Young, hip, connected

If they are young then they probably know everything there is to know about technology.
This is just a fact of life. The younger someone is, the more likely they are to have an insider's knowledge about the complex, mechanistic world of the future. We assume that children are raised in the strict, yet logical world of binary that fosters a sixth sense for all things electronic. Like Robert Redford, they whisper to the machines and the machines whisper back in kind with all the sordid details of their lives. The machines spout useful information at the mere mention of a young person's name.
The young are in synch with the tech. We should all bow down and submit ourselves, or just simply click "submit".

Why do we do this? Why do we assume that our more youthful have an untapped resource into the minds of the machines? Maybe it was first caused when they had typewriting lessons in schools that caused us to assume that we were training our children to be more technologically savvy. Or maybe it was when we first introduced the pencil in a quill-dominated society. Or perhaps it was the introduction of written language over oral repetition. Whatever the first cause, it is now a fad that has been ingrained in our psyches.

I do not take offense to this. I welcome anyone assuming I know something about anything. However, I do not welcome their inevitable disappointment once they hear me talk about the subject in question. This case, however, is different. This case revolves around things that I can still bull-shit my way through. I can still drop a few acronyms to confuse people into blind submission and "thoughtful" head-nodding. But it will only take me so far.
It is only a matter of time before those that are younger than myself expose me for the fraud that I am. All it will take is someone who is a few minutes younger than me to bring to light the horrible truth that there is yet another thing that I am completely in the dark about. And they will expose me withiout mercy. They will display my shame for the whole world to see. And all there will be left is a shattered man who became defragmented when his hardware became corrupted by time.

Belly Dancing Tips

Do Not:

1. Be fat

2. Be skinny

3. Shake your money taker

4. Dance to Dillinger Escape Plan

5. Stab out the eyes of a patron

6. Eat a patron's eyes

7. Scream "LORD GOD, ZEMUTHRA TAKE ME INTO YOUR TRIBUNAL!"

8. Sprout wings and fly out of a window into the night

Do:

1. Be just right

2. Shake your money maker

3. Dance to RuPaul

4. Be human

Family Guy Porn

You ever notice how things in the beginning are shitty but then they get better as they go on? I am talking about, like, when a band gets together and they record an album in their friend's basement and it sounds like complete shit. Then you go see them live and they sound like a polar bear being given a bad handjob during a leaf game. Then you're all like, "These guys suck donkey balls". BUT, friggen two years later, once the band has had time to "practice", they are super amazing. But then every pretentious asshole is all, "I like their old stuff better" even though you both know full fucking well that it was worse than meeting RuPaul in a public bathroom in a bad neighbourhood in San Fransisco.

You know when that happens? Well, I hope that myself/this blog/the world becomes like that.

It'll go from making noise as it breaks into the quiet house and being forced to kill the husband on the stairs to noiselessly entering the home and slashing the husband's throat as he sleeps so that you are free to do what you will with the wife.

C'est L'est

He sits behind his desk. The rain patters against the window as the streetlights outside create white squares with black shadows that flow sinuously down. He pours another shot out of the brown bottle of liquor. The lights are off. His hand appears pale white as it gently picks up the glass by the rim. He downs the liquid, maneuvering his hand artfully out of the way of his nose as he tips the glass into his expectant mouth. The sound of his swallow stands out against the consistent, erratic rain that beats down on the building. He sets the glass down in front of him. The empty glass now appearing slightly white against the grey, lightless desk. With his other hand he grasps the bottle. Snow over muddy water. He rests his hand there and remains motionless for an instant. A noise beyond the door. His free hand instinctively goes to the top right drawer to grasp the .45 millimeter. Caught between the sickening brown bottle and the horrifying metallic-silver gun. His arms are locked in place. He is vulnerable down the middle because he is divided. He waits. Quietly, darkly without reflecting a lumen of emotion. A dark shadow eliminates the word "detective" spelled backwards. His hands are ready. The air around him feels like water. Blue, dark, endless, smothering. The water becomes still. Suddenly, the room becomes a torrent and the atmosphere is violently upheaved by the opening of the door. His finger on the trigger, he doesn't need to wait to breathe.

"Bad time?" Rex Murphey says as he pokes his head through the door. His face stands out against the bluish-grey of the wall behind him and the ebony of his shadow behind the window in the office door. His face appears slightly illuminated. It acts like a lighthouse. It begins to burn out all other things in the room due to its radiance. He almost has to squint. He eases his grip on the .45 but not on the bottle.

"Yeah, it is" he says.

"Should I come back?" Rex asks with a twinge of pain in his voice.

"Yeah. Come back tomorrow" the words are almost smoke that billow out of his mouth. He is barely visible from across the room.

"Okay. I'll come back tomorrow then" Rex closes the door and it nearly causes his head to explode from the cacophony it creates. When the violating noise subsides he is left alone.

