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My travels will take no less than a full day, and including the time change, there is no way I could possibly blog tomorrow (friday) or even the next day depending on whether there is internet in my apartment when I arrive. For your interim entertainment, here are some photos I took today in rainy North Vancouver. I went up to a lesser-known suspension bridge, and around the rainforest near Grouse Mountain.

I'm writing from Vancouver today. Most of the goodbyes are done, and my flght leaves tomorrow morning at 6am. We fly to San Francisco to lay over for five hours, then to seoul; the final arrival time is expected to be 5:30 p.m. Seoul time, Saturday, at which point we'll be stuck on a two hour bus ride to our places of residence. All together, it will be about about a 24 hour trip. I dread the trip, but I look forward to stepping into my apartment and collapsing to the floor into well-earned slumber. Travelling is an awful business.... driving, flying, bussing, ferrying... it leaves one slightly ill, tired, unexercised, and at a loss for appetite. But then, I remind myself that not more than a few hundred years ago, making one's way to Korea from North America's west coast was a months-long journey on the swells of the ocean, and often deadly for those who dared. Sometimes I take pictures of art, but in a sense I feel as though I'm stealing, even if my pictures offer...

"Stupidity is the devil. Look in the eye of a chicken and you'll know. It's the most horrifying, cannibalistic, and nightmarish creature in this world." - Werner Herzog

I find myself at a partial loss to explain just why it is I'm leaving the country for so long. For those readers who don't know, I've contracted with a school in South Korea (Seoul) to teach english for one year, renewable. I depart for Vancouver in two days, and for Seoul in two more. Jordan is coming along with the same contract, and you can find his soon-to-be travel blog "Seoul Searching" at: http://destinationseoulkorea.blogspot.com/ . So here we are. I've been hopping around Victoria these last few days tying up odds and ends, and in the process I've been pressed to admire the beauty of this city, and the deep love I have and always will have for it. Victoria is warm, sunny, temperate, quiet, unassuming, and full of visual beauty. A large portion of all the people I love most are in this city, not to mention my aging cat (who I fear may pass on while I'm away), the ocean that I find myself drawn toward at nearly every moment, and of course the va...

Hiatus, day three. I leave very soon now; the seemingly endless number of odds and ends to be tied up is keeping me from writing. "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed." - Albert Einstein

Hiatus, day two. Still working on my entry, it should be up tomorrow. "Do you ever stop and notice who it is we assasinate? It's always people who've told us to live together in harmony, and try to love one-another. Jesus, Ghandi, Lincoln, John Kennedy, Bobby Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, John Lennon; they all said 'try to live together peacefully.' And BAM!, Right in the 'fuckin head. Apparently we're not ready for that. That's difficult behaviour for us." - George Carlin

I'm going on hiatus for two days to write up a long entry with the addition of some photos. It is in progress right now. It should be for Day 238.

(On the female Chinese gymnasts): "They all look the same to me anyway.... I mean because they're all young! You see, I'm 45, so to me, anyone born post-Ghostbusters-II just looks like an apple-cheeked, nubile symbol of my own mortality." - Jon Stewart

I'm stuck on the notion of historical narratives today. Was it the wet ground below the horses' feet, or Napoleon's personal distractions, or Wellington's strategy that won the battle of Waterloo? Perhaps none of these conditions were sufficient, but all were necessary. Perhaps any combined number were sufficient, but no one was necessary. History is almost an art more akin to literary theory than it is a science akin to chemistry. So, I ask of my readers (all 5-ish of you) today, to look back on your past relationships and ponder honestly the historical narratives you've created to explain feelings, happenings, and the precipitating factors in their eventual ends. What do you tell people when asked? How do you paint yourself as a character in your story? How do you paint the other? Now, I ask that you dig down and try to unbury the memories you feel best, the good times, the pivots, the little moments that have stuck in mind. Try to reminisce, to get as real a...

One never really kicks an addiction. It stays with you until the very day you die; the only issue is whether or not (or how often) you lapse into indulgence. You don't hear "former alcoholic" tossed around much, to name an example. I have my addictions. One of the biggest ones is the world of computer gaming, particularly the WoW or Diablo-style online adventure games. This addiction I share with many others, though I've quite intentionally steered clear of all such games for several years now. It is no wonder that pornography, gambling, and drugs are so wildly popular. They appeal to basic human desires in a way that is entirely compelling and completely irrational. Weaker people get caught up to the point that it destroys their lives, while stronger people still can't help but throw a buck or two in the direction of a lottery tcket, or have a more than few drinks every so often, or take a gander at the veritable universe of sexuality that is but a click or two a...

