Category: Opinion

Squid Games: A Review (includes spoilers)

I’m not one to jump on the bandwagon for anything (unless it’s required by law) as I typically find most fads and “popular” shit are usually overrated. That being said, some things tend to slip through the cracks on occasion and my wife and I sat through all the episodes of Netflix’s Squid Games in the last week. I’m going to provide my thoughts on the series and be warned, there will be significant spoilers herein. Read at your own risk…

I have to say, it contained a number of ups and downs and ultimately didn’t disappoint. To provide a bit of background, the show involves hundreds of people who are in financial strife and facing harsh collectors on their debts, participating as contestants in a contest of children’s games where the losers are killed. The show is based in South Korea but isn’t subtitled. There are only 9 episodes but Netflix shows it as “Season 1,” leading me to believe there may be more episodes in the future.

The series follows the movements of Gi-Hun, a down-on-his-luck Korean man who is heavily in debt and at risk of losing contact with his only child when his ex-wife is threatening to move to the United States with her new husband. Right around the point where Gi-Hun believes there may be no way out, he’s approached by a man on the subway who offers to play a child’s game in exchange for money. When they’ve finished playing, the stranger offers him a business card with a phone number to participate in more games for more money. The show is a bit slow-paced at the start, but once Gi-Hun calls the number and accepts, the real show begins.

Gi-Hun is rendered unconscious and wakes up to find himself in a room with several hundred other people. Masked individuals, armed with weapons come in and explain the rules of a child’s game they must participate in. The first game they play is “red light, green light.” When the people who are still moving after “red light” is called are killed, the horrific reality of the contestants’ situation becomes clear. Over the episodes that follow, the herd is significantly thinned as defeated opponents or losers are shot and killed, with a secretive side business of sending the bodies down to a sun basement to harvest the organs for the black market.

Alliances and partnerships are made, and quasi-friendships are developed. Not least of these include a previous friendship between Gi-Hun and his childhood friend, as well as a connection with an elderly man who appears to be slowly losing his coherence due to a tumour in his head. Emotions run high and heart strings are tugged as the final contestants are all killed, one after another, including the elderly man. The best friend kills himself when the games come down to him and Gi-Hun, crowning Gi-Hun the winner.

Gi-Hun leaves the games, now a wealthy man but burdened with the guilt of all the deaths that were forced upon his soul. this causes Gi-Hun to reject his fortune, which prompts the mastermind behind the games to reach out. It was a bit of a stunner to discover that the old man who had been killed by losing to Gi-Hun turned out to be the one behind the Squid Games. He plays one last cursory game with Gi-Hun, after which he dies in his bed, having succumbed to the tumour in his brain, apparently one of the few actual truths behind the man.

The season ends with Gi-Hun wearing a nice suit and walking through a subway terminal on his way to the airport to see his daughter in the US. He’s stopped short by seeing the same man from the first episode, playing the same game for money and providing a card to a random stranger. Gi-Hun confronts the stranger and takes the card and calls the number, on my to be addressed as “Player 456,” which was his number in the games. He’s told to get on the plane and go, fo this own good. It ends with Gi-Hun turning around and walking back into the airport terminal, which leads me to believe there’ll be another season.

All in all, it was what i would easily describe as a train wreck. Weird and gory, but difficult to peel your eyes away. Once we started watching, we made it through all nine episodes within a week. What’s more is that they’re roughly 1-hour episodes, so they can be a bit long to sit through. But the content keeps you engaged and it has plots and subplots, which makes it more than just a random show about contestants being killed for losing a game. I highly recommend it. ☯️

Work Hard, Play Hard, Everything’s Hard…

You know, I wrote a post yesterday about how a person’s energy levels tend to be lower during the colder season due to the change in weather and the fact that the average working person is exposed to less sunlight due to the shorter days. And then this morning I found myself just as blah as I was yesterday. And it makes me wonder, is this life now? Waking up and existing in a perpetual state of fatigue, all the time? Some weeks, it certainly feels like it.

Throughout my life, I’ve heard the expression “word hard, play harder,” which is supposed to represent that although it’s important to put a solid effort into one’s work, it’s just as important to put the same effort or more into one’s leisure time. That’s IF you have leisure time. So, what if you don’t? The old adage about working to live and not living to work doesn’t always seem to apply, nowadays.