The rain continues to drum its steady, yet unpredictable beat against the window. Creating black shadows that compete for mediocrity with the whites and grays that occupy the room scape.

"Rex, you asshole" he thinks, "I was just starting to get ready for something good there".

He releases the gun and removes his hand from the top right drawer. The bottle retains its companion. He uses his other hand to pour himself another shot. The tinkle of liquid into glass ever so slightly disrupts the harmony of the room. The brown ever so slightly draws attention to itself in the midst of the forgetful background.

"There, that's better"

Rapture of the Little Knives

My back really hurt today. Maybe it's from the weight of almost 50 people that seems to just not get lifted off of it. Or maybe it's because I slept funny, who knows? What I do know is that I am getting into a routine and I kind of dig it. The seemingly mundane work-week is kind of relaxing because I know exactly what I will be doing and where I will be at most hours of the day. My sleeping cycle is regulated and I feel good with myself for being productive even when I don't do anything when I get home. I am feeling more and more that my career can be left at the "office" for the most part with minimal outsourcing of work into my private life. There is the occasional onslaught of marking to do but buckling down and getting it done seems to be the best bet so that I can enjoy weekends of doing nothing.

Planning is not much of a concern due to the overwhelming abundance of resources that have been made available to me. That and the courses are not even in the same galaxy as Difficult. However, one course requires the participation and cooperation of around 20 people going through, finishing or maybe even starting (sometimes their voices sound like they are cracking and I hope they don't notice my eyebrow arcing every time it happens) puberty. So thats obviously seems like it would be this but at times it isn't. At other times (most of the time) it is. So that makes me wonder as to just what exactly it was that I was smoking when I decided to get into this line of work. But the prep isn't hard, which is nice.

I have officially been doing it longer then I ever have before and it is scary but comforting and I worry about it because I don't want to get burned somewhere down the road. I make a mistake now and it goes unnoticed until months later when I can no longer rely upon my proverbial parachute of, "It's my first month". The plane that is my career will have been airborne for just long enough to make any emergency exits unnecessary and I will be fully accountable for anything that goes wrong. Usually they can just sum it up to "mechanical errors" but once that black box gets all the flight info and is recovered then I am no better off than those pilots who got booked for Tweeting, "Dude te sky rox!" and "@Horny_Burger9967, FUCK U BRO!!!!11! psky Captan fuk u up!"

Except my "tweets" will be neither eloquent nor tactful when they are discovered. They will bear the brand of shame that will forever weigh me down until I change my name/sex and move to Bobcaygeon/Amsterdam.

That fear isn't really helping either. The fear that the smallest, most innocent falter in my judgement could potentially lead to years in exile is just the slightest bit unnerving. Now I know how the doctors at Seattle Grace Hospital feel. Their careers hinge on something as trivial as a flick of the wrist or a sleight of hand. The same acts apply for my profession but in much, much different contexts and anatomical localities.

However, as much as I feel like a surgeon on some days; on others I feel like I am a surgery patient. I feel as though I am being operated on by almost 50 inexperienced, immature and impish McDreamys. They cut away at me until I am exposed to my core and then they play around with what's inside. My natural reflex is to tense up to not let them penetrate deeper but sometimes that just hurts more.

Little knives cutting into me. Little knives making little holes.

Little knives all alive in rapture. Little knives draining away my soul.

Blink of an eye for an eye

From whence the storm has come, it has beaten a path in it's wake. The hurricane tears trees from ground like hair from flesh. Destroying infrastructure that was once thought to be secure and unbreakable.

No. This is a wasteland, what was once a paradise.

The storm has ruined this place. And one has to wonder if we are not to blame. Our existence has an effect on the smallest scale. The blink of an eye affects weather patterns significantly enough to generate rain in distant lands. Our domain and actions become our downfall. As all that we choose to love creates the storm. The storm has no choice, it is made to wreck and tear until it is eradicated by a mightier storm or until it has run it's course.

We choose, we desire, we hope. And it creates this abomination that tears all of these gifts asunder. Leaving no remnants. Leaving no trace. Leaving nothing but scorched earth.

This is to be expected as it is our own faults for existing. But there is also a certain sympathy for those that throw themselves in the way of the storm. Some choose, albeit unintentionally, to leap into the path of the storm.

These fools are torn down by the storm. The storm. The storm. the storm. And all the rest of us can do is stand and gawk and pray that there is some sun that comes in the aftermath to lift them up again.

The storm. The storm. The Storm.

Yo, Teach

I am a teacher now.

Two grade 9 religion classes and one grade 10 applied math. My class conversations range from madmen in the desert to one dimensional lines on cartesian planes. While the former may seem confusing and the latter may seem difficult, it seems that the students have it the other way around. In reality they are neither confusing nor difficult and are actually quite simple concepts to grasp.

Now I know what you are thinking, "Hey! You've already done it so of course it seems easy to you, you big meanie!" Well, yes, I have done this before. However, when I was taught it in high school I have a reasonable amount of certainty that I was neither confused nor baffled. Maybe I will dig up some old tests to prove my point.

