Slow Healing, Going Shack Wacky, Dry Streak

Thursday, April 11

I definitely have to force myself to use a full rest day today. I'm healing slower than I thought I would be; that's my own damn fault.  Despite the fact that I've been more idle than usual, I've still been using my injured foot more than necessary in the past couple days by looking around at cars and attending to some other appointments for this week. I only have enough tolerance to go one other outing that I have to do today, otherwise the new snow coming down today is pretty much a prompt that I need to keep myself planted in one spot for the remainder of the day to allow the swelling to subside. It's in these moments of sitting still that I become quite grouchy and frustrated; sitting here miserably brooding over the fact that I've rendered myself half-crippled out of my own clumsiness and stupidity.

Thus, I retreat into writing. I've been getting really bored, and it doesn't help that I have the disposition to automatically start pacing when I do become bored: it's like the use of my feet are a critical part of some function to get me mentally unstuck. So now, being stuck on a couch seems to be further driving my mind into limbo. I can think of a thousand things to do, but they most of them require me being able to freely stand and walk. The pain-killers have been dulling my senses so badly: anything I try reading from books, or from online is pointless as it ends up being just lost in brain fog; plus they're ruining my appetite with the side effects of dizziness and nausea. Watching too much TV is rotting my mind as well: I keep flipping through channels, but I can't find anything but depressing news*, and there seems to be nothing else intellectually stimulating, engaging, or entertaining.** However, the cane has been a source of entertainment for Ella. It serves as a makeshift hockey stick, to put a little more speed and action on her toys when she wants to chase them around and pounce on them. At least one of us is easily amused. After a while, the insipid little game apps I've found made me feel reduced to a level of a cat chasing a dot from a laser pointer around the floor.

Friday, April 12

Spirits lowered even more: I learned about a death in the extended family, my cousin and uncle have my sympathies. I'm still useless and hobbling around, and can't follow a bead on anything mentally; so I caught a ride with my folks, and ventured out of town with them to watch my brother perform in a dinner theater play. He did a fabulous job with his role, and the production was very entertaining. The setting was about a small rural Saskatchewan farming community in the 1980's, during those bad drought years. It brought back lots of memories, plus their characters in the play were the perfect representative archetypes of the kinds of people I grew familiar with from that time: the stubborn, conservative old farmer; the younger generation, either willingly or reluctantly, pushed into seeking prospects outside of farm living, the free-thinking outsider with ideas and opinions that clashed with the culture at the time . . . it was a great comical story and a fine snapshot of what people were facing around these parts during those times. The play was called Dry Streak, and I would have gave it an award if I could have. I wish the pictures I tried taking of it turned out. I'm grateful to have seen it, and to have a little reprieve from the pain and negativity.

Saturday, April 13

I've been able to get around little better, relying less on the cane for support. The last of my pain-killers will be used today, so hopefully I'll soon be rid of their wretched side effects. If this rate of recovery continues, I hope to be back running again (within 5 km) by the middle of next week.

*- The Rehteah Parsons case in Halifax (so tragic that it's hard not to dismiss the thought using vigilante justice against those who bullied her), and the craziness happening in North Korea, being the most prevalent stories upsetting me most.
**- Actually, that's not 100% correct. I started watching Hannibal. They did well by casting Hugh Dancy and Mads Mikkelsen for the roles of Will Graham and Dr. Lecter respectively.

Could It Get Even Worse?

Equation for a shitty weekend: (exercise at home) - (proper orthotic footwear) + (startling stimulus) + (excessive force^overcorrection of stance/clumsy footing) = (three hours of intense pain in RUH emergency room waiting to get X-rays)*: yielding (wild cognition/sensation /lucidity distorting pain killers) + (hobbling around with a cane) = (stranded back home, immobile) + (mind on the crazy train, destination: a long ride to Screwyville)**

Screwyville is not the place where one's mind should be while trying to make decisions about buying a vehicle, but nonetheless, I'm doing it, as I explore online shopping sites. I better watch out, or my next vehicle might be something akin to that of what clowns drive around in a circus ring.

