All We've Ever Had is Time

There's this mentally handicapped guy that goes to my school. We are friends, though I'm not 100% sure he knows my name. Let's call him Doug (not his real name). He's not severely handicapped; he's independent enough that at first I thought he was just kind of weird.

Doug has the absolute definition of a one-track mind. The only thing, and I mean literally the only thing he ever talks about, is how time flies. Every single conversation we've had, every single conversation I've overheard between him and someone else, and every conversation with him that anyone's ever mentioned revolves around the notion that "time flies". Doug's gotten real good at this conversation, goodness knows he's held it enough times. He's got four dozen euphemisms for "time flies", like "yep, it just keeps chuggin' along, just like a freight train!", or "man, ______ sure is comin' up quick, it'll be here in no time flat!". Even his little blurb below his facebook profile picture is about how time flies.

Time does fly. Doug is right, perhaps more right than I'd like to admit. I need look no further than the little paintings that past residence students have left on the stairwell walls. Each flight commemorates a floor from a given year, a bunch of identical shapes personalized with roommates' first names and last initials, and a little quote or picture.

"WWF Forever" one reads. Another has the MXPX head. Girlier ones have things like "Laurie H. and Jennifer R. BFF 2001" or "Small town girl and city slicker meet, unfortunately, in 407". These little tokens of memories mean nothing to us that call this place home right now, but they are dearly beloved to people long since grown up and moved away, not really so very long ago.

Like Doug is always quick to point out, before I know it I'll be grown up and moved away too. I'll never get these days back. Doug helps remind me that it's a crime to waste the time I've been given at King's. He helps me remember that, every time I feel like just trying to get through the week so I can sleep away the weekend. I'm older now than I've ever been, and it only gets worse.

So truly, as cliched as these words are, make the most of every day. Doug does.

This is the Sound, of the Desperation Bound

I spent last weekend in Vegreville, picking up a few lifeguarding shifts, shoring up the bank account for Christmas shopping season. The other guard, instead of turning on our mainstay radio station (91.7 The Bounce), opted in favor of a new radio station: 95.7 The Sound.

The slogan for The Sound is "Because good music is good music. Period." Every time announcer lady smugly uttered it, I felt like I was taking crazy pills. In my opinion, no one, perhaps least of all this particular radio station, has a right to say such a thing.

Firstly, what makes music "good"? In order to proclaim that "good music is good music, period", there must be a clearly defined set of empirical guidelines for judging a song's "goodness", something that clearly does not, and cannot exist. If I were to ask the jazz saxophonists in my MacEwan graduating class, the girls on 4th Floor, and my mom what makes music good, I would get distinctly different answers from each group. For example, the jazz guy would look for technical proficiency and swing feel, the girls would be looking for catchiness and danceability, my mom would be looking for family values or something.

But, you might be thinking, isn't this flawed reasoning? Don't each individual's judging criteria all boil down to simply deciding how enjoyable the music is? This is true, but it doesn't give 95.7 The Sound any more right to say that "good music is good music, period". Every kind of music, regardless of how much one person hates it, is another person's favorite, or else it wouldn't get played. One man's trash is another man's treasure.

Speaking as a person with very narrow and fickle musical taste, I can at least usually understand why people love the kinds of music they love. If 95.7 The Sound played an incredibly diverse cross section of music across genre, decade, and culture, they might deserve the benefit of the doubt. But 95.7 The Sound, from what I heard of them over 2 shifts of lifeguarding, plays mostly bland, monotone, mid-tempo, un-catchy rock songs from North America over the past three decades. For 95.7 The Sound to say, repeatedly and determinedly, that "good music is good music, period", they are saying that anyone who doesn't love bland, mid-tempo rock, and absolutely nothing else, is either misguided or stupid.

It may sound like I'm hating on 95.7 The Sound's choice of songs, and I am, but that's exactly the point. They are hating on my choice of music by saying that only the music they play is any good at all, and then not playing a single song I enjoyed. Other radio stations also play very specific kinds of music, but they manage to do so without dismissing every other type of music as no good. Each to his own, so to speak. Not 95.7 The Sound.

