Sports and Arts

So a wise woman of my acquaintance postulates the sports and arts have a similarly beneficial effect on your community.

If sports teams provide the same kind of benefit, do they provide them in the same way?

It's good to have an arts scene. It encourages artistic endeavour in community members, it encourages people from afar to come to your community to participate in the arts world, and it challenges, in extreme cases, the community to express itself against repression or intolerance.. Ok, let's do a google for "athletes call for..."
Alright, sports passed that test...

Ok, so it's also good to go and experience the arts. I suspect it exposes you to other cultures, it's likely good for your brain, it probably offsets any number of mental diseases. It lowers blood pressure, it engages passion, etc. Any benefits to being a sports spectator? Well I'll be damned. Also "No results found for "watching sports makes you dumber""

Ok, this next one is a gimme. Supporting culture helps cause all the things above, I'm not even going to bother to google whether supporting sports does the same. So I'll just put this here:

(I'd give him $70)


I'm still not 100% sold. Why do sports not have the same reputation as arts, then? Maybe it's because the 'stereotypical' sports fan does not exemplify the benefits above.
We expect to see the fan on the left, instead of the fans on the right.

Ok, I have to wrap this one u

In summary, sports and arts are equally good for you if you let them be. It's easier with arts because we value the benefits, and recognize them, and celebrate them as the primary reason for the thing. In sports, if we value the benefits above more than we value winning, then we see the benefits, and reap them.

I do not say we have to do away with competition, because I believe that competition is heart and soul to sport (this is not fitness, this is sport!)

Now, for a moment, I was terrified that I had talked myself into supporting the public funding of the downtown arena, but I think I have solved that one too. The downtown arena would be privately owned, and thus not erected for the promotion of the benefits above. So I would support a publicly owned arena. Following up from that, I believe we have a good community-owned arena now, owned by "a non-profit, volunteer organization... founded in 1879, before the official incorporation of the city."

What did I miss?

Finances

So I do some pretty detailed analysis of my spending on an ongoing basis.

Now that 2010 is over, I have some interesting numbers:

I spent $2,633 on groceries; about $8 a day. So far this year, I have spent $278, which is about $10 a day. Expected net result, spending will be up $730 this year.

I spent $3,550 dining out; about $10 a day. So far this year I have spent $178 dining out; about $7 a day. Expected net result, spending will drop $1,095.

Hey, so far I'm up $300 on the year! Taking my lunch FTW! The downside is that by the time lunch-time gets here, I'm hungry! I don't like being hungry.

I spent... um... sigh... $1,377 on alcohol, or about $4 a day. So far this year I have spent $192 on booze, about $8 a day. DING DONG CRAP. However.... if I eliminate one very high end purchase, it's only $5 a day, so a yearly increase on this of $365.

The last of my top-four discretionary expenses is... shall we say a particularly popular northern coffee emporium? Last year I paid $496 for their delicious delicious coffee, or about $1.50 a day. This year I have successfully cut it down to $1 a day so far...

So so far, breaking even! Or so.
:)

House update

So, the New Contractor is blazing away on the house, he has had meetings with the neighbours, and the real possibility is that the job may in fact be done by the end of February! This is very exciting.

These contractors seem genuinely interested in finishing the job.

This I like.

I've been in and out of the house a few times, and have noted that there is definitely going to be a mass purging of anything that was in a bottle, as the freeze/thaw process has not been kind on containers.

This I don't like, but it's ok.

I also dropped a bottle of wine off at the house next door, and that has helped a great deal of things, too, I think

Self-control

So She Who Does Not Yet Have a Blog Nickname is away for the week, and I have noticed that my domestic routine is all shot to heck.

I did get up this morning and make breakfast, same as ever, and did some cleaning, so it may be that this is only a temporary state, a sort of reaction to the solitude. Hopefully I can keep myself on routine for the time-being.

I wonder how much of my routine exists only because of other people? hmmm, a far amount these days, at first glance. However, I would say that during my formative bachelor years I did maintain quite a lo of discipline and routine, simply as a way to remember to get things done. I expect I will return to that fairly soon. Within hours I would expect. Also, the cats somewhat insist on it.

