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I've been reading Tuesdays with Morrie. I'll say it's a good book and that I recommend it to anyone who wants a better life and is willing to rethink some aspects of their lifestyle. Not that that's overwith... ugh. Don't get me wrong, the book isn't bad, a bit too light for me, but my main problem with it is that he's right and I've tried it but failed. Now I'll explain what I mean (and the title of this entry). Keep in mind that I haven't finished the book, but I doubt it's going to turn around on itself. It's a true story about a professor's slow death and his ideas of life and how we should live. One of the main ideas is to get rid of all the useless distractions in life like television, video games, new cars, bigger toys and all that jazz and to focus on our connections with real people. He talks about how we should focus more on being happy, being true to ourselves, and more (and there is more to the book, I'm just focusing).

My problem with the book is that, put simply, I'm jealous. You might remember me writing about when I started high school (and if you don't or I didn't, here you go: ) that I was just getting out of a depression and my feelings for a girl helped. That feeling is something I'm still trying to fulfill.

I want to connect with someone, call it whatever you want, a connection, contact, relationship, devotion, affection, love or just sitting down with a friend and having a chat. Humans are social creatures, but I feel alone. Sure, there're friends, those connection count, hell, I used to be fine with just that, but we've grown apart. I don't see them as much, usually when I do it's about video games or we're in a large group, and it loses that personal touch. I don't have anyone with whom I can share secrets, concerns or feelings (if anything, I now trust strangers more than most friends). There's also family, but I'm not the closest with some of them and I've grown independant of my parents, and most of us live on opposite sides of a very large country. But getting back to my topic in particular, I know what I'd want for that person, it's genetic, generic and almost cliche. I want a girlfriend (mate, companion, significant other, choose your term of preference). I trust and feel better connection with girls (women) and yes, I'm also a lusty perverted guy, that's natural (any man who says he isn't is either lying or quite an exception). Mostly now, I think I want the company, hell, I write a blog on the Internet, what about this doesn't scream "lonely."

I bring this up for several reasons. First of all, it's a topic I've brought up before, but always presented in a different way, the term I most often use it "looking for something." Second, it's that prevalent a feeling. Third, and this should probabyl be second, the girls at work keep telling me to get a girlfriend (as if it's easy, I'm on my fourth or fifth try), and bu me about any girl I talk to at Boston Pizza. Usually asking if she's my girlfriend. One was someone I didn't have those feelings for, another was my friend's ex who still hangs out with us, another was three years younger, considers me a pervert, knows me mostly for my knowledge of Japan and Japanese (I'm almost tutoring her) and is too "moe" (pronounced mo-ay, it refers to a Japanese stereotype usually involving young, immature, innocent, clutsy girls) for me. I'm surprised the girl with pink shoes isn't on this list, but she hasn't been to boston Pizza in a long time, at least not while I was there. It's kind of funny considering that she's the girl I mentioned at the beginning of this.

Well, it's one of the clock in the morning and my laundry is done. But I'll continue.

For a long while I actually didn't know specifically what the feeling was or what I was searching for. That's not to say that I didn't want to go out with anyone, just that I didn't make the connection between the feelings. I actually figured it out when I was on a movie binge. I was watching old movies, mostly Disney movies, and I was trying to narrow down what movies I wanted to watch when I made the connection: they were all the romance movies, or at least movies with romance as a core theme: Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid, The Lion King, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Anastasia, Breakfast at Tiffany's (I only skipped Roman Holiday because I own it and have seen it so many times already). I almost found myself skipping the action parts.

Anyways, I'd write more, but I need sleep.

Last minute entries

So. There's a lot going on, but if you were every to ask me what I'm up to, I'd answer "nothing much" for simplicity, your unlikeliness of wanting the full answer and because most of it seems small. There's work, which takes up my Friday and Saturday nights, and it annoys me that I have nothing better to do than work. Thursdays are full, from the time I get out of school, I run to the Cove, and once volunteering is over, I head to work looking for a place to sit down for a few minutes, which is only the case about half the time and from whatever happens there I make it to Don Cherry's for wings with my friends. Now Sundays are filling up. Usually a good day to sit around wanting rest, they've been invaded by nice chats with my uncle over Skype and runing practice, and that was before my friends decided to start going to the bar at Boston Pizza on Sundays (now that their university school year is over). Mondays, which usually aren't as miserable for me as they are for others, are also getting running practice, and I've even found a way to add yet another running practice on Tuesdays. I've never really thought of Wednesdays as anything more than a random day of the week with awkward spelling, I think they might have just turnewd into my weekend.

