and that I should leave everything to my mother.


Unfortunately, I don't trust my mother, since I've done the following:


I file $2000 worth of pharmaceutical medication expense per month to my mother and father to be insured. 80% of that is suppose to come back via a cheque to the respective claimant (Mom). That money is suppose to go back into the pot (joint account of mom and dad). It never does ....


I check the "need to file" bin, and ALL my medication receipts are there, from the past 6 months. That's $12000 sitting in a tray not claimed.



I have invested $1000 in Petro China (when it was at $1.51/share), who gave out $90 of dividends every quarter. I never get any... I don't even have access to that $1000 anymore...


My mom made a promise that I wouldn't have to worry about meds while I was in high school, that she'd take care of my meds properly since her workplace then was right next to a drug store. I'd tell her 2 weeks in advance that I'll be needing refills soon. She'd wait until I've been off the medications for 2 days (weekend), and I've become paranoid of a flare up before she starts moving her arse to get my medication. Of which I still wait another 3 days for her to remember to pick it up at the drug store. That's 5 days of no medication to live, 5 whole days of stress of whether I'm keeping my body under the flare up limits! It's a wonder I only had 1 flare up in high school (That was when delays were a whole 7 days of no meds at a given time).


You can see why I don't trust my mom to do things properly. She messes up the important things. The Petro China I couldn't care less about. However, things like money back in the pot for the family to use, or keeping a promise.


With that aside out of the way (we were discussing the irresponsible behaviour of my brother, and a missing york cheque). My dad and brother return, and I ask my brother if he remembers getting anything from York, he replies no, and I ask him about a cheque, and he replied that he thought it was the rocket project cheque (I bought his school some model rockets for the astronomy club to play with), not a York cheque. So it was all a misunderstanding as I had thought, and I said I'll take care of it when I get back to York. Mom was still angry, ranting, and yelling at me to do something. If I could, I'd go to houses, guns, swords, and all and tell the respective administrators to do their work. However, society doesn't work as beautifully as I'd like it, and I'll just play the game for a bit. With a lot of badgering and persistence. When Dad comes up to the commotion and gets informed of the solved situation, he does his calming play a fool spell again to calm mom down.


After that, I don't talk to my mother anymore, at least for the day. I just stick with my brother, who's ecstatic that his supersmart, superstrong older brother has come home to help him out, and just like when he was 2, and I was 10, play games and children's toys with him. Leaving for the apartment was a good feeling, and I told my slightly saddened brother when I left that I'll be back a lot sooner than before. On Wednesday after I finish teaching Richmond Green Students fencing, and we'll ride our bikes just like the calvary.

Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Crappy TTC! My exam that was at noon, I was LATE and I left an entire hour before it thinking I'd have 20 minutes or so to spare. There wasn't a freaking bus for a whole half hour, and I'm just glad that the prof is a disorganized buffoon that doesn't know how long it takes to move people into a set number of seats (just got to lay down the exams, and people will sit where there is one).

So after that, I went home on the TTC, but since I didn't have anything tasking me, I could afford the 1 hour trip back. Also decided that since it was a perfect day (between 17-20C) to test out my bike and try the yonge to keele bike ride. A good friend of mine did it just about daily, and she used a Tokyo folding bike which are much smaller than my high speed hybrid that my dad bought.

And to no surprise to me, between the time of 5:00PM and 5:35PM while I was riding to York, there wasn't a SINGLE bus along Finch to pass me. There were tons of cars passing me, but not a single transit bus, and loads of people to pass while nearing major bus stops Bathurst, Dufferin and Keele. I was almost tempted to calvary charge the crowds with my Chinese sword

And yup, my friend was right, it does only take half an hour to get to York by bike, and it's way more reliable than TTC. Does anyone know exactly how much "leniency" time the drivers get to be allowed off schedule? I think it was something like 8 minutes. Which is ridiculous for a frequent service route that is suppose to have a bus every 2 minutes ...

Anyways, now that it is summer, I ought to find something to do. Riding to and from York for fencing or archery though is an excellent form of exercise, with a good challenge of hills, and its functionality of saving money and air.

Wednesday, April 08, 2009

You never let time mold your life. Mold your own life on your own time.

That saying has been going through my head all day ever since the end of my meeting with a certain person. She'll stress about scheduling, stress about make sure to cast as wide a net to reel everything in. However, when that's all done, there's still always

"We're too late. We have to start over again. Somebody can't make it. We don't have enough resources. "

Well you can stay 1-track minded or flanking the problem from all other methods of achievement. That my friend is what a problem solver is, and what a person of higher education is suppose to be able to do. To have a solution to the most direst of circumstances, and motivate your people to fix it, that's a leader my friend.

However, if you're constantly letting everything walk all over you, and have lost all hope and confidence in achieving anything. Then your people will see that, and you will falter into the mob and abyss of followers that are your people. You must be motivate, delegate, negotiate, but perhaps most importantly though have faith in your people to pull us all through. For they are what reflects society. We are simply just the guiding rail of this whole rocket taking off.

Now perhaps this thinking is from my optimistic view of humanity. That inevitably disappoints me every time someone like you fails to take control of your life. Yet, because of the following statement, I am able to continue and persevere through all this shit that I see.

Prepare for the worst, Pray for the best!

For you though, it means getting away from niceties, and crusading through life. Which eventually though, you will have to do. Might as well get an early start on the experience before it kills you!

Sunday, April 05, 2009

This is probably one of my worst days ever, or I've just had a ton of patience go out the window because of a lot of crap happening.

