I’m the Goon
[Wikipedia] Goon – n. Slang. A synonym for hockey enforcer.
After tonights game it looks like I am destined to be our teams goon. I swear that it is not because I am trying to be, honest! Body contact is not allowed in the league and is cause for a penalty when it occurs. The campus rec league is made up of players of all shapes, sizes, ages and skill levels. I am a big guy. You do the math. read more…
A laundry success story
I started doing my own laundry in my first year of university. My Mom had showed me a few tricks of the trade like color separation and had bought me a fabric softener ball (I love those things). She even went so far as to try to teach me the meanings of the odd hieroglyphics stitched into the labels but unfortunately they are still Egyptian to me. read more…
It’s that time of year again…
A chill is in the air, snow covers the ground, salt covers your shoes and the first political attack ad is aired. I don’t follow politics enough to know why the Conservative party would be shelling out cash to smear the new Liberal leader so soon after the 2006 federal election. Any ideas?
This particular ad was extremely annoying, it involved a single clip of Stéphane Dion saying “We must get back in power” repeated between attack statements. The focus was on the various indiscretions uncovered prior to the early calling of the last federal election. I must admit that I am more annoyed at the Conservative party for their poor editing than I am at the horrible mess the Liberals made of the federal government during their extended stay in office. We all know that a system can only be efficient for a certain period of time before problems start to occur, exactly like the new battery I just had to buy for my car. From somewhere in the back of my head the quote “A few bad apples spoil the bunch” just arrived. So we really should be blaming ourselves for the Liberals, right?
I hate political attack ads but it seems that they are the only thing being used these days. Very rarely do you see a positive message ad. Although, by the same token, maybe there are a bunch and they just don’t catch your eye during commercial breaks. Who knows. I just hope that future commercials from the Conservatives will have a higher production value, but I suspect I will be disappointed. I mean did you see the Harper ads last election? They looked to be shot by Harper himself with a personal camcorder. I half expected him to stand up and head for the record button at the end.
The CRTC should put in place a ban on these type of ads, why not use their censorship powers for good (for a change).
Haven’t played in a long time
I used to play hockey back in high school, it was only House league but I loved it. Exercise was much more a part of my life back then and I remember being a decent player. I mostly played defense but toward the end I was moved to center due to my Eric Lindros like size and forcefulness. When I started university I was too busy to even think about it and I stopped playing, thus beginning my exercise slide. After moving to Brock for my second year I looked into starting up again but it cost too much and it was a long drive to the arena.
At least a few times each winter I think back to playing hockey and am reminded anew how much I miss it. This year, just before Christmas break, I found out that a few current and former staff members play hockey in the UW Campus Rec program. I was immediately interested. Thankfully, they asked if I wanted to join up so I’ve been waiting anxiously for my first game. The teams first game was the same night that I had tickets for The Hour so I had to miss it but the guys pulled off a win. We are called The Screaming Donkeys.
Today I went to Canadian Tire and had my skates sharpened. I also bought stick tape and a new helmet since mine was old and a little broken. You can see it pictured above and clicking it will show you my hockey bag as exciting as that may or, more likely, may-not be. I have a feeling that I am going to make a fool of myself since I am really out of shape and my equipment is a bit snug but I’m looking forward to it anyway. Wish me luck :o)
Diggleby
For around a year now I have been using a monkey for my MSN avatar. I’ve discussed this particular monkey before, it is a stuffed Gomi Taro monkey. I picked a monkey because I was getting into Parkour and figured it appropriate. I first saw this particular monkey in a Febreze commercial where stuffed animals are laying about on the floor smelling the carpet (couldn’t find it on youtube).
Today Sergey gave me a gift.
His name is Diggleby (which is written on his tag). Thanks Sergey!
Caught “The Hour” Live
Various CBC shows offer tickets to be in the audience during taping. A friend of mine went to see The Rick Mercer Report and said he had a great time so when Sara started talking about going to see a taping of The Hour I was game. It ended up being a pretty great evening and we even met and talked to George.