The statement "good music is good music, period" is nonsensical. 95.7 The Sound, if for some reason you're reading this, let me suggest some new, more accurate tag lines for your illustrious radio station:

"The music our very specific audience enjoys is, in fact, the music our very specific audience enjoys. Period."

"Good music doesn't exist outside an individual's perception of it, but hey, here's some bland, mid-tempo rock! Period."

"You should feel bad about the music you listen to, because it's not what we play, and we are better judges than you because we are a radio station. You should stop listening to what you listen to and, in an attempt to feel like a part of an exclusive group that is so much cooler than all those people who listen to something other than bland, mid-tempo rock, listen to only 95.7 The Sound from now on so we can maximize our advertising revenue. Period."

Back in the Day, When I Still Had All the Answers

I've had the same email address since Grade 8, meaning I've got an inbox of 6 years' worth of email. I never deleted anything unless it was straight-up junk, just in case I needed it.

Well this week, good old general_derez@hotmail.com finally gave out and started spamming everybody, so he's got 30 days before I have to put him to sleep. I remember the afternoon Nolan and I signed up for him. We named him general_derez because I met a kid at camp whose email was captain_clink, and I thought that sounded cool, but we figured a general is better than a captain. Derez was the name of Nolan's created character on WWE: Day of Reckoning.

I'm in the process of switching over to a brand new Gmail account, a service for which I've heard nothing but solid reviews. It syncs nicely with my blogger account, but I've yet to figure out how to make it work with MSN messenger. Oh well, maybe it's time to put MSN to sleep too. There's only 2 or 3 people I talk to on there anymore, what with facebook chat and all, and as a result I'm on blogger more often than MSN these days anyway.

I imported all my 6 years' worth of mail from good old general_derez@hotmail.com, and began the process of archiving it. The deeper in I got, the more surreal the experience became. It really was a window into the mind of 15-year-old Michael, and I could see the little gears turning in my crazy 15-year-old hormonal head as I read.

I found dozens of emails between myself and a girl from Powell River BC that I met randomly at an airport in Costa Rica, and I chuckled at the junior-high problems we would vent to each other about. We were the perfect confidantes for each other; completely uninvolved in each other's drama and totally objective, but 100% on each other's side. I messaged her on facebook to see how she was doing, and it was great to reconnect.

I found dozens more between myself and my Grade 9 girlfriend, who lived an hour and a half away in Beaumont. We emailed each other almost every other night for the whole 9 months we stayed together. We were so cute! It brought back memories of sheepishly asking my dad's permission to go on the computer in the kitchen, and even though he knew exactly what I wanted to do, him asking "What game do you want to play?". He seemed to get a kick out of making me say out loud "I want to email Michelle...".

I found a bunch from a girl that liked me in Grade 11, sent over the 5 weeks I was away in Europe that spring. I wouldn't date her because she smoked, but she would update me every couple days on how she was quitting smoking while I was away, and how much she missed me. Whenever our hotel had free internet, I would find a bundle of adorable emails from home. We did end up dating when I got back, and she dumped me after a month, but no girl has ever made me feel as loved as she did over those 5 weeks without seeing me once.

My writing was atrocious. I thought it was cool to punctuate and spell everything perfectly, but never use capital letters (I still do this on MSN, skype, and facebook chat). My thought structure jumped around like a drunken monkey, and I remember thinking how cool it must be to sound so unpredictable and off-the-wall; You never know what this guy is going to say next! My attempts at being subtly cryptic variably made me facepalm and laugh out loud.

The thing that struck me most about my former self was simply how oblivious I was. Oblivious of myself, of my circumstances, and most of all, what my correspondents were trying to tell me. I had many sincere moments of "what was I thinking" and "if only I knew back then what I know now".

I feel privileged to have taken this glimpse into my past self. This must be why some people so religiously keep a journal or diary; it's an entertaining and thought-provoking thing to read one's own writing from years gone by. Hopefully, one day I'll look back on this blog post and be treated to such a glimpse again.

Mighty Beans Are On The Scene

On one winter afternoon while on an impromptu Tim's run, I asked one of my fellow students how much he spent a month on coffee. I'd assumed it would be a significant amount, as a day rarely passed by that I saw this guy without a Tim's cup cradled in his paws at least once. Even so, I was incredulous when he answered that he budgets $200 a month for coffee. He continued that he literally couldn't function without it, and needs at least a couple cups a day to make it to the end without crashing. This guy specifically budgets for coffee, and shells out 200 bucks a month as a starving student!