I had a nice day at Thetis lake just this last weekend. Jumping off the rocks is an interesting experience. Looking down, it appears to be a dangerous and unnerving height, but looking back up from the water it seems trivial. I can only imagine how unnerved I would be if I ever chose to jump out of a plane (with a parachute of course). The lake was crowded with drunken, obnoxious guys my age, all of whom are followed about by skinny, good looking ditzy girls. "Girls don't like nice guys, they like jerks," as my friend Colin pointed out. Sure, that's clearly true of some girls. But the equation is deceptive: I run into beautiful girls attached to asshole guys, and I default to the mindset that "she could do better." But says who? Those girls are bitches most of the time anyway (forgive my language), and very much match their male counterparts. So, in an important sense, the men who are allegedly more successful with women than 'nice guys' are compet...

I think today's trip to Wal Mart will be my last. I go maybe two or three times a year, typically to buy things like socks, soap, or batteries. But today I felt especially uncomfortable with the massive crowds, the endless beeping of bar code readers, and all the fat people. There were so many fat people, and single mothers, and miserable staff. The staff roster is interesting, a combination of retirement age workers and teenage girls. If we were to drop our elitism for a moment and recognize that we live in a culture of consumerism (i.e. buying things), we'd have to admit that Wal Mart is the new opera house. It is the new art gallery, the new live stage, the new church, the new local restaurant. Buying things has become a source of pleasure, a shared experience, even a ritual to some.

Basically, I'm a pretty average guy, physically. I'm not oddly built, my proportions are normal, my height is just an inch or two above average, and so forth. I had a normal, healthy childhood, and a variety of experiences in education, travel, and skill sets to speak of. I am 23. Therefore, it is a near impossibility that I could ever have been an olympic athlete, or be one in the future. The truth: international level competition is, at this point, reserved almost exclusively for the abnormal, for people who are genetically well-built for their discipline, and who don't have much of a life: "All I do is eat, sleep, and swim," in the words of Michael Phelps. Not to denigrate the effort. Surely to be an olympian, an exceptional level of dedication is a necessary condition. It's just not the only necessary condition. Other ones, physical properties for example, are in some sense arbitrary, and blind to the effort of the competitors. The idea that determination ...

Ok, I am one hour late on today's blog, but I'll call it for 229 anyway and do one tomorrow (i.e. later today). You win some, and you lose some. Those moments when you know you've tried your best and simply lost, all you can do is exit with a little bit of class; don't linger around, don't wallow, and don't beg. But, I suppose, there is an argument to be made for going down swinging. Anyway. There were one or two things I really, honestly, truly wanted to happen, but that did not happen. And I tried for them. On the other hand, some great things have happened too, and more great things are on the way in good time. We remember the good things more anyway, in the long run. Well, some of us, anyway.

I got a letter ito the TC today. Originally, there was a story about a PETA advocate who stood outside a KFC wearing a bikini made of lettuce (or paper painted like lettuce anyway). A few writers wrote in saying that the girl was the subject of exploitation of PETA's part. So the girl herself wrote back in, confirming that she does in fact have free will, and that animals are the real creatures being exploited for their bodies... in a manner of speaking. Enter myself. Here's my letter: --- Re: "Fake fare spares real chickens," letter, Aug. 7. I'd like to preface my response by noting that I am a five-year vegetarian, and (at least to some extent) a supporter of the People for Ethical Treatment of Animals' efforts to move our society away from filling its bloated belly with dead animals. However, I don't believe it a productive measure to send out bikini-clad, gorgeous young women as the "troops on the ground" to win over hearts and minds. The you...

Ok so the Chinese had a cute girl lip-sync the voice of a less cute girl at the opening ceremonies. I'm sure you'd all heard, and I'm sure you've all felt that sense of requisite outrage. How dare they, right? Well, the polit bureau guy who made the decision (or his press secretary, anyway) said that the idea was to create the best possible performance. So they combined good looks with good singing; it was a team effort. I imagine our sense of outrage, or having been fooled, or our sense that the 'ugly' girl got a bum deal, stems from our particular culture and its obsession with individuality. We have a doctrine that individuals ought to get recognized as such for their acheivements, and that it is unfair when the limelight is shone (shined? ... I hate irregular verbs) in the wrong direction, or not at all. But that's not Chinese culture. Both girls were doing what they did for the benefit of the opening ceremonies, and not for themselves. The culture essen...

