Busy day today.
When I woke up, I didn’t feel that good, so it took me awhile to get going. When I did get moving, it was around 9:00. I scootered down to the legislature for the free pancake breakfast. There was a 5km and 15km run at 7:30, so I talked to some of the participants. I would like to have also done the run, but I’m taking it easy while my body recovers from the marathon.
I got to the scooter place at 10:10. They had asked people to come in and be part of the scooter gang in the silly summer parade on Whyte Avenue. We then proceeded to wait and wait and wait. The parade didn’t start until noon, so there wasn’t much we needed to do. At around 11:15 we went to the staging area, a nice suburban area off Whyte. and waited there. The Wooly Bully bar’s float was many beautiful girls in a tub. It looked good for awhile that we would be behind them in the parade, but it wasn’t meant to be. I did get one to squirt me with a water pistol, but that was the extent of my guts. (In my defense, it was hot out, and I did want to get wet.)
So for the parade, we just scootered around in circles. We weren’t an interesting float, but I can now say I was in the parade. Afterwards, I hung around the celebration area. Not much happened there.
I went home and relaxed for awhile. Then I decided to go to the Bikini car wash to get my scooter cleaned. It wasn’t that thrilling, and I don’t know how good a job they did. It was probably overpriced. Still, no complaints. I did convince them to use the hose on me. It was hot, so I wanted to cool down.
I then took the scooter around to Hawrelak park, and went back home. On getting back home, I discovered that my neighbor below me is having a change. Brian and Amy live below me, but now it is just Brian. I didn’t get too many details, but from what I learned, Amy didn’t feel it was going anywhere, and moved out.
Now I’ve just been lounging around, being unproductive. I noticed that I have a bit of a farmer’s tan today. It’s good that I’m getting some sun. I need to buy a lawn chair for my balcony so I can get a lot more.
I’m going to go to the doctor tomorrow. I’m supposed to give some samples to the lab, but I can’t eat anything for 12 hours in advance. Since I have the day off, I’m hoping to get there early enough in the day so I’m not hungry, but late enough so that the morning rush is over.
Now I have to design a D&D game for tomorrow.

I feel sick. It started as a tickle in my throat yesterday, but now I have a stuffed up nose. I blame lack of sleep.
On Sunday, I tried to go to bed early, but I don’t think it was early enough. I got up insanely early to catch a flight to Edmonton. The flight was pretty good, considering it was Air Canada. There was no one sitting in my row, so I got to lie down and try and sleep. I didn’t actually sleep, but I did pretend.
I then went to work, and tried to do a reasonable facsimile of a productive day. I went out to dinner, did some grocery shopping. Then stayed up way to late going through some of the books that came in from Amazon.
On Tuesday, I stayed up too late again. A friend had tickets to see the Molson Indy Model search at Red’s. It was supposed to start at 9:00, but Red’s has an excellent bait-and-switch program. It didn’t actually start until 10:40. When they had a five to ten minute break, it lasted half an hour. I left there around midnight. I didn’t stay to see who the winner was. They said they would find out in ten minutes. HA!
Today, we were let out of work early. We released a major product so in celebration, we’re getting a really long weekend. I get Friday off too. In celebration, I ignored my sickness and went to see Spider-man 2.
It was a good movie. I felt it was a little slow at times. My biggest beef was that Spider-man used any excuse to take off his mask. He didn’t need villains to do it, he just did it himself. As near as I can tell, half of New York now knows what he looks like.
Now I’ve updated all the journal entries that I wrote over the vacation, and posted them. I’m now going to try and get some sleep. I have a busy day tomorrow. And I hope I’m over this cold by then.