Typically, I tend to feel as though the weeks are flying by. When Monday morning hits, I wake to an alarm, make lunches, get dressed and ready and blast out the door. I usually like to think that I always hit the ground running, occasional blood sugar issues or mid-week slumps notwithstanding. And although some days seem to feel a bit on the long side, by the time I get home there’s supper followed by household chores and then it’s either a workout (if the energy and motivation is there) coupled with bathing the kids and getting everyone to bed. If we’re lucky, there’s an hour, sometimes two, where we can sit back and watch something on television or read a book. All of this happens prior to the blessed release of one’s head hitting the pillow for what’s ultimately never 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep. Wash, rinse and repeat until Friday…

Weekends are usually better by virtue of having 8 to 10 hours of one’s day freed up that isn’t spent at work. But having both boys at home at the same time rather nixes that freedom and whatever chores weren’t completed throughout the week need to be taken care of. Nathan is usually pretty good at accompanying me outside if I need to mow the lawn, bring recycling to the depot for deposit or have errands to run. But any “down time” usually involves bringing the boys to a park or taking them outside to play so that they burn off some of the excess energy that all adults are so jealous of. I swear, if I could find a way to bottle Nathan’s energy and take it as a supplement, I’d be downing that shit like tic tacs! But I digress…

My point here, besides passive-aggressively complaining about how busy I am, is that no matter how busy you get, significant effort should be put into ensuring you have some down time for yourself. And to be clear, this can include time with your spouse and family as long as you’re able to relax and let your head cool. I’ve previously written about the importance of having time specifically by yourself. And that’s still true, but the idea in today’s post is that even when it seems like there’s no time to relax, you need to find time to relax. Hand in hand with yesterday’s post, it’s an important way to ensure that one’s energy levels stay consistent and you don’t get overwhelmed. Food for thought… ☯️

When You Start Lacking Some Pep in Your Step…

We’re slowly starting to creep into that time of year when it takes the sun a bit longer to decide to grace us with its presence. Just a short month ago, I would leave to work just prior to 7 a.m. and the sun would already be blinding me on my transit down the road. However, if I take this morning as an example, I stepped outside and walked to the car and I felt the distinctive chill of the season seep through my layers and the sky was still dark. That first little while that this starts happening can be disconcerting and confusing, especially if you leave work late enough that the sun has already started to go down.

The view outside my office window

Depending on the environment you’re in throughout your day, this change in season can wreak havoc on your system. And no, I’m not just referring to the presence of pumpkin-spiced everything… I promise I’ll stop picking on those who enjoy those treats eventually; I just need to get a few shots in before the caffeine levels in my blood make me more reasonable. MOVING ON! My point is that some folks are fortunate enough to work in an environment where they can actively see the daylight. Some are not so fortunate and may work in a remote environment or an enclosed office where access to daylight isn’t always possible.

It should come as no surprise that the daylight plays an important role in a person’s health. First and most importantly, access to sunlight helps our bodies to naturally produce Vitamin D. Since I intended this post as an opinion piece and not necessarily an educational one where I’d have to cite sources and shit, I’ll keep it light. But the reality is that Vitamin D is necessary for all sorts of things like good bone health, stronger immune system and certainly not least or last, it helps with managing Diabetes. That last one is a touch important to me, as you might imagine.

Sunlight plays an integral role in the body’s function, including proper sleep patterns and managing your circadian rhythm. That’s your “internal clock,” which helps you to manage getting to sleep and waking up. So you end up feeling all sorts of fucked up, when you wake up for the day and it’s still looking pitch dark outside. Most people don’t have a regular work day where they wake up with the sun streaming through their window while soft violin music plays.

For all the reasons I’ve described above and much more, it’s important to take some preventative steps to ensure the colder weather doesn’t get you down into the dumps. Once you’re in the groove, these steps can become overall good daily habits. Here are a couple of things you can do to try and ensure you keep your energy levels on the up-and-up:

1. Starts Your Morning With Exercise.
This is the best one, and something I wish I had more drive to maintain. I will FULLY admit that I’m terrible at doing anything, first thing in the morning, other than reaching for some caffeine. But doing exercise first thing in the morning gets you or blood flowing and oxygenated and will help you to hit the ground running far better than any cup of coffee you may grab. My wife is an absolute champion at this, usually starting her morning with a rigorous exercise routine she follows. During the pandemic winter, I used to walk my spin to the bus stop then walk anywhere from 5 to 10 kilometres. The result was the cold air woke me up and brutalized me before facing my day.