So, in case you didn't get that, I'm on the track and field team and training for a triathlon, I'm working, volunteering and handing out hours of my week as if they were on sale. Even if this didn't force hmework to cut in to my sleep more than it already does, there seems to be something that always comes up that makes things that much more crazy. Today, it's a scholarship. The guidance office at my school recieved a letter about a scholarship for any grade twelves going into engineering for fossil fuels, which is how they advertised it, and understandably, got no replies (most grads are luck to have picked their field, even my specialization of mechanics is a bit ahead of myself, and fossil fuels isn't even an academic program). Today, they got clairification and realized that it applies to pretty much anyone going into engineering (or some geo studies). Great, another scholarship I can apply to, and there's not even a Nova Scotia only limit on it, except, they're a bit late on the draw. It's due tomorrow, I need to fill out a few pages and get three references: a community, academic and work reference. We thought we were screwed because none of us had reference letters on hand (the last scholarship I had had specific questions), but then I noticed "Reference letter: Y/N," they were optional. So, after school today, myself and another applicant asked our physics teacher to be our academic reference. I then went to track practice (which is being lead by the girl in pink shoes), ran home, drove to work (I was too tired and the weather too miserable to bother cycling), got my work reference, who wasn't there, but I found her contact information and sent her a text message about it. I had supper and headed to a volunteering event (what are the chances?) and got my community reference. Now all I have to do is write some bs.

Getting out of chronological order, Saturday after work I was eating pizza and pressuring an friend of a friend into trying Guiness, a very heavy beer. He thought he had tried it and remembered it as smooth, which was obviously wrong. We gave him a few ounces and the same to a friend and I took the rest. My friend and I downed our glasses while he could barely choke it down. It was fun (yay for peer pressure and alcohol). I mention this because it kept me away from bed until something after midnight. I then got up early because I didn't know what time track practice was at, so I rode down every few hours to the track to check. Then my aunt showed up and started talking with my mom and I got my uncle on Skype. I also sent out a message asking when track was and got a reply, but it was half over by the time I was done talking with my uncle. I rode down, talked and ran with them for the last few minutes and then went home. A while later I was agreeing to go to the bar with my friends. That lasted again until past midnight. I got home and worked on my french chemistry lab while sobering up (I learned that I'm bad at French while drunk). At about three I had done all I could manage in that state. I set my alarm earlier and slept. Upon waking, I headed to school, which was eerily empty. I started back on my lab as people began to show up. I was still tired and I might have had some insignificant signs of a hangover. I say that because I felt sleep deprived but I was warm and cold is one of the signs I've learned to associate with bad sleep deprivation on my part. I passed my lab in on time and aside from having trouble with complex thoughts through chemistry ( couldn't figure out how to explain something in French, or English) I was fine. I solved a bonus question in math, realized a mistake I made on an assignment due tomorrow, figured out a hard physics question and sat through a presentation in English. And of course, the scholarship stuff fits in there and takes me up to now.

In case this entry isn't long enough, I also have an research paper to do for English about how literature has influenced my philosophy. I've already mentioned it but as a warning now, I'm going to be using my blog as practice and to write out drafts. But those will be in their own entries and I don't have enough time for one now.

Picture time. I haven't had enough lately so here are some.
The house from the lake. I'm not entirely sure why the slope is covered in hay.
The roof is now done. Now it's time for walls and windows.
The view from up a hill. Also showing off the truck, piles of lumber and my shadow.The view from the top of a pile of dirt and rocks. Inside the house with no walls up yet. Tools and wood sitting around doing nothing.
A few days ago it snowed. It was cold and gone before the next day.

Anyways, that's all I have for now.

