crokinole

if it wasn't for the strip air hockey going on in the background (thanks, keith. thanks, girls. great host. great house...) it wouldn't have been quite as great, but crokinole is a great game regardless. and what's even better than being a fun game? being a fun Canadian game. and if you're ambitious you can go to the world crokinole championships in tavistock, ontario - first weekend in june, annually.

but if you're going to go, make sure you're wearing your big-boy/big-girl boots because they don't mess around. 108 20's in the qualifying round? damn, son... that's mad skills, straight up.

so make sure to nick that opponent piece, especially if you're playing caroms, kids. you don't want to see multiple discs hit the ditch. that'd just be a shame.

here's to posting 20's,
jh..

www.worldcrokinole.com

"dinner makes families"

it was said once by someone, though i can't remember exactly whom at the moment. in many ways it seems true to me. dinner does make families. for most families, dinner is where the greatest amount of true quality time is found. think about it. let's say an average of five dinners per week, at half an hour per dinner, for even as little as ten years. that's about 1300 cumulative hours spent together. that's 54 straight days worth of dinners. 54 days of learning about each other, of learning about yourselves.

_______________________________________

it's been a long time since family dinners were actually quality time for me, and even longer since they occurred regularly. but once in a while i'm lucky enough to spend one with a best friend's family; perhaps on christmas, or even when he's half way around the globe.

it seems impossible to pack 54 straight days of dinner time into a matter of a few hours, but it happens. and the 54 days worth of happiness that it brings is more than you could really hope to thank them for.



to you and yours, whether you're two, or more,
jh..

i just never learn. so much stress and unnecessary cramming could be avoided if i'd just keep up with readings. but alas, the exam time crunch has descended once again, and yes, once again i am in the throes of late-night cramming and "temporary" learning. why do i pay to learn it if i'm not going to learn it?

it's a really nice piece of paper, that's why.

i kid, of course. i love learning. what i need is to have attendance-mandated exams on a bi-weekly basis. i'd keep up with readings then, let me tell you.

or maybe i just need to grow up and be responsible with my academic time management.





pffft.

jh..

it wasn't me...

it's funny to think of not being yourself. if you think about it, what does that even really mean? on one hand, you're always yourself because you are as you are, and what you are is you. on the other hand, we've all had at least some times in our lives where we haven't acted or felt like ourselves. i've felt more and more like myself for a while now, but it hasn't always been that way. of course i've always felt like myself in the moment, for as long as i can remember; in retrospect, though, there was a long time in my life where i can see now that i wasn't entirely myself. i guess you could say that i lost myself.

things have come more or less full circle in the last few years, though. i've always been myself at heart, but it's only in this recent era that i've really accepted myself for what i am. for what i've always been. for the things that i denied and repressed for a long time in an effort to be someone else. someone cool. someone i would have looked up to, when i was looking up to all the wrong people.

it's relieving, really, being yourself. i hadn't realized how tiring and distracting it is to be any other way, but in retrospect, it's exhausting. maslow and rogers both posited that anxiety - and in that capacity, stress - arise from an inconsistency of self. we're in constant conflict when our true self and our ideal self aren't the same. and in my experience, they're totally right.


"...don't be makin' no effort to impress, 'cause you're fine the way you are; just do what you feel." - dizzee rascal, 'dream'


here's to you finding the true you, too - whether it's been decades since, or it's long overdue.

jh..