Logic, Lessons and Life Landmarks

The word of the week is indolent.

Mar 27 – Trolling!

I've really been enjoying a new NetFlix show lately, called Trollhunters.

Surprisingly, it's not a kid show, though it is a CGI-animated production. From the mind of director Guillermo Del Toro, better known for such movies as Hellboy, Kung Fu Panda 2 and Pacific Rim, the new Trollhunters is... well, surprising.

Quite honestly, I've been taken with many aspects of the show, which although slow to start is building fast towards what looks to be a fantastic second season. The writing is excellent, building solid characters with interesting backstories and story arcs that look like they'll be fascinating to explore as they unfold. There have been unusual twists with the story so far, with unexpected things happening to the main character that you don't see in mainstream animated shows. While the violence is toned down, there have been deaths, ghosts, injuries and other happenings that again you just don't see in regular broadcast series, but because this is on Netflix there's a much lighter touch being observed - which is a GOOD thing!

Sadly, one of the main voice talents was Anton Yelchin, also known as Checkhov in the new Star Trek movies, who passed away tragically in June 2016. The director Del Toro has stated that while there'll not be replacing it, the series does have a natural change in the second season and has Yelchin had already recorded all of his dialogue before his untimely passing, the series can proceed unchanged.

TL;DR: go watch Trollhunters already!

Mar 28 – Happiness

What does it mean to be happy?

I thought about this a lot over the years, and you could spend a lifetime investigating the nuances of just a question, let alone trying to find an answer or two.

Personally, I think that happiness is defined by each individual and can change throughout their lives moving from the material to the spiritual and all the places in between. It's up to you to discover what makes you happy, and to determine if that particular path will be fruitful for you or not over the years.

So really, anybody can be happy...




Mar 29 – Peaked?

My girlfriend doesn't like his chart, but I find it interesting:

According to Science, these are the Peak Ages in Life for all sorts of things, so you can have a rough idea of where you'll be in, say, spiritualism in 20 years. I think it's pretty cool that it's at least a talking point between your current self and future self, so that you don't get hung up on any one thing wrong way.

The there's this lady.... who's about as inspiring a person as I've ever seen, especially since I can't dance worth beans:




Mar 30 – Assumptions

Speaking of science: why do people think scientists are arrogant?

It's been my experience over the years that when people don't understand something, they tend to try to downplay it in terms of their own experience so that they can feel superior and therefore more control of the situation. This often comes up when dealing with people whose sense of self-worth is directly tied to their ability to understand the world around them and whose balance is upset when it's pointed out that they really don't understand things much at all. To wit:

Personally, I just don't think that people listen all that well. For some of them it's not their fault, because they're hearing isn't all that great. I know that my right ear has reduced hearing for various reasons from my years listening to the world, and I also assumed that since I don't perform well with music, that my sense of pitch is way off.

But, apparently that last bit isn't true! I discovered a free online hearing test that you can take online to see if your pitch is true or not. All you have to do is see if you can tell the difference between some well-known tunes being played without any errors and the ones that are played with slight tonal variations.

Imagine my surprise when I discovered that I scored a 26 out of 27: a nearly perfect score! So now I know that while my lack of musical talent yet, it's not because I can't tell if someone's playing a tune to spec or not. Amazing!

Mar 31 – Spaceships!

Internet is a wonderful place, getting cooler all the time.

As you may know, I love spaceships and starships of all kinds, given my epic love for science fiction( and fantasy! )in general. Thanks to modern social media, it's much easier to connect with other people who have those same laws, and even finding folks with more specific interests that match your own.

One thing about spaceships that's always been at the top of my list are blueprints and specifications, which I feel makes these fictional creations you'll far more 'real' to me. Other people have obviously had the same thought, and just this week I've discovered a YouTube channel that perfectly captures this. Spacedock looks at famous sci-fi starships, examining all the cool things about each design without getting too geeky, presenting them just as though they are showing an informational video to familiarize you with the vehicle overall - so cool!




Apr 1 – A, B and C

I've been sleeping terribly lately, according to my sleep app. I feel it.

