I have woken up to this for the last time.

Dear Green Day,

There is nothing hardcore and/or punk rock about you.

You are a mascara swipe away from being Avril Lavigne.

Yes, you once had street cred. But, the day you decided to continue making music post Warning will now be known as the day you made the worst career choice of your life.

A freak out doesn’t constitute the fact that you need rehab. It means you are crazy, and past your due date.

Sincerly,

Anyone with eyes and ears

P.S: Yes, Bieber IS bigger than you. Get over it.

Yoga conundrum

I enjoy doing yoga. I enjoy it a lot. Over the past year especially I have started doing yoga more.

I do not enjoy yoga class. I do not enjoy it very much at all. Though, I’ve only been to a couple classes, I can say I don’t enjoy it. Chances are, the classes that I went to were taught by sub par yogi’s. I’m sure good yoga classes exist.

My issues with yoga probably derives of a childhood participating in competitive sports. Leading me to an unknowingness of how to act. Yoga is a different kind of intensity, one that I have grown to be quite fond of, but still am not used to.

When I go to Yoga class I am not in the meditative state that is expected. I am my most neurotic self. I am thinking non-stop.

In class, I am a broken human.

—

“How does everyone know ALL of these positions?”

“I wonder if everyone is sweating as much as I am right now..”

“Why does no one else fall out of position?”

“Oh my god, my body does NOT look like hers in my yoga clothes. Jealous.”

“Is grunting allowed in here?”

“Everyone can hear me breathing loudly…. I need to stop breathing loudly… oh god, how do I stop breathing so damn loudly?!”

“Namaste? Doesn’t that mean…”

“Eff this.”

—

I love yoga. I love how it makes me feel. I love that I am using every part of my body. I love that I am suddenly aware of my entire body. I love that it gives me an excuse to buy stupid expensive clothes from lululemon.

My issue with yoga class stemmed from the first time I heard “namaste” uttered from the yogi’s mouth.

That word is thrown around these days. And, most people don’t even know what it means.

Namaste, from what I have studied, literally means “bow to you”. It is traditionally used when to say “I salute the God within you”. It is a lovely sentiment.

But, given my mostly agnostic outlook on life, I don’t think it appropriate, neither do I welcome someone saluting “the god within me”. No thank you. I also don’t feel it appropriate to “bow to” me. What have I done worth bowing to?

It’s not that I don’t like the word. It’s a great word. And, if used properly, a really great word. I don’t like that the majority of the time, though, it is not used properly.

I think it’s important to respect yoga’s history and tradition. To embrace the art. For the most part.

My biggest issue with yoga class, beyond my own neurosis, is that it is considered “cool”. Using “namaste” in a sentence doesn’t make you cool. Unless you are using it in the right context. Then, maybe, you can be cool.

I’m sure as time goes on I will learn to enjoy yoga class more. And who knows, maybe I will feel so comfortable to go out saluting the gods in everyone. Maybe.

Story of my life.

The timbits beer league

It’s interesting how often life will bring us in a full circle. We are born into this world crying, wrinkly, and fragile. We leave this world sometimes crying, wrinkly and fragile. We start out our lives with a sense of unknowingness. The world is our oyster. We are curious bright eyed beings. We will likely end our final days as whimsical, “all knowing”, old beings.

Somewhere in between our bright eyedness and our whimsied weathered selves, we may have experienced heart ache, failure, and felt real pain. I have come to realize that sometimes our “full circle” happens sooner than anticipated.

I often go out and support a “beer league” hockey team. They are not good as a team. Individually many of them are quite talented. As a team, lacking. I have friends on the team which makes the experience worth while. Also, I have never seen more entertaining hockey, NHL included.

The other night as I sat and watched the team play, guts baring and all, I felt that they reminded me of something. As the game went on I couldn’t quite place what they were reminding me off. It wasn’t until the opposing team scored 3 unanswered goals within a 2 minute span that it hit me. This team plays like Timbits.

