Andy's Blog

With the myriad of complications that have been taking up my time this year, it is still surprising that “people” are the biggest complication of the lot.

I made a decision earlier this year.  A fairly radical decision tis true.  The decision was based on a very personal time of reflection, not lightly made, and one that was built upon some quite intense experiences this year.

Am slightly surprised therefore that someone has taken offence.

As my Sensei has said on numerous occassions; “karate is a journey, not a race”.  For some of us this journey takes a little longer than others, wrong turns have been made and our own personal SatNav needs a little tweaking to get us back on the road.

One person’s decision on their readiness for a new grade is not a reflection on another’s.  It is up to each of us, when the question is asked, to answer if we are prepared internally for that next step.  I’m not.

As I said in a previous post, which far better puts across my feelings, than this slightly rambling post;

“I need to stop chasing the next belt for the next few years and practise on becoming a black belt rather than just wearing one“

I made that decision for myself.  I ask that question of my students.  Each of us can only make that decision for ourselves individually and not for someone else…   and that has to be respected if nothing else.

There is a certain assumption when using a simple technology like the telephone that what you communicate from one end will be repeated in the same manner on the other end.  You can be fairly sure that when you speak down the phone the recipient isn’t going to be hearing Donald Duck or Popeye like vocal inflections making lewd comments

….Unless, of course, that’s your particular “thang” – but let’s not go there… well at least not in public… call me… later…

The problem is that phones are no longer a “simple technology”, especially the mobile ones, they are made by a variety of different manufacturers with all kinds of whizz-bangery wonderfulness that you can now do with them.  I don’t know about you, but my phone is more of a portable internet device that, sometimes, does voice as well.

We just kinda assume that they’ll still function like our old phone though; what you speak or write on your side will be reproduced faithfully on the other side… Uuuuunfortunately it t’aint always so.  One phone’s nice little cute smilies aren’t quite the same on another manufacturers phone.

The resultant confusion can make for some very interesting conversations though, and very possibly a surprising visit from someone who’s just gotten a very wrong idea.  That is of course if the recipient tends to see the risqué version of a particular textual rendering… which is pretty much all of those with an extra Y chromosome in their particular DNA strand.  So please, dear female reader, please remember to be careful out there.

Don’t be too surprised if you text this , from a Blackberry, to a male of the species, who doesn’t own a Blackberry, when you receive the following…

8====D

Yesterday, Sunday, was a mixed day for me, flicking between feeling sick to my stomach, angry at chances lost, quiet, melancholic, happy for others, and more darkly somewhat self-pitying.

…and I hate myself for that.

I’ve been reading Gichin Funakoshi’s books lately; namely ‘The essence of karate’ and ‘The twenty guiding principles of karate’ and have found myself wanting.  I think I’ve been so focused, recently, on the next grade that I’ve forgotten what it entails.

The colour of your belt is not a right based on how long you’ve been practising the art, but the culmination and growth of understanding of the principles underpinning it.  This has been proved by a colleague who has just reached that next level and his karate, which is far better than mine, proves the point.

Time is not the measure, understanding and application is.

I think it’s time to get back to basics for me.  This isn’t a throwing-dummies-out-the-proverbial-pram moment, the karate training will go on.  However I think I need to stop chasing the next belt for the next few years and practise on becoming a black belt rather than just wearing one.

Sometimes having the wind taken from your sails, metaphorically at least, is the best thing if not a little hard on you at the time…. time, at least, will tell if that’s true or not.

Some peoples stomach drop when they see them on the doorstep, some get angry, whilst others stand and listen with a kind of pained patience.  Me on the other hand actively look forward to their little visits, although I have an uncomfortable feeling they’ve been warned about me.

Jehovah’s Witnesses.  Charles Taze Russell’s door-to-door God botherers.  Read on, dear readers, for the troozers 3 golden rules for dealing with the watch tower inhabitants;

A bright cheery “Helloooo!” always puts them on the back foot, and the look of surprise mixed with what-have-we-got-here that flits over their face is a joy to behold.
Rule #1: Always be polite, excessively so.

Apparently “Who?” is somewhat frowned upon, within the Jehovah community, as a reply to their “We are here to spread the message of God”.
Rule #2: Be joyously dim.

“Ahh, you’re an Atheist”.  Now there’s not a lot you can come back with after an accusation like that, however “No, I always stand like this” is a golden classic that can be used in almost any situation…

“Wait, No…  What…?”

Ah the blessed Rule #2 never disappoints or fail to deliver upon its promise.

Of course the above is just but a part of a longer, slightly more tedious conversation about religion, ethics and morality.  Not that ethics or morality are tedious topics but the “divine righteousness” of one side precluded any form of argument or view to the contrary.

