Nobody reads blogs anymore...

And that's okay, I never maintained this blog for readership. But I just don't need to express myself this way anymore.

I'm finally over what started it all...

Thanks.

Until the next existential crisis, time to live, and die...

Life's Cool...

Life's cool, life's good. Been too busy to write anything recently, but there's some decent stuff that happened so I'll try to get something written down soon.

Also, I'm getting restless, I'm looking forward to get out of the city and back in my backpack.

Slightly Ridiculous

Here's a dumb experiment.

I am not superstitious. I laugh at people trying to bring luck on themselves and their endeavours, or at people that avoid places, situations or objects that could fuck their luck up.

But every time I get a zit on the right side of my nose, which is probably the only place where I get acn. It was also the source of important awkwardness back in my teenage years as it was the only place where it would reach such epic proportions. Back then, it seemed like it would always pop out when I'd be about to meet a cool girl, so, being a pavlovian creature, I ended up associating this particular skin defect with meeting the next girl of my life.

As I grew in confidence, if not in size, I came to accept such temporal skins imperfections. But everytime the zit would be back, I'd be convinced the next girlfriend was around the corner.

I thought I wasn't superstitious.

Today, the zit is back, and my first thought was of the girl I'll meet (probably this weekend, as I'm interviewing a bunch of university students for tree-planting jobs), but my second thought was to doubt the actual accuracy of my prophetical acne, for you see, I can't remember if it actually works or not. Seems like it did, but I can't put my finger on one encounter predicted by the magic zit. A little like when you have a feeling of déjà-vu, but you can't remember when it happened because, well, your mind plays tricks on you as it never occured!

So here's the little experiment, and the reason why I'm blogging about it. Recording my actual skin outbreak will allow me, in the future, to confirm or infirm the nose zit/girl theory and finally free myself from this rather ridiculous superstition.

And if it actually works, well, cool, but I'll have to test it again next time. In a world where such zits actually predict potential sexual/romantic encounters, I'd rather not think about the implications of a nose zit when I'll be married. Note to self, never allow future wife to read this blog.

"Yes your honor, I'm requesting a divorce as my husband cheats on me. Proof? he has a huge zit beside his nose!"

Now that I'm done with this experiment, let's remain on the teen theme. I'm not a fan of McDonald's, I eat there about once a year and I usually regret it soon after. But this McDonald's France advertisement does convey teenage awkwardness very well, and I find the girl's struggles to find her style rather cute, fitting with the French slogan, "Come as You Are". Oh and I love the song too (Time Machine, by Rinôçérôse)...

Yeah, it's weird, I know, but fuck it, the marketers got me this time! Here's the vid:



Arghhhh, shame, shame on me! I'm posting a multinational junk food chain ad here!!!

Time to go check my brain, then my zit, then my online dating account.

Holiday Spirits

Some people hate Christmas and the holidays. To their credit, there’s probably as many reasons to hate them as there are humans celebrating the same damn fucking holidays!

Despite the previous line, trust me when I say I don’t hate the holidays. I’m just at the level where I won’t care one way or the other. Sure, I like to gather with family and friends, or the girlfriend’s family (if applicable), but I wouldn’t mind just doing nothing, sleeping, maybe drinking, watching a movie or fucking. You know, stuff like that, ending with “ing”... without me looking too stupid!

And believe me, I’m not one of these guys complaining about Christmas being too commercial and shit. Sure it is, and listening to my roommate almost breaking off with her boyfriend over presents prices did bother me when I was trying to handle my hangover without having to stand up and run to the toilet (It’s probably been the theme of my last weekend, thankfully, and happily, in various settings, from trains to Chinese restaurants, passing by friend’s places and buses), but I still think presents are indeed in the spirit of the holidays. It’s just that most people don’t have any clue of what spirit means...

But, thanks to all that, an amazing brain and another crazy Christmas story, I think I have a decent theory as to why some people hate Christmas that much, even if in the end, it's only the celebration of a hero’s birth...legend or not.

And here I am, going back in time. Back to when I was too young to be cynical, but too old to be naive, or to believe in a Santa Claus hanging out at the local mall for a month, asking us if we've been naughty or nice (as it turned out, every kid has been a little of both)...