The other day I went to see Shrek 2 with Coram. It was a good movie. What impressed me the most was that a small element from the first movie became a larger plot point in the second. Specifically the Muffin Man. I felt a little spoiled from the commercials and trailers. I know I shouldn’t watch them, but I can’t help myself.
Yesterday I went to the bar with Canticle. Everyone was saying that the place was dead compared to the ususal. It was nice that no one is allowed to smoke, but I think I smelt marijuana at one point. The TV playing some Godzilla movie was somewhat distracting.
I met Jeff’s friend, Erik. (That was weird to type.) We have a surprisingly large amount in common. Just to start with, D&D and no fear of math. It sounds like the three of us will be going to Europe next year, but the planning stage doesn’t seem to be progressing much. Well, we’ll see.
At the bar I met Adam. Erik said I was supposed to talk to him about Magic Squares, and then their practical applications. He did seem to know a lot about them, but I’m guessing they are his hobby. I talked to him about fractals, but I only know enough to be dangerous. Not enough to keep up a conversation.
An interesting thought crossed my mind. I had never met Adam before, but I was able to have a good conversation with him very quickly. I’ve never had that luck with women. I wonder if that is because I have never had anything in common with any of the women I’ve talked to. Or is it because their gender makes me uncomfortable. I’m not talking being gay or anything, but with men, I know that nothing is ever going to happen. But with women there is always that faint hope, which starts making conversations awkward for me. (The more you want something to happen, the less likely it is to happen.)
I guess I just need to talk with women more and get comfortable.

So I just saw Troy with Canticle. I haven’t had time to really absorb it, but I liked it. Part way through I decided that I would not want to own the DVD. I think the problem I had with it was that there was no real hero to root for. Achilles seemed to be the protagonist, but he didn’t even like what he was doing. The Trojans seemed far more honorable, but you know from the start that they are going to lose.
I’m happy I saw it, but not again.

I got the paper and the final results.
I placed 156th out of 869 people. The official time I had was 3:41:49. The first place winner did it in 2:31:27 and the last place person did it in 7:08:26.
There is some controversy over the first place women. Apparently some women, signed up for the full marathon, had actually run the half marathon. That must have been hard to do because there were big signs showing where the half and full people should split up. Heck, if I had just been doing my previous half marathon, I would have come in before her.

Yesterday I ran a marathon.
I completed it in roughly 3:42:00.
My goal was to run it in 3:30:00, but I’m not upset I didn’t make that goal. I am getting over an injury. Fortunately my peroneus [sic, probably] muscle didn’t hurt at all during the run. That is no longer true. My legs are really aching now. Hardly a surprise.
For the first half of the run, I was great. I was going faster than the 3:30 pace bunny and felt good. My father and sister were stalking me the entire way, so I had something to look forward to. I loaned my sister my camera and she took pictures. My mother was waiting for me in Assiniboine park with the dog, Harry. She had made friends with a photographer who got a good picture of me. (I hope I’ll be able to buy it for a reasonable price.) Harry was having a great time and when my mother was racing to meet me at another part of the park, he thought it was a great game and tried to trip her.
After the halfway mark, I started slowing down. I didn’t really accept it until the 3:30 pace bunny passed me on main street going over the Norwood bridge. I tried to increase my speed to keep up, but I just didn’t have the energy. So I slowly fell further and further behind. Eventually I just lost sight of them. By then I was just slogging along. With seven miles to go, that was a real slog.
The worst part was when I turned onto Bishop Grandin. I could see the apartment building that was at the end of University Crescent, and I could see how far off they were. That was discouraging. They never seemed to get any closer. But eventually they did, and I was in the university again.
For the last bit, I didn’t have any more to give, so I didn’t try and speed up for entering the stadium. I just focussed on the track and got to the end. There was someone there to greet me and guide me to some food and drink. I downed a Gatorade quickly. It was one of those awful tasting blue ones, but I didn’t notice.
My family was all in the stands cheering me on. I found out later that they didn’t take any pictures. My sister had run out all the batteries of the camera. She thought she could take a hundred pictures without a problem, but I had never mentioned that the batteries could run out. So there is no picture of me crossing the finish line.
After I stretched and ate whatever was put in front of me, I wandered out of the stadium to see the family. I was pretty giddy, and feeling high. Everyone was my best friend, so I was giving profuse thanks to the volunteers.
We went home and I showered. Then we went to a quick brunch at Perkins. The rest of the day was spent recovering. I took a walk to help flush out the lactic acid in my muscles, but they still hurt today.

Life is hectic. I haven’t had a good chance to update this journal, and I still haven’t. I have so much to do to prepare for the trip, and I’m having trouble organizing myself.
The weather has been at odds with me. I want to take my scooter to work, but the weather forecasts have all said rain for the past while. And in the morning, it has been rain, but in the afternoons, it looks beautiful.
After Improv class today, I realized I had left my sunglasses behind in the building. The locked building. I’m hoping I have a chance to pick them up tomorrow. I really need them if I’m going to be on vacation next week.

