Yup…

So despite my steady descent into insecurity and self-loathing (always scheduled to take place during the transition from summer/fall into fall/winter and some of the funnest times I have), I managed not to bang my head against the wall until I passed out, although that might have helped to be honest.

As update to my detachment as mentioned in my previous entry, it’s still there. Although to be fair I have undertaken a few activities outside the classroom with a few of these folks with the possibility of some more. This however doesn’t change the fact that I’m still at a loss as to how to relate to the majority of my classmates, and of course I still quite frankly don’t feel as though I really know anything about them. This fact in turn does nothing to ease my discomfort.

This is mostly my fault of course, I’m not exactly an open person, but even with this said, wouldn’t it be nice if for a change of pace I could get a bit of a break from having to try and change myself to accommodate the world around me. If was able to adjust so easily and get myself comfortable in these situations, don’t you think I would have done this already? If for no other reason than to keep myself from losing my mind on a regular basis.

My complaints notwithstanding, you will note that my tone, while still self-reflective is nonetheless more clinical and somewhat neutral. That is because although I’m still saddened by many of these facts, I nonetheless am coming to accept that A) there isn’t much I can do about it and B) although I’ve done a fair bit in figuring things out for myself, there is still tons of work to do.

That’s always fun to think about, more work to do…

On that note, I will try really, really, hard to do something novel, like… more frequent updates. Like many of my other such pledges we shall see how reality bares out to the best laid plans, but if these profs insist on boring me to death the least I can do is make some use of the time to use this forum to leave some kind of testament to horrible, horrible boredom.

Tough way to end the month…

One of the great misfortunes of having too much time on one’s hands is the ability (which I would gladly forego by the way) of being able to spend far too much time in reflective thought.

This situation can of course result in some pretty useful personal revelations, which in turn could increase my understanding of myself and leave me in a better state to deal with things than before the contemplation began, but in all honestly, most of the time I tend to end up reflecting when I’m in a more depressed frame of mind.

The results of this as you might imagine are far more damaging to the psyche than any useful revelations I might have garnered in a better frame of mind.

Today seemed to be a perfect storm for this type of thing.

- We began the day regaled by a CEO who wished to impart his sage advice on knowing ourselves and not finding a job, but rather finding the “right” job for us. To this end he encouraged us to consider the 11 year old version of ourselves in depth.

First of all, with someone like myself it is almost never a good idea to ask me to consider anything pertaining to childhood, unless this particular personal fact finding mission is taking place under absolutely optimal conditions, and even then it’s not advisable. It generally puts me in a state where I am more susceptible to the aforementioned depression.

- Following this glorious start we moved to lunch which in turn followed another lengthy class in which I was able to indulge briefly in conversation with more of my classmates and then we were forced to sit through groups presenting their overly long findings on things.

Once again, idle time and boredom are not a good recipe, Rather than contemplate the riveting aspects of different world regions in relation to culture and business practices I instead had too much time to consider just how detached I still feel to the whole schooling experience this time around.

I have succeeded in establishing the standard group of people who could be considered the “study group” or whatever, and thus have spent some time between classes conversing with said people, but the fact is that at this level of education everyone is more or less set in their group of friends, buddy’s or what have you.

So what we have is material I don’t care about, classes I don’t want to attend, and I don’t even have the real saving grace in undergrad which was the group of people you can hang around with outside of the classes. People who you can meet at the bar, share a few pints with and get to know somewhat better than “so, how was your weekend?”

Which left me with the question, why am I even there?

The depressing part is that I have no good answer.

I’m not even sure what I want to do about it.

If there is an upside to this whole thing, it’s that in a few weeks, if I can manage to keep myself from banging my head against the wall I’ll at least derive some enjoyment from watching my buddy try to kill himself with birthday alcohol. That usually cheers me up.

Here’s hoping.

So much and yet so little…

How does one accurately summarize two months in which technically nothing happened and has nonetheless managed to consume an impressive amount of hours?

I suppose the best way to do so is like this:

June: Not much happened.

July: Not much happened for most of the month. My birthday almost exactly in the middle, but that was largely a non-event, which was expected.

The only truly notable item from July, and one which has continued into this month is that I began two semi-related projects.

First, I have been on a bit of a reading kick lately. Since about July 20th I’ve gone though 17 novels.

This recent surge has spanned a fair bit of variety.

For my legal thriller interests we have John Grisham: A Time to Kill, The Firm, The Pelican Brief, The Broker, The Runaway Jury and the King of Torts. Currently on the back burner waiting to be read: The Rainmaker.