“Let me ask you a hypothetical question; If the laws of the land were suspended for one day and you were able to kill without fear of prosecution, would you do it?”

The reply, of course, went along the lines of God seeing and judging all and some place called Devon not opening its gates to you, who knew Devon had gates made out of Elizabeth Hurley?  (I have a feeling I misheard this section of their reply)…. and there in lies the rub; Some of us wouldn’t kill cos it’s just not a nice thing to do, whilst others have to have some invisible overseer and a threat of goodies being removed to stop them.

Which is the more ethical or moral standpoint?
Rule #3: Be comfortable in being responsible for your own actions.

I think 1) I may have blown my chance for yet more doorstep theological discussions in the forseeable future, or at least until they get more raw recruits in, and 2) that there’s a VERY special place in hell for me somewhere… although of course that is one thing that both the Jehovah’s and myself have in common; No belief in hell.
(Unofficial Rule #3a: a little knowledge about your door-stepper is always nice).

I am beginning to come round to Sam Harris‘s view that “Atheist” isn’t a term I should be labelling myself with, after all there’s no term for someone who doesn’t believe in Zeus so why have a label for something you are NOT, surely you should be labelled for something you ARE?

As my new found friends leave my doorstep to wander back down the drive I have a feeling that I may have picked a fair few labels after all, and some of them may not be considered entirely Christian either :-/

Toodles…

Safer with a computerless keyboard?

There is a certain laziness that creeps in when riffing off a quick comment. Unfortunately this laziness when armed with a keyboard is where trouble lurks, awaiting its chance to bite you on the unmentionables.

It seems that my writing skills, and its slovenly attributes, change dependant on where I visit when armed with the aforementioned keyboard;

• Blogging: For some reason I can never seem to post a small snippet of what I am upto quite like the talented Mr Fitchett is able to.  A veritable torrent of letters, words, sentences, bullet points and paragraphs gets splurged onto the computer and then gets edited, re-edited, moved around, edited some more, updated, deleted, polished and buffed to within an inch of its life.

The end result is no more eloquent than when it began, but it does probably reflect more what I was trying to get over in my own unique way… most of the time. There being some notable exceptions apparently.

• Twitter: …and in what can only be considered the extreme opposite end of the scale; being forced to voice an experience or thought in 140 characters or less gets you to consider VERY carefully what you want to say and the best way in which to say it.  Of course, as with all things, this can go somewhat awry.

It seems to be in the ‘little’ area between those two extremes that I come unstuck.  The quick reply often done without thought is where unmentionables get the nibble I spoke about at the beginning of this post (way, way back – I did say I tended to splurge on a bit).

Unfortunately, to a greater extent than I should really be doing, you rely on the person reading these unthought out replies to understand what it is you were trying to get across.  Hence, what you thought was a critique of yourself becomes criticism of another which is on the perverse spectrum of where you wanted to be.

Sometimes when a sentence begins with the word “I”, that is where the heart of the sentence lies.

Time to be less flippant online methinks and begin watching, not so much my P’s and Q’s, but my Q’s and M’s and all the combination of letters between the two (look down at your keyboard to understand).

Apparently the short one-liner of a post yesterday is better suited to twitter and not a blog post, I wasn’t aware that netiquette had developed to such a degree.

As to an explanation….

..Somewhat more difficult.  I am sat here, in front of the keyboard, with a  thousand words, phrases, sentences and paragraphs running around my head refusing to attach themselves in any permanent form to the screen.  The backspace key is getting worn out and I’m afraid that the artificial intelligence within WordPress will just get tired of the relentless type-delete-retype-delete cycle and just publish anyways.

Where to begin and how to word this post without the spitted teeth embedding themselves into the paragraphs?

I dunno.

I value honesty above all else, and always ask friends to be frank and honest with me.  I have a particularly thick skin and most things will be taken as they are meant – I always thought it particularly stupid to seek someones honesty and then repay that with hurt pride after they have taken a difficult leap to provide you with that feedback.  Take it, deal with it, move on.

However the stream of ‘truth’ that came through over the Bank Holiday was a little too much, even for one as thick skinned and dense as myself.  Whilst I recognised some of what was said, and sheepishly say “guilty as charged” to others, the rest just seemed pure anger and nothing that I recognised.  The shutting of virtual doors afterwards leaves no room for response, and to be frank I don’t think I want to rattle those ‘doors’ to see if that’s even a possibility.

There comes a point in time when you think this is happening too often and I just don’t have the energy to weather this anymore.

I took it, the “dealing with” is being exorcised here, and now it’s time to move on, however sadly…

From this...

Somewhat in the same vein as my ‘8 beginner tips for Yoga‘, I bring you 10 gym warnings for the unwary.  These have been gathered from my daily visits to the gymnasium in a desperate bid to develop a muscle.