White noise isn't noisy enough

Today was the first day back after the Easter weekend. I spent much of my time working on a roof or trying to recover from working on a roof. Apparently I missed a lot of sleep too because I slept through my alarm. This would be understandable for most people, my alarm is white noise, but I'm a light sleeper and even white noise on minimal volume settings can get me up and panicked. This is because I've never been good with mornings, and my brain, while semiconscious, is very good at avoiding getting up. So, in order to counter this, I've been playing something similar to pshycological warfare with my morning self. I've set alarms early, set clocks ahead, changed the minute the alarm goes off (because most people don't pay attention to the hour if they think they know it), hidden my clock, set the alarm late, placed it far away and much more. Now I'm worried about tomorrow morning. Oh, and I use white noise because I wake up early and I don't want to bother anyone else.

So I missed physics this morning, but I know the topic, it's another one I remeber from Japan and there weren't any projects or tests, so I'm fine. I think my absence was mentioned less than three times and only casually. The rest of the day was normal. We have another book on religion for English (specifically, Catholisism). I'm getting tired of it. Religion is really not a good subject to flood me with. A breif mention or something short, fine, but constant reading, debates, even for the side I agree with is a bad idea.

So, getting away from that. Right now I'm just procrastinating. I'm bored and there's nothing that makes me want to work. I'll have all of my projects and stuff done for tomorrow, but I'm not feeling that productive and I know why: teen agnst, mostly undue and mostly from not having as much of a life as I want. I have about three good friends who I see at best, three times a week, and one of those times is work. My life at school is depressing. There are people I talk to, but I know I'm still an outsider. The only ones who talk to me are the ones who need something for school or want to see what eccentric answer I'll give this time. I'm being negativce and pessimistic about this, but luckily today I have an example of the best reaction I've gotten so far:

I was talking to cg and a-guy-who-is-always-well-dressed after school. I said that I thought cg was better dressed than him today (my words specifically were "I do believe you've been outdressed"). She was taken aback saying that I always seem to imply that she's not attractive. This is not true, (well, I might be giving the wrong impression but) she's very attractive, smart and has a great personality with lots of twisted humour. Most guys would be luck to have her, except that she would probably be the one wearing the pants. She's desirable, but no, I'm not after her. I have my reasons.

This also sort of scared me because it shows just how wrong of an impression I give. It reminds me of all the times I've been called a liar while telling the truth (I think people would believe me more if I told lies).

I've always wondered what I'm really like. I don't think anyone knows what they themselves are like. We can't see ourselves. Sure, you can look in a mirror, or take a picture, video, a recording, or see how others are affected by you, but it's never you. It's a reflection, a photograph, video, a strange voice and often very indirect (respectively). Oh well, I just hope that I get better at this impressions thing, or signals, or being believed when telling the truth.

No I need to finish a physics lab. Goodni-

Oh, and I had a chat with Niku yesterday via Facebook. I was at a friends and it was late, but it was nice to be in contact again. I REALLY need to get some letters and e-mails off.

G'night.

Do e-mail posts still work? (typed on PSP)

Blogger wants me to change some settings for my e-mail posting, so I'm
testing it out.

I got home at supper time from a long day working at the house. The
roof is almost done, I'm sore all over, and any more sun will turn
this reddish tan into a burn.

I stayed up playing Starcraft, agood old strategy game. I'll be tired
tomorrow, but I had fun.

There's no school tomorrow, but I'll be out at the house again.

Well, I'm off to sleep.

I get around

Mostly on foot.

I've been working at the house, which is a few days' work away from having a complete roof. When we started on the roof I was still dealing with acrophobia and trying to get a nail in with less than twenty strikes of a hammer. Every once in a while a nail will fall over the edge and I see the cartoon effect as if it's pausing in mid air to say goodbye before plummeting down. I would hear the sound of ringing metal and a few seconds later, a landing. This was while laying along a twenty-two degree roof with no harness or straps staying on by only the friction of my fabrics.

Now it's getting better. I can hammer in nails without too much trouble, I walk around with ease and while the edge remains a misstep away, I'm getting used to it. I'm also getting around in the rafters, but I've always been fine with that, I don't care as much about heights when I have something to hold on to.