*- Thankfully, nothing is broken, most likely plantar fasciitis (hopefully no tissue/ligament damage), but if it affects my mobility it is considered a serious injury.
**- Let's not forget to include even more snow coming down today, just to make getting around with a flippin' cane even more challenging and treacherous.

Slow Thaw, Vehicle Shopping

It's snowing again today. . .blargh!  I'm not posting any more entries after this one about this ugly, freakish season, nor shall I bemoan the fact any longer that there is such a ridiculous amount of snow that has yet to thaw away, bringing on a subsequent heightened flood risk. If we have snow around here on April 20th, we will then be heading into a full six months, exactly half a year, of winter. Any further complaining about the weather is just a waste of time and energy; the point has been made: Mother Nature just really doesn't give a shit. Even the non-humans are revoltingly depressed. I came home last Thursday night, and began to walk the dog, and I heard an enormous flock of migrating geese returning; creating an uproar of honking and squabbling near the river a couple of blocks from me. It was like there was aggression and desperation in their tones; landing and crowding, and fighting for space around the only bit of open water they've probably found at this latitude on their course northward, when instinct is telling them that all this amount of extra ice and snow should definitely not be here. They probably were nagging and bickering at each other; trying to find the culprit leader in the group responsible for this gross "navigation error".




My Dad watching the last of the ice shacks being hauled
away for the season's end 

The really depressing ass-kick into reality about how late spring will arrive came to me on Easter weekend. Some of Good Friday was spent at the closest southern lake to my childhood home, to try out some ice fishing. I didn't have any great expectations to catch many fish (which was good, because none were caught). I went more to inspect the conditions of the lake, to note and estimate when off shore casting could be done from the marina in late spring, where my luck is the best. As it is was, the auger was sank down right to the shaft head on the engine, a full 125 centimeters (a little over four feet) before we bit into water. That's the thickest I've ever seen it for this time of the year. This was about 300 metres from the closest point from the shore. Even with a radical meltdown, I realistically don't expect to be able to come back there, to cast off of the marina, until the first week of June at the earliest.

Currently, I'm reflecting about last year at this time. Within the first week of April, I was running outside on a regular basis, in shorts, and even shirtless, and the streets were all clear for cycling to work. I'm especially bitter about not having ideal conditions for cycling.* Now, at the same time of the month, there are still ice ruts as deep as 20 cm along some neglected and unkempt backstreets, and pot holes that could easily snap off wheels from axles and wreck suspensions while trying to turn out of them. I'm bothered even more that I'm also now pressed into the sordid business of finding another vehicle. Listening to my car bottoming out now, and having its undercarriage scraped off and filed away by rock hard ice while trapped in ruts doesn't inspire me to run out and find another car if there is even one more day of this hazard around.

Generally, I hate shopping for vehicles, or for any other big ticket items where financing plans are necessary. It becomes a stressful responsibility; and I make it a point of not suffering from bull-shitters; so being exposed to so many at once in wheeling and dealing (more like dickering and bickering) with salesmen/private sellers is not in anyway a pleasurable pastime for me. This snowy day, with nothing else to do, pretty much forces me to spend some of the day doing research for one; and I just have no heart to do it right now. I'll never get a new one (unless I won it in a charity raffle or lottery**), the degree of depreciation makes it illogical and impractical. Such a purchase really taxes the over-analytical side of me. I don't make such a big deal about making a vehicle a big part of my personal identity. I'm just realistic and practical. Sure, I have some standards for quality, but I'm not some idiotic gearhead either: the kind who thinks that driving an overpowered or luxury vehicle will somehow automatically make him cool, powerful, or will magically add a few extra inches to his cock***. I choose plain-Jane vehicles more so because I'm not deluding myself away from the fact that nothing around this country and climate will stay pretty, and whatever I get has to be mechanically tough enough to withstand the worst (winter) driving conditions that are thrown at it.

