the opportunities of incompetence

Turns out I'm not leaving for China until the end of August now.  I'm a little disappointed, mostly in myself as the delay is because of some mistakes on my part.  

That being said, I'm still going to Europe for a month, leaving Monday.  Exciting.  

Secondly, summer in this city is sweet.  I'm looking forward to working just enough to pay rent and spending most of my time with training and hangouts.  I can't see how getting to see my friends more before I leave can be a bad thing. 

pigs at the trough feel no fear, pigs at the trough slit and squeal

On Friday I drove to Calgary with some friends.  We were going down to pick up some equipment and see a show.  The times, they were good.    

We were in red deer on a bathroom break.  Everyone else had gone inside and I was sitting on the curb by the car.  I realized three things:

-No one has ever had a good reason to stay in red deer for longer than thirty minutes.  Not once.  

-If was another person walking through the parking lot and saw myself (shaved head, shorts, red shoes, squinty sort of look) I would have a small suspicion that I was about to be mugged.  By myself.  You know what I mean.  

-Semi-aimless traveling makes me really happy.  Going to another city to see a band and meet people is a really great experience.  I like the feeling of bumming around a different place and meeting cool people/listening to good music.  Planned, guided tours of the polished spots of something else have always been so much less satisfying to me than wandering.    

The sun is out now, the snow melting.  Every spring, being able to practice outside puts me in the best mood and the past two weeks have delivered.

the only way to wake up is with daft punk

this I firmly believe.  

Let's not ruin this with words. 

the land of twang

Postcolonialism has ruined me.  But papers are done, so I can blog now.  

Alabama was good times, enough people have expressed better than me how inspiring working with everyone was.  The highlight for me was definitely meeting Dave Mcneil--a truly amazing man.  Seeing Greensboro was staggering. The racism, poverty and a whole wack of other things floored me.  A place like that simply shouldn't happen.   But it's getting better.

I think one of the best parts of the trip was the past week, when people have asked me "so why were you down there?"  

Quicker than they can react I whip out the spiel, hitting them with terms like "real self defense", "living the martial arts" and, of course, "out of the dojo and into the world".  I've given some variant of the UBBT speech at least a dozen times and everyone has reacted fantastically.  A few people I saw after a few days and they've told their family, other friends, even a professor or two.  My friends are, for the most part, jaded punks or academics who are very good at dismissing everything.  But I've found that enthusiasm shines through.  I used to think inspiring people was hard, but all you need to do is have passion and be willing to show it.  

Plus, some guy in Alabama said "howdy" to me.  It was amazing.  And Sifu Edge slit open my finger with a swiss army knife.  For science!