Dark Day

This morning as I was sitting on the subway, I realized that I completely forgot to make my lunch.  It wasn't even a "crap I forgot it on the kitchen counter" moment, but that the thought of assembling food to get me through the day didn't even cross my mind.

Not a big deal, I thought.  I had some tangerines on my desk, and I could grab a bagel at Tim Horton's as I got my morning coffee.

When I got upstairs to my office,  I realized that I completely forgot to pick up my bagel at the food counter at Tim's.  Crap.

Luckily for me, I don't teach during the first period.  I was assigned a coverage, but not until the second half.  I threw on my coat and ran back to Tim Horton's where my bagel was still sitting for me as the employees chuckled over my forgetfulness.

As I was jay-walking across Bloor to make it back to school, a co-worker let me cross and offered me a ride down the street back to school.  I told her about my forgetful morning, and she commented "when I'm out if it like that, usually it's something... it could be getting older, my period..."

"Oh, I know exactly what it is," I replied. "I'm just bothered/scared/anxious about the inauguration." And then we chatted about the myriad of terrifying problems that the new presidency will bring.

I guess that's my story about how today is a dark day and as a result I feel scattered, distracted, down.  It's the symbolic beginning of potentially darker days to come. 

I try to be optimistic: that with resistance he won't be able to change much, but we all know terrible things could happen.  I try to think about all of my favourite quotes about how after darkness come lights, and so on, but I feel like today, I just need to embrace and feel the darkness and then perhaps get ready for the fight so that that the light can come through the cracks.

"There is a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in." - Leonard Cohen

Concerts! 2016

• March 23rd - Metric and Death Cab for Cutie @ The ACC
• May 3rd - LIGHTS @ The Danforth Music Hall
• May 11th - Ben Folds @ The Danforth Music Hall
• May 25th - BEYONCE @ Rogers Centre
• July 13th - Lisa Loeb @ Adelaide Hall
• July 21st - Hawksley Workman @ The Algonquin Theatre in Huntsville
• July 30th - Silversun Pickups @ The Danforth Music Hall
• August 12th - The Tragically Hip @ The ACC
• October 25th - Our Lady Peace with I Mother Earth @ Massey Hall
• October 28th - Tegan and Sara @ Massey Hall
• November 3rd - Mariah Carey @ The Bay
• November 26th - Basia Bulat @ The Danforth Music Hall
• December 16th - Hawksley Workman @ Hamilton Public Library
• December 21th - Stars @ The Danforth Music Hall

Books Read in 2016

Reading (2016 goal = 26 books)

• 26) Missing, Presumed - Susie Steiner (quite good)
• 25) The Conjoined - Jen Sookfong Lee (excellent)
• 24) Little Black Lies - Sharon Bolton (OK)
• 23) The Couple Next Door - Shari Lapena (OK)
• 22) Wilde Lake - Laura Lippman (good)
• 21) The Best Kind of People - Zoe Whittall (excellent)
• 20) My Sweet Audrina - V.C. Andrews (awful but fun)
• 19) Arrowood - Laura McHugh (quite good)
• 18) Harry Potter and the Cursed Child (excellent)
• 17) This Is Not My Life - Diane Schoemperlen (quite good)
• 16) All the Missing Girls - Megan Miranda (meh)
• 15) Don't You Cry - Mary Kubica (meh)
• 14) Shrill - Lindy West (amazing)
• 13) I, Bificus - Bif Naked (loveable)
• 12) The Psychopath Test - Jon Ronson (quite good)
• 11) So You've Been Publicly Shamed - Jon Ronson (excellent)
• 10) Hide - Lisa Gardner (good)
• 9) Find Her - Lisa Gardner (good)
• 8) Furiously Happy - Jenny Lawson (okay)
• 7) Hidden Bodies - Caroline Kepnes (good)
• 6) Still Mine - Amy Stuart (good)
• 5) The Passenger - Lisa Lutz (good!)
• 4) The Widow - Fiona Barton (meh)
• 3) You - Carolyn Kepnes (deliciously creepy)
• 2) Down the Rabbit Hole - Holly Madison (trashy read)
• 1) Wildflower - Drew Barrymore (pleasant!)

Summary of 2016

As you can tell, I do not blog with the voracity of the old days.  My posts in 2016 have been few and far between.