I've probably gained a bit of colour while working out there. Being on the roof puts me at a better angle with the sun, and sadly, I've been out working there more than I've been outside of my own will (though transit probably still holds the majority of my outside hours). I'm not being paid for this as it is work for my parents, but it'll make for an interesting line on my resume, "helped build house." My sister also reminds me that this counts as "spending time with dad."

Here's a picture from the inside of Blacketts Lake from inside. We're putting in lots of windows and doors. As a technical note, my camera can't take this sort of picture, it'll either go bright for the outside, or dark for the inside, this is a photoedit of two pictures to show what it actually looks like.

Moving on.

Walking around Thursday I noticed a stream I pass by every Thursday walking from the Cove to Boston Pizza. I like it when this happens because it usually means that I've missed something, and that usually leads somewhere. I hope it's somewhere interesting. I noticed that it comes from a river in the residential area (which I've never noticed because the area it's in, Ashby, is a labyrinth). The other way leads to a large pond or small lake in the middle of Wentworth Park. I've always found that though I know the area, I have yet to figure it out in my head. This might be my chance for that. I'll see about poking around there the next nice day I have free.

One thing that I miss about Kanazawa is that the old city always had a mix of interesting environments and shops. The electronics store was way out of town and I got there via the river, and even the city itself was an interesting environment and full of interesting shops. Around here there aren't as many temples and cultural shops. There are a few, but they're mostly in town, and unfortunately, I don't find my own culture as interesting. I guess that was one of the advantages of being a foreigner, everything was foreign to me as well. Oh well, I'll do what I can. I can't wait to get to Vancouver to start exploring that city.

So, here's a few pictures I've taken while getting around town.



This last one is of the stream that caught my eye. It's not in any way beautiful, especially on such a dreary day, but it got me interested.

And here's another picture I took quickly while waiting to turn onto the Esplanade in Sydney. I never realized how well Wentworth Street (unrelated to Wentworth Park) is lined up for this shot, especially since this used to be a one way street going the other way. In the distance is Westmount on the other side of the harbour. I'll try to get a better picture of this another time.

Anyways, I'll leave you with that. Hopefully I'll have more and better soon, hopefully the sunny days we have will stay. Hopefully I'll have some time and will to go walking around. Hopefully.

Project before Procrastination

In English, we're working on philospohy. This comes mostly in the form of two projects: a presentation on a philosophy, and a report on how literature has influenced our own philosophy. Considering the last suject in English was religion, my teacher seems to be aiming for subjects that are best left alone around me.

I'll got into the project of influence first. I have to write about how literature has influenced my own personal philosophy. This would be easy, except that literature has had only minor roles in my philosophical developement. I began thinking about philosophy as a kid with the, very creepy question, "why am I me?" I was brought up Catholic, which usually means leaving all those answers to faith, but in junior high I moved into science and rationalization. I spent those years trying to understand existence. In the middle of it came what has been the single greatest influence on my philosophy: Neon Geneisis Evangelion. (What? You were expecting maybe Sartre?) This might seem strange, but the last two episodes of Eva are actually very weird and ... the expression "mind fuck" comes to mind. I spent two weeks trying to wrap my head around the idea that our preception affects or even effects the world. It also had other ideas, but basically, for me, it turned philosophy from something that you wrote in stone into a playground. That opened the floodgates for ideas like Orson Scott Card's philotes, quantum and string theory, and many more.

Since then, I've decided that I think the world exists for something, but I don't know or care what. Even if the answer to life, the universe and everything is ever solved (forty-two), I doubt it will be in my lifetime. So for all intents and purposes, I consider my life absurd, without meaning, and I live how I want. Oh, and hoping the thin line over to religion breifly, in case I haven't said this already, I don't believe in or care about life after death. I'm hoping for nothing, I could use the rest.

Whatever other influences in philosophy I've picked up from books affect more my interactions than my fundamental doctrine. Hamlet was the first time I realized just how mortal I am. It wasn't his famous soliloquy, it was simply "there is no good or bad, but thinking makes it so." That phrase, and other parts of Shakespeare made me realize that other people had had my same thoughts and just how similar we are in thinking as humans. Before then I had also always thought myself alone in my beliefs. It also gave me something to quote for my ideas or morals, but thinking back, I don't know how I got there. Lack or good and evil stemed from my thoughts of perspective, objectivity and subjectivity. It came from realizing that there is no quantifiable good or evil and that they are mearly opinions, at most, social norms. I can't think of any book that influenced this.