Yesterday evening I went to the Magnetic North showing of “The Danish Play”. I wasn’t that interested in seeing it, but I felt obligated, being of Danish heritage.
It wasn’t a comedy.
It was more of a tragedy. It was one of those shows where they give the life story of a real person, and show how everything conspired to make them miserable. But through that misery, they created art that will last for blah blah blah.
Frequently, my opinion of these styles of play are that the protagonist made their own bed. In says to me that there are certain people, who although they may be great artists, cannot function in the real world. Just because you want something to be true, doesn’t make it so.
In this case, Agnete Ottosen was part of the Danish resistance. She was captured by the Nazis and experimented on. That was the first act, and I was fine up to then. The protagonist was actually someone I could care about.
In the second act though, she had lost her grip on reality after the war. She wanted to have a child and did so. The father was unknown and she didn’t want to say who he was. Then the nice bureaucracy had trouble with that, even though they gave her many options that would have let her go on. But she had to raise a stink over everything. Attacking German tourists didn’t help either. So the son, Soren, was taken away.
I can see where Agnete was coming from. The bureaucracy was reminiscent of the horrors of the work camps. But she had friends who tried to help her. They told her what she had to do to keep her son. But she refused them all, and had to do things her own way. In the end, her son died an hour after he was returned to her (at age of maturity) in a scooter accident. She committed suicide soon after.
Oh, and through this all she was writing poetry.
If some Danish nationalist reads this review they will probably despise me. I don’t know what kind of hero Agnete Ottosen is to Danish culture (I suppose I should, but I’m more Canadian than Danish), and I’ve never read any of her poems, but this is the impression I got from watching the play.
To give myself some credibility in this, I saw a play about Emily Carr at last year’s fringe festival (I think the title was “Talking to Trees”). I think she is the Canadian cultural equivalent to Miss Ottosen. My opinion of Emily Carr is equally bad after seeing that play. Ms. Carr should never have been let out in public and seemed to determined to make her life as miserable as possible. Just because you talk to trees and keep a lot of animals doesn’t mean you can take care of yourself.
Art is all well and good, but don’t needlessly suffer for it. I have no sympathy for the starving artist. Art is not a substitute for life; Don’t sacrifice yourself for it.

I got my evaluation for last month’s improv class. Finally. So I’m going to share it.

5) Students Reason For Taking Course (as they explained it to you)
a dark secret
6) Instructors Overall Goal – What were you focusing on?
Improving understanding of games ie: purpose vs. execution,
7) Students Attitude:
very open, willing, thoughtful, honest
8) Ability to Accept Concepts Presented:
strong acceptance of new ideas. Dives in.
9) Strengths:
good with pace of scenes, very positive energy.
10) Weaknesses:
I would like to see more diverse characters, changing body and voice.
Needs to connect with other players more. Aims for comedy over drama.
11) Recommended Future: Next level, more training, Show?
More training recommended

Frankly I liked my last evaluation better. Josh put a lot more information in them.

So I went to a Wednesday run today. I haven’t been for two months, but I feel like I’m totally out of shape. Running up hills was taking a lot out of me. So I’m starting to get worried about this marathon I’m running in eleven days.
I’m accepting that I won’t be able to make my time goal. But I’m worried I won’t finish. The past few runs I’ve done seem to take a lot out of me. Mind you, most of them have involved hills, and there won’t be any in Manitoba. And it has been hotter in the afternoons, and I’ll be marathoning in the morning.
I can only hope.
A person at the Running Room commented that it looks like I’ve lost weight. I don’t know if that was in the good way (lost fat) or the bad way (lost muscle).
Well, more things to worry about.

Yesterday, there was a nice meteorological event. It was generally overcast, but there was a place where the clouds had parted and a single beam of light was cast down onto the city. It looked very nice.
One of the things I miss from Winnipeg are the clouds. For lack of a better term, the clouds in Winnipeg are aged properly. In Alberta they have just come over the mountains, so they lack character. All the clouds seem to mix together, and very rarely show any distinction. In Winnipeg they’ve had time to build themselves up into high fluffy things.
You don’t notice it, until they’re gone.