What has changed?  I don't exactly know.  I'm no more or less busy than I used to be, other than the fact I devote myself way more to the baseball season than I used to.  I think the words don't come as easily as they used to, and that I don't always have my laptop with me.  (Surfing the internet from an iPad is great; writing not so much.)

Anyhow, before I take off to the DR for the second time this year (they have good beaches, drinks, and food!) I wanted to summarize this year for myself.

2016 has been a shitty year for politics and pop culture, no doubt.  I think the consensus in social media has been that 2016 has been a dumpster fire.  We've lost many amazing artists and people, and the politics of hatred and ignorance has reared its scary and ugly head.

But when I reflect back on my year, I realize that hey, I'm actually feeling OK and a heck of a lot better than I did a year ago.  And that's a huge blessing, because I think that if I was feeling the way that I did in 2015 after this dumpster fire of a year, I'd be in a dark place indeed.

I started 2016 in a flurry of tears having lost some essence of myself somewhere along the way somehow.  It's not that there had been a change in my life or something bad had happened, I was just feeling lost.

After some self-care and reshuffling of priorities and hard work and forgiveness of self, I managed to find my way again this year.  Of course I stumbled and fell along the way, but as I compare where I am to where I was a year ago at this time, I feel sooooooo much better.

I credit Beyonce. Lemonade was the best album of the year and I loved seeing her Formation tour.

I credit the baseball season and my baseball support group of friends.  I'm happy that my Blue Jays made it to the ALCS for the second year in a row.  Playoff baseball is fun.  But playoffs or not, I love that team, and I truly appreciate the game for what it is, and how each one of the 162 signifies a new start, a new narrative, and another go at it.  There is always another day in baseball.

I credit friends.  I have great friends.  I got to visit friends, had friends visit from afar, and have my usual crew who live around here.  I credit the new friends, and the friends who have been around forever.

I credit lifting weights twice a week.  I'm not running like I used to (I want to get into race shape again).  I don't feel faster this year, but I feel way stronger this year.

I credit small adventures.  I didn't do anything too crazy in 2016, but I have good memories of cross-stitching at breweries, baseball talks, midwest roadtrips, away games in Kansas City, little concert roadtrips, scoring a Hip ticket, curling for the first time, boxing for the first time, standing outside for two hours to see Mariah Carey sing two songs, and my first resort vacation in ten years. 

I'm glad I found my strength again in 2016.  I goddamned well needed it. 

Happy new year to you all!  Maybe 2017 be better than 2016, and if it's not, let us all have the strength to fight back.

Holidays (so far)

The September - December part of the school year is the longest slog of the year since there are no real breaks, other than Thanksgiving in October.  This year we had three PD days which provided some respite, but I still had to go into work.  (Although one of those involved boxing, so that was pretty awesome.)

Anyway, by Christmas Eve Eve, it was the last day of school before the holidays and I felt like a shell of a human being.  I was exhausted.

However, a week later and I'm feeling waaaaaay better.  I took the train to my parents' house on Christmas Eve, and just returned to the city today.

While in Stratford, I slept, read, spent time with my parents (and Ms. Rilo who is staying there), and saw friends too.  It was a good break.

I came back today so that I could meet up with my friend Gloria (from my university days) who lives in Singapore now and is around for the holidays.  We met up with another mutual friend and had drinks at a literary-themed bar and I was so happy.

I'm home now, and going to sleep early.  Tomorrow I need to get my nails done, my hair done, and pack because on Saturday I'm leaving for (another) tropical vacation to the Dominican Republic.  A week of lying on a beach, reading books, and drinking pina coladas is exactly what I need to fill up my shell with humanity again.

:(

Twenty-four hours ago I was optimistic and happy.  I was anticipating that history would be made: that for the first time ever a woman would be elected a President of that great big nation just south of Canada.  Even though I'm not American, I think that following US politics is as Canadian and maple syrup, toques, and talking about the weather.

I didn't realize the impact that the candidate of a major party being a woman would have on me.  It's one thing to acknowledge that yes, in theory, woman can do anything, but it's another to see it happening.  And not just happening, but to see a competent, kind, knowledgable, determined, intelligent, strong, unfuckwithable, and qualified woman being the one to do it.  I did my research.  I would have voted FOR Hillary and not just against Trump.

I was ready to cry tears of joy when it happened.

But then it didn't.  I felt bad at 9:14 pm and turned off my TV.  I tried to do something else.  Netflix, books, marking, cleaning.... none of of those things appealed to me.  I was in purgatory.  I wanted to stay away from the election, but I kept peeking on social media.