Under the thriller category I have a few people:

John Rollins: The Last Oracle, The Doomsday Key.

Brad Thor: State of the Union, Blowback, The Last Patriot and The Apostle.

Dan Brown: Angels and Demons, The Da Vinci Code <— I was going to get to it eventually, and now I have.

Thomas Greanias: Raising Atlantis, The Atlantis Prophecy

And last but not least under the literary classic category: One Hundred Years of Solitude.

Having gone through these many pages one can only conclude that I have way too much time on my hands (which is very true) and also that I’ve had some chances to look at different styles, even within the same genre, which is also true.

The main reason for this is my second little project, which is my own little literary work.

Details will remain secret for the moment as quite frankly I’m still in the first draft stage. What I can say for it is that I’ve already had quite the adventure working out exactly what I’m trying to do with it, especially since my style in fiction has always been a little sparse. At 28,000 words I was already nearing the final chapters.

“Fortunately” a small problem with one of my characters and some suggestions I’ve gleamed from writing books (which I’ve also been reading) has given me another potential subplot and give me a new beginning which has swelled things up to a nice and tidy 35,000 words with plenty of additional work to put into it.

So there you go. For now I will use this space to keep tabs on what I’m working on from those two projects.

What I’m reading: The Templar Legacy by Steve Berry.

Nicely done…

Though mother nature did in the end conspire to delay the inevitable until this afternoon, Randy Johnson did get his 300th win.

I wasn’t able to watch the majority of the game, but I was able to get in long enough to watch replays of Randy making an impressive dive and throw to try and preserve what was a close game for the most part and of course the requisite attempt by the Giants to somehow blow it by loading the bases and putting Adam Dunn at the plate.

The magical powers of the convenient low strike managed to end the inning and set the table for some actual offense by San Francisco to make the 9th more comfortable.

Two things stand out from the game of course.

1. Randy can definitely still do it when he’s got his game going, which is impressive given the way he’s adapted his repetoire to accomodate his advanced baseball age.
2. The Nationals really, and I do mean REALLY suck. When even the home announcers (including Rob Dibble) on MASN make observations about just how badly you’re running as a team, that’s not a good thing, that’s an extremely bad thing.

So there it is kids, bask in the warm glow, etch it into your memories, it could be years before we get this again.

Somehow it’s appropriate…

That another potential watershed moment in the history of Baseball is currently on pause button.

On the precipice of career win number 300, Randy Johnson stands with the lowly Washington Nationals between him and immortality as possibly the final 300 game winner that any of us may see until well into the next decade if not longer.

Randy Johnson

As I did with Greg Maddux before him as he pitched his 350th win, I have to point out for those that don’t follow such things as closely as I do: we are simply in the wrong era for the potential contenders that were the hallmark of baseball’s past.

Where years ago one might have thought that the Mussina’s, Pedros and such might have had shots at such milestones with the seeming ease that they were able to consistently put up nice win totals, injuries, old age or a steady decline and now virtual retirement (official retirement with Mussina and no contract yet for Pedro) have more or less ensured that everybody close stands at or near 100 wins away from the vaunted mark outside of the anomaly that is Jamie Moyer.

Considering that Jamie just recently recorded win 250 and I have a 1987 Topps card with him on it (yes, he is that old) I’m not holding out hope that the ageless wonder somehow continues to churn out double digit wins for another 3-5 years.

You can of course as baseball fans thank the era of 5 man rotations and the fact that pitchers are lucky to get into the 7th inning let alone complete their games for the lack of decisions let alone win totals.

So assuming mother nature ever steps aside long enough to let this game get underway tonight and Randy is able to pitch keep an eye because if this is somehow the night it will be the last time in a long time we get to see any such thing.

With that said, good luck Randy, and do stick around for another year if you could, that 5000 strikeouts thing might be somewhat of a big deal too.

Yes, I am actually still alive…

Roy Halladay

Though you wouldn’t know it from the sheer frequency and impressive volume of work coming from this little neck of the woods.

Since the last time I have posted the world has continued to spin, time has continued to pass, seasons have come and gone and yet we are somehow back to the same old refrain that has been a frequent theme of this blog in it’s relatively short history.

Rather than simply rehash what feels somewhat like a broken record, I will simply say: You deserve better Roy, we all do, but you most of all.

I’ll keep on watching you pitch lights out for some other team most likely after this season, though more surprising things have occurred before.

Before I move on to other things to address I will expand on this by saying that as a fan, there can be few things more frustrating than watching your star performer go out and actually deliver on what you expect from them, time and time again and to have the ineptitude around them continue to astound you in all the ways in which they can render that effort moot.

