Hoooo My Lord

I love Morrissey but I don't know what to make of this pic from the inner sleeve of his new album.

Mr. Gladwell Does It Again

I just finished Malcolm Gladwell's third book entitled "Outliers", and as with the previous two, I was totally enthralled. Not to bore you with details about the book that you can look up on Amazon or Wikipedia, it essentially digs up the ol' "nature vs. nurture" argument in how and why people become high-achievers in their respective fields, or so-called statistical "outliers". The book is filled with fascinating theories on such things as why things such as date or year of birth and ethnic background play a huge role in how we as humans succeed (in everything from hockey to rock stardom to billionaire computer conglomerate CEOs). Gladwell takes social science phenomenon that we take for granted and bends them in his classic manner, as he did in "Blink" and "The Tipping Point", and makes you view the world in an entirely different way. Sounds cliche, but his unique vision is a major paradigm shift in many everyday accepted facts. He's been criticized as being a "pop sociologist", but so be it - it's absolutely brilliant. I breezed through the book in about a week and a half (and I've got two other books going also!). The man's a genius.

Coolorado

So last weekend, actually Thursday through Monday, I went with my friend Rob (owner of Bikram Yoga) to Colorado - my first visit there. It was fantastic! We flew into and out of Colorado Springs, but we spent the majority of the time in the town of Silverthorn, about an hour west of Denver near Copper Mountain. The first night there we ice skated at Keystone Village on the largest outdoor ice rink in the U.S., actually a natural lake frozen solid - that was really cool! Then we snowboarded for two solid days straight at Copper. I haven't been snowboarding in two years, but I felt extremely confident and comfortable, like I had been doing it all along, falling only a handful of times and not seriously. The great snow conditions probably had a lot to do with that (compared to the icy, hard conditions we encountered in Nagano two years ago). My equipment worked great, and I was hardly sore at all after two days. The family we stayed with included two guys that graduated from my high school shortly after I did, but whom I hardly knew back then. Rob is our mutual friend (the Philipino connection at its finest!). But it really is a small world because I and those guys and their family know a lot of the same people. Six degrees indeed! Plus, on day two of snowboarding another high school friend that I haven't seen in 20 years and who now lives in Denver doing pediatric nursing came out to spend the day with us on the slopes. It turned out to be a mini-reunion! Coloradians (is that correct?) were so pleasant and laid-back, also; especially in the stores and restaurants. When you get away from the East Coast, you realize how high-strung, aggressive, and OC people are here. I really think we'll end up living in the West Coast area at some point in my life (and eventually back to Japan!). Now I just need to plan my escape from Jacksonville! Who's onboard for the prison break?

Momentary Lapse of Blogging

Yes - I've taken some time off from this blog site, but I'll resume again soon. I'm trying to ween myself off facebook a little bit - it's a time-vampire. The holidays were good and work is picking up. I have a snowboarding trip coming up this weekend, so I'll post again after that. Happy New Year!