Finally I realized I needed to sleep.  I woke up at 4:30 am, lay awake in bed, wondering should I check.  I think I had a confusing dream where Hillary did pull ahead and hoped that was reality.  It wasn't.

I had to call my mom and cry this morning.  Not the happy tears that I wanted.  But the tears that you cry when your foundations are shaken.

I believe in the good of humanity.  I believe that most people are just trying to do the best job they can of being alive, and that would should try to understand everyone based upon our shared humanity.  I believe that working hard and being kind will lead to great things.  I believe in helping others, in community, and in the equality of all.  I believe in using my privilege to help the oppressed in our society.

It's not just that the candidate I believed in lost; it's that she lost to the worst, most unqualified, racist, mysogynist, ignorant, self-serving, ill-equipped candidate in history.  This is a person that shares in none of my beliefs.  The fact that millions of people voted for this man sickens me and saddens me to my core.  There is something broken with humanity and it hurts me.

I'm at work.  My period 2 class is in a presentation and I should be marking but I can't concentrate.  I'm thankful to live in Canada where currently we have done the opposite: we last elected a leader that is compassionate, strives for equality, understands science, and listens to others.  I'm thankful that as our neighbours are divided, we are more-or-less together.   We're not perfect, we have problems and some shameful history to deal with (our treatment of indigenous people), but we're doing OK.

However, I would have said the same about our neighbours to the south a few years ago as they elected their first black president.  It's scary how quickly things can change, and how anger and hate can resurface quickly.  This is something for Canadians to be cautious about, lest we rest upon our laurels too easily.

I am most shattered for the fact that those who struggle most society will be hurt the most by this new leader.  I think about the impact this will have on people of colour, women, the LGBTQ community, Muslims, Jews, immigrants, and anyone else who does not fit into this leader's narrow view of humanity.

I swear I'm going to update this blog one of these days soon.

It's A Good Life If You Don't Weaken

If you're not Canadian, this post might be weird to you.  I grew up listening to The Tragically Hip, who pretty much Canada's band, but didn't make it so much anywhere else.  Which made us love them more. I was a teenager during the heady days of 90s Can-rock, so the Hip's songs run through my veins, even if in my early twenties I was too cool for them and shirked them away, much like a teenager would to her father.  However in my mid-twenties, I was back to appreciating them but they were always going to be there, so no big deal, right?

Anyway, this spring it turned out the lead singer of the Hip, WHO IS A LEGEND, has terminal brain cancer.  Gord Downie is Canada's unofficial poet laureate.  The band was going to do one last tour.  I managed to score EXACTLY ONE ticket to a Toronto show.  I went.  It was amazing.

After petitions, our beloved national broadcaster, the CBC, said it was going to air the very last (albeit a miracle) Tragically Hip show from their hometown of Kingston Ontario.

That show was tonight and WHAT THE FUCK I'm more emotional than I was after the show I saw in person.  I do not understand feelings.

I wrote a long rambling thing I was going to post for my high school friends' (Group of 9) Facebook Group but I decided it was embarrassing so I'm posting it here because in a a away, I want to remember these feelings.  Forgive me.

****

Guys, I'm an emotional wreck after that Hip show. Who else watched it? (I know Joanna did.)

I think we ALL went to that Hip festival together in 1997. Am I right? I know MEL and I were in a car with Jonas and Mark W. She was being annoying by throwing pretzels around.

I remember so many shed parties and dancing (okay moshing) to New Orleans is Sinking. I remember when the Trouble At the Henhouse album came out and we'd drive around listening to Gift Shop and Ahead By A Century. I remember wide open blue country skies with white fluffy clouds and feeling that we were invincible and life would never change.

But then it did. I remember moving to the city and listening to Phantom Power and In Violet Light and saying about the Hip "it's not the band I hate, it's their fans." (Snobby Sloan lyric.) I listened to those songs so much as I did my best not to fail out of U of T.

I remember studying, studying, studying but then taking a break to see Gord play a solo set at Yonge-Dundas Square during the Coke Machine Glow era.

I remember seeing the Hip with new friends but still feeling connected to the past. I went to the most amazing Hip show for Canada Day 2012 with my friend Elisa (who is Vern's friend too now!). I remember Gord playing with the Sadies at the Field Trip music festival a couple of years ago and when he came out, so did the sun and my friend Matt from Winnipeg and I said that if Gord can't change the weather, no one can.