We emailed to secure tickets for a day we all could get free, you have to arrive at 4 pm so taking the afternoon off was necessary. The show emailed the next day confirming our reservation and the day before a representative called personally to remind us of the time and location which I found quite amazing as the tickets are free. The audience of the show consisted of about eighty people seated in one main section and two smaller ones all of which are at ground level (so try to get a seat up front). Watching the show live was almost exactly like watching it on TV with a few exceptions. The pre-taped segments played on monitors on the left and right of the studio and commercial breaks were filled by George talking with us and answering any questions we had. Our Thursday taping covered that evenings show and the Sunday recap show but only took one and a half hours to tape; George doesn’t need retakes.
I was very impressed with the whole experience due in large part to George. He is a very accomplished interviewer and is able to direct the guest without talking too much himself. He knows his stuff and it is evident that he and The Hour team do a lot of research for every show. Before the taping started and during commercial breaks he entertained us by candidly answering questions about the show and himself. As an example, we learned that he barely sleeps and is about to buy his fourth motorcycle. After the show he stuck around to shake our hands and thank us for coming, encouraging us to come back again. He posed for pictures and conversed with anyone who engaged him not rushing or cutting anybody short even though, we learned later, he had a flight to catch.
I for one welcome our first Canadian news/talk show host and I will definitely be getting another set of tickets in the future. I encourage you to do the same. :o)
Update: Sara found this article about George; it is a good read. Toronto Life: Rebel Rebel.
Madonna – Jump (Video)
I caught this on MuchMusic last week and thought I would comment on it. First take a look for yourself; if you utterly detest Madonna hit the mute button but watch the guys jumping around.
First off I only recognize Sebastian Foucan who plays Molaka in the new movie Casino Royale (my review), if you can help identify more post a comment. Foucan has been working with Madonna quite a bit on this last album. I have seen videos of him on stage with her during the tour and he is also in another previous music video called Hung Up. He is taking Free-Running to the masses using multiple media.
As far as Parkour is concerned the video starts off pretty well. We see several young men in a city environment. The camera takes in the sweeping urban vistas which of course include 5-15 story roofs on which the guys are jumping; pretty standard in the media treatment of Parkour. The guys start jumping and the video kicks off to the beat of Madonna’s “dance”. The first major event of note is a rather large Tic-Tac-Drop at 0:20s. “Nice!” I verbalized upon first watching it, I was hooked, “I wonder other Parkour they will include?”.
The beat picks up and we see Foucan do an underbar on an Asian archway followed by a jump over a rail and then a drop down stairs. The scenes are all disconnected with widely varying camera positions so it doesn’t really flow that well. I think they actually wanted your focus on the Karate Kid head band instead. We then hit a pointless pole climb/dismount by a guy wearing very anime ninja styled pants and footwear. The chorus then comes in and we move through a few more jumps from height and almost miss a crazy underbar along the ground at 0:55s that I have now watched about 15 times. I can’t imagine he made it back to his feet afterwards. After this it is pretty much downhill into the Free-Running zone. Some of the notable things include: ariel drops, pointless tic-tacs, break-dancing on a car, back-flips, a front-flip, etc.
By the half way point of the video my knees started to twinge in sympathy. Check out 1:36s, 1:45s and especially 1:49s, ouch. Essentially Madonna is capitalizing on the cool factor of the guys jumping as most scenes are only quick clips of the first half of a jump. Even given all of this I can vouch for the effectiveness of video. I immediately wanted to get out and run. Music and exercise are becoming tighter and tighter as hardware vendors and marketing firms turn their full attention to pair. The Nike+ system I mention previously is a good indication of that. I think I am going to add this track to my MP3 player.
Exercise for the technophile
I just ran across a pretty cool piece of technology from Nike called Nike+ which has inspired this entry. I’m sure many of you are all familiar with a device called a pedometer, it counts each step that you take. A lot of people wear them and attempt to take a certain number of steps every day which I imagine is doctor recommended. Kellogg’s recently had a marketing campaign involving giving pedometers (provided in the cereal box) to kids to get them exercising. I’m sure it failed rather miserably since the consoles from Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft are quite a bit more fun than incrementing a number by skipping rope or whatever.