The house project is moving ahead, finally, with engineers and pilings and such. I am such a dolt, but I am a better educated dolt.

Mrs. A's dilemma

TO BE 100% CLEAR: Mrs. A is in no way and has never been in any way involved with me.

Mrs. A had this on her facebook today:

Mrs. A-----
‎When I was married, I was running 4 times a week, weight lifting 3-4 times a week, practicing guitar 30-45 minutes daily with few exceptions...

was also writing recording and performing music, sewing my own clothes and crocheting various projects. On top of that, I was keeping up with school work (though admittedly last year was a light year in terms of teaching load) and I was ...spending plenty of time with my children. I also somehow managed to fit it copious amounts of FB time and weekly correspondence to three regular e-pals. Plus regular reading time for pleasure was accomplished with no stretch.

I now live on my own and have my children every other week. I am absolutely swamped with marking, I am exhausted and the house is not "set up" so there are always things nagging at me. I also have to cook now and get my own groceries. Nevertheless, I don't see how that can account for the fact that I can't seem to get my momentum back. Squeezing in three runs is arduous and so painful in terms of logistics that it easily gets lost in the shuffle. Same with guitar practice. Everything else has completely fallen by the wayside. Even taking into consideration that C----- is distracting me 12 days a month, it still doesn't make sense.

Someone please ask questions/analyze my schedule so that I can fit in the things I love once again!

I think, Mrs. A-----, that the problem is that you are crazy. You disliked your marriage because you found it very confining to 'follow your husband's rules' (direct quote).

Is it possible that you , a lady in your mid 40s, but be self-aware enough to notice that you might need some 'rules' to flourish? No? The joy of attempting to reclaim your youth has somewhat occluded your self-image?

There's not much to say about this other than I remember when you decided to leave your marriage, and what it did to your husband, and to your kids. I'm amazed that even when you state what it did to you... you don't see it as anything but a win.

Onwards and upwards

My day to day workload these days is about 104 things.
My own task management system means that I do not accomplish any of things, but nothing gets left too far behind. I guess you could say that I fail equally.
No spikes, no valleys.

That may not be a sustainable system.

You cannot outsmart crazy

So don't try.

The moment you try to outsmart the crazy, you are behind the eight-ball. Crazy is a moving target. Aim at it, and it's already moved on ahead.

So how do we prepare for it? How do we reject it? I think it is based on the idea that while you cannot outsmart crazy, it cannot derail you.

Keep going, don't adjust course based on craziness, and crazy will miss you.

There's some kind of metaphor... in the back of my head, for a thing that can only affect you if you look at it, and if you ignore it, is powerless to injure you.

Snow and driving

I am imagining a course for winter driving. REAL winter driving:

Lesson 1: Steering.
In a front-wheel drive car, you steer with the same wheels that you pull with. Therefore... The less you steer, the more power you will have.
If you turn early into a corner, you will drag the back end (the non-steering and non-pushing) end of your car through the snow. Click here and learn the late-apex turn

Lesson 2: Power.
Imagine for a moment, that you are spinning your tires. What happens when you give more gas? If you answered "magical pixies will give me traction", please buy a bus-pass. If you answered "the tires will spin faster", you win a cookie.
Lay off the damn gas when your tires are spinning.

Lesson 3: Braking.
You have more braking power when your wheels are turning than when they are not.


Lesson 4: Tires.
Snow. Tires.
That is all for Lesson 4
Supplemental Reading.

Lesson 5: Getting unstuck.
This will combine all the above lessons. You will learn to steer gently, accelerate very slowly, on good tires. Students who fail will have to take Lesson 6.

Lesson 6: Shoveling and Pushing.
First: Wear proper clothes. Hat, mitts, boots, coat.
Second: Take a shovel.

Any questions?

2010 reflection number 1

(I said number 1 in case there are more)

2010 was a year of recovering from mistakes and errors. Not a year of great success, as those came in 2009 for the most part, and not entirely a year of _making_ mistakes, although there were some of those, too!

I am significantly a better person than I was a year ago, but as always, that process has been one of constructive criticism, not one of being awesome. Being awesome has never resulted in me being actually better, compared to 'digging out' from previous mistakes