There are enough different cars out there that do appeal to me though that I would like to experience driving in my lifetime. Some aren't considered the best in their particular class, or practical for this region, but I don't care. These are the ones, for now, that I like and my weird reasons for liking them.

• Sport Coupe: Audi (A series) or BMW Z4 - Ahhh, German engineering. . . Vorsprung durch Technik. It's a toss up between the two for me. 
  
• Classics: MGB - This one appeals to the romantic in me. It would be the car to drive a girlfriend to a do picnic in the country or something. Just to be special, my MGB be authentically British, and would have the right-hand steering on it, all the better to cruise and cuddle at the same time.
  
• Compact: Mini Cooper - I loved this little car ever since I saw it perform in The Italian Job. It also appeals to my inner Mr. Bean. It's definitely a vehicle to have if I ever wanted to prove to everyone that I was having a mid-life crisis.
  
• Sedan: Volvo s60 - I have great respect for the Swedes. It's because they are fellow northern climate dwellers who would know how to build a car that could endure bitterly cold weather. That, plus their reputation for rigorous safety standards for all their models. The only time I ever saw a wrecked Volvo was when I watched a documentary about military vehicles on TV, and one was purposely drove over, and crushed by a 60 tonne Swedish Army Leopard tank, to demonstrate the power of the tank. Even then, the damage that was inflicted on the Volvo wasn't as bad as I thought it could have been. I don't need a luxury sedan, but if I ever wanted one that could take the punishment from this region, and not depreciate so rapidly in value, this is what I'd have.
  
• SUV: Toyota Landrover (old school) This to me says "tough, rugged, and cheeky" It looks like it could plow through a herd of gnus in Africa, or burn across the worst of the Australian outback. I look at it and it screams out to me: "Adventure!" It would be a fun little summer vehicle to have (if summer ever friggin' comes here, that is).
  
• Mini Van: VW - I suppose it's because there is this inner hippie that dwells within me. The one below is my preferred model. However, if this winter continues making this place feel like the ice planet Hoth, it may more be practical to use the one below that.
  

 

*-Used the stationary bike at the Field House today. It's the like the same sort of hell as using a treadmill: moving around yet going nowhere. . . like the bloody snow around here.
** - Even then, I'd most likely swap it for a cash prize, or sell it outright, and buy a quality used car and re-invest the rest of the remaining money that otherwise would have been wasted on depreciation.
***- Sadly, I've seen and known too many of these dummies. Speeding around in a muscle car or mega-truck sure didn't/doesn't help them get any smarter either. Such a type of vehicle can indeed be personality magnifiers, but 9 times out of 10 it only exposes just how much of an asshole the driver really is.

Springtime in Saskatoyuktuk

It's somewhere in the realm of 3:00 AM time-wise. I'm writing now as a bit of a mind purge. I've not been able to just simply drift off to sleep because the howling 90 km/hour blizzard wind that is slamming at my outer wall of my bedroom. It's not at the state of being destructive: if you are inside, just an eerily noisy nuisance. We are in the midst of a clipper that is raging throughout the western interior of Canada. We've been through our first full day of the vernal equinox, and conditions are nowhere near appearing close to being spring-like throughout the time since I last posted here.

Did I share this photo to show you the interesting
 geographic info on the sign?. . .No. . .
Did I share this photo to show you the alphabet soup
 that is the Inuvialuktan language? . . .No. . .
I shared this photo out of envy, to show you that even
they have less f****in' snow there than we do! 

A few days ago, I noted that Saskatoon was even colder than the far northern hamlet outpost of Tuktoyaktuk near Inuvik in NWT, close to the Arctic Ocean. I commented on Facebook that we should rename this town Saskatoyuktuk, or something else that sounds more linguistically concordant to an Inuit dialect, given the extended length and snowfall of this miserable winter. I thought it would at least roll off the tongue more rhythmically to match all the other "-uck, -uck" words I've been muttering repeatedly every time I've tuned into the weather report for this region each morning for the last few weeks. After these last hours of the wind packing the snow, we would indeed have the ideal banks around here now to cut out sturdy enough blocks to actually build a few igloos. Given the affordable housing shortage around here, that might not be such a bad thing.