2. Drink Some Water.
I’m a huge fan of caffeine for a variety of reasons. So I can’t honestly say with a straight face that I do this one, but there are studies that show that gulping down a glass of water first thing in the morning will jump start your system and help to wake you up. I have no idea if it works or not, since I guzzle caffeine minutes after waking. And don’t ask me what studies I’m talking about. I don’t have enough caffeine to remember where I read them…

3. Get Outside And Take A Walk.
If you don’t work in an environment where you can see the sun, then go to where you can access it. Get some fresh air, take a walk and get some natural light on your body (and no, I’m not condoning stripping down and sunbathing while at work). Twice a day, I’ll take fifteen minutes to take a short walk outside, get some air and move around a bit. It makes all the difference and helps greatly with productivity. Most jobs entitle you to breaks throughout the day, so you should take advantage of them.

4. Control Your Blood Sugars.
It’s obvious that you should be doing this anyway, but maintaining balanced blood sugars will help keep your overall energy levels up. Nothing saps your energy faster than having an extreme high or low, followed by balancing it out. I don’t know about the rest of you, but that usually leaves me feeling like all I want to do is sleep. Keeping your blood sugar levels balanced is not only a good idea for Diabetics in general, it can go a long way towards keeping you energized and moving throughout the day. Especially when in conjunction with everything else on this list.

There you have it. I’m no genius and none of this is reinventing the wheel, it’s simply common sense. But not everyone thinks about these things so maybe this will spark some ideas for the cold weather ahead. Especially here in Saskatchewan, the morning blahs tend to hit all that much harder once there’s snow on the ground and the weather reaches -50 degrees Celsius. That almost guarantees wanting to stay curled up in bed, despite whatever steps you may take. But life happens and facing the day is a necessity. May as well try to make it a energized and motivated as possible. ☯️

Pumpkin Spiced, Be Damned…

I consider myself to be a pretty straight-forward kind of guy. In general, I know what I like and I know where to get it. When I find something I like, I prefer knowing that I can obtain something I like year ‘round, which is why the concept of things like pumpkin spiced items only showing up when the leaves change colour and Halloween is imminent. But I digress…

The true purpose of today’s rant is to address something mentioned in that last sentence. That is to say, leaves. Autumn has the potential to be the best season. The morning air is crisp and cool, the need for constant air conditioning in the house is lessened/eliminated and I don’t find myself in a constant state of sweating anymore. certainly not least is the fact that kids have gone back to school, which provides an element of silence for a number fo hours in the house (not that I get to enjoy it, since I’m at work all day).

One would even be inclined to say that autumn is better than the winter, since there‘s no snow to contend with. There is, however, another insidious monster to deal with: the falling leaves. It’s odd how some of the things people find the most beautiful require the most work. “Oh, the falling snow is SO beautiful…” Yeah, until you need to spend an hour at 5 in the morning shovelling it out from in front of your car. “Oh, I just LOVE the colour of the falling leaves…” Again, it may look “pretty,” but your back and shoulders sure pay the price of having to clean up that “pretty” stuff…

That’s how I capped off my weekend. The photo above is the pile I accumulated in my front yard after raking it, yesterday. I was supposed to be assisted by an energetic 6-year old, who decided at the last minute to go play with friends instead of helping his old dad. Kids! I started immediately after breakfast and had Nathan flip-flop twice on whether he wanted to be involved or not. In the end, I wound up raking and collecting the entire back yard on my own. I was lucky enough to have one of those metal racks that holds a plastic bag in place, so I was able to pick up and dump leaves into the bag on my own.

I wasn’t so lucky in the front yard, however. Without the protection of the fence and trees, there was JUST enough of a breeze to keep the bag from staying secured to the rack. Every time I collected a handful of leaves, the bag slipped from the rack and I’d have no way to place the leaves in the bag. Fun. Finally, I called it quits and left the pile on the front lawn. I’ll go back to it, once I know I’ll have some help to collect the leaves or there’s no wind and I can effectively use my metal rack.