That covers my raison d'etre and morals, now for my modus operati. My choices (actually, I'm a hardcore determinist, but that a belief and impractical for everyday life) I make based off of two things. The first is video games. This may sound weird, but I've learned a lot about myslef from video games. I know that I usually play the good guy, and that because I've found that it gets me more. If you give to others, they'll give back. I don't consider this some devine law (see golden rule, "what goes around comes around," and karma), just good sociological advice. It doesn't always work and it's not always direct, but it has worked for me (that, some luck, and good planning are what I think got me to Japan). In a way, it's its own greed. The other thing is that I like to keep things interesting. That's why I like chaos and anarchy (please remember back to the entry where I explained that by chaos, I don't mean death and destrution). I like adventure and doing things spontaniously. I like walking around cities to see what I can find, even if I end up walking in circles all day. I'll make mistakes, even on purpose if I think I'll get something out of it. I'd go as far as to say that my eccentricity keeps me from going crazy with bordom. Oh, and for the report, I'll find a way to link this last thought to the ending of Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere.

For the report, I'll also be looking for ways to link this all to Dr. Seuss, Calvin and Hobbes and other kids' books (hence my earlier entry).

That was my take on one of the projects (now you see why philosophy is a bad topic around me). The other project, I'm working with two others on existentialism. It's strange because my beliefs are almost entirely opposite this, yet I find it very practical. It most revolves around the ideas that we are what we do, that we are free, we are responsible for ourselves, we are what we make of ourselves and cetera. I would prefer some component of thought and not action, but like I said, it's practical.

Our project comes in two parts: a hand out and a presentation. I've designed pamphlets and I'm waiting for word from the other members of my group before I start working on the presentation. I've also looked up a lot of the information we need for the project. We deligated different parts ot different people, but after my last group projects, I'm not taking chances. I've already found what information I need and I'm looking for the rest while going over everything I can find of value. I'm not saying that the others aren't doing work, they have, I just don't want to be sitting in this seat at two the morning it's due because someone didn't get something done on time. I don't want to take over, but I want to have a backup. I usually do this by simply doing all I can and saying "this is what I have, do whatever you want with it," ("all I have" usually including more than was expected of me).

I might put the project up on here if anyone's interested.

Anyways, I'm going to write more, but in a new post.

Oh, right the title. Existentialism is usually defined as "existence before essence," so I swapped existence for our project and essence for procrastination. That would be more profound if I had time to think about it.

Virtual or Real

I've had a lot of talk recently about how much you can do with technology. Most of it can be connected to Google's street view. It is, in my opinion, the closest thing we have now to virtual reality.

For those of you who don't know what it is, Google has mapped the world with road maps, satellite imagery, terrain maps, links to pictures, a digital globe with three dimensional terrain and buildings, traffic reports, all the border's of the world, links to location based information and now, one of their latest additions: street view, which is a three-hundred and sixty degree view of the land from the perspective of the highways (and major roads, and they'll probably have more soon). Not only do they have pictures every few meters, the also have it in three dimensions with the use of cyan-red glasses. So you could nearly take a virtual walk down to the store and back without leaving your house.

That's impressive, almost to the point of scaring me, but I'm used to technology. Facebook Still scares me more.

Anyways, It's Easter weekend, which means little to nothing for me. I get Friday off, all I've done is played a few rounds in Starcraft, shown up for something quick with Interact, eaten all the meat I want and made a mess of my room. In an hour I'll be going into work.

Yesterday was slightly more interesting. I saw a few people from school while going out for wings. They bugged me about my crush and I annoyed them back about drinking, which I would have been, but by the time we were done our wings, there wasn't enough time left before it closed to bother. We played a few rounds of video games and I had another night of not enough sleep.

I'm hoping to get outside on my own or with some friends with weekend, but it's unlikely, knowing my friends, knowing Easter and knowing how these things usually end.

At home I've also lost a television which is being moved back to Boston Pizza (probably to replace our defective set) and the top of my desk, which will be back soon.

I'll be posting pictures soon.