One of the first day of spring 2013 photos, taken here locally.

The most salient question I suppose the locals around this city/part of the province have been asking themselves is: "Why do I live here again?" The only positive answers I can scrape up for now is, at least it's not North Korea, or Iran. I can dress for the cold and snow and be protected. I don't know how to dress for an earthquake, or volcano (Pacific Rim), or for a car bomb (the Middle East) or for a sudden spray of bullets (like what's possible now in Syria, or any American school/movie theatre). These realities don't diminish the fact that this winter has been overly long and depressing for me though, even with the effort to use some of the days that were more ideal for skiing. By this coming Sunday, there will have been a full five months of snow coverage, and still no sign in the forecast for potential good thawing weather, until the maybe the second week of April, which still could potentially throw another couple storms our way.

A pileup scene somewhere between Edmonton and Calgary

I'm definitely not an Inuit, nor do I have the constitution of one. I have this innate urge in me to experience greenery, flowers, or even just simple grass close to this time of the year. The heightened flooding alert is going to delay even that from coming normally. It's becoming even more imperative that I visit Gardenscape this weekend at Prairieland Park. After this brutal season, I would bet my bottom dollar, despite the great delay for planting and sowing stuff, that there will not just a few, but throngs of people there, with near-orgasmic expressions on their faces, paying a ridiculous admission price, to just get a simple long awaited opportunity to smell the heavenly aroma of actual dirt and compost again, and to catch a glimpse of these things long estranged from our memory called "tulips", and "daffodils". The horrid road and highway conditions will not deter them. This picture above of a scene from Alberta won't be a sobering enough reminder for them to take it easy, or to just stay home.

That's how desperate people around here are for spring to come. . . here in Saskatoyuktuk.

Ides of March, Training and Detox, and the Futility of Seeking Serenity

The harsh reality about how unfit I've been rendered by this winter came to me Tuesday. Armed with my new heart monitor, I burned around the track for a five kilometer distance as a trial session for getting to know what my actual peak heart rate is when I run. I shamefully admit that after two and half years of running, I still didn't know what this was yet. I confess that I pushed it a little harder than I should have; my average rate was recorded at a terrible 169 bpm: way too high, and my pace wasn't even anywhere close to my personal best for my high pace five click running. What was even more distressing was when I exited the steam room afterward. I realized that another thing about this winter compared to the others since I lived here is that I haven't found time to make better use of the sauna, or sweat properly. When I walked out of there I was not just looking red, but almost purple as I shocked myself passing a mirror, a worse looking sort of sickly hue than when I come out of a heavily chlorine-saturated swimming pool. 

The common thing about the lungs and the skin are that each have direct contact with both the air in our environment and the body's blood supply simultaneously. It stands to reason that if my lungs are still crappy and full of toxic junk, it's quite likely that it will reflect on my skin that has been exposed to it as well, especially when it's put through even a mild degree of environmental stress, like the steam room. The dryness, plus not being able to expose the skin and open the pores and sweat freely for this especially long winter season probably doesn't do much good for any body. Neither does constantly being indoors, inhaling recirculated air, with the dust and fungal/mould spores, and whatever other viruses, germs and household product chemical residues are in it. I'm sure that the shockingly ghastly and unnatural colour of my skin after that session was a sign that I'm due for some hard core form of spring detoxification.