Anyways, the main focus of this specific blog is that I am a teacher. I think that fact is evidenced by my insulting students after only having met them a week and a bit ago. I'm a fetus in the womb that is my career and yet I have already learned (learned might be the wrong word) how to kick. Some would just claim that my immune system has developed against the plethora of viruses that now hound my existence (where immune system means scathing insults and viruses are students).

This is the rest of my life. Suicide note to follow.

I can't punctuate for shit

I was watching Canada's Super Speller and realized that I am an amazing speller. I was holding my own with most of the contestants on the show. My elated sense of myself was brutally cut down to size when I read my last blog entry and discovered my literary liability that cut my celebration of my skills short. I did not punctuate "friend's" appropriately. I could not fathom how the evidence that I was a fucking AHMAZEENG spellar could be juxtaposed with the horrendous truth that my punctuation sucked Buffalo buffalo balls.

I guess I always struggled with punctuation and paid it no heed because of my dear friend SpellCheck. Where the average person gets a large number of words underlined in red I, on the other hand, receive tremendous amounts of green.

It is a hardship that I must endure on my own, just as blind people persevere despite their disability. I guess each person is born with some type of fault and I guess mine is not being able to punctuate correctly .

I suck at punctuating. It feels so liberating to say.

It's Too Early To Be Thinking About This

The creation of the universe was a highly unlikely event. I think everyone agrees with that statement and there is not a lot of ground to refute it because no one was around before the creation of the universe (except for my friend Steve Omnitron). A question I have pondered often is, "Why don't new universes spontaneously form in the middle of my living room during afternoon tea?" It's a tough question. One would assume that since the universe has existed for so long it would be probable that an improbable event would occur again. Right? Wrong? RightWrong?

However, I just got on a thought train after reading my Introduction to Quantum Chemistry book and perusing Physics Forums I have come to a new realization: with all the improbable events that occur in an atomic system, perhaps the universe gets it's "quota" of improbability and the need for a new universe to be created is quelled for another billion billion years.

I mean, if there is a node in between two s-orbitals and in that node there is 0 probability of finding an electron and there is an electron in one s-orbital and it wants to get to the other, how does the electron get to the other s-orbital? It happens. But how? How does the electron pass through a region where there is no probability of finding it?

It's like saying you need to get from your house on one side of a cliff to your friends' house on the other side and you get to your friend's house even though the FUCKING BRIDGE IS GONE.

Now I know you are going to say that it's just tunneling that occurs but that makes no damn sense and seems so improbable.

But there seems to be so much shit going on in the bottom that is just ludicrous and confusing. So much that the Universe goes, "Okay, that's enough retarded shit for today" (the Universe's words, not mine). And it's all this wacky business that prevents another Big Bang from occurring between two fat people as they make love for the first time in the backseat of a Chevy pickup in the parking lot of a McDonald's in the middle of a Tuesday afternoon (this event itself is not very uncommon. If you don't believe me, I suggest you watch Maury and my point will be made)

I know that I am excluding a lot of math and critical thinking that is the very foundation of modern physics but fuck it, this stuff is fun to think about without "reality" telling me I'm a moron for ignoring probability calculations and not carrying the 1.

The only problem is that when I try and do the math (by "do" I mean "read" and by "read" I mean "look at" and by "look at" I mean "not look at") my brain hurts. And when my brain hurts I end up playing video games. Maybe I should just cut out the middle man, and so should all of you.

Hey, I think Maury's on.

Mighty Mighty Boss - Someday I supposed

I just recently added all of my music from my desktop to my laptop. All the music I had on my laptop had been accurate in the sense that all the songs were properly labelled. The title, the artist, the album, everything, was correct. I knew exactly what was going on in my playlist. But ever since I moved home and added all the songs that I had been meaning to add, my playlist is no longer the pinnacle of organizational splendor that it once was.

Now my music lies in disarray like it was so many years ago during undergrad. However, then it didn't seem to matter because it felt like disorganization and spontaneity were the keystones of that era. Now that I am home I keep struggling to correct all the mistakes in the "info" for each song I have but it seems like an Everest of a task. Each time I try to accurately label each song I am reminded at what an arduous task it is and I keep thinking that I could be doing better things with my time. I keep feeling like I should have addressed this issue years ago and then I wouldn't have to deal with it now. But it still lies in front of me.

2610 Songs. 6.8 Days.

How long will it take? When will they all finally be corrected and organized?

When will my playlist finally have some semblance of order?

I usually buy all my music off of iTunes, so they come to my computer in an ordered state. I have faith in the assumption that at some point in the future my playlist will be what it is supposed to be: a completely self-sufficient list that is easily navigated by others and has a solid structural foundation of music. It's just right now that provides the doubt that it will be like this forever. Full of cobwebs, confusion, multiples of the same song and spelling errors in the song titles.