Today I was supposed to work on the D&D game for tomorrow. It has been hard. It’s beautiful out, so my attention span is really short. I came home on my scooter at around 6:00, and couldn’t bring myself to go in. So I scooted around, eventually going to Hawrelak park and doing a loop there.
I got home at 7:00, and then channel surfed. I eventually made dinner, but only really started looking at the D&D game at around 9:45.
In other news, the Unknown Challenge today was at Argyll Plaza Hotel. We had to look at pictures of a bed in various stages of being made. Then we had to make a bed while being timed.
The same thing happened for the bathroom.
The trick to this event was that they gave extra items that we didn’t need. The bed had an extra sheet and an extra pillow. We realized the pillow wasn’t needed when it didn’t have a pillow case. But we put the sheet on the bed before we realized it was superfluous.
The bathroom had extra towels and soaps.

So I did the run today.
My foot aches a bit, but not too badly. I’ve globbed on some anti-inflammatory. But we’ll see tomorrow how it is. If it hurts a lot, it will probably mean I can’t do the marathon in two and a half weeks. Fingers crossed.
I did the 5.4 mile run in 38:42. I think I was the ninth person in my division to make it in. Not great, but I’m not embarrassed by it.
There was a lot of commuting to get to the run though. My car is now 250 km ahead of my scooter. So I’m probably going to park it until gas prices come down.

I just looked out my window. The moon is rising over the clouds to the south-west. It looks beautiful. It’s both big and orange. All in all, an impressive sight.
It’s rising quickly, so I don’t expect it to be as spetacular for mych longer.

So I was totally lazy on Sunday. I did no exercise. I did spend time designing a monster to throw at my players on Friday. That’s my biggest complaint about the 3.5 edition of D&D. It takes forever to create the powerful creatures and characters.
On Monday there was the season finale of Die-Nasty. It wasn’t that good. It really wasn’t that funny. Dana Anderson, the director, is still ending the scenes too early. But by far my biggest complaint is that every time someone has a gun on stage, Dana has the gun go off unexpectedly and someone gets shot. Every! F%&*ing! TIME!
And it never helps the story.
Before Die-Nasty, and before dinner, I took a run on the treadmill. I wanted to do 3.66 miles, and I saw that I was running late. So I had to go at a faster speed. But my foot is getting better, because I don’t feel a lot of pain today. The foot is still sensitive, but I should be good for tomorrow.
Because tomorrow I’m running the five mile challenge for Corporate Challenge. It is actually 5.4 miles and off in the boonies of Edmonton. I’m nervous about it. I know I can do the distance, but can I do it without injuring myself more. I’ve signed up for the Manitoba Marathon on June 20th, and even have the plane ticket. Now is not the right time for me to make myself worse.
We’re doing a carpool to the event. Unfortunately I’m driving. There is nothing wrong with that, but I’ve given myself the challenge to drive my scooter more than my car. It hasn’t helped that it is always raining around here, forcing me to use the car. I’m about 200 km behind, so I need to catch up. A long drive to the boonies of Edmonton will not help.
I just came back from Improv class. It is smaller this month, but we still have nine students. That is really pressing it. I’m still waiting for my report card from last month. I want to send in my teacher evaluation, because we have the same teacher this month.
Frankly Jacob Banigan is overrated.

So on the Friday before the Victoria Day long weekend we got let out of work early. Only by about an hour. So I went home and felt lazy so I channel surfed. I saw that Mrs. Osbourne has her own talk show.
There were several people sitting all together. When the camera was back you could see that there were five of them. The person second from the right looked like a beautiful blonde in a revealing evening dress. But they never showed her on the close ups. They showed the man to her left, and the women to her right. But never of her.
Then while Mrs. Osbourne was saying goodbye, she mentioned the woman was Anna Nicole Smith. Then we got our close up.
My god! She was hideous.
Worst cast of bait and switch I’ve ever seen.

I want to be positive. Stop the whining. But every so often something happens that depresses me. This journal seems like a viable outlet, but I said I would stop whining. This generally happens when someone describes how the world works for them with the assumption that it works that way for everyone, and I know it doesn’t work that way for me.