Some Homemade Sealer Salads for the week
 Energy/Nutrients Value per jar: Calories - 231.3
Total Fat 17.4 g, Cholesterol 0 g, Sodium 272 mg
Potassium 411.3 mg, Total Carbs 18.6 g
Dietary Fiber 7.0 g, Sugars 5.3 g
Protein 5.0 g, Daily Recommended percentage of
Vitamin A 93.2%, Vitamin C 102.3 %
Calcium 13.0 %, Iron 22.0%

I've been already taking measures for such a detox, and commiting to it for least for a couple of weeks. I've started to automate things enough in the kitchen to do the following:

• eat more raw greens/chlorophyll
• eliminate sugar and white flour/starch
• use more leaner simple proteins (fish, chicken, nuts, eggs, and beans)
• limit salt
• increase antioxidants and vitamin C (lemons, grapefruits, onions, ginger, turmeric, garlic, berries, mushrooms)
• increase dosages of vitamin D
• consume more fibre
• gobble up those multivitamins
• limit milk intake (except for cottage cheese, buttermilk/kefir, and yogurt)
• water, water, water, water . . . at least four litres per day
• stop drinking alcohol (Boooo!)

I'll try to steam/sauna everyday throughout, then I should get a massage after the first week of this, and another after the second.

Despite all the good intentions, there was nothing but a road to hell before me, no matter which I turned. I'm talking about yesterday. The ides of March weren't just bad for Caesar. I completed my circuit at the track, only to have my sports watch display crap out on me, rendering it useless: my new monitor, which I was so proud of for getting at a great discount a few days before, also rendered useless. I was beginning to fume with frustration. Walking out of the track building (into more bloody blowing snow) didn't improve my mood any either; but I tell myself to think progressively, baby steps, etc., and I drove to the Future Shop to assess the price of a replacement (not buying anything, nothing in stock, thus wasting my time). I could (should) have opted to use the exit from the parking lot that took me directly home, but I reflected a bit, upon looking at more of this goddamned snow coming, and thought to myself that it might be better instead to go the other way out to Dutch Growers greenhouses. Why this decision? Probably because the core of me was (is) so desperate to see something floral and verdant after this long, dreary, wretched season. I tell myself: "Remember, be progressive man, seek out the better, SERENITY NOW!" As I was driving away from the shopping centre, waiting for my chance to try to cautiously turn onto the road in drifting snow conditions, BAM! An idiot in a truck* rear-ends me.

My day of trying to work progressively for training better and trying to mentally endure ten more new centimeters of this oncoming white hell only resulted in a damaged watch, a wrecked car, and few other unwelcome scenes and issues waiting for me when I arrived home. I should have just stayed in bed. I chose to say "Screw it!" to the detox for rest of the day, and drank wine and feasted on bread and sugary sweet baklava at a function later that evening.

Yesterday for me was only proof that the road to hell is paved with the best intentions. Perhaps I should be observant of the fact that today, according to Mental Floss, is World Sleep Day. A day to stay home, draw the curtains, shut down and go into some kind of coma, and stop the rest of the world from biting at my ass.

*- A stupid big-ass Dodge half-ton. I hate these friggin' trucks, and the most of the typical dimwitted and foolish personity types and demeanor of the young men around this neighbourhood who drive them.




Getting Unstuck, and Bond-ology

I was muddling through Thursday wondering what I was going to do through the weekend. The last dump of snow was so de-motivating. Initially, I was just in no mood to take on any extra home projects, but then I looked in my fridge. I've been trying to eat healthier again, buying more fruits and veggies, but with the neglect because of the long days at work, I discovered that it was looking more and more like a regular bachelor's refrigerator. It was coming close to the point when brown stuff was turning green, and when the green stuff starts turning brown. In another couple of days, I'm sure I'd be able to roll up the lettuce and smoke it. Without intending to do so, I managed to create my most efficient mise en place ever. I created a lot of recipes, some classy ones, for very cheap. It was my first measure for getting unstuck. The fates conspired to push me along through the process further yet in an interesting way.