On the 6.8th day the list was complete and he saw that it was good.

Can I hope for this much? Or will there always be empty spaces in the Album section, misspelled Names and erroneous Artists?

Dr. Livingstone is trapped in my backyard

Holy shit, I came home after 4 months out West and my backyard looked like it had been uprooted from the Amazon. It's not as bad as it was a couple years ago but this time there is more than just grass. It is overrun by weeds of all varieties and that attracts a plethora of various insects. I walked in my backyard to get to the barbeque and a swarm of grasshoppers flew around my legs and it felt like I had just stepped into a fast moving stream of water. And then, after all the grasshoppers had departed, I noticed that there were an abnormal amount of wasps hanging around in the grass. After my run-in with a wasp a couple of months ago I was immediately terrified of being in or around my backyard. Memories of when I was young and feared the outdoors for its vastness, its vacuousness, the way it appeared endless and also for its abundance of natural sunlight (it makes me feel dirty). But now I fear my outdoor living quarters that border my indoor living quarters for extra reasons than those accumulated in my youth. I fear the jungle that has become my backyard. What am I to do? Shall I face the jungle? Lawnmower in tow, am I to do to my yard what big business has been doing to the rain forest for the past decade? How could I be sure that mother nature would not strike me down with a cascade of wasp stings that would immobilize me and then my grisly demise would be realized by the millions of tiny mouths of grasshoppers as they slowly devoured me.

I would need to wear armor but that could lead to dehydration at the hands of the mighty Solar Orb. It is truly one man against the world. But I must persevere. I must tackle the yard with water bottle at the ready, lawnmower revved, long sleeved shirt and long pants wrapped around my body and I must have my rage just below the boiling point. The rage would need to be called upon at a moments notice so that my system could be flooded with adrenaline should a renegade wasp manage to break my defenses.

It will be me.

The sun will burn.

The wind will be still.

Nature will crave blood.

I will be standing in front of the green abyss.

I will reach into the heart of the dense jungle that has enslaved my backyard.

I will grab hold of the dark heart.

I will mourn the lost explorers that have fallen at the hands of the thicket.

I breathe.

I will breathe.

Then with motor and blade I will tear the dense, tangled heart of the jungle out from its core and restore my yard to its former glory as my outdoor living quarters.

So I've been hanging out with kids a lot lately but not many of them speak English very well. So they don't understand all the variations of dirty things that I whisper to them. They just smile and say, "Teacher you are so funny". But seriously it's fun work. I basically help out with the administration of an ESL school youth program. Kids' ages range from 10 to 18 so it's a fun mix of ages and personalities. A large part of the job is just talking to kids and making sure they are having fun and I get paid to with them on activities. I got payed to go to Whistler on a field trip and all I did was see the Whistler sights, eat and have fun. There were no issues involving any kind of behaviour. All the kids are super nice. So I got a paid vacation.

Scwhing.

The only downside is that I never fully realized just how weird it is to sit in a group of people who are talking and laughing and not being able to be a part of it. Whenever I ask them to explain jokes it's always

"He...say.....that, uh........my seester.........have...the loung hair" (some words spelled phonetically to help provide generic accent)

Brutal.

And whenever I tell a joke it's always met with silence and awkwardness. I haven't had this many blank stares since I worked at the morgue.

That is pretty much the only downside and I can't really complain. The job was super busy in July because that was when we had the most students but they have all since gone home and we went from 110 or so to about 37. Big difference. There is a lot less gibberish being screamed with my name being yelled occasionally and always immediately followed by raucous laughter.

So yeah, that's pretty much it. I'm coming back to Ontario at the end of August so I guess I will need to disband the blog because it's no longer on the West Coast but we'll see if the Blog Police catch me.

Fun fact: Brazil is actually a developing nation and has quite a good economy. Most of the slums there have been eliminated by specialized housing projects. I have heard many good things about it and it is supposed to be very beautiful and quite safe. So yeah, maybe you should look into it with a more reliable source than a rich, Brazilian 16 year old but I think you'll be hard pressed to find a better source or a better [REST OF TEXT OMITTED DUE TO INAPPROPRIATE CONTENT FLAG]

The Fallen Exacted Their Revenge On Humanity In Film Format

I will never watch another Michael Bay movie ever again.

After I first saw Transformers way back in 2007 I thought it was cool but I had one problem with it, namely:

Not enough robots.

The movie is called Transformers, not motion blur. Why do all the shots involving a robot have to be so jerky and fast that I feel like I'm watching home movies where my Uncle Mike has had too many margaritas and decided to pick up the video camera to record the festivities of Thanksgiving.

WTF, I saw no reason for this and hoped they would fix it in the sequel (which was highly implied by the end of the movie and some scenes shown during the credits).

An extension of the "not enough robots" motif was the fact that there were too many human characters that were essentially pointless. Why do I care that some blonde Aussie bitch is an A-plus hacker and who conveniently has a fat, black, cowardly, hacker friend that provides just the right amount of comic relief where it really isn't needed.