I’m tired.
I didn’t sleep well last night because I was nervous about the Corporate Challenge event today. Unknown Challenge. I had to be at West Edmonton Mall by 8:15. I would have taken my scooter, but it was raining. It has actually been raining all day. If you have to be stuck in a mall all day, this was the day.
On a personal note: I hate West Edmonton Mall. None of the natives go there, it’s just the tourists. I only seem to go when relatives are visiting, or something forces me to go. Like a movie. I think they don’t pump enough oxygen in that place because it always sucks the life out of me. The only store I really like there is the Garden Bakery, conveniently close to the movie theatre. They have really good deserts at cheap prices. Anyway, back to the Corporate Challenge.
The first event was at Galaxyland. It was one of the rides where you sit in chairs on a revolving platform and use laser guns to hit as many small green lights as possible. I don’t know how well we did, but it was fun. Afterwards, we had to wait around 45 minutes for the next event.
The second event was a scavenger hunt (their term, not mine). We were given a list of twenty questions that we had to get the answers to. We split into two teams, connected by cell phones. We were doing fairly well, but we got tripped up by trying to find the Kang Hsi vase. We found several vases all over the mall, but couldn’t find the Kang Hsi one. We eventually got it, but we wasted a lot of time doing so. It was a fun event though.
The third event was the food challenge. Lloyd was to try and finish a tub of foreign ice cream in two and a half minutes. Tania had to shovel it into his mouth. This was in front of the Asian megafood store, so the ice cream flavors were weird. He nearly finished his tub in the time allotted. After that we went to Moxies for lunch. Lloyd didn’t have much to eat.
The fourth event was at the shooting range. I thought that we could get the people who had experience shooting to do it. But since Tania and Lloyd had done the food challenge, Patti and I had to do the shooting range. Five bullets and a target. I didn’t like it. Guns make me nervous. I tried to be calm when a was squeezing the trigger, but with loud bangs happening all around me, that was difficult. I was able to hit my paper all five times, but only three were in the target area. Patti only hit her paper twice, and none were in the target.
By the time the last challenge came around we were pretty lethargic. Mall air. It was a short and simple one. Two people (Lloyd and Patti) were blindfolded and the other two (Patti and me) had their hands tied. The blindfolded people had to put a jigsaw puzzle together while the others directed them. We didn’t do that well. The big problem wasn’t getting the pieces into the correct spots, but getting the pieces to fit together. It is apparently very hard to do when you are blindfolded.
We’ve now been given a list of some other challenges we have to do during the week, but anyone from our companies can do them. We did find that one was at the Argyll Plaza Hotel where my parents stayed last week. I’ll probably be doing that one. I don’t have a lot of time for this though because I have a busy schedule during the week.
Overall, the challenge was fun except for the long wait times between events. I think they had those so the challengers would spend time shopping.
I’m taking it easy for the rest of the week. I’m not going to New City tonight, and I’ll probably sleep in tomorrow. I need to do some treadmill still.

So I just completed the Power Pull event for Corporate Challenge. Last year we ended up in fourth place. This year it was raining whenever we pulled.
In our first match, we lost. However we made them pull long and hard to beat us. We could have beaten them if we had used the correct technique, but we were off. So although it looked like we would win at the start, we eventually caved in. That didn’t mean we were out though. There is a round-robin pool between us and four other teams. The next three matches, we beat everyone. Usually quite easily. In fact, the people who beat us, Associated Engineering, were beaten by The City of Spruce Grove, whom we beat. In the end, it came down to time taken to win, and so we came out of our pool in first place.
So we were in the finals. Unexpected since we lost one match, but hey! Now we were competing against seven other teams. We won the first match. So that put us in the top four. Unfortunately we lost the next match to Dynatech (or something like that). But then we got to compete for the third place.
And we won!
I now have a bronze medal for the Corporate Challenge Power Pull. I feel great. I’ve got a nice little high of some self-esteem going that feels good. Dynatech went on to win the whole thing, so I wonder if we could have beaten Grant-Thorton who came in second. We never lost to anyone who lost to them, so we might have.
I have to get up early tomorrow to take part in the Unknown Challenge. I think it is like Fear Factor.

My back hurts.

So I saw both doctors today.
Foot Doctor: I can try running a bit on the treadmill. 1km run, then 0.5km walk. Do that for six km, or stop if I feel any pain. I’m going off to try that now. He also gave approval to the new runners I bought awhile ago, and I can use them instead of sandals.
Family Doctor: I am alive.
It was really a get-to-know-you meeting. I made an appointment for a checkup in a month. It will be right before my trip to Winnipeg.
At work I found out where my office is when we move to the west end of Edmonton. We will now have offices instead of cubicles. No more collaborating over the walls. (Although collaboration was often about non-work related topics.) I also get to have a window. Unfortunately it doesn’t open so I can’t throw waterbombs at passersby. I also don’t have enough room for a decent putting green.
In my current cubicle I have an executive golf putter that I’ve set up. I’m also running a pool. Pay a quarter and then take a shot from a really far distance away. If you sink it in the wooden hole, you get half the pot. It’s been a good game because the floor is uneven and you have to do some weird things to get it in. A difficult lie.
But with summer here the floor must have shifted. Old tactics don’t work anymore. So the pot has grown. Before, it never got above $13 before someone won. Today it was up to $29 before Keith finally sunk it and walked away with $14.50. A week ago I watched Kevan pay $5 for twenty shots and he didn’t make one.
I’m making my co-workers gambling addicts.