In successive starts the Jays have managed to squander an 8 inning shutout performance by putting their bats away and losing 1-0 and then followed it up with an inexplicable job from the bullpen to blow a 5 run lead in the bottom of the eighth inning against Baltimore of all teams to lose this afternoon. While I’m of course disgusted with the effort (and the 9 game losing streak that not surprisingly has surrounded it) I must on some level applaude the creativity that was involved in coming up with such varied and impressive ways to lose games that were entirely winnable.

<Breathe in, breathe out>

There, now that I got that out of my system somewhat, I would like to update on what’s been going on:

In brief:

Working, and recently not working as the store has closed due in large part to managerial indifference. Something about not wanting to get inventory, which in turn may have had a negative impact on sales. Obviously such a connection is unforseeable, unless you have any sense of economics or business whatsoever.

Can’t complain too much though I am getting some severance parting gifts, which is always nice as nobody ever complains about money, ever.

I also got accepted in Humber College around these parts for Global Business Management. In the spirit of… well… school spirit for my new institution, I give you this…

Humber College

If it’s half as impressive as it sounds I will truly be a man on the rise soon. In all seriousness, I like it because it contains not one, but two placements which is a definite plus for somebody wanting to try out some work that doesn’t involve explaining to somebody why a retail store cannot and will not negotiate a discount on something that is already priced down to a dollar (yes, I have had to do this, many, many times).

So there you have it, I promise (seriously this time) that I will be more timely with the typing and content. I’m sure they’ll be something to comment on sooner or later.

I’d say something about the Stanley Cup Playoffs, but as I strongly suspect it will be the Red Wings clinching tonight to set up the Detroit – Pittsburgh rematch I have no interest in seeing… well you can imagine how much thought I even want to put into that.

In a shocking turn of events…

… not only is there something worth writing about for the first time in essentially forever, but much to my simultaneously amusement and horror I actually haven’t been away long enough to qualify as a truly extended absence.

I suppose then that you can consider this whole thing where I haven’t posted in a month to be my “summer vacation” perogative in action. In reality it was nothing of the sort, but I won’t tell if you won’t.

So… since apparently I can actually still type, what seismic event actually dislodged me from my self imposed hiatus and brought me back to the land of the blogging?

Glad you asked.

The month of September, along with the end of summer and the impending doom which the changing season foreshadows, marks the conclusion of my time at my present employer and the beginning of another job.

The unfortunate news is that I will still be within the retail sector, with all the glorious implications that it brings about into my day to day existence. On the upside, it is a return to full time employ for me with benefits, a higher pay scale and the open opportunity for advancement within a fairly short period if I manage to take full advantage. The most important of these for my short term requirements of course being the increase in pay scale and hours. The fact that the hours are fairly straight forward and consistent is just a fantastic little bonus which is tacked on there for good measure.

So yes, now that there is actually something going on I might actually be able to get back into the habit of putting something up over here on a somewhat consistent basis as the stagnation that I had been suffering from the past few months gives way to some welcomed unfamiliar territory while I get accustomed to this new working arrangement.

If this wasn’t enough however, there is always the fact that we are merely hours away as I type this from…

NFL FOOTBALL!!!

Oh yes, Carlos is rather pleased with the way this week is going and opening night in the NFL is just the perfect icing to this delicable cake I’m metaphorically having right now.

Further discussion of this NFL business shall have to wait however as I need some sleep to produce some coherent thoughts on the matter.

Incidentally, the complete lack of mention of the baseball season on this entry with the exception of this sentence should hopefully convey my complete disappointment with the performance of a certain baseball franchise. I can truly say that this remaining month will be a true test of my ability to go through the motions for another disappointing regular season.

Yes, surprisingly enough I am still alive.

As the month of July turned over into August I cannot help but consider the old adage that “the more things change, the more they stay the same.” It just seems to be more of the same.

With a win today, the Toronto Blue Jays have returned to .500, which would be fine if this team was within a rebuilding year, but is increasingly unacceptable when this team had the potential on paper to contend.

The key words in the preceding sentence of course being “on paper.” On this point even the statistics lie. Consider that the undisputed #1 and #2 starters in Roy Halladay and A.J. Burnett each have 13 wins, which ranks them amongst the league leaders in wins.

If you knew nothing else you would believe that things were proceding along well. In fact, the pitching for the most part hasn’t been the issue this season, but rather the theme of the hitting failing to come through has continued.