So my former fencing student had challenged Kendo to a duel. It's a cool thing, it's a wonderful way to be social too. Although it's horribly egotistical, and horribly difficult to maintain a sort of equality considering that they emphasize different concepts. Tradition to simulate combat, or the techniques to prepare for it (Kendo). Technological progress and modernization to allow the release of all the controls had in training, and the closest experience to actual live combat without the consequences of it(Fencing). Both have their goods and bads, but I personally think that fencing's direction has allowed for sport mentality to seep into the combat art. "I don't care if I get hit first because i'll read their actions from that first hit. " in reality though, you're lying down in your own pool of blood.

Anyways main problem is that he's got a huge ego, he teaches horribly, he's scared students away, he's belittled students, AND he thinks he knows the terrain of a 10m x 10m arena when all he's practiced on is a 14m x 1.5m strip. He has no concept of evasion from a high powered attack. His first reaction is to full block it. Not deflect, full block. A katana coming down on your sabre full force is going to be painful.

So I try to teach him a more realistic approach. Evasion. Side step left, Side step right. Left right left. Something that just about all martial arts still have. So pretty siimple an attack coming to your left, you shift right and vice versa. Unfortunately he doesn't understand this concept and just runs in 1 direction on an angle. Even after chopping his fingers, having my 230lb fencing president pulverize him with a shinai AND my Longsword has not drilled into his head the idea of evasion. I've given up on trying to teach him. If he wants to learn something, he has to learn to think first.

Then there's the fucking flaker who says he wants to play Freespace 2 with my friend jeff and I. We're trying to set a squad up so there is more enjoyment in the game with teamwork. Ok, so we set a time, and then when the time comes, he backs out. Why the fuck do you say you want to play if you're just going to flake out at the very end. Don't lead people like that. What are you flaking out for? To play 2nd life. Not just run around 2nd life. You're going to play war games 2nd life. But if you wanted to play shooters, get battlefield 2, 1942. Play CS, Play Planetside, Play Call of Duty. Play a REAL shooter, not an online mock up with horrendous glitches. Also if you're playing Jungle/city map. don't a) run through the middle of a corridor b) think a bush is a bush, it's most likely your brazilian enemy waiting for you to turn around and shoot up your n00bie virtual fox arse with AK-47 rounds.

I'm most angry with your wasting my time to help you setup only to do what? Ignore every fucking word I say and do things the stupid way. Go download 2.14gb when you've had all that data stored and you deleted it for no reason. For some reason you are unaware of the most frequent torrent sites pirate bay, mininova and the superb search engine torrentz. You download all sorts of data and manage to get viruses. You should know that a torrent that says 2.14kb and says 3 files in .iso of Freespace 2 can NEVER be right! how can you have admin rights if you're unable to change your folder options and views?

How can you be so dumb as to TELL ME to prioritize living life properly when you spend more time on 2nd life and in cliche D&D games than you do in reality. You spend more time daydreaming yourself as an ace pilot when you can't even hit the broadside of a barn at point blank range. You imagine yourself a great commander when all you do is build massive armies and zerg. I don't even see the hint of a flanking maneuver, or unit diversity, or squad decentralization.

You seem to have forgotten, that instead of achieving the following in my 2nd life like you, I achieve all this in my 1st and last life in reality and you have the guts to talk to me:

the armourer of the Fencing Club, the armourer of the Archery club, The leader of the Weapon Art Union, A referree for Nationals Pentathlon Association, A businessman between weapon suppliers and their clubs. An air pistol shooter capable of firing an MOA of 3in radius at 10m. no bullseye or circular labels of reference, A 0.22cal Rifle shooter that can shoot a quarter at 20m. A microbiologist that faces the threat of infection and death everyday because of immunosuppression.

AND YOU SAY I DON'T LIVE MY LIFE! I fucking swear that is an insult coming from you. I have no regrets, and I love what I do. Why? Because I don't have to imagine myself as that soldier or warrior that fights for who he loves, that fights for what he believes in. I am that person. I am capable of doing those things in both times of peace and war.

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Fresh friends straight from the society tree!

It's amazing how I can let relationships (friends since that's all I have) go stale so much more easily than actual food that I eat.

Here's an idea of how bad I really have to get to allow awkwardness back into conversation.

Food goes stale in a week, maybe a month if you freeze it right.

Friendships don't get awkward unless you leave it for at least a month, more (like on the order of 3 or more) is just insane to go on without talking to some people. It's strange too considering I had an entire 3 month holiday. However, it could be that everyone's busy with plans of convocation and endeavours and basically setting off on our paths to "A Wonderful Life. "

So Mr non-initiator, what are you going to do?

I don't know but I'll say hi to some old and new faces and say bye to some familiar faces.

Thus far in life I have my own "web" of friends, and for me to expand it more requires that I sacrifice something somewhere in my life. This could be anything from grades, opportunities, other people, even my personal lifestyle. I'm not saying go and destroy your life to accommodate me, but think about just how much effort are you pouring into keeping in touch with others? Do you prioritize other things over it? It's always worth that thought when you feel lonely.

SO! What is John going to do about that lonely feeling?

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!

Because ...


I'm quite content right now actually, and this post isn't a complaint if you thought so earlier.

I'm just more acutely aware lately of some people "noting" their lack of a social life. It's your self-inertia. The cause of your problem is stated as followed:

"If you don't show interest in others, they won't show interest in you."

Pretty simple concept, that requires a lot of work to get over that inert self. Anyways, that's all I got to say for now, maybe I'll see y'all sooners or laters!