Okay. I have a long day tomorrow, so I’ll make this quick. (Ha ha. When has that ever happened.)
The parents have come and gone. I’ve taken them out to dinners. I’ve taken them to theatre. I let them ride on my scooter. We got me a new table from Ikea. I’ve been busy. Right now I’m exhausted.
I abandoned them yesterday evening to get weighed for the Corporate Challenge Power Pull. We have to be under 3,000 lbs. We weighed 2360 lbs. The rules this year favor the fat a lot more, and apparently we don’t have fat people with company spirit.
After the weighing I went to Improv class. The class is too big, and I don’t care for the subject that they taught. We were doing a lot of games that seemed to just make Improv harder with very little return.
Work isn’t that exciting. I’m trying to rework the open file dialog in our product on the Mac, and the Navigation Services API is fighting me. Apple has not documented this area sufficiently, so there is a lot of guesswork. And pondering.
Tomorrow I have not one, but two doctor appointments. The first one is for my foot. I’m hoping it is getting better, but ever since I went dancing on Saturday evening/Sunday morning it has been hurting again. I took a short run on the treadmill for seven minutes, and it hurt a bit, so I stopped.
The second appointment is with a general practitioner. I’m trying to get myself a family doctor again.
On Friday the Corporate Challenge Power Pull is taking place. We’re going to get slaughtered.
I need to design the next D&D game. I have to create my own mutant creature. I would tell you more, but I have a fear that one of my player’s will eventually figure out that I have a journal. I think this game would be more fun if I had some other DM to discuss things with. A sounding board if you will.
Anyway, I’ll try and post tomorrow. But no promises.

My parents are visiting from Winnipeg. They came in today at around 4:00. My place is mostly clean, but not perfect. They aren’t staying with me because I don’t have any extra beds and they are getting up there in age. My father seemed impressed with my place which is nice.
We went out to dinner at Osaka. It’s a nearby Japanese restaurant that has an all-you-can-eat sushi option. So we gorged ourselves. Afterwards they went back to their hotel. We’re going to have breakfast tomorrow at a Barb and Ernie’s (a local restaurant).
They toured all over Alberta on their way to Edmonton. They were looking for a good place to retire to. They had some excitement when crossing Roger’s Pass.
Their brakes failed going down a mountain.
The emergency brake didn’t work either. But eventually the brakes started working again and they were able to stop. They got towed to Revelstoke where they got it repaired. Apparently the emergency brake had gotten locked on somehow and overheated. When the brakes overheat they stop working.
The irony is that before the trip they had the car checked out thoroughly. The mechanic, when he heard that they would be going over Roger’s Pass, determined that he would look extra hard at the brakes. Apparently not hard enough.
I love my parents and all, but it is a bit of a hassle to have them visit. I have stuff I need to do, or would like to do, but I can’t when I should be entertaining them. This past month I’ve been stressed and not getting enough sleep. With the year end of my condo ownership coming up, D&D games to prepare, and other worries, I need a vacation, like a long weekend. Technically I should be in one right now, but when you have relatives visiting, it’s not relaxing.
Anyway, if I’m having breakfast with them tomorrow, I need to go to bed. See you tomorrow… (maybe.)