In my mind, the coming of colder weather means sipping hot coffee while writing/reading. But I guess there’s no real happy medium. Mowing lawns has you sweating in the summer. Shovelling snow has you freezing in the winter and you have leaves to deal with in the fall and yard clean-up in the spring. That’s the beauty of home ownership; it’s never boring! Now, if only my basement renovations could be done… ☯️

The Pandemic Taketh Away…

There’s no shortage of areas that have been affected by the pandemic, including work, schooling and social aspects. Some businesses have closed, some jobs have sent their staff to work from home and schooling was largely done online in the past year with graduating classes having virtual ceremonies or none at all. For me, the biggest effect was having the karate dojo close,

Although I recently wrote about how good it was to be back in the swing of things, we got word last week that we were once again closing amidst increased restrictions. This came after consulting with a martial arts association that the dojo is affiliated with, as they regulate what conditions we can train under and what’s permitted. Although we were scheduled to have class, last Tuesday, we got word on Monday that training in the dojo would be temporarily “paused” until it could be properly determined what we were safely permitted to do or not. A wise precaution. Or, is it…?

To some extent, I totally get it. Karate is a contact art, requiring practitioners to have some hands-on contact with each other while training in the dojo. Having someone literally in your face while training, without knowing their medical status, vaccination status or whether to not they may be a carrier can be a concern. And it certainly doesn’t conform to social distancing requirements. But one needs to recognize that to an extent, some conditions are more of a society-calming placebo than an effective means of stemming the virus’ propagation. That’s strictly an opinion, of course.

As it stands, we lost the entirety of last week without any word on what will become of classes for the foreseeable future. We were doing Zoom classes last year, which was a good alternative but it lacked a certain “oomph.” With this 4th wave hitting Saskatchewan, who knows what may come of all this. I don’t have a crystal ball. After 33 years of studying karate, I’m well-suited to continue training on my own, despite the fact the ambiance and joy of training with others definitely brings something to the table. If the world and society could just right itself, all of this would be significantly easier. I guess we’ll just have to wait it out. ☯️

Don’t Push It, Let It Come To You…

Writing is a kept skill. If you don’t write often and consistently, it’s a skill that will dwindle with time and you may find yourself lacking if you have to draft something pertinent. When it comes to authoring a blog, trying to o provide daily content to keep people engaged and reading can be a challenge, especially if inspiration and ideas tend to run dry.

Considering the number of posts I’ve written, I’ve challenged myself to always provide something daily. This has been reasonably easy, considering I try to cover any topic related to Buddhism, Diabetes, Health & Fitness and martial arts as well as generous sprinkling of some opinion pieces that don’t always fall under those categories. And after posting well over 500 daily posts without missing a day, I’ve learned one important lesson: you can’t push ideas. You need to let ideas and inspiration come to you naturally.

As children, imagination and inspiration are the dominant ways that we process and interpret information. This can be proven by taking a quick look at my 6-year old son, who can make a solid box out of plastic LEGO’s and consider it to be a vault, a fortress, some kind of a square spaceship or even a weapon’s array (which was premised by one of his cartoons). On the negative side of it, a brief creak of a floor during a nighttime bathroom trip will suddenly turn into some malevolent presence seeking to do harm, despite logic arguing against this.

As we get older and leave childhood behind, we tend to draw on knowledge, experience and logic for our inspiration and ideas. But some of the world’s best authors have created the best stories and manuscripts based on the free-range imagination they had as children. I think that for the most part, this is because children aren’t trying to force an idea in order to formulate it on paper (or on screen). This is one thing that becomes more difficult as we move forward in life.

Because I like to share credit, I always have an open invitation for people to share their thoughts, ideas and inspiration. And I’m going to go ahead and invite any of my readers to do this, now. If there’s a topic and/or idea that you’d like to see me cover, please indicate it in the comments. If you have something you’ve written that you’d like to collaborate and share on my blog, I’m always willing to share posts with full credit going to the author, provided the material fits with the normal parameters (no racism, hate writing, etc…)

Inspiration can be fleeting, and ideas don’t always come easily. As with all things in life, it never hurts to reach out and ask for some help. And I’m certainly not afraid to do the research if someone suggests something I could be writing about, so don’t be shy. I’ll always do my best to provide daily content. But in order to for that content to be inspired, I can’t allow myself to push. I need to let it come to me, naturally. in the meantime, I invite anyone’s inspiration to pay a visit to mine. ☯️

Supplements? We Don’t Need No Stinkin’ Supplements…

Supplementation can be an important tool for proper fitness, but it’s one of those things that is very specific to the user. What works for one person may not work for the other, and if you happen to have Type-1 Diabetes, you need to be very careful about what you may be putting in your body, as it may inadvertently affect your blood sugars.