The above being a case more on the extreme side, I've heard many such stories of people being utterly dependent on coffee, as if it were as important as food, sleep, or exercise. I wonder how someone ends up in such a tragic state? My guess is that they start drinking coffee innocuously, making it easier to get going in the morning, or to stay up late writing university research papers. The dependence must come as they gradually lose the ability to do these things by their own discipline and force of will.

I hope I never start drinking coffee. I'd like to think that I can will myself to accomplish things to the best of my ability, without ever needing artificial aid. That's what everyone had to do before they popularized coffee. Can it really be so hard?

But perhaps more relevantly, I couldn't drink it if I wanted to. Coffee is disgusting. Seriously people, it tastes really gross.

I'm breaking the habit tonight.

I saw Scott Pilgrim vs. The World the other night.

All Scott Pilgrim has to do to get the girl of his dreams is repeatedly risk his life in seven deadly battles. All I have to do is live my life and wait. Yet, I envy Scott Pilgrim.

Without question, it's harder having to sit tight while every burning passion of every shred of my being is screaming "FIGHT! CHASE! PURSUE!". But there's nothing to fight for, nothing to chase, nothing to pursue. Even worse, as I struggle to hold myself back, I kick out fiercely at the world around me, damaging myself and those close to me.

When I meet my Ramona Flowers, her Seven Evil Exes won't know what hit them.

Hope it gives you hell.

All I'll say is that a girl should know better than to mess with a guy who writes good music.

If I had my own world, I'd build you an empire.

A friend dropped this on me the other day:

"You really live in your own little world, don't you?"

I asked him what he meant by that, and he told me that in the few months he's known me, he's seen that I slip into a trance-like state with noticeable regularity. I'll tap out rhythms with my hands and feet, speak out loud to no one in particular, sing under my breath, or generally just glaze over and disregard the people and happenings around me.

We brought this to the attention of a few other friends, and none could deny that I exhibited the described behavior. While I agreed that I visit my own little world from time to time, I was taken aback by just how frequently, publicly, and noticeably I do it. For the rest of the day, I caught myself slipping into my trance at least a dozen times, and that doesn't count the times I didn't catch. I was caught redhanded drumming double bass in the cafeteria line, commenting on my own technique as I swung down the stairwell railings, even drifting into la-la land mid-conversation. I couldn't help but wonder whether this was "healthy" behavior, and rather more urgently, whether people thought I was crazy.

What do you think when you see someone tugging at his neck hair for an entire chemistry class, or rating commercials on a scale of 1 to 10 out loud for the benefit of an empty media lounge?

On a Scale of One to Ten

Something that has always bugged me is the subjectivity of the classic 1 - to - 10 rating scale. Different subjects are rated independently, some people rate more liberally or conservatively, and worst of all, each mark means something different to each individual person. The handing out of marks is not grounded in any sort of concrete set of guidelines. As a tool to communicate one's feelings on a subject, the 1 - to - 10 rating scale, as it is now, is unreliable at best.

As a service to mankind, I've developed a Universal Rating Scale TM. This scale can be applied to any subject, and be consistent in it's appraisal and relatability. It manages this by using a bell curve system.

The Universal Rating Scale TM gives out marks on a scale of 0 to 10. A score of 5 is neutral. Anything above 5 is positive, anything below 5 is negative. 6 is marginally good, 7 is solidly good. 4 is marginally bad, 3 is solidly bad. 5 is at the very top of the curve, and so the majority of marks will be within this 3 - to 7 range. Marks above or below this range are exceptional cases, and are not to be handed out lightly.

A mark of 8 is very good, a mark of 2 is very bad. 9 is exceptionally good, 1 is exceptionally bad. 10 is as close to perfection as it is possible to go, and 0 is the antithesis of this. Marks of 10 and 0 represent the furthest reaches of the curve, and should almost never be handed out.

So next time you're out with the boys watching pretty girls walk by, or someone asks you how your day was, or your waiter asks you how you're enjoying the food so far, you'll know exactly what to tell them.