With the return of warmer weather, I had to take advantage of trying to put some effort into getting more physically active. Motivation to move though has still been lacking. My performance in both running and skiing has been erratic and more taxing on me than usual. My lung capacity is still greatly diminished, and it's putting more strain on my breathing and circulation than I find comfortably acceptable. I decided that I needed to get the compatible heart rate monitor that transmits the reading to my GPS sports watch for biofeedback. It seems like I have to outsource my willpower in the form of gadgets and apps. I went to three different stores before I finally found it. At the place I found it at, the price tag listed it at $79.99 before taxes, I paid with plastic. When I collected the receipt, I saw that I was charged only $21.99 after tax. Either there was a flyer discount I wasn't aware of, or some scanning error that perhaps rang in the wholesale price instead; whatever the case I didn't argue about it. CoincidentalIy, I have to note that I checked my lotto tickets earlier and won twenty two dollars. It was a fluke that it covered almost the exact cost of the monitor. This bit of serendipitous luck was as if karma was dictating and making it such that I had to have this unit. All in all, my heart monitor really only cost me three bucks, the price of the lotto ticket. As it has been though, nothing else was mentally making it anymore inspiring to run harder, and while I was skiing this weekend, imagery of machine gun toting henchmen pursuing me didn't make me move any faster, which leads me to the next subject.

The final thing that has been giving me a bit more inspiration to move more is the 50th anniversary set of the 007 movies on loan to me, and watching my more favoured of the action-packed series all weekend. Thus comes the list part of my entry:

Top 10 Favourite Bond Films

1. Skyfall
2. Casino Royale
3. Goldfinger
4. For Your Eyes Only
5. Dr. No
6. Quantum of Solace
7. Goldeneye
8. Die Another Day
9. The Living Daylights
10. View to a Kill

My Choices for the Five Worst Bond Films

1. Never Say Never Again*
2. Live and Let Die
3. Moonraker
4. Licensed to Kill
5. On Her Majesty's Secret Service

My Five Favourite Bond Villians

1. Le Chifre (Mads Mikkelson)
2. Silva (Javier Bardem)
3. Jaws (Richard Kiel)
4. Max Zorin (Christopher Walken)
5. Ernst Stavro Blofeld (Donald Pleasence)

My 15 Favourite Bond Girls

1. Melina Havelock, For your Eyes Only (Carole Bouquet)
2. Jill Masterson, Goldfinger (Shirley Eaton)
3. Major Asimova/XXX, The Spy Who Loved Me, (Barbara Bach)
4. Honey Rider, Dr. No (Ursula Anders)
5. Severine, Skyfall (Berenice Marlohe)
6. The Cigar Girl/Assassin, The World is Not Enough (Maria Grazia Cucinotta)
7. Christmas Jones, The World Is Not Enough (Denise Richards)
8. Pussy Galore, Goldfinger (Honor Blackman)
9. Xenia Onatopp, Goldeneye (Famke Janssen)
10. Domino, Thunderball (Claudine Auger)
11. Solange, Casino Royale (Carterina Murino)
12. Elektra King, The World Is Not Enough (Sophie Marceau)
13. Miranda Frost, Die Another Day (Rosamund Pike)
14. Plenty O'Toole, Diamonds Are Forever (Lara Wood0
15. Naomi, The Spy Who Love Me (Caroline Munro)

My 10 Favourite Action Scenes

1. The showdown at Skyfall Manor (Skyfall)
2. The little yellow car chase (For Your Eyes Only)
3. The Tank in Moscow Scene (Goldeneye)
4. The Parkour Chase in the Madagascar Construction Site (Casino Royale)
5. The Miami Airplane Fuel Truck Ride (Casino Royale)
6. The ski jump parachute scene (The Spy Who Loved Me)
7. The Ski/Motorcycle Chase (For Your Eyes Only)
8. The Thailand Canal Boat Chase (The Man with the Golden Gun)
9. The Fencing Club Dual (Die Another Day)
10. The Port au Prince Boat Chase (Quantum of Solace)

