I Didn’t Think it Was That Obvious.

I went to Wisconsin this weekend to see my parents. I took Carter with. He and I don’t spend a lot of time together by ourselves. It was nice. We bought some good cheese. I upgraded my Dad’s computer to XP so he could run a webcam so they could see the kids more often. I almost royally messed up his computer, but was able to get it back and running better than before without too much loss of data. My Dad and I went to see the new Bond movie. It was kind of a disappointment. Casino Royale was awesome, and this one just seemed like a setup for future movies with a plot that was pretty thin.

Winter hockey has started, and I’m playing in the upper division which is a combination of A and B league. Myself and 3 other guys managed to get ourselves on an established team of locals. (Fucking locals). Anyway, we’re 0-4 so the locals are all pissy. The “captain”, Todd, gave us a speech before the game about how if the game was close he was going to be calling lines, we had all paid to play, but we want to have fun and losing isn’t fun.

JJ, the ex-Canadian Junior and best player on our team, had called out on the bench last game that the locals should calm down that everyone paid to play and this was for fun. I guess the locals, including Todd, didn’t like that.

I wanted to chime in after Todd gave his speech that if you can’t lose and still have fun then why the fuck are you still playing? Winning is fun, but I like playing the game enough that I don’t mind if we lose. We’ve been competitive every game and a few bad goals have been the difference. So we were down like 7-3 going into the third last night, and then we start to rally and bring it to 7-5 in the last 2 minutes. I figure Todd is going to start calling lines, he doesn’t. What a dick. He scolds us like children and then doesn’t man up and act when we actually get a chance to win. We ended up scoring one more goal and losing by one. One of the four we brought into their team isn’t very good. He’s not a strong skater. The locals have singled him out as the reason for our terrible start. It’s not that none of them are really producing. It’s his entire fault. It’s always easy to blame someone else.

These guys are so obsessed with winning it’s affecting their game. If they would just focus on playing the game and having fun I think winning would take care of itself. It’s kind of like your campy teenage / college get laid or die trying movie. The more they obsess over it, the harder it is to achieve.

Losing All Hope is Freedom

I don’t know if my lack of posting has been a result of being busier than I normally am at work, or if my life has drifted into that gray area of nothing interesting or anecdotal happening to post about.

I’m not sure what goals I’m supposed to have in life right now. I have a job, am married, have a house, have kids, have a hobby/pastime. I’m not sure what I’m supposed to look for on the horizon. Retirement, not dying prematurely, I just don’t know. I’m starting to feel better about the amount of time I’m spending on things I enjoy and don’t really enjoy but are necessary.

I’ve panicked a couple times about dying recently. That had gone away, but now it’s back. I was watching the movie Dinosaurs with Carter, lying on the floor, and it just hit me like a bucket of cold water. Long term, broad spectrum topics like extinction, the breadth of the universe, and things like that have a habit of tripping the panic in my brain. It was full blown heart racing panic, the kind when you look the wrong way and start to cross the street and a car veers out of the way while you stand there with a stupid look on your face.

The two are related. The goals of being a better father, a better spouse, a better hockey player, a better employee, are all hard and have vague nuanced payoffs. It’s easy to achieve major life milestones, but to excel at them takes focused time and effort.

I answered my own question.