Tim Hortons has a sports sponsor program for young kids. Kids from the ages of 4 to 8 can participate in one ice hockey scrimmages. The goal is not to see which team will win or lose, but to have fun. I have seen a few “Timbits” games. They are cute. The mini humans skate their brains out, all chasing the puck. There are no positions, and there is no order. When someone gets the puck, he or she doesn’t stay with it for much time. Before long there is a gaggle of little all stars on skates ready to attack. It’s a good way to keep young kids active in house league sports.

My friends in their beer league are not far off from the young Timbits. A lot of  them have played hockey before. Maybe in elementary school, maybe even in high school. Maybe some of them even thought that they would one day make it big, or at least to OHL. Honestly, I’m not unconvinced that some of them still don’t think that. But the point is, they didn’t and they won’t. Now, as twenty-somethings they play a game that makes them happy to stay active, have fun, and hang out with friends.

Though, like the Timbits, everyone just wants to touch the puck. They are just searching for their time to shine. Majority of the game turns to anarchy once the team starts to lose. All the reason has gone out the window and suddenly the only thing that matters is “will I be the hero to win the game?” Which contributes to them losing by more.

The most difficult part about watching this team lose, is knowing that they can win. Wherever their lives have taken them, however they approach the game, is different from how it would be approached if they knew it would one day mean something. Instead, they become little Timbits. They become men who swarm the puck in dire desperation to be the hero. It is probably the personal gratification that is both their bane, and contributor to their willingness to keep going.

And, I think personal gratification goes quite well alongside timbits, and beer.

Killing yourself to live

“How will you focus on your dreams?” he said.

She sat there in confusion pondering what he could have meant by this. “My dreams?” she thought “how does this affect my dreams?”.

Her goals and aspirations, her many ideas, her clouded future, would it all fade by making this life change? The answer is unclear. She thinks, “I will be fine”. Like most of the other twenty-something year olds she knew, she would be fine. She would not turn to crack, and hookerdom. She would be fine.

—

We all do it. Privileged, unprivileged. We all do it. We kill ourselves to live. We put ourselves in certain situations to subconsciously test ourselves. We have an innate desire to prove to ourselves that we are in fact worthy. We can handle the job, or jobs, our hobbies, our ambition, our responsibilities. All the while maintaining relationships, a fashion sense, and proficient knowledge of the “it” TV shows.

We don’t settle. We don’t slow down. And we rarely sleep. We do what we can to get what we want. We work ourselves ragged so we can live a life worth living. We kill ourselves, to live.

—

She looked into her magic ball. As she looked on, asking question after question she came to a conclusion. I can do it, all. She decided she would write, and write, and write some more. She would write like her world depended on it. Because, it did.

Moped postulation

While in Phuket town (Thailand) Greg and I decided to rent mopeds. We also rented mopeds when we traveled to Cuba a little over a year ago. In both countries we had something (s) go wrong. In Cuba we rode together, Greg driving, me… holding on and taking pictures.  In Phuket we decided it would be fun to each drive our own bike. I now feel like, having learned from our mistakes, we are moped renting pro’s we may someday be able to rent, and ride a moped without difficulty.

Here is a list of do’s and don’ts pertaining to renting mopeds outside of the motherland.

Do: … rent mopeds. Renting a moped is a fun, cheap, easy way to explore wherever it is you are traveling. You have ample opportunities to see things that you may not otherwise have found if you were walking, getting driven somewhere by taxi, or taking a subway/sky train. I highly recommend looking into renting when you are traveling if not only for the sake of exploration purposes (just make sure you have a map).

Don’t: … wait to fill up. Most times when you rent a moped it will have very little gas in it. You are usually expected to pay for your own gas. Chances are there will be enough gas in the tank to get you to the gas station, and that’s it. When we were in Phuket, Greg and I decided to test out our bikes and drive around a little bit before filling up. When we did finally decide to make our way to the gas station my bike had run out of juice, in the middle of an intersection. Which left me having to walk my bike to the gas station. Luckily the roads were not too busy, and we were very close. In Thailand and in Cuba gas was stupid cheap. Fill yourself right up.

