A lot about nothing

September 1 2008

Hi all,

I have made this blog to share my thoughts when I get them (well, the ones worth sharing anyway). Hope to get you reading away soon!

The price of bull

The price of bull

There’s a guy at work, and I have to wonder how he can spend so much money on shoes. Granted, if he had a high-powered job, I might think the high shine on his shoes would go with the wax on his resumé. But for a language school teacher to be wearing 400 dollar shoes? Something doesn’t jive, unless his other job is hosting! But somehow I doubt it, he just seems to have fallen for high-end consumerism.

Have to wonder, do 400 dollar shoes last that much longer than cheaper ones? I know we all know the adage of paying for quality, but doesn’t there come a point when you’re paying more for the ad man’s bull than the cow’s skin? Of course, the same goes when we shell out for a happening bar’s drink or plunk down hard cash for a ticket of some sorts. Everyone has a price, and what they relish from buying into that experience greatly varies.

This same individual goes to a sandwich chain every day, and I think, how mundane. But are the meals that my dear spouse makes any less so? Probably not, though I suppose the emotional connection is dearer in more ways than one. So where does one draw the line on what is bull and what is value? It seems like an individual’s values decide that, and people do what they want to do until they decide to change or are forced by circumstances to do otherwise.

Round and round we go

Ever wonder why it’s so easy to fall into arguments with females?  Could you tell me what your secret is? It always seems females often take things the wrong way. I suppose they don’t have the rhino skins that men seem to be born with, so that must be part of it.

But often you find the conversation wandering in directions you can never forsee, and then suddenly someone is boo hooing that you are not careful about what you say. Of course, tact is a skill, but must it be used in every conversation to the point where one’s speech is so heavily guarded that you cannot agree to disagree nor discuss anything remotely controversial?

I have to wonder if being politically correct is being taken to a new level and men are just not aware of it yet.

Losing my reality

Losing my reality

Have to wonder where my sense of being is recently.  Keep thinking that life has to have more than work (and travel).  Then again, there are lots of moments that I wish I could lose, but they all are precious in the end. So perhaps we have to endure and experience all that we live through to get to where we’re going.

Second winds

Funny, whenever I get to late afternoon on Wednesdays (and Thursdays too) during my uni semesters, I know I’m either going to have a great class or a  belated hurrah as I try to hope for a second wind (though sometimes when I have a longer teaching day, it’s more like a 3rd or 4th wind). You get times when you may have a flimsy lesson plan, some haphazard ideas, and it all comes together brilliantly as you tumble from one activity to the next. Some of the best lessons I have taught have come out this way, half scripted, half spontaneous episodes of free form assaults.

Second wind

Of course, as you have more teaching experience under your belt, you know better when to punt activities that are not going anywhere, or to modify them into something more digestible for the students. But how to call instantaneous audibles at the line where you’re not carrying the whole team as your offensive line or lesson atmosphere falls apart? It’s always a judgement call, and with classes that are at best half involved, that may be as good as it gets, half confused involvement where you feel you’re doing more pulling than leading. But even with these classes, there are times where you get the whole mass moving and motivated, and those are the moments when it is very satisfying to be a teacher.

Just another ‘thinking about work’ day

I sometimes wonder how much of each day is spent thinking about work or tasks than actually doing them. I suppose it might be a form of day dreaming, or the subconscious working. Goal making in your dreams sounds very surreal, but it has the advantage of being unscripted and much more free associating than the usual lists people draft at year’s end or at certain times in their life. Certainly for myself, getting too comfortable or complacent can stop someone from really achieving what they feel they can. But often visualizing what one thinks is possible is the first step toward accomplishment of that task.

As the Nike slogan says ‘Just do it’ can be a mistake in realization. How often do we think of offing someone who is annoying or rude? Well, probably more often than we’d care to admit in many cases. Contemplation in a fast paced world is not always a bad thing, and may lead to bigger returns in the long run. Of course, convincing your boss that you are really working when you seem to be just looking off into space with a memo pad with seemingly unconnected phrases on it may be a herculean task.

Hearing silent bells

I keep reviewing options for various small businesses, but nothing seems to ring a bell. Of course, my partner doesn’t instill much confidence, with memories of my last foray of being peppered with questions about “Have you made any money yet?” being a constant drain. Being more realistic, I think it will probably be something related to my hobbies, though I’m not sure if either of those is enough of a niche to live on. Perhaps I’m thinking about it too much, and living here I suppose makes it a little more difficult, though getting a proprietor’s license is not that difficult here. Sometimes you have to take off to fly, but just thinking about it seems difficult recently.

Grooving on not moving

A teacher and I were talking about where people decide to live. His situation and his sisters’ were very different, in that his sister even when faced with leaving her ‘home’ city to find other work in her career line refused to consider relocating. In her defense, she also has a husband with a good job in the same city, a home, and three kids. She literally did not consider at all moving as she has lived her whole life in that one locale. She is mentally and physically very settled in her city.

Time to settle down?

The teacher in question is different in that he has lived in a few places, and wouldn’t mind moving again and living elsewhere, given a place he wanted to move to and a suitable income to live there. I also fall in the ‘have passport, will move’ category. I have lived in Japan for a period, but I don’t consider not leaving. My parents on the other hand, have lived in the same place now since 1967. Somehow the thought of doing that gives me the chills, though I suppose at this juncture I am ‘moving’ in that direction.  I still wouldn’t mind moving though, and would welcome a change.

One last thing I left out about the ’stationary’ sister was that she also had a wide circle of friends in her home city. This might be a deciding factor for many people, as building a new network of close contacts takes time and energy, more so when your friends live farther away and you have to make real efforts to meet each other  when you travel. if you’re fortunate to have them on your business trip routes, that makes it slightly easier (and cheaper) to visit them, but still it’s not like where you can meet them anytime by walking out the door and running into them at the local pub or store. Then again, if you’re a common person in Japan, you might not meet your friends very often as all of you are very busy and of course possibly not living near each other (but possibly near a family member of some sorts, more on that in a future post).

Idile Minds head somewhere

This weekend I’ve been catching up on ‘Family Guy’ and roaring with laughter. Seems like it often is a free form association program, where any thought is capable of being found.

Is Japan still the place to be? Is any place the place to be? No matter where you go you’re always with yourself. So perhaps it doesn’t really matter where you are as long as you can see your way to moving toward some goal. Being centered on results helps you avoid growing old in places where you don’t want to be.

Idle mind

Then again, if you take a more Zen approach to life, things are supposed to happen for a reason. And it doesn’t always mean that you know or understand the reason. So when you’re watching a TV program, that’s what you’re supposed to be doing…

God is calling

This story on a minor leaguer who was due to probably be called up to the show soon.

http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/blog/big_league_stew/post/A-s-prospect-leaving-baseball-for-call-of-the-pr?urn=mlb,215238

Seems he decided to serve god instead, though I heard god doesn’t pay as well. Perhaps the ‘death benefits’ make up for it, I don’t know. But seriously, we all have to decide what is more important in the long run. Being a professional ball athlete is not for everyone, and of course the career one has will probably be limited. Now as to readers’ comments that he could have done more with the money he made from playing ball, it would depend if his focus was still on that. That is harder to do, be focused on religion when your main focus is on your career and possibly the money that it brings. There are athletes though that get involved in youth programs, etc., so it is possible. Of course one could also argue that serving god can be done in many different forms.

Serving the lord