Words to live by

"A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects."
- Robert A. Heinlein

Worst superpower ever

When I was in my second year of University, I dated a girl named Tina. She was cute, witty and fun and I really liked her. As the summer break approached, I found out I had been accepted into the officer training program in the military and would be spending 16 weeks in Base Gagetown in New Brunswick. I discovered to my dismay that Tina was not interested in continuing our relationship. While doing basic training, I found out she had started dating some guy named Brad, who was the cook at the Swiss Chalet where she was waitressing.

Upon my return to school in the fall, I was walking across campus with a friend of mine when I bumped into Tina. I asked her how she was doing, she said she was great and then held out her hand, palm down. I had no idea what this gesture meant and stared blankly at her until my friend suddenly said, "Congratulations." That's when I refocused on her hand and noticed the engagement ring on her finger. The exchange then went something like this:

"Brad?"
"Yeah."
"I see. I'm going to go now."

The reason I bring this up is because that was when I discovered my superpower. After breaking up with me, the next guy my ex meets is the guy she ends up marrying. While this doesn't happen every single time, it's happened far too often to be chalked up to coincidence. So, no super strength, no flying, no telepathy. Apparently after dating me, women realize everything they don't want in a guy, which narrows it down for them to meet the man of their dreams.

While on Facebook today, I saw a pic in the highlights section of my home page that made my heart sink a little. The pic was of a woman I was dating up to about six months ago. The pic showed her hand with a ring on it. Being the masochist I am, I clicked on it and sure enough, she's engaged.

Last week, I noticed updates on my news feed from a woman I dated near the end of last year, discussing how her and her new boyfriend are like one of those couples you see in those eHarmony commercials. While they haven't got engaged yet, give it a few months. It'll happen.

For my own mental well being I deleted her from my friends list, so I don't have to receive regular updates about how blissfully happy they are. It's not like we're in contact with each other anyways. I think I'll be doing the same with my ex who was recently engaged. I only need to slam a car door on my hand once to realize, "You know what? That hurts. I don't think I'm going to do that anymore."

This is the superpower I got? Really? Even the Thing got a better deal than this. This is the worst superpower ever.

Renaissance Runner Redux

After being absent from here for almost two years, I decided to write a new entry. It's late at night here in the nation's capital, and it's just me, my dog curled up next to me, and a slew of thoughts. What should I write about after having been gone from here for so long? I suppose I could sum up the highlights of the past two years, but I think I'll save that for another day. Instead, I think I'll write about something that's been on my mind lately.

I've had it with dating. I feel like I've spent an inordinate amount of time and energy only to have a string of bitter disappointments in that area of my life. I'm tired of dating women who turn out to be the emotional equivalent of a David Lynch film, and there are far more of you out there than I ever imagined.

So, for now I'm going to focus on improving myself. I'm working out regularly again, which is great for dispelling the winter blahs and increasing my energy levels. I've always wanted to learn a musical instrument, so I'm taking guitar lessons. Hopefully I can stick with it and learn to rock out. I'm even taking night courses to improve myself in my professional life. It's already paid off with helping me to land a better job.

Am I done with dating for good? Doubtful. Perhaps I'll feel different once Spring or Summer is here. In the meantime, take your neuroses and unresolved traumas somewhere else. I'm not interested.

"Don't know that I will
But until I can find me
A girl who'll stay
And won't play games behind me
I'll be what I am
A solitary man
Solitary man"

Oh God! Urp! Oh God! Make it stop!

It's been a rough couple of days for The Runner, boys and girls. A dose of viral gastroenteritis went through my family like a prairie grass fire. Just when I thought the angel of pestilence would pass me by unscathed, I started feeling queasy late Tuesday night.

"No problem," I thought. "I'll just pop a couple of gravol anti-nauseants, pass out in bed, and I should be able to sleep through the worst of it."

Yeah, right. I woke up around 1am to the realization that I was not going to sleep through this. The next four hours or so were spent with me dragging myself to the bathroom at 15 minute intervals, sitting on the crapper and cradling a bucket in my arms, simultaneously projectile vomiting and hershey squirting. Then staggering back to bed, sweating profusely and shaking. Soooo c-c-c-c-cold. Those four hours of hell made me realize that just when you think you couldn't possibly throw up anymore...you can.