Do: … shop around. Moped renting tends to be a popular tourist activity. And the locals are quite conscious of this. If you let them, the locals will rip you off. And, good for them if you aren’t smart enough to shop around. In Thailand (at least in Phuket) there is a stand renting out mopeds probably on every street. Even when you think you’ve found you’re ideal price bracket, haggle it down.
Don’t: … “forget” to wear a helmet. I’m not trying to sound like anyone’s mom. But, seriously, wear a freakin’ helmet. It has absolutely saved us from any potential brain injuries. I know it looks silly, and that neck strap is a pain. But, whatever. There is no good reason why you should not be wearing a helmet. Anything can happen (trust me).

Do: … observe traffic before getting on your bike and going. In Thailand people drive on the the left side of the road. Different from what we’re used to in Canada. It can be difficult to get used to, but as long as you are always thinking, you should be fine.

Don’t: …drive your moped if anything is not working properly. You would think that this is a given. I mean, duh, why would someone drive something that doesn’t completely work? Well. We are those genius’ who thought that we could magically make a broken bike run, we are just that special. In our defense, we didn’t realize that our Cuba bike was pretty much, crap, until we were on a very busy road. We did not realize that it would break down so far away from where we were staying. We also did not anticipate it sputtering, holding onto it’s final breath of existence all the way down a main road, in the rain. We just didn’t know OK?!

But, I guess I diddddd  know that the brakes of my Phuket bike weren’t working.  I mean, I supposeeeee  I found out within 15 minutes of our renting it. Why didn’t I go back and just make a quick exchange? Because I’m stubborn, OK! Though, I wish I had. It would have prevented various injuries. Do me a favor, and please please please do not drive a moped that is not in perfect working condition.

Do: … make a lot of stops. In both Phuket and Varadero we had a final destination in mind when we began our ride, but we also made sure to make a few stops on the way. In Varadero, we made a stop on our way to the downtown market in a run down area overrun with chickens, stray dogs and children. We watched a little bit of a local pick up baseball game. And we saw some of the biggest ocean waves I have ever seen. In Phuket our final destination was the aquarium (where we would meet Ryan and Dan), we made a stop at the marines camp harbor. We sat and looked out at the beautiful scenery in solitude.

Don’t: … get into an accident. Luckily (and I do mean “luckily”) we did not get into an accident in Cuba. I cannot say the same for Phuket. Within about 6 seconds of each other Greg and myself both got in an accident (that’s gotta be love, right?). Like I mentioned earlier, my brakes were just not reliable. They would work. And then, they wouldn’t work. But then, they would work. And…. then they wouldn’t. We were driving along happy as clams when we decided to turn around to check out a side street. All we had to do was turn around and make a right turn. I turned around. Check. But then noticed that the strap of my helmet was loose. I decided to pull over to the side of the road to fix it. Unfortunately here is where my brakes decide not to work. I was given the option to either drive straight into an oncoming car, or drive straight into a very large, very concrete pole. I chose the pole. My bike and me went head on into the pole, busting up my bike, scratching my leg, and hurting my knee. My head snapped sideways and hit the pole on the way through (thankful for that helmet!). At this point the bike is sideways on the ground getting caught in plants. I get it in an upright position, only to look up and see Greg collide with another moped. Greg wiped out huge and with his bike were sliding on their side across the pavement (go team helmet!). I don’t think I’ve ever been so nervous. I limpily ran over to see if Greg was OK. He was completely fine other than a few scratches and forming bruises. His bike also looked good as new (I was a little jealous about this actually). Turns out a local Thai kid (15 years old) was driving a little recklessly and smoked Greg. The kid with the help of a local Thai man tried to get Greg to pay for the damages of the kids bike (which were hefty– his tire also popped while we were standing there). Greg refused and we made the decision to flee. If the cops got involved we knew whose side they would take. I was pretty shaken by our dual accidents and just wanted to return the bikes. So, we did. And I paid 900 baht (about $30 CAD) for my damages, which honestly is not bad considering what I managed to do to the bike.

Do: … it all again (without the accidents). Like I said before, renting mopeds in a foreign land is a lot of fun and probably worth what you will be paying. The exploring and adventures that you will have from something so simple is well worth it.