Ten Stupid/Sucky Things of the Bond Films

1. For Your Eyes Only - A glaring technical mistake about the oxygen/helium respirator mixture. If their tanks were full of  helium, they would have been speaking like Munchkins.
2. Diamonds Are Forever - Mr. Kidd and Mr. Wint. Enough said.
3. Never Say Never Again - Not being able to classify Kim Basinger as a Bond girl, because this movie can't be ever thought of as a Bond film
4. Man With the Golden Gun - The midget Nick Nack, and funhouse props juxtaposed to a state of the art solar energy converter, WTF??!!
5. Moonraker - Mr. Drax, like come on. . . if you are going to be a bat shit crazy megalomaniacal villain, at least try to have a personality that varies a bit from that of a brown sock.
6. The Living Daylights/License to Kill - Locking Timothy Dalton's place as the "spazzy" Bond.
7. Thunderball - The underwater battlefield scene was rather slow for an action scene, the bubbles do a lot to obscure the shots. The "airlift" ending was pretty cheesy too.
8. Sean Connery - Hey, I like the guy; but is it just me, or do other people find it as freaky and distracting upon noting how the far ends of his eyebrows almost appear to be trying wrap themselves around to the back of his head? I guess tweezing wasn't a popular option back in the sixties.
9. Octopussy - I think you've lost more than a bit of screenwriting talent when you are trying to introduce a rotary saw yo-yo thing as a legitimate possibility for an assassin's weapon. 
10. Live and Let Die - I hated this instance and effort on the part of the franchise to mess around with Blaxploitation, no matter how cool they thought it was to do at the time.

*- Never will this be ever considered a proper Bond film.

Future Thinking and Running Again

I'm so glad that February is finally over, but it didn't end without strain. I spent the last two nights of it, each one until around 3:00 AM, immersed in paperwork; preparing stuff for deadlines due on March 1st. It's like gambling under duress. The resulting headaches from all the analysis and reorganizing of things have been so brutal, and didn't fully disappear until today. My head has been made too numb with fatigue. Dealing with stuff for investments inevitably leads me to think of questions and speculations about the future. Not really financial or economic ones per se, but ones leaning more toward possible social, environmental, and geo-political changes, and ramifications*. It is from this where some of my current angst and unrest probably comes from: in not being able to foresee much in the years and decades ahead beyond something bleak and dystopian, on several levels ranging from the local to the global. No matter what avenue of investment I take, it would be seemingly pointless in the long run if it ultimately will be lost some way, or doesn't garner me any means of future happiness, or any protection from socio-economic and environmental factors and failures that are beyond my control. Thus, being engaged with such decisions becomes draining, and mentally taxing for me.

I finally began running outside this morning: for my first outdoor run of the year 2013. It was only two kilometers, but enough to reintroduce my leg muscles to such rigour now that there is enough ice free street surface to stride out across, and just long enough to re-acclimate my lungs properly, and to trigger them and my sinuses to rid themselves of a winter's worth of respiratory stagnancy. The skiing has been helpful, but it's not an accurate physical substitute, or facsimile, compared to running. With a reminder from my friend, it has struck me that my half-marathon that I signed up for is less than three months away. I'm trying to be mindful to temper my regenerating sciatic nerve slowly and properly.

*- Things like disturbing facts regarding: Education - Almost 70% of this globe's population believes in the ridiculous meme of creationism instead of the scientific evidence supporting evolution; Resource Management - It has been estimated that the energy equivalent of 4-6 barrels of oil is used to draw out just one barrel of it out of the Earth (If I said that I was paying 4-6 dollars to work for every one dollar I earned, I would be called crazy); Social Justice - This past exposure of the ignorance, corruption, and racist agendas on both sides of the fence of the "Idle No More" movement is probably a small glimpse of the unrest that's coming ahead in this nation; Agriculture - Farming is done by only (an aging) 2% of the growing global population, on increasingly depleted land, and yet the amount of industrial scale food production/processing waste is alarmingly increasing; Population - There are seven billion people living on a planet with, given our current rate of wasteful/inefficient resource usage, a carrying capacity of less than four billion, while at the same time, some religious institutions are still maintaining political influence/lobbying in many nations for preaching against and outright forbidding of family planning/birth control. These are only a few of the things that bother me about mankind. With such ignorance, impending limits and shortages, and uncontrolled growth, we are due for a worldwide collapse of civilization very soon. I can only hope that some definitely major paradigm shift is happening ahead to intercede.