And why is there so much fan-service to the U.S. military? Did M. Bay sign his soul away to the army on the condition that he show some kind of military presence in every one of his movies? I wouldn't be surprised if he had a section of the Pentagon taped off specifically so he could film his movies there because (in a Pooh-type way) he can't keep his fucking nose out of the honey pot that is American Nationalism.

So I enjoyed the movie but I thought it could have used a lot of work. Then I started hearing stories about the sequel that was in production. And I read that M. Bay was limited by budget and couldn't get as many robot shots as he wanted but now that Transformers had done so well, the sequel would have a bigger budget and more robots.

Do you know what I fucking saw? I saw a bunch of robots with the exact same screen time as they had in the first movie, I saw two new partially mentally handicapped robots that served as comic relief, a random hispanic character added for comic relief and John Turturro reprising his role as a comic character who was important but has now fallen from grace. For a movie with so many characters aiming at providing comic relief it wasn't fucking funny.

The only thing I laughed at was the fact that M. Bay's promise of more robots was simply more fast moving, non-static camera shots of a bunch of shiny stuff. The robots were not characters, they were just there for eye candy and the fight scenes. I think only 3 of the Decepticons had lines in the film and pretty much only Optimus did any talking on the Autobot side. Why make the robots talk at all? If you want them to be so disposable why not just make them all mute, like Bumblebee. Even though his voice circuits were fixed in the first one Bumblebee spoke not a word through the entirety of the movie. Explanation?

"Voice still not working, huh?" - Meghan Fox's character

All in all this movie should never have been made. It was basically the first film with a slightly different plot. It had typical Bay American Military jargon, which had way to much focus. I remember a scene where a female operator in uniform states that their communications are down. I remember thinking, "why was this placed in the movie?" and I can't remember many scenes with robotic aliens, whom I thought were the main basis of the movie. The name of the movie should have been titled, "Shia LaBeouf does some stuff while hot chick does some stuff while the American Military does some stuff". That's it. Then someone could write on all the posters in marker, "Plus there are some robots". That seriously should have been what it was called because that's what it felt like.

Fuck Michael Bay.

If he made The Rock 2, I would watch it. If he made An American Explosion in Paris, I would watch it. But if he tried to make a remake to Citizen Kane, I would send him a box full of my shit.

Stick to what you are good at. Don't get people's hopes up by making a movie they actually want to see be good and just make a stupid pile of mind-numbing, story-less, fluff and leave real movies to the pros.

MCATS: The Mmusical or All's Well That ESL's Well

So a little bit has happened in the past few days (or is it weeks? I can't really tell anymore). I applied for two jobs: one teaching an MCAT class for a prestigious prep-course and the other being a student monitor for an English school. I just recently was informed that I had job offers from both that I quickly accepted. One job will have me re-teaching organic chemistry to potential pre-medical students and the other will have me ensuring the entertainment of students enrolled in english courses. One day I will be explaining the properties of Buckminsterfullerene and the other I will be playing soccer with a bunch of kids. There is obvious room for overlap, which is a nice plus when having two jobs. I will now go into a bit more detail regarding these two employment opportunities.

The MCAT position requires me to relearn a whole bunch of organic chemistry that I should have learned in undergrad. I could blame Frank, Alex and Harald (my old professors) and I think that's what I will do. So thanks for nothing guys. Hemiacetal? They never even TRIED to teach me that. 

Before that job offer, I was given two tests to take to make sure I "knew my shit" as the company put it. I was super excited at the prospect of doing some chemistry because my atomic muscles had not been flexed in quite a while and I wanted to get the bats out of the Boron. So I pulled up my sleeves, turned on Star Trek and set to work on the General Chemistry quiz. It took me a while to complete but some of the answers I wanted to be absolutely sure on so I took the long method as opposed to my gut chemical intuition. There were also some questions that I should have known immediately because they are taught in high school. 

So I did pretty well on the general chemistry, it didn't take me that long and I managed to make educated guesses where I was unsure. Now onto Organic Chemistry.

Well, let me tell you. It was like signing a lease to live with your significant other and then finding out the first day you both move in that they are cheating on you and want to break up and date this other person. However, you are roped into a lease so you have to pay until it expires but you don't want to move out and pay rent at another place. So you are forced to live with your ex and his/her new love interest and pretend not to hear the sounds of sexual exploits emanating shamelessly from their bedroom while you try to watch television, eating a raw onion so you can explain the tears. In short: it was fucking BRUTAL. 

I had to look EVERYTHING up. I was even looking up definitions for words I already knew. That's how shattered my confidence was.

" 'In a Friedel-Crafts alkylation of toluene, the toluene acts as:', okay. What the fuck is 'Friedel-Crafts'? What the fuck is 'alkylation'? What the fuck is 'the'? Oh wait."