What do old rich people think, when they are just a few years (or hours) from death, full of nothing but memories of working for the extra zeros in their bank account, and a nicer car than other people's cars, and so forth? They must not be thinking happy thoughts. Everything is about money! It can't be escaped! Have you ever known rich people before? I have. I once taught piano to the two daughters of the people who own a 10 million dollar house at the end of ten mile point - the house way at the end, that's massize and almost all glass windows. Anyway, life is the same for them. The only differences - square footage, car horsepower, couch quality, the number of TV channels - really are the only differences. The people are the same, with the same desires and same miseries and same conflicts and same everything. They gave me a present for christmas. It was wrapped and handed to me directly. It was an ugly, kitchy, loud, motor-powered mini-fountain. Turns out the p...

The olympic athletes... they're all on drugs. I don't care how many 'negative' tests they get. Those swimmers are doped up. World records are broken almost every time they jump in the pool, and their bodies and abilities are a far shot from anything resembling the bodies and abilities of normal humans. The road to modern athletics has been long, such that we've grown slowly accustomed to it all, but take a step and have a real look at these people. Winners get millions of dollars, in advertizing, or cash rewards, or whatever else. My bet is that there are many, many illegal substances and methods out there that aren't being tested for on account of their newness or indetectability. And if I might add, a lot of the olympians look completely miserable. Especially the gymnasts. Those teenage girls look like they're on the verge of suicide from all the stress and pressure. And all the rules are arbitrary! I suppose that's true of any sport, but in some sport...

Slogan ideas for the law firm I'm temping at. They deal largely with divorces. Duncan & Faber: " At least half the dog guaranteed, or your money back !" Duncan & Faber: " You wed 'em, we behead 'em " Duncan & Faber: " Feeling remorse? Divorce, of course !" Duncan & Faber: " Experience the second happiest day of your life"

Half a day spent as a temp at a law firm, and I'm reconsidering lawyering as a career. It was the half-hour I spent typing in billable hours for the lawyers, realizing slowly that pretty much all they do is prepare or review documents, take calls, write emails, and occasionally meet clients and/or go to court. None of this should have been a surprize, but still, it is a wake-up call! I'm thinking about journalism now. Perhaps column-writing, like Dave Barry or Jack Knox for the TC; the notion of making a career of peddling unnecessary, quirky, and periodically humourous opinions is a pleasing one. And with God as my witness, that is something I am capable of doing!

A friend mentioned to me that studies have been done demonstrating that our memories of past feelings are usually aggrandized to a certain extent; that is, we remember a happy time as being happier than we really felt it at the time, and likewise with sad times, etc. Sure, that sounds true enough. Memory is a terribly inaccurate thing; criminal lawyers and detectives will tell you that eyewitness testimony is typically the most unreliable sort of evidence. Likewise, we all have inaccurate or misconstrued memories of things. Ever been back to a childhood playground, or classroom? Everything looks different, usually much smaller (as you are bigger). Your childhood memory of the objects doesn't really match up at all with your recent memory of them, even though the objects are the same. The simple conclusion is that the sensory apparatus that does the perceiving effects the memory just as does the raw sensory input. You aren't so much remembering objects, but a weird combination o...

Has anyone been watching the news lately? Former presidential candidate and democratic vice-presidential nominee (2004) John Edwards has admitted to having a sordid affair! Welcome, John, to a not-so-exclusive club of politicians who got caught. You will lose face, and eventually make a lot of money on book deals. Some of that money you will lose paying to defend against lawsuits of various sorts. This affair is particularly juicy (from the perspective of our diseased culture) because his wife Elizabeth is a cancer patient. John Edwards is going to get pulled through all kinds of mud for this one. The same is true for the woman with whom he had the affair. CNN posted a classy photo juxtaposition on its front page today: Really, CNN? Seriously? Could you have possibly picked too more hilariously unflattering photos of these people? Given the context, I think the forward-looking-visionary-esque photo of Edwards is hysterical. And, if the dictionary were ever to officialize "huh?...

One of my favorite photos, taken by the Hubble telescope; this required 800 exposures and 400 revolutions around earth to put together. Visible are, give or take, 10,000 different entire galaxies: There are too many perspectives with which to view the world! I suppose it is the pattern-seeing nature of the human mind; I'm constantly finding ways to look at things, ways in which words and actions and events in nature can be construed into harmony, and so forth. Then I see this picture and think "Ah yes, then there's that". I run completely out of thoughts when I look at this picture. And as cliche as it sounds, I do recognize that there is a degree of insignificance to certain things. That one's restaurant meal isn't to one's temperature liking... well, it's not exactly front page news in the grander scheme of things. And hoo boy would I love to somehow roam the universe. There's so much out there, more than we could ever possibly grasp (even concep...

