now?

do you think that Boundless is emotion-porn for the single? that's not to say it is lurid, or unwholesome, but merely inducive to desires beyond present privilege.

Armchair Coach: Trade Deadline and Free Agency '08

so the Leafs, already a fairly non-physical team in the past 2-3 seasons, just shed the contracts of enforcer Wade Belak, checking-leader-and-hardest-slapshot Chad Kilger (both to Florida) and largest-defenseman-in-the-East-after-Chara Hal Gill (to Pittsburgh). what we gave up in size, we gained in draft picks (a 2nd, 3rd and two 5th rounders). for a team that hasn't had a 1st round pick in 3 seasons, i guess that's a good thing. come the start of free agency season on July 1, the Leafs have promised to clean house a little bit more, using the extra time to get a bit more creative about moving contracts. Kubina's no-trade clause, for instance, no longer applies if the Leafs do not make the playoffs this season.

of course, this means next season's squad will be vastly different. the following is a list of players i want to see returning to be the core group of players to rebuild from:

Vesa Toskala: has clearly proven himself to be No. 1 goalie material and can handle himself in the Toronto media storm. we need Pogge to develop in the AHL for one more year to see if he can handle the workload of a full season.

Mats Sundin: he didn't want to be traded. we now have a chance to actually build a team around him, instead of saddling him with over-the-hill ex-marquee players. give him someone who can score and a couple of veterans with character and class to form the core leadership of the team.

Nik Antropov: after 8 seasons of inconsistency and injury, Antropov is finally showing the naysayers just how wrong they have been all these years. he is healthy and at home in Toronto. he is a rare breed of hockey player: huge in size with a very deft touch and great shot.

Matt Stajan: he's not the flashiest, nor does he put up the best numbers, but i think Matt Stajan brings a lot more to the ice than can be quantified in stat sheets. his game has improved very steadily over the years; thanks to the influences of Nieuwendyk and Peca, his faceoff and defensive game means any line he anchors is a stablizing force almost every night. though he doesn't score much himself, he has shown offensive capability once in awhile and has the gift of being able to elevate the play of his wingers. case in point, Blake and Tucker, who were practically deadbeats on the ice earlier in the season, have found new life on the ice with Stajan. he is not the fastest skater, but is very strong on the puck for someone his size and has a nose for finding loose pucks, resulting in his line being able to cycle down low for extensive preiods of time. he is always available to the media after every game or practice (having grown up in the GTA watching and idolizing the Leafs) and has shown leadership potential and initiative as the NHLPA representative for the team. when Sundin retires, i think Stajan, the kid who scored a goal on his first shot in his first game in the NHL, should be the next captain.

Alex Steen: brings a very similar game to the team as Stajan, but less of a playmaker and more of a digger. has some offensive potential to go with his speed and sound defense, which will hopefully blossom in the next year or two.

Tomas Kaberle: slowly but surely becoming one of the premiere defensemen in the league. skates beautifully and has a very patient and slick approach to puck control. passes like no other player and can log a mountain of minutes in every situation. shoots very accurately, but is loathe to do so, for whatever philosophical reason, so he will need to be paired with someone who can launch the biscuit.

Carlo Colaiacovo: brilliant offensive defenseman that plays fairly responsibly and throws his weight around with almost reckless abandon. has been in the NHL for 5 years but has barely played a full season's worth of games due to freak injuries. if he can stay healthy and play consistently, we'll see a renaissance in his game, like Antropov.

Anton Stralman: anchored the Swedish junior team's defense. similar to Colaiacovo in that he is a very smooth skating defenseman who can carry the puck very well.

see how the list is short?

what we'll need to rebuild:

Defensemen that play defense. after years of Potvin, Joseph and Belfour, Leafs defense has been notoriously porous and lackadaisal because they've always relied on gamestealing goaltending. Toskala can provide that now, but there are some nights the defense needs to steal a game for the goaltender. we need large bodies that can clear the blue paint with little fuss and make it tough for screens to set up shop. we've got puck movers, so the other half ought to be puck stoppers.

Forwards that can finish. this was the general idea in bringing in Blake, but he hasn't regained the 40 goal scoring touch that he had in his contract year with the Islanders (like *ahem Jeff O'Neill). we need trigger men who can put the puck into the net given our wealth of playmakers (Sundin, Antropov, Stajan, Kaberle). this doesn't mean we need flashy Alexander Mogilny style snipers, but more like Gary Robertses or Ryan Smyths or Dave Andreychuks, who put away the garbage in and around the blue paint.

the worst thing about teaching

i had to fart ALL day.

undeserved

on the weekend before i start to teach, instead of preparing lessons with focus and determination, i went to a sleepover party (technically a leadership retreat) and hungout for awhile, slept not-quite-enough and ate lots.

hosanna leaders are awesome, by the way; they are very self-sufficient, organized and dedicated. boy howdy, they are good at taking care of each other. substituting for art this past month has been a privilege, and i enjoyed getting to know the fellowship members more. they are an entirely different generation with almost completely different set of foundational experiences (they were born AFTER Gameboy and learned to MSN before they learned to walk and talk).

in other news, i received a phone call last wednesday just before i headed out for lunch. it was TDSB, calling to schedule an interview with me. so now i have an interview with the largest school board in Canada on April 25, the last day of my week off before my internship in May. if i pass this interview, i will be placed on an eligible-to-hire list, where TDSB principals pick applicants to interview to fill job openings in their schools. other school boards generally require only one interview, but i haven't applied to them yet.

later that night, i received another call reminding me that there was a lunar eclipse, at a less foresaken hour than the last one i beheld. two phone calls in one day! unprecedented!