So it was tough but I submitted my tests and later on I was informed that I would be the next Organic instructor for the biological sciences portion of the prep-course. How that made any sense I don't know. So here I am, frantically relearning various things that sound like I should know, "Aren't hands super-imposable? So how come these molecules are different?" and many things that seem brand-fucking-new, "The internet is on computers now?"

As for the other job, I think I will mostly be hanging out with kids and making sure they are having fun and speaking english outside of the classroom. So I am getting paid to play with kids. I keep thinking that one day I will have to clean the oven and as I am half inside, they push me in, shut the door and cook me for supper. I am also scared that some other type of "catch" is involved in this job, but I will keep you all posted on that as time goes on. 

Long story short, I will now have something to occupy my time and I can start making some bling so I can buy and sell your sorry ass. Look out, world. Here I come. 

Gross Grindhouse

So yesterday I was coerced into climbing Grouse Mountain and I figured, "How hard could it be?" So I put up little resistance to the idea. Initially, my climbing colleague and I found many hardships in the public transit that would lead us to the monstrous mole-hill but after about an hour of waiting for buses, farting around downtown and aimless wandering we eventually found ourselves at the base of the behemoth. We looked around for some kind of information and saw a large sign that said:

Admission rates

$34.50 Adults

$20.00 Children/Seniors

$10.00 Toddlers

(Please note: These prices are not accurate and in no way reflect the actual ridiculous pricing at Grouse Mountain. For more information, please refer to the link above or just ask the person nearest to you if they know the rates)

I'm not ashamed to say that I almost turned right around and walked away despite the insurmountable amount of effort that was put into simply getting to the mountain. But it was like 35 bucks. I could just use my bus passes (a net spending of ~5-7.50 dollars if I had enough time to get the appropriate transfers) and say that I SAW the mountain and was impressed and leave it at that. However, my partner-in-climb was not so eager to give up just yet (he didn't have any bus passes) and we proceeded to walk around looking for some kind of way to get into/onto the mountain. We walked up one path only to be greeted by a couple descending the path who informed us that this was not the way to get onto the juggernaught of dirt. After a little more aimless wandering in the parking lot (we have two bachelor degrees each, just to put things in context) we decided that the lady sitting in the booth below the "information" sign wasn't just there to get a sun-tan, rather she was put on this Earth for the sole purpose of providing people like us with the information we so desperately were craving. That and having a funny accent (she had a funny accent). Our booth-bound saviour providing us with vital information on how to get to the base of the mountain we were about to climb. As we approached the path entrance I saw a lot of people drenched in sweat, coming out of the entrance. I was worried for a split second before I realized that all these people were either: old, overweight, slightly overweight or polish and figured again, "How hard could it be?"

My companion and I stood before the entrance onto a path and on either side hung large signs detailing how by entering the pathway before us we absolved the province of British Columbia from any liability should we get hurt, lost or stub a toe. We both agreed to keep the usual frequent but hilarious stupidity on the "down-lo" for the duration of the hike and we set off. 

Before my tale goes on I will share some factual information with you. The general trail up the mountain is referred to as the Grouse Grind. It is pronounced gre-ow-ss (thats gre as in "great", ow as in "Ow! Mommy I hurt my toe! Call the doctor for fuck's sake!" and ss as in "Oh no mommy! Doctor says you need a hysterectomy! Stop using your uterus for fuck's sake!" and grind as in "Grindhouse was better when it was two movies in one". However, I was calling it "gross" grind and no one said boo besides one particular agitator and one particular ghost, both of whom shall remain nameless (the ghost remains nameless mainly because the ghost was the Nameless Ghost of Kentucky who says "boo" to me frequently and sexually). 

Some other info is that the average person takes 1 hour and  30 minutes to climb the Grouse Grind and it is not a Tom Cruise type climb, more of a very steep walk accompanied with some moments of climbing like a doggy (on all fours, like a doggy). 

Furthermore, radioisotopes are sexy.

Okay, now you have that information we can get back to the story. 

So we set off on the trail of the Grouse Grind and begin our ascent. At first it wasn't anything too strenuous, just a bunch of steep steps but overall it did take some effort. About a 1/4 of the way up I stopped to tie my shoe and told my climbing companion to go ahead without me. He went on and when I was done he was far ahead. Eventually I saw a briefcase along the path and stopped to look inside. I noticed that it contained one hundred million dollars in uncirculated US currency. I was a bit taken aback but couldn't react before a team of expert thieves caught me. They informed me that they intercepted a US Treasury helicopter that was transferring the money in the briefcases to the bank of America. The thieves opened fire on the helicopter from the base of Grouse Mountain and the helicopter crashed somewhere on the mountain, scattering the cases throughout the mountainside. The thieves needed professional help finding the cases because they were not used to the intense terrain. I was forced to help them clib the Grouse to find their money. I was bound with ropes and chains and had two guards on me at all times. I had no choice.  The suitcases had tracking devices in them and the leader, Lithgow, had a detector (like in Dragonball). 

