Archive: December, 2007

----- 12.18.2007 --------
No longer am I blinking and losing a day or two, or even a week.... they're going by 2 and 3 weeks at a time! But that's fine by me. I'm having fun! Last weekend was my company's Christmas party at The Carlu. It was a beautiful venue, had great food, and I was surrounded by amazing company. I had a really great time, and so did Jen. We had dinner in the "skyroom", which was beautiful! It was a round room with a huge dome ceiling and a fountain in the middle. A small 3 piece band played softly while ate. Afterwards, there was a DJ, desert and dancing. Who could ask for more?

What else is new? Oh ya... I finished my PHOT9031 course - Photography of People. I'm glad it's over with. Unlike my other photography courses, I did not feel like I got much value out of this one. And for a 42 hour course (14 weeks), I expected much more. Oh well, there will be other courses to take. Jen also finished her course in HR Management. But more important then finishing 1 course, this was the last of 8 and she got her certificate. Congratulations! It's tough working and taking school on the side. But patience and persistence go along way, and before you know it, you're through (in a good way!).

Well, not sure what else to report on. I'm sure there's lots more. I've been climbing more, working lots, but probably sleeping less. Already it's almost 11 and it feels like I just got home (although I've been home for about 2 hours). 6 will come pretty early, like it always does. Anyway... I guess it's good that time flies as opposed to it crawling and feeling like I have to stare at a clock. Hope you're all doing amazing! And I don't want to give my Merry Christmases and Happy New years now.... I'll update before then. There's still time... I can find it :) Until then.....

----- 12.04.2007 --------
December. Wha?!?! Could this be possible? The snow outside tells me not only is it possible, but it is fact. Although I won't give you a play-by-play since my last update,I do want to tell you about a few highlights. Such as Friday. On Friday, I went climbing with a couple of my new workmates, Denise & Harry. We went to the usual locale: Rock Oasis. Although it was about a month ago since my last climb, and much earlier since the one before (a year?), I felt I did really well. I was conquering 5.8's & 5.9's. There were a few new runs that weren't rated yet and although one looked like maybe it was a 5.8 or 5.9 on the surface, it had to be a 5.10 or higher. Not only did I have a difficult time, but so did Harry, as well as a host of experienced-looking strangers. Ones that could glide up the runs I struggled on, but even on this one they weren't getting past the same point. It made me feel somehow better about not being able to do it myself. Strange how that works, isn't it? If I beat myself up over something that I can't do, I'm totally justified in not being able to do it once I discover that the majority of people are stuck in the same place. And once that happens, it's simply "OK". It's no longer necessary to persevere past it. Just to clarify, I'm not talking about climbing anymore. It's simply an observation on society. An observation that explains why mediocracy is king today. The same thought it helpful as well though.... what if you hit something you are sure is impossible and decide to give up. If you find the majority of people breeze through whatever it was you were stumped on, you are surely to retry until you yourself can do the same. There's a lesson buried somewhere in here.

It just occured to me that my last thought (the paragraph before this) either makes sense, or is total gibberish. Now I could re-read whatever it is I wrote before posting, but that's not my 'style'. And neither is spell check since I'm enjoying the simplicity of notepad right now. It could be gibberish because I'm writing through a fog of sleepiness. It's 12:30 and I have some work to do around 1 AM. My choices were stay up and wait till 1, or get some rest, set an alarm, and then get up. I decided on the latter and it's proving to be very difficult. I've put on some coffee and I'm sipping on a mug now. It's clearing up some of the fog, but I have an overwhelming urge to go back to bed. I must have disrupted a sleep cycle. In fact, since I had about 2 hours sleep, I am sure that's what I did. Now that brings me to an idea for a next-generation alarm clock:

The next generation alarm Clock
This idea isn't all mine. In fact, the basis of it came from a conversation I had at a poker game about 2 months ago. Imagine an alarm clock that monitored your brain waves. Wouldn't it be great if you set a time to wake up, let's say 6 AM, and it adjusted itself to ring when it was most beneficial to you? Let's say your average sleep cycle is 4 hours, including those critical REM phases. If you went to bed at 10 PM, ideally your alarm rings right after you've completed the 2nd cycle. It's easiest to wake up after a cycle has completed. And depending on where you are in a cycle, it can be almost impossible to hear anything outside your internal world, such as the alarm clock. This is something that I have a tough time with... I am a VERY deep sleeper in some parts of my cycles.

So this futuristic alarm clock would analyze your patterns, and based on where you are in your sleep, may ring at 5:30 AM if you have a better chance at getting up then 6AM, or just as easily wait until 6:10AM to wait for a cycle to complete. Health-wise, I'm sure we'd all benefit from such a device. One of these days....and if anyone stubles across this and makes such a clock, please contact me. You're going to need some testers and I'd love to be first in line! And you could take this idea a step further. Have you seen the "Peaceful Progression Alarm Clock for Hammacher Schlemmer"? It's supposed to gently wake you by first introducing some aromas into the air to start the wake up process. Combine this with some biofeedback as to the timing and effectiveness of the aroma released, and getting up in the morning could become an enjoyable experience.... akin to that of naturally waking up at an opportune time.

Well, I went WAY off on a tagent I did not expect to go on when I set out to write an update. Maybe for better, maybe for worse. If nothing else, it should add some variety to my posts. Maybe I should force myself up to write more updates? What might come out of it are more interesting thoughts. After all, when you're still feeling like you're in dreamstate, your unconcious mind is much accessible then in your daylight fully awake hours where your concious mind is king. But that's a mega-tangent I won't go on right now. Another 15 minutes or so before I can start poking at the VPN gateway at work. And another coffee in me and I think I'll have the mental capacity to carry out what I was intending to. I guess that's a tough part of this plan to nap then get up. Something I may have well overlooked: my state of mind when it comes time to DO the job! lol

More highlights from my past post? Last Thursday was my last company's Christmas party. I decided to go crash it late. It was awesome to see all my old coworkers. I miss you guys! And this past Saturday, was a friend of mine whom I haven't seen in too long... about 4 years. Gail (of the "Noel and Gail" that lived down the hall from me on Queens Quay) was celebrating her 40th birthday in Streetsville. I drove out, enjoying a great reunion with a number of friends I haven't seen in 4+ years, many of which I partied with in Newfoundland in 2002 when we went out to Noel & Gail's wedding. Good times! Afterwards the drive home wasn't so fun. There was a snow storm and the 401 was a MESS! The plows hadn't hit it yet and there were a few inches covering the road with hardly any tiremarks to figure out where the lanes start and end. Eventually I made it home safe & sound, after a long white-knuckled drive.

That's all for now. If you made it this far, you must have been entertained..... or were looking for something entertaining and then got here only to come up short. I always love hearing feedback on what I write. After all, YOU are partially whom I'm writing for. I am the other part of the audience. "Future me" that is.... when I take a trip down memory lane and re-read all of this some day in the future. A day I have yet to hit. Let's just call this my time capsule burried in the Internet ;) And with that.... g'nite.

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