Blog Archives
The Shooting
Note: This is long, it is rambling, at times incoherent, and should probably not be read by anyone.
After learning the details behind the Giffords shooting this past weekend – kinda strange that we call it the Giffords shooting, when she survived, when all those others did not; why not the John Roll shooting [and it goes to show that just a few days after the shooting, it took me ten minutes to actually find an article that references his name and not Giffords] – I was as disgusted as anyone, and probably a bit more than the average American. I was disgusted that this is the world we live in, that any douchebag with a mental problem can get his hands on a gun and kill people with no real danger to himself, and that it took no time for people on either side of the political “spectrum” (hard to call anything that consists of two points a spectrum, honestly) to start pointing fingers at each other. The ongoing debate over it all disgusts me. Humans disgust me. Read the rest of this entry
Embracing the Dark Side
Pushing your body through a difficult exercise session is as much mental as it is physical. When your head isn’t in the game, it’s hard to get the extra edge necessary to give the effort that ends up making the most difference. When your body is tired and ready to give up, the only chance you have to eke out more work is if your mind can rally those fatigued muscles and sore joints into giving it absolutely everything they have, which is where many trainers will tell you that real body change happens. A lot of the time, positive energy can push you through the wall: thinking of all the work you’ve already done, how many calories you’ve already burned, the jeans you want to fit into, the outfit you want to wear for The Big Party. You can encourage yourself through positive thinking, and can even help a flagging partner through it, telling yourself and them that “You can do it!” or “You got this!” Positive energy is great and awesome.
But sometimes, it isn’t enough. Read the rest of this entry
Exercise DVD Review: Jillian Michael’s Shred It with Weights
If you’ve read any of my reviews before, you’ll know that I generally take a very light-hearted and whimsical approach to them. I hate dry and stuffy reviews, and I prefer to try to make them at least somewhat entertaining while providing you the reader with my impressions and opinions of the item or restaurant or book or movie in question. Unfortunately, this review is not light-hearted, but I don’t think it’s going to be dry either. Normally, when I write a review, I’m in a good genial mood. Right now, I’m not. Honestly, I’m a little angry. I am also disappointed, and in a way, I feel betrayed. Bear with me; there is honestly a review in here. Read the rest of this entry
Daylight Savings Time
I fucking hate daylight savings time. Just as your body clock is ticking along nicely, when the sun is rising as you get out of bed, allowing you to pour your coffee with actual sunlight coming into your windows, you’re arbitrarily forcede to move your clock for no good fucking reason whatsoever. It’s now pitch black as you stumble sleepily around the house trying to find the goddamn coffee filters and feed the dogs.
Terrorism, Close to Home
On the way in to work this morning, the folks on the radio were discussing the October arrest of a woman that lived near Philly. She was attempting to organize/join a terror cell with the aim of killing a cartoonist who depicted Muhammad combined with a dog. She was a convert to Islam and felt fervently enough about her new religion to attempt to kill another human being on another continent. It’s a piece of news that is all too common these days. Maybe it was the nearness of this woman to my own home that engendered the feeling that it did; I don’t know. All I know is, it impacted me.
Winter in Derenemyn 