EASY REFERENCE SUMMARY:

10: As close to absolute perfection as is possible. Once-or-twice-in-a-lifetime.

eg. The day you get married to your soulmate.

9: Exceptionally Good

eg. Winning $5,000 in a 50-50 draw.

8: Very Good

eg. Floor tickets to your favorite band.

--- (most things below this) ---

7: Good

eg. An cold Coca Cola on a hot day.

6: Marginally Good

eg. Getting a notification on facebook.

5: Neutral. No positive or negative feelings whatsoever.

eg. Someone you've never met and never heard of.

4: Marginally Bad

eg. Doing laundry, making your bed.

3: Bad

eg. Traffic when you're late for something.

--- (most things above this) ---

2: Very bad

eg. Having one night to write a 6-page essay worth 30% of your mark.

1: Exceptionally bad

eg. Getting dumped.

0: Absolutely soul-crushingly, gut-wrenchingly, hellishly awful.

eg. The day your baby was kidnapped and murdered.

We were the Kings and queens of promise.

There have been a lot of changes over the last few weeks.

Change #1: I'm not at MacEwan Music anymore. I'm taking a bachelor of science at The King's University College, grabbing required credits for an application to medical school. People here have been asking me, "Music to medical school? Why the change?"

Over the summer, I had some long talks with my parents and friends about what kind of lifestyle I want to have. To make a living in the music business, I'd have to have my hands in everything. I wouldn't just be writing, recording, and performing my favorite music. I'd be scoring, arranging, teaching, and all manner of other gigs in all manner of musical arenas. There's very little "steady work" in music, and chances are the majority of musical stuff I'd be doing would be so far from my area of interest as to be barely recognizable. To top it all off, I'd probably still need a day job or two anyway.

This lifestyle of living paycheque-to-paycheque, gig to gig, town to town greatly appeals to some people. I am not one of those people. Sure it would be fun and exciting for a while, but I don't want to be a grey 55-year-old dude hustling up bar gigs to put his kids through college. By that point, it really doesn't sound so cool anymore. So I've gone back to what I've always done best: taking cool science courses and getting really good marks in them.

Change #2: I'm not living downtown at the condo with Kurty and Zander anymore. I live in residence at King's. My room is spacious, if a little dated. My roommate and I may not be the daily Spongebob Squarepants allegory that Zander, Kurty and I were last year, but we co-exist and don't fight or anything. A major positive about these digs is the cafeteria and meal plan. Not having to shop, cook, or clean up has added a significant number of hours to the week to be spent diligently studying (or, more likely, frittered away in friends' rooms). Which leads me to arguably the most significant change...

Change #3: I have friends now. Clearly I've always had friends, but there's a difference between having friends and having friends, if you know what I mean. For the first time ever, I have a group. A core group of friends, a mixture of guys and girls, that is somewhat exclusive. A group that actually goes out of it's way to come find me to hang out, a group that genuinely wants me around, a group that says "Hey where's Michael? We can't ______ without Michael!"

Beyond my group, I've been making all kinds of other friends too. People I've never met know who I am. I get invited to stuff. Girls have crushes on me (though, unfortunately, never the ones I want). I don't have enough time in the day to hang out with everyone that wants me to. My confidence is at an all-time high. I can hardly believe I'm saying it, but I'm popular, and it feels incredible.

The Lord, through amazing people and circumstances, is working in my life in a way that's never been so noticeable. I'm so thankful for everyone that's entered my life, and everything that's fallen into place this fall. Praise God! For the first time since Shad Dal '07, I can genuinely say I love my life.

My life right now scores a solid 9 out of 10. If you know my out-of-10 rating scale, you'll know that's kind of a big deal. If you want to help me push it to a 10, well... girls, I'm still single ;)

Bubble Shooter

I'm not normally one to get hooked on an online game. I am staunchly against Farmville, it's knockoffs, and all that they stand for. If I'm in the mood for a video game fix, I'll indulge in a console game or a GBA rom. However, this all changed a few days ago when Stumbleupon found me Bubble Shooter.

If you're not familiar with Bubble Shooter, it's a game that's been around in various forms for a long time. The object is to clear the screen by launching colored bubbles to form popping groups of like colors. It's a simple premise with simple gameplay. Go to http://www.bubbleshooter.net/ to play it.