One Christmas eve, at my maternal grand-parents very hospitable, welcoming home (as only grand-parents homes can be), not able to sleep for that weird nap French-Canadians (Following Catholic traditions they don’t believe in anymore) adults force their kids to have until midnight’s mass, Christmas dinner and all, I was just waiting for my mom to come wake me up. I’d pretend to wake up, get my nice clothes on, go to church, read the little prayers booklet out of boredom, then finally come back home to...what? Eat?!? At, like, one in the morning?

Granted, the food was always amazing, but I just couldn’t wait to unwrap those presents, with my uncle playing Santa, always joking about getting a kiss on the cheek from awkward teens, just to make them feel uncomfortable (Years later, in adulthood, offering to kiss him would be way more hilarious).

I’d unwrap my presents, thank everybody, start to play with them until I’d fall asleep. Next morning, while English-speaking kids all over North-America would discover what they’ve got, I’d be waking up earlier than any adult in the house to play with all these goodies.

My brother, much younger, and at this moment in life when you think you should stop believing, heard bells outside that convinced him Santa Claus might actually be real. It took him two more years to stop believing, probably becoming the equivalent of that ridiculous girl in my 4th grade class that still believed in Santa, reincarnation and magic, but knew how her parents conceived her by fucking like animals...


And back then, we'd even celebrate Epiphany!

Then my parents got divorced.

“More presents for us!” Said the lil’ brother. He was right. It also started to fuck Christmas up for all of us.

As the idea of a parents’ union went down the shitters, so did the idea that Christmas was a family holiday. Separating everything, but doubling the obligations, things got worse when we got girlfriends with their own set of separated parents. What used to be a simple, enjoyable, gratifying party became a logistical mess with ramifications transcending the traditional holiday season, or, god forbids if the relationship lasted long enough, years!

Years of telling bad jokes in the middle of a bunch of people wondering what you’re actually doing there, unless they realized you could be a good hockey coach to their son, that suddenly became your nephew.

So, the gratification was obtained through other means: A stressful job with a shitload of money, and therefore, a shitload of debts. What was the job? Dealing with other people’s debts. The result: Thinking I’d die from a heart attack on my first holiday day off, drinking way too much cola in a crowded theatre, watching a fucked up movie. I woke up on Christmas Eve’s eve at the hospital, a worried girlfriend asleep in that uncomfortable chair beside my regularly beeping bed. I spent Christmas Eve at mom’s looking for my pulse, and the next day looking for an opened restaurant as my mother was enjoying Christmas day at her then-boyfriend’s parent’s home.


Thinking I'd die on Christmas Eve...

Fast forward through mom’s tears and dad’s disappointments, spending many Christmas mornings unwrapping protestant presents in Southern Ontario, getting upset at the girlfriend when she told me her orthopaedist father could help me with my flat feet and some very shitty Boxing Day shopping, to us coming back to our downtown Montreal apartment for New Year’s Eve. That trendy holiday that became more about friends than family. Us, a trendy multicultural couple, center of many people’s social life(mostly her though, I was merely an accessory), shitting alternatively because we've got sick beyond belief, exchanging each other New Year’s wishes through a washroom door, asking the other if he/she was about done...

Usually, we were not, and in the end, it was a great night!

Later, I traveled through the holidays, as far away as possible. Trying to forget the ex-girlfriend, but only upsetting my mother for not being around. I had good times, things were different, but it contributed to make Christmas less family-friendly.





Years later, I made it back home, enjoying Christmas with mom and her very nice boyfriend, and his daughters that, well, at least looked like they despised me, their respective boyfriends (one very pretentious geek and the other being the “boyfriend of the week”), and a brother with a new eager girlfriend.

Me? Happily single!

This year, the story is quite simple, I went to Toronto for my tree-planting employer’s Christmas party, got wasted with friends, then with more friends over the weekend. Good times and train rides.


And here I go again with the silly hats and amazing sweaters!

Then, I came back home for a simple, dual Christmas dinner over a few days with my two sets of parents. Two days before Christmas, I was having lunner (a lunch-dinner mix) with a tree-planting friend who was stuck in Montreal for a few days after her Toronto-Halifax flight was cancelled midway (Blame Air Canada) when I got the shitty call:

My mother was in the hospital.