I understand why so many people buy lottery tickets: Mine is burning in my mind, I honestly am excited for the draw. It is a strange feeling; I can genuinely sense some sort of subsersive set of desires overcoming me on occasion. Normally sex is the occasion, but in this case, it is gambling. The "Gambler's Fallacy" states that one ought to pick the draw that hasn't come up for a while (say you've flipped 3 heads in a row, so now you think you should guess tails) because 'it is due to come up.' The faulty logic is common, even among those of us who fancy that we never use it. Of course, the coin doesn't know what its previous flip entailed, let alone does it have effective memories of past flips. The chances are always even. Rules of probability are generalizations, that become increasingly accurate the more and more times they are tested. Probably. According to a website, the least drawn six numbers in 6/49 history are: 11, 13, 14, 15, 28, and 24. Eac...

Oh dear God it is true: people don't change. Gah... this whole new worldview is avalanching my thoughts and perceptions. I can't even pen it right now, it is so new and altering. We really are machines, in the most literal sense. Descartes' "I" - the thinking thing - doesn't exist, it is an illusion. Someday, perhaps before I die, there may be an artificially intelligent being; one whose parts are so complex as to give it the same illusion. Race is, in a manner of speaking, very real. Gender is very real. Culture is informed by genetics, and in many ways is much less fluid than we imagine it to be. Free will is as free against genetics as the body is against gravity; our technology helps us to overcome it only emotionally so. Probabilities govern everything. Not rules, and not maxims, and not absolutes. The preceding three are just expressions of probabilistic norms that are consistent enough to validate ongoing predictions. And I'm not high. ...

Times are changing. I am becoming disillusioned as a result of some recent reading, and all the things about this town I enjoy feel a bit more fleeting as my departure nears. But I look forward to leaving. According to a travel book I read some of today, there are good eats, cheap beers, a bustling night life, and beautiful women aplenty where I'm going. Three of these four things I intend to take full advantage of. I still haven't the slightest idea what I want to do for a career, or even if I want a career in the conventional sense of the word. But then, I never fail to remind myself that about two thirds of all children aren't planned, meaning that there are a many parents out there who aren't exactly living the lives the way they planned to live them. Like most people who don't have children or the intention to procreate anytime soon, I make my plans on the assumption that nobody will be dependent upon me for some time. But, in order to have a sex life, one ...

Simple, inexpensive (even free) pleasures are the best ones! But then again, a part of me does want to know what being rich is like; I'd probably enjoy buying and gunning a supercar, or flying about in a helecopter or piloting yacht, or playing the big spender in vegas, having beautiful escorts follow me about while I blow money on high risk tables, or whatever else. But it isn't worth spending a lifetime trying to get the money. The rich people I see on television, or in person, don't look any happier in their Porsches than I do on my scooter, or any happier in Armani suits than I do in blue jeans. That, and lottery tickets are a total waste. "Idiot tax", as some call it. So, richness is out. Back to the simple pleasures.

One might say that modern science is, in many ways, ruining literary themes. Some philosophers argue that the traditional dichotomies between good and evil, substance and essense, experience and innateness, mind and matter, are all breaking down into multi-faceted and more complex theories of how the brain and the world operate. But it will be a boring day, when the mysteries of the understanding and the will will be replaced with hard facts no less factual than chemical compositions of stones and universal gravitational constants. Well, that day will be interesting. The next day might be boring, though.

On the porch today I saw a wasp tackle a large grey moth right in mid air to the ground. The wasp stung the moth, and proceded to chew it clear in half over the course of a writhing thirty seconds, leaving the front half of the moth squirming about and flapping its one still-attached wing as though it somehow still had a chance. Then the wasp flew away. I stood there gawking at the horror for a few moments, before returning to the business of hanging up the laundry to dry. Bugs are both inspiring and macabre that way: they never appear to give up. They're of a simpler construction than other, larger creatures, such that any intact parts will remain in motion until it is biologically impossible for them to do so. The result is, literally, the sight of bug parts still trying to move around, or escape the spider, or fly. It is the very essence of futility. I wanted to appeal to the moth: "Your time has come, just let it happen peacefully!" But alas, I could not make the appe...