Despite it's apparent simplicity, there are deceptively difficult elements of skill and strategy required. Mindlessly firing bubbles at the first group you see is a sure-fire way to quickly lose the game. It takes much planning, a few skilled bank-shots, and knowing when to take a risk to get anywhere. I officially pronounce myself addicted, to the point that I couldn't resist playing through a quick game when I went to the site to copy the above link.

My latest high score is 104,600. Let me know yours!

If I had more than one writer's block, maybe I could build a fort. Sadly, I've just got the one.

It's been a very long time since I've written anything. I haven't even tried to pen lyrics or write back my pen pal, much less blog. There have been numerous ideas that, by some inexplicable lack of motivation, were neglected. They stagnated, lost relevance, and have long since been forgotten.

This post is a desperate midnight effort to get something, anything, flowing again. I'm all stopped up. My ideas have been bubbling too long in my brain, getting thick and overcooked, keeping fresh ones from being thrown in, stirred, and served piping hot.

I hope I can just gently squeeze my brain, pop the blockage out, and get everything running smoothly again. There's lots on the near horizon that definitely begs writing about.

Takes My Pain Away

I got my tonsils taken out on Tuesday morning. I spent Tuesday and Wednesday in the Viking hospital, drugged up and bored. I spent today at home, in essentially the same state.

As a young adult, my tonsillectomy was a more invasive procedure than the one commonly performed on young children. The doctor's words of warning were "there will probably be a lot of bleeding, and you will be in quite a bit of pain". He did not disappoint, on the second point especially.

When I was under the anesthetic, I involuntarily bit down hard on my tongue and lip. They hurt right now in a nagging, frustrating way that makes it impossible to hold my mouth in a comfortable, neutral position. This is, of course, in addition to the whole scraping-the-tonsils-off-the-back-of-your-throat-and-cauterizing-the-stumps thing. Swallowing makes it feel like I'm igniting butane lighter fluid in my throat, letting it rush up my eustachian tubes and out my ears in little jets of flame. Thank goodness for Advil.

The doctor told me to drink as much as possible. The more moist my throat is, he said, the less it will hurt. I've been carrying a bottle, and downing water at a rate begetting bi-hourly bathroom trips.

It's supremely frustrating not being able to eat, sleep, or do anything but distract myself. I'm bored of TV and video games. I'm starting to get bored of movies and guitar. If I get bored of teh interwebs, I've officially lost my mind.

Batting Average

I got rejected again last weekend.

It felt the same as it always does. The best I can describe it is that it's like a kitchen knife stuck up underneath my ribs. A sickly, painful feeling, wrenching deep into the middle of my chest.

Since my pubescent years, I've had my share of crushes. They come and go, some pie-in-the-sky, some down-to-earth. Most pass by unnoticed by anyone but me. Others might find their way to the ears and IM screens of my closest friends. But once in awhile, I step up to the plate. This rarely ends well.

I worked it out, and found that my "batting average" is .091 . Less than 10% is a pretty humbling number, and I was a little taken aback. Bewildered even, as every one of these girls were my good friends, had shown at least moderate signs of interest, and were completely "in my league", so to speak. Further confounding me was that my "on-base-percentage" came out to .500, but I won't get into that.

I'm getting too old for this. I'm sick of being depressed and losing friends over this. I'm afraid I'm getting callous and cold, because even though it hurts just as much every time I pour my heart out and get cast aside, I'm getting over it faster each time. I hate that I'm well practiced at hardening my heart and shoving friends out of it.

I'm sure my girl is out there, I'm not worried about that. But at this rate, I feel like I'll have to ask six or seven different girls to marry me before one says yes.

Afternoon Showers

Yesterday it rained. People were complaining.

But I loved it. It reminded me of when I was little. One of my favorite experiences was driving home from Edmonton in the rain, and falling asleep in the back seat. I loved how the mood was set by the quiet patter of raindrops on the windshield. I’d then watch them slide hypnotically upward, and then along the side windows, meandering lazily, melding together and branching off again.