So, what are supplements? As they pertain to this specific post, supplements are anything you consume in order to help improve performance, muscle growth and/or energy levels in order to allow one to develop better. They can come in various forms, including pills, powders and even pre-mixed shakes. They vary in their delivery, meaning some need to be taken prior to working out, some after and some don’t really matter and simply need to be consumed on a daily basis.

I think that one of the important aspects to bear in mind, is that there’s no “magic pill” or supplement that will do anything for you. You have to put the work in, even if you take supplements and use them on a regular basis. I’m always reminded of an old friend of mine, from years ago. I stopped in during early morning to go for coffee. before we left his house, I noticed he scooped out a spoonful of some unknown powder and consumed it with a glass of water. When I asked him what the powder was, he said it was creatine, because he was trying to gain mass. When I asked him what workout regimen he was following, he gave me the curious puppy look and asked, “Workout? What workout? That’s what the supplement is for…”

Here’s the thing: a supplement is defined as something that completes or enhances something else when added to it. This means that there’s no supplement that will make you lose weight, help you gain muscle mass or burn fat on its own. The important thing to remember is that ALL of these supplements need to be used in conjunction with proper diet and exercise. It won’t DO the job for you, it may simply help make it a touch easier.

Another important aspect to remember is that most supplements are substances that you either already get from a proper diet or that your body already produces. Creatine or whey protein for example, can be good supplements to help push you along your fitness routine, but these are substances produced by the body and/or can be obtained by consuming certain foods. “Pre-workout” supplements, that I’m aware a lot of people I know consume, are basically just B vitamins, caffeine and creatine, which you can obtain naturally or elsewhere. I would argue that unless you’re feeling sluggish, there may not be a great need to take a pre-workout supplement.

From a Diabetes standpoint, it’s important to recognize that a lot of supplements may contain sweeteners, carbohydrate amounts or simply affect the body in such a way that will cause fluctuations in overall blood sugars. I’ve noticed over the years that almost everything indicates “not suggested for people with Diabetes” for exactly this reason. It isn’t that it will inherently cause issues. But it COULD affect Diabetes, which is why it becomes important to consult your doctor prior to starting any supplementation.

I’ll be the first one to admit I’d be hitting up my pharmacy, should they ever create a pill that will melt the fat off my gut. Otherwise, know what you’re putting into your body, consult your doctor and remember that there are no shortcuts to fitness. It’s incumbent on the person to include proper diet and exercise in order to reap the benefits of supplements. The body is programmed to do what it needs to, but should you feel the need to use a supplement, just be wary. And keep a close eye on what secondary effects you may get from using them. ☯️

It’s Hard To Be “Social” When Everyone Focuses On The “Media”

Anyone who’s been following along on my journey will know that I have something of a love/hate relationship with social media. On the one side, participating on social media platforms allows people to connect, communicate and potentially get in touch with some folks they may not have seen or heard from in years. I, myself, recently reconnected with a handful of people from my high school graduating class, which is saying quite a bit although I won’t age myself by saying how long it’s been. But it could be easily argued that this is the intended purpose behind social media: to connect and communicate. To be social, albeit over a digital environment.

Unfortunately for me and many others who seek a peaceful existence, this is rarely the reason behind people’s presence on social media. Most choose to use it as a platform to argue their views and opinions, which often leads to unnecessary conflict, once again albeit on a digital forum. It takes away from the experience of maintaining contact with those we aim to remain friends with and becomes all the more convoluted when some of the involved parties causing this “digital suffering“ happen to be good, close friends.

About three years ago, certain events took place that altered the course of my life. Although I could arguably say that these changes were in my best interest and that I’m happier now than I have been in a LONG time, it doesn’t remove the fact that these changes came at the cost of great, personal suffering. As many of you know, the elimination of suffering is kind my thing. So, it makes life difficult when others who should be understanding and compassionate cause MORE of that suffering instead of trying to eliminate it.

I’m getting slightly off path here, and the point is that a big part of the difficulties I faced years ago were due, in part, to social media. When the world spends its days living in a way that involves sharing what they’ve eaten, where they’re going and where they’ve been, as well as personal details of their everyday lives online, it should come as no surprise to have those who wish to do wrong use that information against you. When I discovered that this was the case, I made the difficult choice to take a step away from social media and permanently closed all my accounts.