In trying to get to the bottom of the exact why( or multiple whys )I've done some analysis of my daily habits as well as mental state. I've mainly come to the conclusion that (a) I really need to find a way to exercise regularly that's not going to cause a re-injury to my tendons  (b) I need to figure out why I experienced such internal pain whenever I eat modest-sized meals that are mostly liquid and (c) I need to continue to stress less about my finances.

I'm working on (a)by starting to go to a local swimming pool starting in a week or so, once the cold and flu season around here wraps up.

For (b) I'm talking again with my doctor a week and insisting on some kind of internal examination, via CAT scan or video probe or whatnot - this just can't go on, where I have to wonder if every meal I eat is going to cause me a sleepless night where I sit up in pain 12 hours after eating it. I just can't do that anymore.

With the finance thing for (c) I'm continuing to apply for better positions in the government, learning the system so that my applications might actually make it on Sundays desk instead of being screened out as I think keeps happening. As I mentioned last week, I have a few people were willing to help me and while it's going to take away from my writing time, I need to move up and onwards: making more money will lead to less stress and that will cycle back into a better writing state of mind, even with a job change.

Apr 2 – Weekend Forum

All I did today was attend the Land mark Forum here in Victoria.

Actually, today was the third day of the weekend-long forum that I attended, as I booked the day off work Friday( swapping it with my EDO from last week )and spent yesterday at the Forum as well as today, which worked out rather nicely, I think. Except for the part about my being friggin' exhausted after it all.

Because of a nondisclosure agreement, I can't get into the details of what was presented, but I can tell you about my impressions of what I participated in today. As with anything people have little accurate information about, there's a lot of misunderstanding and rumours about what goes on at a Forum, and I will admit I was subject to a lot of apprehension going in, as nobody would tell me what would happen there, aside from assurances that I wouldn't be hypnotized or otherwise coerced against my will do to or say anything, this coming directly from my sister who was taken several of the more in-depth courses after this initial '101' level course. I was still nervous going in, but the demographic of attendees is interesting, from all walks of life:

The forum was, in two words: informative and insightful.

What it wasn't( at least for me )was transformative, though many of the participants experience profound breakthroughs and insights into their own lives, which is what Forum was all about, and for that I feel privileged for having been able to attend: some of these folks absolutely needed this to happen in their lives. Sundered family connections were re-forged, incomplete people were made whole and one guy finally got the courage to propose to his girlfriend after two years then and there... to which she said yes. Like I said: needful.

If I had to sum up what I got out of my three days in terms of what I found useful from the totality of what was being presented, it would be as follows: the first day I got about 30% value, the second day 10% and the third day zilch. So I was all eager and attentive the first day, less so on the second wind so many of the lessons didn't apply to my own situation and the third day I checked out mentally about halfway through the day once their Big Concept About Life reveal was made, which to be honest I was already familiar with, having studied philosophy and being a very well-read person.

Not to mention having done much of my own 'heavy lifting' in life already, having examined Who I am and Where I'm Going, which are both big questions from my favourite show, Babylon 5: again, I can't recommend that series enough for all it offers people who embrace it. I've come out of my own past problems a stronger, better person, while still renaming true to the core of who I am in the face of needing to survive all that I've had to. I'm happy with that result, and so is my family... and this weekend really reinforced that truth for me.

If I had to do it again, I would politely decline and ask to read the book instead, though I do value the 'personal touch' of interacting with people, the emotional content of which can't be overstated for its power to affect one's life... though I think I overdosed on Empathy this weekend and will need a little while to recover. I'll naturally be mulling over my own insights that I arrived at from my experience and seeing how they apply to my life, and considering some of the frameworks that were shown to me to use in my own toolbox.

But I've got many other things to do this month, so I'm not going to be dwelling all that long that often: it was an interesting weekend, but it certainly didn't change my life, though again I was moved by how it did so for so many others there.

Now if I could just take as powerful a forum on how to sleep properly...

I'm posting this Monday morning after a so-so sleep, having been mentally and physically exhausted from my 13-hour-a-day 3-day weekend: I haven't been that tired since working double shifts at MMart more than five years ago. However, I think it was worth it, as I've been stressing out about WHAT I was going to experience during the weekend; more about that next week. For now, I'm just going to let things process as necessary and get on with my week.