So, here I was, calling my brother to plan a visit, getting updates from my mom’s fiancé (they are set to get married, and I fucking hope they will). As we visited the crowded suburban hospital, the whole idea of Québec’s (Or Canada’s) healthcare system being similar to third world countries went down the drain. I could witness first-hand how well my mother was treated, despite the late hour and the busy time of the year. It looked like a Scrubs episode; Competent, relatively good-looking staff all-around, funny and sad, lots of losers. Plus, I'd hit a few of the girls working there if it wasn't that creepy and innapropriate!

The good news was that my mother would get out on Christmas Eve. The bad news was that, just like Scrubs, it doesn’t always have a nice ending. My mother will indeed stay at the hospital for Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and, thankfully, Boxing Day, but at least it will allow the very competent staff to run every test they can to make sure my mom’s condition will improve or will be completely resolved.

With such a background, you'd understand it could be easy to hate the holidays. Instead, here I am, alone in my apartment on a shitty Christmas morning, writing that story, and feeling happy about the current outcome.

Why?

Well, strangely, it’s all about being thankful, for you see, all of these Christmases could have been much worse. I never asked why all this shit happens to me because, ultimately, I know I’ve been bad. Quite bad, this year included, still the asshole, still the occasional liar.

Yet, I’ve never lost a family member, never experienced death and always been smiling though the worst times. I always knew it’d get better and I still believe so.

You know why?

Because Christmas isn’t about Santa punishing bad kids, it’s about faith, no matter what you make out of it.

Because if there’s something I’ve learned, it’s that if you believe in the power of prayer, it shouldn’t be wasted on your own little person, winning more money or keeping the traffic lights green while you’re passing through. Instead, pray for these poor dudes in real deep shit, in third world countries, the sick kids, all the lonely people you don’t know. That’s sharing, that’s giving, that’s being generous.

So, I don’t really know if it’s because someone actually died for my sins thousands of years ago, or out of plain, sheer luck, but I’m thankful for all that stuff I didn’t enjoy enough.

And I’m glad I didn’t pray for my sole purposes...

Get well soon mom. Je t'aime.

And Merry Christmas!

Challenges

Ever heard someone saying that life sucks?

I'd rather say it's challenging. Of course, some challenges suck. And sometimes, these fucking challenges last quite a while (examples: Your whole childhood, teenagehood, marriage, life), but I do believe that it's a question of attitude and how you act and react to life's blows.

Recently, I've been procrastinating my fare share and I actually became apathetic and satisfied with the nothingness of my life. I was filled with contentment over simple pleasures and a stress and worry-free life.

So much that I became bland.

No, wait, not bland. FUCKING BORING!

A life wasted doing the same routine, repeating the same useless actions, a brain amorph, without virtually any stimulations despite hopes and ideas waiting to be developped.

I did hurt others, not intentionally of course, and felt basically nothing. But then it happened to me. My ego was bruised, my contentment with my little existence ceased as one of the few exciting moments of my trouble-free life, one of the few activities I would do outside the cocoon I've settled into, was suddenly cut down.

I was somewhat expecting it: The stress I had in the afternoon prior to this change was palpable. I knew something was going to happen and that I had to act accordingly. I made a small effort getting ready. That was a good start.

Then my actions realized before my brain that it was too late. So I stopped caring and had a political discussion over a few drinks with a friend I haven't seen in months.

Then I went back home and took the expected blow. Stayed on the ground for a day or two.

And now I'm standing on my two feet. I learned something, I've felt something. That's good, I was getting a little worried about that part.

I've got a kick in the butt, again. That's the way I live, that's the way I need to live. It's been written in this blog's title for years, because I always wait for one to get me to the next step. I need a motivational jumpstart to learn, adapt, grow, improve.

Therefore, I think I would need more challenges, more often.

Donc, merci pour le coup de pied au cul. Ce n'est jamais agréable, mais ça empêche de s'asseoir dessus, pendant un temps...

Bloggin' Nothin'

You know, there's an upcoming election for me...again! Québec's Premier, Jean Charest just threw us a provincial election. Nothing too interesting on this front for now.

So I figured I'd talk a little about my personal life, since it's been a while.

The problem is that it might have been a while, but there hasn't been a lot...

So, just got out of between a rock and a hard place. Or actually, I've kept people there with me. I basically held other people's feeling in hostage.

Now I feel like my life's all over the place, with no clear focus...and no, I don't want to be clearer, for now.

But I think I owe apologies to my past and present. As for the future, let's wait and see...But fingers crossed, there's a bright and shiny one there. Just hope I didn't affect such a future already with the consequences of recent past choices.