This was a difficult step for me since, like most people, my day was filled with frequent checks of my phone and computer, looking at people’s updates, sending messages and getting a laugh at memes and jokes. What made things worse is that I had a handful of people with whom social media was the ONLY form of contact I had. And even though I spent some time posting the ol’ “I’m leaving social media, flip me your phone number,” there are a number of people that never got back to me. A necessary step, thanks to someone else’s negative actions.

In recent months, life has gotten progressively better, despite the current state of the world. So, I tentatively dipped my toes back into social media, which is where I managed to connect with the aforementioned folks from high school. But it’s in FACT the current state of the world that has now begun causing issues for me, through social media. I’m sure I’m not alone in recognizing that the world is currently divided on the key issues involving vaccination, masking, health requirements and the overall state of the world. It’s pretty much THE hot topic and is hotly debated by even the closest of friends and family members.

I’m not having it. By definition, peace cannot be imposed. It’s up to the people to recognize what’s required in order to achieve peace and sustain it. Understanding, compassion and open communication are part of those requirements, to name a few. But these are things that are in short supply in today’s society. And it’s for that reason that I’ve found myself in a compromised position where I am once again considering stepping away from social media. Then I thought to myself, why am I depriving myself of good communication with family and friends for the sake of the few who choose to use this platform to argue their opinions with others? Rather than eliminate social media, why not simply cut out the negative energy?

I’m tired. The daily grind of life is difficult enough without people making it more difficult amongst themselves. The ideal scenario would be for each person to keep to themselves and exercise their choice without broadcasting it to the world. You do you. I’ll take it a step further and won’t even bother saying which side of the line I fall on, because it doesn’t matter. I don’t care what your choice is, just don’t give me shit if it happens to be different than mine. Vaccinated, not vaccinated, pro-mask, anti-mask, whatever. Do what you gotta do to survive this roller-coaster called life and stop picking on each other. Life’s too short.

For this reason, I’ve made a compromise with myself in order to eliminate some of the negative in my life. Rather than remove social media, I’m removing those who spread negativity, hate and ignorance of the facts. Some people may suddenly be disappearing from my social media. The irony is I started this practice almost two weeks ago and the removed parties have yet to notice. Or at the very least, they’ve yet to reach out and ask why. Maybe they’re too busy arguing “their rights” over “what’s right.” That’s a balance we all have to work on. ☯️

Be Who You Are, You Aren’t Designed To Be Anyone Else…

Here’s the thing, and you may as well buckle up because this one will be a bit of a rant. I am who I am. I spent a good portion of my youth being someone I wasn’t meant to be. And that’s a horrible way to live, even as a child. As we grow into adulthood, there’s always this great expectation that we’ll conform to certain societal norms and kowtow to the masses. But realistically, we don’t live in that kind of world anymore. And with the advent of social media and the internet, it doesn’t take long for anyone who tries to suppress any individual’s thoughts, beliefs or lifestyle to be swiftly and sometimes radically, put in their place.

I take stock of who I was in my youth (my youth includes both childhood and my teens) and I recognize that I had a lot of work to do. Sure, I studied the martial arts and I worked on my health. But there were a lot of hiccups along the way. I was quiet and withdrawn. I didn’t associate with the world very much, which I’ve come to feel has damaged opportunities and taken away certain options I COULD have had in life. I made myself content with staying in my small corner of the world and ignoring the rest of it, all while doing karate and enjoying my few, small pleasures.

It wasn’t until I reached adulthood and took ownership of certain personal choices that I finally began to open up. Most people who know me now would likely be taken aback by the quiet, pliable and compliant individual I was throughout my youth. Considering how loud and larger than life I tend to be now, all thanks to my specific heritage, no doubt, I think it would come as a shock to most people who knew me “back then.”

What got me here? Honestly, I’ve screwed up during my life. A lot. I’ve made mistakes and errors in judgement that I’ll never be able to take back and that have had real and measurable consequences on the way my life has turned out. I’ve made poor and even bad choices. and have lost friends and loved ones due to my inability to say or do the right thing at the right time. Although some of them are dearly missed, their chosen absence tells me that they weren’t meant to be a part of my overall journey.

I’ve done a lot of good in my life. I’ve done charity, made donations and given away possessions and time. I’ve solved crimes and saved lives and tried to make the world a better place in whatever way I could. I have also done some bad in my life. I’ve failed to be there for people who needed me. I’ve ignored the needs of others and have ended friendships because walking away was often easier than fighting it out. Sometimes in the pursuit of eliminating suffering; sometimes not.