I would have never guessed that I'd be obsessively listening to the Hip again in 2016, more than 20 years since I discovered them. I took them for granted. I take a lot of things for granted. I suck at living in the moment. I don't think I have much courage. I need to work harder at boosting people up, especially myself. Art of all types has always been my solace. Where would I be without words, stories, and music? And I think that's why I've been so sad about the finality of this tour. I always thought I'd have access to these words and music that make me feel better, but I don't. I always thought there'd be another Hip show.

I just now want to to approach everything with courage and grace, too. And to remember that there is no dress rehearsal, this is real life and let's get friendship right, get life day-to-day.

I'm Still Here

Wow.  I think July 2016 is the first month since I started this blog back in 2005 that I've gone without posting. 

It's not that I've been busy.  My mind has been scattered and unfocused, I suppose.  Tasks that require full attention (like reading and blogging) have gone by the wayside for wasting time on Twitter, watching baseball as escapism, and paying too much attention to American politics (I was glued to the DNC).

The upside of summer is that I'm not longer feeling tired, stressed, or overwhelmed and that's a sweet way to feel.

What have I been doing with my time if not blogging, reading or traveling?  I guess I've just been being.  I've caught up with friends somewhat.  I've gone to a shitload of baseball games (seven in July).  I visited my parents.  I saw some movies.  I watched Stranger Things on Netflix (loved it).  I've gone to a few concerts.  

The most notable concert that I went to was Hawksley Workman in his hometown of Huntsville, Ontario.  I've always wanted to see him play there, and it's close to my pal Becca T's cottage.  I was hoping she'd be there for the show and we could go together, but her calendar didn't align with the show.

As I was sitting on the train going to visit my parents, I was thinking about how much a Hawksley Workman show would soothe my soul.  I decided that I was going to go, so right there on the train I used my iPad to book a rental car, a hotel room, and a ticket.

It was a great idea.  I think my only regret is that I didn't spend more time out in cottage country.  I decided that it'd be a 24-hour trip which consisted of me driving there (about 3 hrs), settling in, having a Dairy Queen Blizzard for dinner, a nap, and then walking from my kind of crappy hotel (which reminded me of travels with my parents in the 80s/90s but with wifi) to the theatre.

It was a beautiful theatre that was installed inside the old city hall.  Hawksley was amazing.  It was just him and his longtime piano player, Mr. Lonely.  It felt like he had seen my "Favourite Hawksley" playlist and was exclusively playing songs from that.  It was definitely what I needed and planning that little concert getaway has been my best decision all summer.

On the baseball front, the Jays have been treating me to some amazing baseball.  I've been to 15 games so far this season and I kept track: the Jays are 10-5 when I'm there.  I've seen some crazy stuff, including a 19-inning game on Canada Day (they lost) and some exciting wins.  I have a good network of baseball friends to stand in giveaway lines with, and endlessly message during live and televised games.  Our baseball in-jokes are growing by the day.

There's been a lot of bad news in the world this year, and I'm glad to have baseball as my blanket fort of escape.

Oh, and the best part of it is that the Jays are in playoff contention this season.  They were in first place of the AL East yesterday but slipped to 0.5 games back with today's loss (in extra innings).  I'm looking forward to an exciting August and September.  That AL East will be a tight race.

On Friday I'm leaving for a little trip to Kansas City for a baseball game, a blog friend meet-up, and some midwest road-tripping.  I'm also hoping to get to Cleveland for another baseball roadtrip.

And who knows? I'm trying to be more spontaneous this summer so maybe something else will pop up.

Well, now I've got at least one August post in, ha-ha.  Hope to make it more!

Final Exam!

I'm just sitting here while my last period class writes their final exam for the year.  I've got the rest of them marked and all of my term marking done.  I seriously am just waiting for them to be finished so I can complete my last set of marking for the 2015-2016 school year.  It will be so nice not to have the ever-present anvil of marking backlog hanging over my head.

The last five days of school will be for me to get report cards finished, clean up my very messy lab, and organize my binders.  And the usual year-end social gatherings, goodbyes, and of course, graduation.

So far I have a very unplanned summer.  I really want to mainly stick around the city for July to focus on self-care.  I want to exercise, eat healthy, and declutter my apartment.  Oh, and I also have a very packed baseball schedule in July.