Even in today’s win, where run support finally helped Halladay get his 13th victory, the Blue Jays scored 6 runs, despite having the bases loaded with less than 2 outs in at least two separate innings, while also managing to have runners in scoring position on several other occasionals. In all, they left 12 men on base. Doesn’t seem like a big deal when the team pulls out the win, but imagine what happens when this same offence doesn’t have base loaded situations handed to them with such frequency that runs also had to happen despite the best efforts of the offence.

Since I don’t want to beat this dead horse much more I will just conclude with a simple fact: there is something inherently wrong when a team with a $30 million dollar payroll (Tampa Bay) has managed somehow to hold off the Yankees (over $200 million) and Red Sox (over $150 million) into the beginning of October while the Rogers conglomerate with all the money in the world to get competent people to run their operations has put together a team that can take nearly $100 million to put together a 4th place team.

It’s just a little disturbing.

Some other minor sports notes as man does not live on baseball alone (though I do try).

Brett Favre saga: Green Bay needs to suck it up on this one. Keep Aaron Rodgers, trade Favre to wherever and just accept that maybe he’ll come back and haunt them for a season or two. It would potentially be painful in the short term, but I seriously doubt that a 40 or 41 year old Favre is going to trot out there and beat the Packers brains out, so you’ll only really have to worry about it for a short period of time. If Rodgers is the future he was already waited long enough to get his opportunity already.

Mats Sundin: Just take the Vancouver Canucks offer of $10 million per season. Seriously, you play for the Toronto Maple Leafs for years with no chance of ever winning anything and now somebody shows you the money at this advanced stage of your career and you hesitate? Methinks Mats has taken too many pucks to the head.

And if you don’t like Vancouver you can always just look around for a contender to shop your services to, just get it over with already, you’re no Brett Favre who can apparently just sit around thinking about his options ad naseum.

Happy Birthday indeed….

In a way It would make perfect sense for me to be experiencing a sleepless night this evening as I “celebrate” my 25^th birthday. The problem is of course that my sleepless evening actually began a night early as I found myself unable to bring about slumber on the 11^th.

As a result of this the majority of this particular day and evening has proven to be quite the struggle

More times than I can count I have wanted to fall asleep and found myself unable to, mostly because I was at work at the time, or even because I was in the midst of a pool game in the “pre-birthday” activities that I chose to start off my unofficial two day birthday festival.

Tonight will be the real test however as another sleepless night will pretty much render me useless for the upcoming week. One night I can handle. Two or more at this point is liable to kill me

Generally this introduction would be followed by a lengthy treatise on something or other, but as you might imagine I simply do not have the stamina at this point and juncture to even attempt another solid paragraph. As a result I will simply leave it at this.

It really does make you think…

As with everything, even something as simple as going to a work-related social gathering has it’s share of good and bad aspects.

When the work place in question is a small chain retail store belonging to a moderately sized but growing franchise this then has it’s own interesting set of factors going for it in both directions.

Positives:

- Getting to socialize with the co-workers outside of the normal air of “professionalism” which we apparently exhibit at work, at least in theory.

- Getting the chance utilize some competitiveness as of course any games such as say… volleyball, soccer and bowling will then bring about the necessary amount of competing and dare I say cheating from all involved.

- Getting to see the Manager demonstrate levels of cheating and ridiculousness which once and for all dispel all rumours that he is to be considered the responsible one. Truly we instead can ask, “how the hell are we working FOR this guy? Shouldn’t he be working for us?”

Positives and amusement aside there are of course some drawbacks.

Competitiveness can hurt. It does so especially when the turf in question is slick, thus making traction a luxury, which in turn makes sliding a common occurrence.

This would of course not be an issue unless of course some of the turf happens to have abrasive elements that can nicely scar up your forearm. I’m not saying they did… I’m just saying… ouch.

This is a relatively livable problem however; the forearm will heal soon enough. More pressing however is the plague of mosquitoes that are the bane of those foolish enough to choose a park that literally ends at Lake Ontario.

Seriously people, what the hell are you thinking? Tons of vegetation, an abundance of still water and obviously the ground itself is maintaining moisture if you can’t run more than a few steps without sliding. This impressive combination generally results in a fair number of our blood sucking friends taking shots at those foolish enough to tread on their terrain.

Overall it was good times nonetheless. Interestingly the success of this endeavor has prompted the powers that be to consider having another one in a month where the activity of choice could be paintball.

Without my making any direct references or inferences, consider for yourself the fact that these powers that be actually consider it a good idea to arm the employees with (albeit paint loaded) guns and proximity to their bosses.

Yes, this ladies and gentleman are the people who actually get paid to make decisions worth money, think about it.