Among all of my direct and indirect actions, my words and choices comes one ultimate result: I am me. For better or for worse, here I am. Some people like me. Some people don’t. Hell, some people hate me. And I KNOW that some people love me. And therein lies the secret to life: it doesn’t care about your plan. And by that very fact, it’s important to recognize that one should never live with regret. Regret is insidious and can only lead to suffering. And it gets you absolutely nothing.

Learn to live with the life you have and you’ll never be without happiness. This isn’t to mean that you won’t ever feel sadness. Or loss. It simply means that your life as a whole will be far happier. Once you let go of hate (and the haters), eliminate the suffering in your own life and do what makes you happy, especially with THOSE who make you happy, you’ll always be on the straight and narrow path to a happier, more enlightened life.

I am me. I am who I am. I may be weird, although I prefer to think unique. I’ll always say exactly what I think and what you see will always be what you get. I find myself incapable of ever being otherwise. Those who know me, know this for a fact. I don’t make friends easily and keep them even less easily, especially once folks get to know the real me. But if you happen to be one of the select few in my life who stick around through the good AND the bad, my love and loyalty will be yours. Without question.

The only down side to being open and always saying what I think, is that it works both ways. If I don’t like you or you bring harm to me or my lobbed ones, you’ll discover that little fact quickly. I make no apologies for turning the page on the story that is my life. As the line from hamlet says, “To thine own self be true.” Life will throw you a lot of curve balls. Some good and some bad will always be inevitable. Such is the balance of life. But so long as you remain true to yourself in all aspects of life, you’ll navigate the good and bad without issue. Food for thought…. ☯️

Your Helmet Won’t Stop A Speeding Car…

I grew up during as time when the wearing of bicycle helmets wasn’t really a thing. And how could it be? I couldn’t wear a helmet while wearing earphones to my walkman, now could I? This was long before the advent of earbuds but honestly, as long as I was wearing a ball cap to protect my scalp from the sun and I was home before dark, my parents never imposed the wearing of a bike helmet. These days? Depending on the community you live in, the requirement of a bike helmet may be law. But there isn’t a day where I don’t see multiple people cycling in heavy traffic areas without a helmet.

It is what it is. Some people are more apt to follow rules and best practices than others. But the curious thing is, what purpose does a bike helmet serve? If you’re a young child and you happen to topple sideways on your bike, a helmet may save your skull from cracking on the edge of a sidewalk; no question. But whether you’re a child or an adult, you’re helmet won’t save you from any significant incident, such as getting struck by a moving car. This makes one wonder why it’s considered so necessary on most cases. And this post is about all of those little “rules,” not just bicycle helmets.

The reason behind certain rules and regulations isn’t always clear. And more often than not, it can seem unnecessary and perhaps even excessive. Especially if you find yourself on the receiving end of a penalty in relation to any of it. One good example is last week, when I was issued a traffic ticket for performing an “illegal” turn. I won’t get into the specifics of the ticket, other than to say that I definitely performed the alleged action, and the section of legislation does render it unlawful. So I really can’t argue the traffic ticket. But I couldn’t help but feel that I had done nothing wrong or unsafe and that being issued a ticket because of it was rather ridiculous.

The point behind today’s particular rant, is that even though it seemed perfectly safe and acceptable to me, doesn’t mean that it would be to everyone. In most cases, an incident likely occurred that led to that action becoming unlawful. By that logic, it becomes important for people to observe those laws and abide by them. Not only for their own safety, but the safety of others. At the risk of opening my comments section up to a plethora of argumentative points of view, this concept applies to a lot of rules, regulations and laws that are being enacted in response to the current state of the world. Some of them may seem unfair or excessive, but they all have the aim to protect and safeguard the population as a whole.

Most people can’t discern the difference between their “rights” and doing “what’s right.” The two often don’t go hand-in-hand and don’t always apply to one another. And sometimes, we need to abide by certain rules in order for society to continue to function normally. This is the cost of living in a modern society where we live in mass gathering of populated towns and cities. I’m quite certain that if a vehicle clips me while I’m out cycling, my helmet likely won’t do a damn thing to save me. Just like wearing a face mask “may” do nothing for me or the people around me. But I acknowledge two things: the first is that I can still observe my rights as a person while abiding by the rules. The second is that it costs me nothing, which tends to make peoples’ theatrics over most of these issues more than a bit ridiculous. this is why you’ll always see me do both those things, so long as it’s required of me. Food for thought… ☯️