The dehydration brought on by this was no picnic either. After a certain point, my kidneys started to ache. I started to wonder just how much dehydration needed to take place before your kidneys shut down. The only thing that stopped me from going to the hospital, was I didn't think I could make it from the house to the Emergency room without having another bout of the trots. Walking into the Hospital after just having crapped myself would have been one indignity too many for that night.

Luckily, sometime after 5am exhaustion overcame me, I slipped into the sweet embrace of unconsciousness and slept for about 2 hours. After that, I started drinking tiny doses of gatorade to restore my fluid and electrolyte levels. Against my better judgement, I started drinking more and more of it. Around 11am I was sick one final time and brought up about a jug's worth of gatorade. I have to say though, in the grand scheme of things, gatorade is one of the easier substances to throw up. It doesn't burn on the way up, and there are no messy chunks. After finishing, I actually thought, "Well, that wasn't so bad."

The rest of yesterday was spent lying on the couch and consuming fluids. Today, I ramped it up a little and had some chicken broth. Yes, I know what you're thinking. You're a wild man, RR. Out of curiosity, I decided to weigh myself, figuring I probably lost a couple of pounds from this. I looked down at the reading on the scale and thought, "That can't be right." I tried another scale in the house and received the exact same reading. I dropped ten pounds in the last two days. Jebus, that can't be good. Kids, listen to me when I say, don't try this at home.

Dreamland

So there I was, on a state of the art private jet with a half dozen beautiful women. I don't know where we were flying to, but I knew it was someplace far away and exotic. I also somehow knew that I had orchestrated this journey. The ladies were giving me long, appreciative looks indicating a guided tour of the garden of earthly delights was in my future.

Suddenly, I was rudely awakened to the fact that both of my legs were losing all sensation in them. The reason? My dog Scout was stretched out across both of them. Don't get me wrong, I love my dog, but sometimes he can be a real buzzkill.

Rule Britannia!

Look kids! Big Ben! Parliament!

Green Space

After several months in a country where the predominant landscape colours were tan and brown, I didn't realize how much I was missing the colour green until I arrived in London on a beautiful spring day.

Desert Rat

For those who haven't seen them, here's a couple of pics of me in Kandahar, Afghanistan from last year.

Mmmmmm, ham

Last week, the Notorious MBA and I went to the National Job Fair in Toronto. After having thoroughly perused their website, I had high hopes for what this event had to offer. I was looking forward to getting face time with a large number of corporate HR reps and wowing them with my leading-edge business card CDs. The CD label and resume contained within which were both designed by my artistically talented friend, Jalapeno. MBA was looking forward to speaking with the people from Australian Immigration, as the warm sunny climate would suit her just fine.

Alas, both of us were disappointed. Every person I tried to speak with about job opportunities would inevitably tell me to go look at their website. Look at your website? The whole point of this exercise was to have human contact. To get those extra dimensions you can't get just from submitting your resume online. Can't these jerks see I have personality, dammit?! Had I known it was going to be like this, I could have saved myself a trip out to the T-dot. Hell, I could have surfed the web looking for jobs and not even put on pants. I put on pants for this, people. This is a big deal here!

MBA's disappointment came when the Aussies told her they were only looking for people who wanted short-term employment down under, doing jobs such as picking fruit. Let me assure you, MBA, you are capable of doing more than just picking fruit.

On the bright side, I finally saw the Phantom of the Opera. Yes, I was the one who hadn't seen it. I learned that Phantom of the Opera = good, Phantom of the Opera while liquored up = better! I don't think the cast or audience liked it when I yelled out, "Hey! Where's all the singin' cats?!"

Eventually, I drove MBA back to our Nation's Capital and managed to get a few things crossed off on my to do list, such as getting my summer tires on my car, getting my mountain bike out of storage and even getting my bike tuned up for spring. We also saw the Adam Sandler/Don Cheadle movie "Reign Over Me", which was quite well done. Our favourite line of the film by far was, "That girl is crazy, with a side of crazy!"

I even got two Easter dinners out of the weekend. One at MBA's friend's house, and one back at home. For my money, you just can't have too much ham. Mmmmmm, ham.

RR

"Wake up, without a care. Your head's not heavy, conscience clear
Sins are all forgiven here, yours and mine
Fear has gone without a trace
It's the perfect time, it's the perfect place
Nothing hurting. Nothing sore. No one suffers anymore,
The doctor's found a simple cure.
Just in time

All these things if I were King would all appear around me
The world will sing when I am King
The world will sing when I am King"
- When I Am King, by Great Big Sea