At the beginning of August, I'll be flying to Kansas City for a baseball/blog friend meet-up.  That will be super fun!  Also, I think there is a baseball roadtrip to Cleveland in the works in August too.  I kind of want to do something spontaneous in August (i.e. fly somewhere random) but hopefully I will have enough money still kicking around then.

Really, all I want to do right now is sleep for a solid week.  LOL

Update!

Right now I'm keeping Hallway #8 under control during Day 1 of final exams.  Yes, there is a light at the end of the tunnel.  I've got a few labs left to mark, but it's kind of the last thing that I want to do on a Friday afternoon.

Last weekend was fun overall but I did one thing that I have NEVER done in my life: I bailed on a concert.  Eons ago, I bought a ticket to see Florence and the Machine (who I love) with Of Monsters & Men (who I like).  When I bought the ticket, I think I completely forgot how absolutely draining June is.  When the show rolled around last Friday, I had to go home after work to drop off my laptop and work stuff at home.  The idea of taking transit for an hour to a crowded venue with lots of people, sound, and light was so unappealing to me.  I just wanted to sit on my couch and watch baseball.  Mathew was going with a bunch of other friends, so I didn't have to worry about bailing on a friend.  I ended up staying home, and going to bed early.  I regret nothing.  I'll see Florence next time.

On Sunday + Monday, I had two super fun days of baseball.  Sunday was Country Day, so my friends and I arrived early to get our free cheesy plaid baseball caps, and run around the Flight Deck taking pictures with cardboard cowboy cutouts of various players.  The game itself was very close.  The Jays ended up outslugging the Orioles to win.

Monday was my batting practice visit.  It was amazing being on field watching the Jays warm up, although I kind of felt weird gawking and taking photos.  All the others in attendance had brought stuff to get signed (I brought a Sharpie just in case), but I was skeptical that I'd get an autograph.  At the end of practice, only one player came over to sign and guess who that was?  Russell Martin (aka my sports boyfriend).   I got him to sign my hat!

In other exciting news, I managed to score ONE ticket to one of the Tragically Hip shows here in August.  I had tried several times to get 2-3 tickets for myself and friends, but no luck.  On Tuesday, they released more tickets, and I tried for multiple tickets to no avail.  Finally, I decided to just see if I could get one, and I did!  I guess it'll be a lonely show, but I'm glad I'll get to go.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, I pulled some late-night marking marathons.  I'm so glad that I'll get to have a chill weekend now.  I don't have any big plans and I'm glad.  Quality time with sleep + cat is what I need.

Welcome to a neglected blog.

Still not finding too much time to get my blogging mojo going (checking other or writing mine). June is such a busy time.  Writing exams, marking marathons to get it all done, prepping final lessons, and getting exam reviews together.

Socially, things get busy too with many year end events.

And, the next four days are jam-packed!

Friday --> Florence and the Machine concert
Saturday --> Road trip to Hamilton to visit friend
Sunday --> Jays game
Monday --> Work, and then I won an auction using my baseball nerd points to go on field for Jays batting practice!  (Then watch the game.)  Can't wait for this one!

C'mon ladies let's get in formation.

Holy shit Beyonce.

I was blessed enough to get tickets to the Formation World Tour that hit the Rogers Centre last night. This is because I'm blessed enough to have my friend AlieMalie who figured out the pre-sale code and bought two tickets to the Toronto show and two tickets to a Chicago show for herself.

Then I was blessed enough to bring my friend Justin, who loves loves loves Beyonce and it was super great to make a person's dream come true by saying "Hey do you wanna be my +1 for BEYONCE?"

If you are a long-time friend of this blog, you'll know that I've always identified myself as an indie rock chick.  My diehard musical snobbery of my teens/twenties has dwindled.  I'm kind of happy that now I'll listen to pretty much everything.  I love Katy Perry, P!nk, Kesha, and Drake (especially Drake).  Heck, like the rest of the world I enjoy the new Bieber songs.  (Everyone does, right?)  So yes, I'm a bit of a pop fan now and I'm thankful I've loosened up on the snobbery.  This is more fun.