We got to a cliff and Lithgow informed me that there was a case on top of it. I was forced to climb the cliff and retrieve the case, alone. I climbed the cliff (arms still bound) using only my legs and teeth and got to the top. When I was there I immediately broke free of my restraints and attempted to throw away the money so the thieves couldn't obtain it. They opened fire at me and the resultant gun-play caused and avalanche (it was snowy on the mountain despite it being the beginning of June). They presumed me dead but I had cleverly disguised myself amongst the rockface, unharmed of course despite them shooting at me with AK-47's. I needed to find the cases before them! I used my advanced knowledge of nature and my climbing skills to scale the mountain faster than the thieves. I called upon my animal friends to help me locate the other two cases. Farafax, the Eagle, located one case at the top of the tallest tree on the mountain. I made my way to the tree and began to climb it. It was 1,000 feet tall but it would have only taken me 30 seconds to climb except that one of the thieves was there too! We had an epic battle while climbing the tree, him with a gun and me with no weapon. I would catch whatever bullets I could but he had an automatic rifle (an AK-47, if you recall). Eventually, I broke off a tree branch and threw it into the barrel of his gun, blocking it completely. The thief tried to shoot but the blocked barrel caused the gun to explode, blowing off his hands. The thief was shocked and slowly brought the bloody stumps up to his face so he could see what had happened. "Need a hand?" I asked as he screamed and lost his balance and fell backward, off the tree into the dark chasm below. I found the case and discarded the money. 

One to go.

Neobar, the Grizzly Bear informed me that there was another case in an ice cave near the peak of the mountain. I thanked him and reminded him that I could beat him in a wrestling match and he responded, "No Grizzly would dare face you, Warren-san". We bowed to each other and I was off. 

I entered the ice cave and located the last case but another thief (only one) found me! He was the second best of the group and had gone ahead. We had an epic battle in the ice cave but it wasn't as cool as on the tree. We used icicles for swords at one point because he ran out of bullets (I would just like to point out that the cave was no more than 3 meters in diameter, so there was very little room to dodge bullets but I did it anyway. Like a pro). I think we awoke a sleeping dragon, so I had to fight a dragon as well as this thief, who was also a cyborg-ninja with 4 arms. I slew the dragon (by biting off his head) and knocked the cyborg ninja on the ground into a corner with newly grown icicles from the ceiling. The thief fell in a spot that had a little bit of water and it froze, holding him in place, with an icicle growing from the ceiling directly above him. I had no choice but to watch in slow horror as the icicle grew longer, sharper and longer and pierced his chest. Several days later the icicle pierced his heart and then several days after THAT he died (he didn't die from blood loss after the initial piercing because it was such a slow process that his blood was able to clot with more than enough time). 

I was powerless to save him and I remarked, "Chill out". 

I had the last case, however, so I left the cave in order to dispose of it only to be surrounded at the entrance by all the thieves. They all had AK's and rocket launchers on me and the cave had sealed itself because I beat the level (that's why you can't re-enter levels in some video games, because it happens in real life. After an epic battle or some laborious puzzle solving inside a cave of some kind, the entrance always gets sealed up. Video game designers know this and put it into the virtual world as well). Lithgow stood on a rock, triumphant, and milliseconds before he could order them to fire I threw the briefcase at the semi-circle of thieves. Since I am also amazing and throwing things, the case hit and killed every thief because I threw the case like a boomerang. Lithgow jumped out of the way just in time. The case returned to me after the last thief was dead (they were all robots). Lithgow and I then proceeded to fight. He with a gun and me with a steel briefcase full of uncirculated US currency. I knocked the gun from his hand and he knocked the case onto the edge of the biggest cliff on the mountain. We fought some more and he reclaimed his gun. I was out of options and had nowhere to run. Lithgow laughed and began shooting at a school bus full of orphans, elderly and endangered animals. I pleaded with him to stop to which he replied, "I will always be evil, there is no chance of redemption for me!" Followed by fits of uncontrollable and highly evil laughter. He began walking backwards to retrieve the case, whilst radioing for his robot-helicopter to come get him. He began trying to pick up the case without looking down fearing (and rightly so) that I would disarm him the second he looked away. He wanted to keep me alive long enough to know that he had won. As he tried to pick up the case he lost his footing, dropped his gun off the cliff and began to slowly fall backward. I shot over and grabbed a hold of his jacket using both my hands. I started to say, "Death comes for us all, Lithgow but something much worse comes for you. For when you die, it will be-" I couldn't finish because in the blink of an eye, Lithgow threw a concealed knife at me. I instinctively caught it before it could hit me in the face but as a result I had to let go of one side of his jacket. He fell backward and spun due to my one-handed grasp on his jacket which led to both his arms slipping out of their sleeves and he plummeted over the edge. As he began to fall, his helicopter appeared beneath him. I could only watch as Lithgow tried to shield himself to no avail from the spinning propellers. The cliffside was instantly stained crimson like the result of an exploding red paint can.  The helicopter then lost control because of the impact and crashed into the mountain, exploding on impact. 