I’m giving up. She wasn’t there and probably will never be at New City again. I lost my one chance with a really good looking girl because I wasn’t forward enough to ask for (or give) a phone number. Have I been ignoring other women that were interested in me while looking for the mythical Melissa.
I met Steve at the bar though. He’s a friend of Jake who just got back from a vacation where he visited all his relatives in Denmark. When the subject of all the beautiful girls in the place came up, he asked why I didn’t talk to them. Lack of social skills. He said I should just go up and talk to them. It’s easy. At least he makes it sound easy. He was commenting on sitting alone, but that he was going to be sleeping with someone tonight. He didn’t sound like he was bragging.
I need more self esteem to talk to girls. I don’t feel comfortable approaching them unless I get an indication that they are interested in my existence. I usually try and make eye contact with one and smile at them. Only one girl in memory has ever smiled back: Melissa. (Do I have a creepy smile?) If I don’t get the smile, I don’t get the confidence that I need.
A theory that I’ve got in my head is that I’ll get social self-esteem if I had a girlfriend. (Hell, a one night stand would be ideal too.) But to get the girlfriend, I’m going to need the social self-esteem first. I see myself in a vicious circle. I really should have learned these skills while I was in school. Back then it would be okay if you didn’t have them because everyone was learning. But at my age, everyone assumes you have them already. And if you don’t, well that’s just creepy.
When I left the bar at around 1:00, I lingered in the front for a few minutes. I did talk to a girl who said that she wanted to hurt someone. She was upset because security wouldn’t allow her back in the bar. I suspect it’s because she was having trouble with standing upright without swaying. I didn’t mention that as the reason, because I don’t feel comfortable arguing with drunk people.
Well, I’ve got to stop whining. So far this journal seems to have been just a medium for me to whine about how pathetic my life is. No one is interested in reading about that. So I’m going to try and be more positive now.

I had improv class today.
I think the class is too big. It’s hard to get actual stage time with so many people. In addition, I screwed something up at the start that seemed to affect the rest of the class. The first game had us mingling at an office party and just talking in gibberish. I wasn’t involved in any exciting activities at this party, unlike the other students, and the rest of the class was spent analyzing the party and seeing what the effects would be the next day.
The only other scene that I was involved in I don’t think went well. I want to blame the person who was supposed to be my inner monologue, but I’m not good at assigning blame like that. My hands are probably equally dirty.
The class was supposed to end at 9:30, but I didn’t get out of there until 10:30. I really need to get to sleep now, but I felt I had to write some things into the journal before.
Mostly I felt I needed to respond to Canticle post about his day of success and failure. From what I’m hearing he did the right thing, and I hope he realizes that too.
Now I really need to go to bed. I haven’t had a decent night’s sleep in awhile, and I’ve got a lot of stress coming down the pipe.

So a bunch of us took our scooters tooling around town. I had the fun of going up Groat road and enjoying all its twists and turns. The high point for me was when we were on Whyte Avenue waiting at a light. A pretty girl walking by smiled at me when I smiled at her. It’s small things like that that mean a lot to me. We were to far to talk, but it was a nice boost to my self-confidence. I guess the stories are true: Scooters are good for picking up chicks. 🙂
Unfortunately, I’ll need to buy another helmet if I want to actually pick one up. Legally anyway.
After riding around we went to Hawrelak park and had a barbecue. It was fun. We had hotdogs and some trout. Mostly guys though, or girlfriends of guys.
A bunch of them were playing dominos for money. They started out at quarters, and the goal seemed to be to win enough to buy a tank of gas. Which would be about $5.
By about 9:00 it was over and I went home.

So I didn’t sleep in too badly today and I was on the exer-cycle by 10:00. I did two hours of that, then relaxed for awhile. I then hopped on my scooter and went to a park, stopping at a McDonalds on the way. At the park there was a Corporate Challenge practice for the tug of war. There wasn’t many groups there, and none in our division. So we were pulling against very stacked teams. Needless to say, we didn’t do that well in the practice. Often, we were in perfect form, but our feet skidded across the grass because the other team didn’t have much weight to pull against. We know a bit what to look for in our technique. We also need more weight.
I’m about to go on a scooter club event where we’re going to scoot to Hawrelak park and have a barbecue there. It’s been a beautiful day so far, but the clouds are starting to roll in. Environment Canada says there is a 30% chance of rain this evening.
Hope it doesn’t.

I’m getting worried about my foot. It isn’t healing as fast as I want. I know that on June 2nd I have to run 5.3 miles, and on June 20th I want to do the Manitoba Marathon (42.2 km). I took it out for a test spin yesterday, and only ran 7.5 minutes. I think I felt some pain, so I stopped. When I woke up this morning it felt a little painful. I’ve been slopping on an anti-inflammatory. After I did the exercycle today, I used some cold compress on it. I hope this thing heals faster.
I think I should see the foot doctor again, but I don’t think I have any new information for him. I should probably just continue to keep off of it.