However, Beyonce transcends pop music.  I knew her singles with Destiny's Child and from her solo albums, but it wasn't until 2013's eponymous Beyonce album that I really got into.  Long story short, I was bummed about something, my dear friend AlieMalie said "you should listen to the song Flawless, it's a feminist masterpiece" and boom, life changed.  Then, the Queen goes out and makes the Lemonade album/video which is an artistic masterpiece.  Best rock song of the year? On Lemonade. Best country song of the year?  On Lemonade.   Best gospel vocals of the year? On Lemonade.  I know that I'd adore this album at my height of music snobbery because I could always appreciate great art.

When it comes to shows, for much of my life, I would mainly only see bands that would have to set up their equipment themselves with the odd musical festival thrown in.  Most of the bands I follow have graduated from shitty basement bars and back rooms to comfy theatres like the Danforth Music Hall or Massey Hall.  In the case of Metric, they can even support stadium tours.  However, it's always great when I can catch a show at Lee's Palace or the Horseshoe Tavern.

I went to my real first pop concert last year.  It was a 90s throwback of Nelly/TLC/NKOTB and was hella fun.  Then I saw Mariah frickin Carey in Las Vegas which was a total spectacle.  But last night's show?  Oh my goodness.  That was something.

The show mixed visuals with amazing dance numbers, vocals, and spectacle.  I don't want to spoil anything, but for the last set of songs, part of the stage TURNED INTO A POOL, and Bey and her dancers danced in the water and it was transcendent.

The Queen is also genuine and charming and her message of powerful feminism, empowerment, and owning your life and sexuality as a women is so fucking necessary.  Not to mention her celebration of woman of colour.  I loved that her drummer, guitar player, and dancers were all black women and like Lemonade, the show was a celebration of black women who have so fewer opportunities.  I love Lemonade but I know it wasn't made for me.

Everything Beyonce is amazing.  Bow down.  When is the next world tour?

Do not punch Jose Bautista in the face, you loser.

I was super excited to follow tonight's Raptors game.  I was pretty confident that they would win game seven (and they did, decisively) and advance to the Eastern Conference semifinals for the first time in franchise history.

But I got distracted by the brawls in Arlington Texas and didn't pay much attention to the excellent basketball news.

Those Texas Rangers can't get over a well-deserved flip of a bat.

Look, he hit the HOME RUN of his career.  The home run of the past 22 years of franchise baseball. It was Jose Bautista's first time in the playoffs, and he flipped the bat when he won the series.  Big deal.  You would have too.

Response: wait until his last at-bat of the two re-match series of the 2016 regular series.  Bean him in the ribs with a 98 mph fastball.  Then, when he illegally slides into second base, punch him in the face when he's not expecting it, because people in baseball don't punch.  But that's okay; it's deserved because he flipped a bat.

***

On top of all of the sports emotions, I had a really great conversation with a good friend who I hadn't spoken to in six months.  The six month hiatus wasn't necessarily purposeful, but it was as a result of changes in life, and more changes.  It's a really weird situation that I can't get into here, but fuck. When the news that you know was coming, and had already accepted, arrives it still throws you for a loop.

On the same day Jose Bautista was punched in the face.  How poetic.

So I grabbed one of those craft beers I was saving in the fridge and threw on a record and I think it's OK now.

But, geez, emotions in baseball, emotions in life, it's a lot sometimes.

Blogging.

I'm going to get back into it, I swear.

Just lately have been so busy with work, social life, baseball etc that I don't have a lot of time.  And when I do, I just can't get into a writing zone.  Hopefully it will come back to me.  I miss it.

Currently.

Jays are disappointing. Ugh.

I love love love Beyoncé's Lemonade and can't wait until the Formation tour comes to town.

Sadly, I've had a lot of friends lose loved ones in the past couple weeks.  :(

That's about it these days.

If you need me, I'll be under a pile of lab reports.

It's report card season!  Aka one of my four least favourite times of the year.

When the report card deadline nears, my procrastination skills skyrocket. I had three good chunks of downtime this weekend that I could have used to tackle the 13 sets of lab reports that I've let pile up during the first half of this semester, but instead I used them for sleeping, watching baseball, going to the gym, going for a walk, getting myself a better internet plan, getting into meaningless arguments about sports I don't follow, and reading an entire detective novel in one sitting.

This evening, the time for procrastination was over, so I spent over an hour shooting the shit with friends at work.  I got a ride home most of the way home with one of them, and then walked a few blocks home in the beautiful weather.