Wouldn't be a first, I just hope I already have seen the last...

Cryptic, eh?

Nah, people will read what they need there...

Life...Na-Na-Nanana!

Hey reader, did I tell you about my life, nowadays?

No?

Weird, I'm sure I did...Oh well, it's probably because I have none. It consists mostly of sleeping at really weird hours, doing nothing, procrastinating, getting to bed at even weirder hours because I'm doing nothing, but I don't want to go to bed yet as I have been procrastinating and unproductive. Then, I read on politics, visit the same 5 websites, revisit the same 5 websites to see if there's anything new (turns out, there's nothing new, the world seems to stop moving when you stop moving...Or maybe it's just that visiting the same website every 20 minutes doesn't give quite a lot of time for the webmasters to update their content, mostly when the subjects treated are limited or heavily specialized)

Huh... where was I? Right, in my room, doing nothing.



I do things though. Saturday, I went to see the Montreal Canadiens' last pre-season game. They lost 3-0, they didn't push it to avoid injuries, quite boring.

I also go for a few drinks once in a while, but my favourite neighbourhood bar, La Promenade just closed down as it has been bought by a trendy bar owner from the Plateau Mont-Royal to get it a little hipper. I hate how they are slowly "gentryfying" my neighbourhood. I fled the Plateau for that exact reason 7 years ago and now, just like a bad Zombie movie (where the Zombies would wear stylish thickly-rimmed glasses and palestinian scarves, thinking they reached the ultimate of cool despite not being able to sustain a conversation for more than 5 minutes, spending their school loans on expensive beers and hit the food bank to save a few bucks), it keeps coming back to kill me, slowly, softly, fashionably. (Yep, I'm judging...)

Granted, Chez Baptiste is not the most bourgeois of establishments, but it does have that "Plateau" feel (nothing against the Plateau itself, it's just that some people made it a parody of itself), with foosball tables instead of pool tables, slightly more expensive beers and cluttering the place with a shitload of busy tables. I do appreciate high quality beers, but I already have a pub for such drinks, with the best terrasse(patio) in town and I don't like my next door tavern to be full of people full of themselves screaming while holding metal rods...

But hey, back on doin' nothin'.

So, there's actually a few things I ought to be doing. First, I should write back to my treeplanting regional manager to send him my non-production day hours, as it's basically worth $2,500 and it should have been paid a month ago by now. But the fact it hasn't is completely my fault (And Microsoft's fault, as my new computer didn't come with Office and I couldn't open my boss' Word document. Also, I love to blame Microsoft for random stuff, I mean, they kind of replaced God, right? Oh, no, wrong, that's Apple that does the religious sect stuff...My bad!)

Funny story. This morning I was too lazy to get out of bed but I wanted to visit the 5 websites, so I extended my arm to my table and dragged the laptop in bed, forgetting that my iPod and my camera were attached to it. Both fell off the table, which stands higher than the usual table. I was quite disappointed to see that my iPod was not broken and my camera was slightly broken. In the iPod's case, because I can't wait to dump this fucking Apple product in the recycling bin and get another company's mp3 player, but I was still relieved I wouldn't have to spend money just yet, and in the camera's case because it's such a solid and efficient camera, despite getting slightly outdated, that I'd never expected I'd break the little battery cap thingy. Nothing some scotch tape wouldn't repair, but I really did expect the expensive, disposable, unreliable and fragile piece of crap that is an iPod to break first.

Did I ever tell you how much those things cost to replace batteries, hard drives and earphone jacks? Oh, I hear you, "might as well buy a new one!"

Sure, that's what they actually say and do, they'd rather replace than repair. But aside from the fact that a battery or earphone jack should be cheaper than a brand new iPod, they know that their shit is so cheaply built that it costs nothing to replace it, and the only reason they can overprice such pesky things is because they market them very, very well to naive young kids with money to waste since they can't drink yet. I was caught too...

If objects could be douchebags, they'd be iPods.

Funny how I'm actually not pissed, but reading this post, it looks like I am. Actually, I'm in a really good mood (Doing nothing remains awesome, mostly when you can rub it in your friend's faces) and I have great people around. Won't say much on that side though. Besides, shitty stuff makes for funnier stories!

Oh well, back to bed, it's noon soon.