It was cool in the car, as if the air conditioning was running, but there was no annoying air blowing in your face. The tires on the pavement hummed smoothly and vibrated gently. The rain clouds made the lighting flat and dim, but not blatant all-out dark. It was a subtle dark, and the sleep it induced was a subtle sleep. It was a more sophisticated sleep than the sleep that the unenlightened masses gorge themselves on in their beds each night. If sleeping in a bed at night were Kraft dinner, then an afternoon sleeping in the back seat in the rain was filet mignon.

The 10,000 Hour Rule

The final speaker in this year's professionalism class alluded to Malcolm Gladwell's book Outliers, a study of the factors that contribute to high levels of success. He specifically mentioned the 10,000 hour rule, the idea that it takes 10,000 hours of practice or experience at a certain discipline to gain effortless mastery of it.

I obviously haven't practiced music for even close to 10,000 hours. In fact, I likely have well short of even 1000 hours under my belt. I am a very long way from being a musical master. But there is something else, an area of expertise wherein I am much closer: I am, slowly but surely, becoming a Pokemon Master.

I set out to tally up my total estimated hours of playing Pokemon since the release of the original Red and Blue versions for Game Boy in 1996. I've played through most of the games released since, beating at least two of the handheld games in each generation, as well as several of the console games. The estimates are very conservative; the real totals could easily be over 50% greater, but the hours still add up quite formidably. Here are the results:

Red - 200

Blue - 200

Yellow - 100

Stadium - 50

Silver - 200

Gold - 100

Crystal - 200

Stadium 2 - 25

Ruby - 200

Leafgreen - 200

Coliseum - 25

Diamond - 200+

Soulsilver - 65+

_____________

Current Total = 1765

My dad often used to bug me about my burgeoning Pokemon Mastery. He would tell me that if I devoted all the space in my brain invested in Pokemon knowledge, I could learn at least one new language. He probably wasn't exaggerating by as much as he thought. All this knowledge of stats, moves, evolution, items, strategy, and other specifics seems to stretch deeper the more I think about it.

Its too bad a true Pokemon Master has to know such things. Otherwise, he'd probably be a much better musician.

P.S. The book in the image is ridiculously novice. Don't even bother.

Gui-tarded

This long weekend I picked up a guitar and learned to play it. This is a big deal for me.

People have always assumed I played guitar, and were somewhat shocked to hear that I didn't. It makes sense, I'm a musical guy and my favorite music is heavily guitar based. I play piano, drums, and sing pretty well. Why wouldn't I be a guitar guy too?

Unlike piano, for which I took lessons from the time I was old enough to sit still right up to highschool graduation, I've had no training on guitar. Unlike singing, which I'd been doing in church for just as long, I didn't have constant exposure to guitar. Unlike drums, which came easily enough that I taught myself, guitar felt unnatural and hard. I'd tried before, gotten nowhere, gave up, and decided it just wasn't my thing.

For whatever reason, I decided that by the time the weekend was over, I was going to be able to play pop progressions in G. Somehow, at the end of the long weekend, I was able to play pop progressions in G. They are very slow and have no intentional proper technique to speak of. But now I can whip out "Wonderwall" or "You're Beautiful" by James Blunt whenever I want.

Oh yeah, and power chords. Especially in drop D. I can totally rip on power chords.

The guest speaker in professionalism class today said something that really stuck with me:

“If you want to be a musician, get out of the business. If you can’t afford NOT to be a musician, if you HAVE to be a musician because its hardwired into you, because its in your blood, then this is a great business to be in.”

This statement struck me because I do want to be a professional musician. However, thats about as far as it goes. I don’t feel any grand, profound, specific need to work in the music business. I just want to, thats all. Music is but one of many talents God has blessed me with, it just happens to be the one I enjoy the most.

I doubt the speaker today was making his statement in the context of God’s plan for a person, but it certainly stirred up the familiar sense of uncertainty on the subject as it pertains to my own life. Since I don’t feel in my heart 100% that I should be pursuing service of God through music, should I be cutting bait and running? If so, where to next?

I write this in the basement of my parents’ house in Vegreville, as I prepare for a weekend of filling out applications, and preparing for auditions for next year’s schooling. Some will be for musical schools, many will not be. Which will I get accepted to? Where will I choose to go? Will God make it clear when the time comes?

The suspense is killing me.