1. There will always be somebody there bigger than you, trying to keep up with their regime will only result in arms that ache so much that you can’t lift your cup of tea at work an hour later.
2. There will always be somebody smaller than you, and perversely they too are able to lift more than you.  Stick with your exercise regime and do *NOT* attempt what they just did… Nothing hits your self respect quite like whimpering for help as you try not to strangle yourself under a heavy bar.
3. There will always be a ‘fat-sweaty-bloke’ present whilst you exercise, whose sole job is to precede you on all equipment to cover it in a fine fragrant musk.
4. Laughing at the guys gurning as they lift heavy weights is NOT acceptable behaviour and can be hazardous to your health.  (In a related note: do not attempt to look at your own face as you lift your more modest weights… it’s doing the same THING!!)
5. Parading or posing in front of the mirrors flexing your ‘muscles’ is acceptable practise, up until the point when somebody who actually does have muscles notices you.
6. No matter how big you are; strutting your stuff around the ladies section of the gym, in a faux attempt at getting water, makes you a cock…. in every sense of the word.
7. The amount of attention you attract is in direct correlation to the amount of wind you break and the attempts you make to try and maneuver said weights onto your chest and into your lap, after a major “uh-oh” failure in anticipating how heavy the actual weights are.  (See #1 and #2 for more understanding of this point).
8. No matter which shower cubicle you walk into, and regardless of the colour of the shower gel provided, it will always be ‘essence of coconut’ and make you come out smelling like a macaroon.
9. Using the hairdryer to dry your hair is fine, using it under your armpits is a little weird, using it to blow dry your pubic hair down below is downright freaky!
10. Finally… Walking into the changing rooms to be confronted by the rear-end of fat-sweaty-bloke in all his naked glory, one leg up on a changing bench, throwing liberal amounts of talcum powder between the cheeks of his but-tocks does give you pause to wonder why you got up at this obscene hour and punish yourself in this way.

...to this!

All of the above has either been noticed, witnessed or done by myself – i’ll leave it to your overactive imaginations as to which ones which.

Further rules can be found here, please add your own comments as to any other warnings/rules/observations I may have missed.

There are very few rules to be followed when visiting the toilet and these rules tend to be unwritten and, certainly for use of the men’s toilet, more in the form of an etiquette to be followed; such as which urinal you choose and where the eyes should remain focused, etc.

Speaking on the mobile is definitely one of these unwritten rules, and you have to wonder what the person on the other end of the phone is thinking as they hear the background noise to the scintillating conversation the offender is engaged in.

Unfortunately the toilets at my workplace only come in pairs, so I was slighly surprised as the big Indian chap waddled up next to me with mobile clamped between ear and shoulder and proceeded to ‘do the business’ in the toilet next to me…. and chat… whilst, disconcertingly, have his head angled such that it looked like he was having a damn good ogle at my splendour!

Actual Script;

Me       : "Excuse me!?"
Him      : "Yes?"... (moves head to look me in the face)
Sound FX : Plop!
Both     : (look down to see mobile in urinal being peed upon)
Him      : "Shiiiiiiittt!"
Me       : (laugh)
Phonee   : "Hello?"

My previous stated Atheism may have to be revised, as I now believe there *MUST* be a God after all

I find myself, almost unconsciously, wandering back to facebook to check out what my listed friends are upto, moving my cars around in Parking Wars, building up my castles in the Knighthood game, updating my profile and uploading more pics.  She-who-must-be-obeyed is starting to feel like a facebook widow.

As some of you may know, I am an iterate IM’er (Instant Messaging), and facebook also allows you to IM friends when they come online – hallelujah!  …or as I am beginning to wonder “uh-oh”.

IM’ing for me is a simple, and cheap, way to chat to friends and gets over some of the inate shyness that is, unfortunately, built into my DNA (which is one reason why I don’t use the phone on a constant basis).  However I am beginning to wonder at what point does IM’ing friends start to become, for them, something coming close to stalking?  The unfortunate element of IM’ing is that you don’t know what the person is doing or feeling at the time you send a cheery little “hello” down the line to them, and people (despite beliefs to the contrary) will always try to remain polite, especially to friends, whatever their mood.

So I think, from now on, I shall try and keep my IM’ing to a minimum and only on a as-needed basis – unless of course I am IM’d first.  Maybe I am overly worrying about a non-issue, but that is a side effect of having too much time on one’s hands during the wee hours (I go to bed WAAAAAY too late).

So if you do find yourself being pestered one too many times, a “feck off” is always taken in the mood it’s given . What’s more worrying, is the following reply given by a friend when I brought it up with them;

coooooool, i have my own stalker….wicked !!