The iPod is becoming pretty ubiquitous for those that can afford it. Many companies have realized this and are starting to bring out devices that attach their brand onto the iPod. Nike+ is one such device. Nike realizes that music is as important to us as their shoe and clothing products so they are trying to utilize music to improve sales. To participate you will need an iPod, the Nike+ sport kit and Nike+ ready shoes. The sport kit comes with an insert that goes into the Nike+ ready shoes to monitor your footfalls. There is also a connector for your iPod that wirelessly receives data and can give you updates on your progress (via voice over). When you finish your run you plug the iPod into the computer and your run data is uploaded to the Nike site. The site tracks your runs over time so you can see your progress and the stats from each individual run historically.
It certainly is very similar to making the number on the pedometer go up but at a much higher technology level. I would love to get my hands on this stuff to test it out but it is too much $$ for me; maybe next summer. I would be curious about the longevity of the shoe insert, putting technology in such a high stress location is bound to be problematic. Combining music and the cool factor of this device would certainly get me out running more often. Does anybody have this? I’d like to hear what you think of them.
The purchase of mundane things
Todays after work chore was a quick trip to the local grocery store for some essentials. We needed some food, snacks and toilet paper. I don’t know about you but when I go for groceries I always end up with more than I went for, especially if I’m hungry. But at the same time I almost always have forgotten the key item that sent me out in the first place. Hopefully some time soon a random geneticist will come up with a reason for this trait in men; then I won’t get it so much trouble.
Purchasing things that you need is most often boring. I just recently posted about buying light bulbs and here I am again complaining. You are confronted with a raft of possible products to fill the need and generally you have no idea which to pick. The difference between the options are usually unclear or non-existent. I’ve often went to this type of decision making: “Mmm, this one smells better.”, “Two dollars cheaper?, I choose you.”, “Oooo, shiny!”, etc. As you can see it is not a very scientific process. Over time you are able to start adding anecdotal experience to the process like this: “Cheaper but tastes like crap, next.”, “Hmm, got in trouble for buying that one sooo…”, etc.
Standing there in front of the Wall-O-TP (TP = toilet paper for those not in the know) I started into the process.
Hmm, cheaper but caused dirty looks to be shot my way. Bright shiny packaging, nice. Would have to walk a few steps to evaluate, nope. Wait what is this?
“What was it?” you ask. Well I happened to notice the following:
Yes indeed a portion of my purchase would in some way go to Breast Cancer, sold! I’m sure by now you’ve become aware of my support of that particular cause. So the choice was thankfully easy. It seems that charities are starting to figure out this whole Capitalism thing that we’ve got going. Off the top of your head I’ll bet you can name at least two products that when purchased support a cause. I’ll help you out with a hint: colorful rubber bracelets. Lance Armstrong is an amazing fellow.
A snipet I wrote
Just came across this little piece of a conversation I wrote after watching The Departed. I’m not sure what to make of it now though. So to setup, it is a fictitious conversation between a disenchanted mafia man and a low level recruit during a lull before a big scene. Try to discount the grammar and any spelling mistakes if you can; if fact consider them part of the grit of the piece.
“Every crime must have the twin pillars of crime, motive and opportunity. Now opportunity is the easy part and every person at all times has the opportunity to commit some crime, be it murder or speeding. Knowing this it becomes obvious that no crime is random since at the time it was committed their was opportunity, obviously and more importantly a motive, you just have to figure out what it was. Motive is the interesting part and the part that nobody really understands fully because it is so personal.
“What I have come to realize is this: You are either moving up or you are moving down. Organized crime is only different in that the motive is always the same, to move up. We are sent daily to specific opportunities with our motives in tow. Bang, bang. Only thing is that when you stop to investigate your motive you realize that it is bullshit. Moving down means death plain and simple no matter your level and moving up is moving down in societies organization. Once you realize that there are two choices for guys like us. Either run, run like the wind, never stop and never look back but always be looking over your shoulder. Or realize that your motive is actually within, deep down in the bottom of your caveman head, and it is desire.”
What do you think? Leave a comment to let me know. :o)