As the smoke settled, an eerie silence fell over the Grouse Grind. I bent over and picked up the case and whispered, "-without honour". 

Shortly thereafter I reached the top of Grouse Mountain and the authorities were there. I handed the case over to the authorities and the head officer said, "What happened to Lithgow?"

"He had to split" I replied and ordered a round of drinks for everyone at the top amid their laughter and praise. 

This whole adventure took about an hour and a half, I would have gotten to the top sooner if I hadn't had to stop the bad guys.

All in all in was a great experience and I would definitely recommend it to anyone visiting the area. 

Gimme a job (the money kind, not blow, hand, foot, sandwich, oyster, gerbil, nose OR Hand with a capital H)

I've been trying to find a job for a while now and its getting pretty tedious so I am toying with the option of:

Returning to work at a certain electronics retailer.

Initially it was my first choice but was met by harsh criticism and even some death threats from critics. I don't see what's so wrong with the place but perhaps I am missing something. So lets do this thing analytically by weighing the pro's and con's.

PRO

1. I've already worked there so there is a higher probability that I will be able to obtain employment unlike my applications to Costco and Blockbuster. Yeah, that's right. Two degrees can't get me a job that the companies want to pay monkeys to do because its so easy (the legislation is still getting passed on that). GAWD.

2. Discounts on electronics. I have been meaning to get some kind of gaming console since Rebecca lives like a grown up and has no device for entertaining persons who are yet to achieve maturity. What's that you say? I have a computer and can just play vids on there?

I would rather die. Not being dramatic, just honest. Although Bex does have a mouse so I wouldn't be limited to a mousepad.............okay so the jury is still out on that one.

3. Easy. The most I have to think at this job when I have a problem is what manager to call. Critical thinking out the window and hello conformist, hivemind-like, corporate, assimilating type thinking (thinking is used loosely here). Not too berate or take away from the ability to be promoted in that company or insult the people I know and still talk to who still work there BUUUUT its easy work. 

Fulfilling? No. 

Soul-crushing? Sometimes. 

Supporting the consumerist mentality by selling average people shit that they don't really need? You bet. 

A job that has higher officials that take the job way too seriously? Definitely. 

A job that when I make a mistake, I feel bad about it and try and perfect my work so as to not make that same mistake again? Not really.

Easy? Yes. 

CON's

1. There are none

So I think that I will go ahead and put out an application, who knows, I probably won't get it and be stuck in job limbo for a little while longer. 

Although I have been tutoring and it has reminded me of what a joke biology is. A bad one that promotes the teaching of incorrect chemical concepts. Stick to poo, monkeys and Darwin (which are all connected anyways, each for different reasons) biology and leave the real science to the other, superior disciplines like women's studies. Oh wait, I meant to say Chemicology, the study of chemicals. Yes, stick to studying "bio" and leave the real brunt of science to the scienticians of chemicology; with their abaci of doom and their pocket protectors of chastity.

With all this knowledge of chemicology and teachingology you'd think I could AT LEAST get a job at Blockbuster. I guess I will just have to start performing various odd-hand jobs to get some money priming poles or waxing wood or stuff like that.

If you want to send me money please feel free to do so! Stop being such a cheap bastard! 

That's right, I started a blog

Wanna fight about it?

I figured that this would be an efficient and inexpensive way to keep in touch with people while I am out galavanting on the West coast. And as I am sure many people don't want to hear about what I get up to (it can get kind of "blue") I have discovered a medium that allows people to check or not check at their own leisure and convenience. 

I am making the transition from Facebook to here because what I initially intended to do on Facebook in the form of notes was basically a blog anyway and I figure that this is a good test run for how well the blog works/how often I update/how many people enjoy it/how long the internet is around for (I think its 15 minutes are over). So I will be a "blogger" for the summer and then perhaps into the fall if I feel so inclined. 

So this is it, this is everything, this is...me...hello...how are you?..I am good.

I already wrote an update on FB so I will probably not get a meaty blog for a little while but I may also use this as a conduit to express my:

1. Opinions about various things

2. Hopes and dreams

3. Fears and ways that I would prefer NOT to die

4. Turn ons and ways that I WOULD prefer to die whilst on a date

5. Information about science and technology

6. Information about religion and technology

7. Music reviews

8. Film reviews

9. Various witty remarks that are made when no one is around

10. My bigoted and prejudiced views on all races that end in "ish", "an" and "ese" and all religions that end in "ism", "lam" or "ity"

I won't keep you in stitches any longer because I need to read the book Wicked, so I will leave you to ponder the consequences and repercussions of me having this blog.

Being a burden on you from across the: country/ocean/universe,

W

What is that you say?

And so it begins...