overdressed

when you're my height and still look and act like a kid, it can be pretty difficult to hold court in a classroom -- you just don't get the respect required. the easiest way to adjust the perception of your age (and thus, your experience level and social power) is to dress and speak accordingly; take full advantage of human psychology.

today i wore a tie. i had decided on a dark gray shirt and the usual black pants with belt ensemble. the shirt was just a solid colour without pattern, so i felt it needed to be kicked up a notch; enter solid black tie. i spent 7 minutes and took about 5 tries remembering how to tie a half-Windsor and getting it to the right length.

the effect was immediate. students would part in the hallways between classes for me a little bit more. rowdiness was hushed with a look. off-the-cuff cussing was immediately followed by apology and demurity. it was sweet.

why does the tie have such symbolic power?

sociologists and psychologists say that from birth, people are innundated with information to process and internalize; the tie is almost always associated with adults in business or other money-moving environments. it symbolizes work and serious stuff. when you see someone wearing a tie, you think, ah, there goes a white-collar working person. most working folk see the tie as a noose that represents the hold their company and the working life has over them. loosening the knot of the tie means you're off duty and ready to go home. casual Fridays usually entail forgoing the tie.

anthropologists say that the tie represents a penis and points everyone's attention towards the wearer's crotch. our primate brains are hardwired to automatically give deference and respect to the tall and well endowed. the necktie says, "i am large and in charge; you will submit and prostrate yourself before me." it is tantamount to wearing a sword, that other ancient phallic symbol of wealth and power.

i say, ties are great because they cover your buttons.

harder, better, faster, stronger

play Portal long enough and you begin to think beyond how cool it is to have a portal gun, and on to thinking, i could go for some heel springs right about now. you know, the implanted devices in Chell (the protagonist's) legs that prevent her from getting owned by the ground when her gravitational potential energy is converted to kinetic.

i could totally use them for running faster, jumping higher, saving kittens in trees, racing kangaroos, etc. i should make something like that.

oh look, they've been invented for almost 5 years.

Casulo: Apartment in a Box

i want. see pictures and more by clicking title link, via Treehugger.

Slinkachu @ Nuart, Norway

a compelling and morbid socio-cultural criticism in miniature.
click title link for full set on Flickr.
for more, visit Slinkachu's blog

it was a dark and stormy night...

on the way home last night, through the snow that was coming down steadily since 9 pm and about 2 minutes away from home, my front wheel on the passenger side dipped into a sneaky ditch that was pretending to be road thanks to the snow accumulation that made it level to the actual road. naturally, i tugged the wheel to the left just a touch to pull out of the ditch. of course i was going at about 52 km/hr, so that was enough of a differential in wheel velocities to throw the car into a spin.

not a fan of the spinning car on a snowy road at night (especially while i'm in it), i tried to turn out of the spin, succeeding in making the car spin harder. so i let go of the steering wheel and resigned myself to the immutable laws of Physics.

540 degrees and one rather large crunching sound later, i am submerged two-thirds into the same snow-filled ditch i dipped into earlier (86 m further down the road), leaning about 43 degrees on the driver's side and facing oncoming traffic. except that there was no traffic for a minute or two. if a car does a super spinout on an icy road, lands in a ditch and no one is there to see it, did it really happen?

thought #1: that was exciting.
thought #2: i wonder how i'm going to get to school tomorrow.
thought #3: perhaps i can shovel my way out.
thought #4: i should make some phone calls.

to make a long and boring story about standing around trying to get through to Roadside Assistance on a snowy night, making small talk with a police officer and spending almost $200 getting the car unditched by a tow truck, i got home about an hour later than expected -- without a scratch on car or person.

what do you call that?

ah, the sweet, sweet taste of indignation

new learning! when i am tired, not only does my patience disappear, but my inhibition follows suit and lemmings away into the aether; that is not an excuse.

so today, i has double plus angry, and due to the above new learning, i showed it. mm, catharsis. i won't elaborate (because most of my readership was there), but some innocents got caught in the crossfire, and they will receive an apology.

another new learning: when double plus angry, i can whip off some very elaborate, biting, scathing, snippy remarks, but i can hold them back by jumping up and down.

earlier in the year, and quite recently, i was and have been thinking about professionalism and how, as a teacher, it will extend outside the school life and how my reputation will have to be held to a higher standard. in the middle of a double plus angry, that is the last thing on my mind. therefore, to maintain self-control, it would be prudent of me to learn to prevent such anger from developing in the first place (bud-nipping); regular angries that i normally just let slide must be piped off periodically, in private, to trusted, non-judgmental ears who will tell me if i'm wrong.

lately, i've been eschewing the high road in conflicts and just letting the bridges burn because i honestly don't want to be bothered with maintaining them anymore. i am not a people-pleasing kiss-up, nor do i subscribe to the chinese notion of face-saving. if it doesn't bother me enough, i'll let it go. if it activates double-plus angry, bridge-burning and snarking, i will show it and then i will bear the consequences of my actions.

Romeo + Juliet = <3 4eva

The Reduced Shakespeare Company's abridged version of Romeo and Juliet (parts 1 and 2):
The following contains coarse language, scenes of violence and mature subject matter. viewer discretion is advised.




BONUS: RSC's Hamlet

someone has invaded my happy place

someone has invaded my happy place,
where clouds are shaped like medieval weaponry,
and i'm not sure what to make of it.
there in the still, amongst the greens
and blues and browns, the breeze and birdsong
and burbling brook to no where, she is
now here in my happy place.