I passed by my local pub and noticed the Raptors game was on.  I really wanted to watch because I have a vested interest in the game.  Remember how I mentioned meaningless arguments about sports I don't follow?  One of my baseball friends called the Raptors garbage in our Jays WhatsApp chat, and I got mad about it and the resolution was that if they make it into round 2 of the playoffs, he pies himself in the face on video, and if they don't, I pie myself in the face on video.

I decided to grab a beer and a burger, and claim a table for marking.  I got three sets done!  And the Raptors won. Now I'm only three Raptors wins away from not getting pied, and 9 sets of marking away from getting caught up.  Woo-hoo!

I was saying Boo-tista.

It was Opening Weekend here in Toronto, so you know that my weekend revolved around baseball.

Friday was the Home Opener; my third in a row, and the fifth in a row that the Jays lost.  As far as HOs go, it was pretty fun despite the loss.  The game started with a ceremony where Josh Donaldson received his American League MVP award, and then he went on to hit a grand slam.  After the slam, the game was great for awhile.  I felt relaxed and confident.  The Jays were 5 runs ahead.  Just the kind of game I like.  Well then the awful Red Sox got their own grand slam (hit by a less valuable player) and then they actually went ahead to win the game.  Oh well, I had moments of fun at least and I got a blue rally towel and a 2016 schedule magnet, so B+ HO overall.

I watched the game from home on Saturday and quite enjoyed the beginning of it when Joey Bats hit two home runs in a row.  But then stupid Boston blah blah blah and I got disgusted and turned it off.

I had tickets again for Sunday's game.  The giveaway was a souvenir 2015 AL East Champions pennant that I wanted.  I got to the game early with some of my friends and had a really great day at the ball park.  The Jays finally won.  Marco Estrada pitched a gem of a game and Donaldson brought the rain again.

One of the main reasons why baseball is so fun is that I really love my baseball crew.  My good pal Mathew, my friend Vic and I are on our third season of flex passes.  This year my friend Vern bought in too and sits with us.  Mathew always gets a spare pass, so there's a rotating bunch of people who are the fifth of the group.  My friend Elisa and a friend of hers also got flex passes, and it looks like they chose many of the same games as we did.  So far, they've always been sitting on section over and one row up so we can wave to each other.

I also love our random baseball in-jokes.  Last season, Mathew was griping at Jose Bautista saying "what has that guy done for us lately?" to which I replied "He hit two home runs yesterday!!!" And Mathew replied "Well what has he done today?" Now whenever Bautista does something amazing (like the bat flip in game 5 of the ALDS), I heckle Mathew with a "what has he done lately?"

Another favourite in-joke is that somehow along the way, inspired by our love of baseball and the Simpsons, we sometimes say "I was saying Boo-tista" when the crowd is booing.  Now Bootista is our nickname for Joey Bats and my phone recognizes the word Boostista before Bautista.

Anyway, the point of this is that I'm glad baseball games are back for the excitement, and for the laughs.  But not for the losses, hey there Blue Jays, let's minimize those.

It's baseball season!!!

Right now I'm watching the Jays' third game of the season.  They won the first two, and currently the score is 2 - 1 in their favour.  There are 162 games in a season, so there is a long way to go and tougher teams to face (we are playing Tampa Bay) but hey, I like this season so far!

Watching baseball on TV soothes me so much.  (Even though it works me up sometimes.) There's nothing better than making it a day at work, and then a tough workout at the gym, and coming home to a Jays game.

I hope to become more productive during my baseball watching.  I could be marking or doing some crafts but right now I'm just happy watching the game and messaging my baseball pals.  At least I got in a small blog post, right?  Now back to this at bat.

Vacation buzz fading... fading...

Day 2 of back to reality is in the books.  Man, I didn't want to come home so hard.  Who knew that I have natural skills in the area of luxury tropical vacationing???

Yesterday while sitting at my desk planning lessons and reaching into my lunch bag for lunch (i.e. random foodstuffs I had at home) all I could think was how much I missed having a lunch buffet, and man, would a lunchtime beer be grand.

Okay, I'll stop whining and summarize with the fact that my vacation was fun, relaxing, fun, fun, and more relaxing.  I loved it.  Man, I'm lucky to be able to do such things.

Oh, and on the Boris/Helga front, we saw them many more times over the course of the week.  They were even on our flight home.  Everything we saw them, Helga was wearing her perma-frown and Boris was on his phone.  They clearly do not have my level of vacationing skills.