Ahead by a Century - Tragically Hip

I meant to include a picture with this one, but for whatever reason Blogger said "No!". I assume they've been taken over by a small hoarde of enraged waterfowl, intent on restriction of civil liberties. They have begun by witholding photo-posting privileges. Clearly they are jerks.

1. My full name is Christopher Charles Rivers.
2. I wanted to be known as “Charlie” for a brief period of time last year.
3. Less than two dozen people, who aren’t related to me, call me “Chris”.
4. I’m technically a 21-year-old male.
5. According to many, I’m actually a 14-year-old girl.
6. Sappy, romantic movies hold more attraction to me then people being blown up.
7. I often cry in the movies, and try very hard to hide it.
8. St. Ives Apricot facial scrub is currently rocking my world.
9. I am endlessly concerned about my weight.
10. I’m not gay.
11. I have four peers I would trust with my life.
12. I have two I would trust with my deepest secret.
13. I would trust Ian Breneman with anything bigger than either of those two.
14. I had 3 major life goals in Grade 10: attend university, have sex, see the Maple Leafs win a Stanley Cup.
15. I don’t believe 66% is a good mark. On anything.
16. I have met three people I consider marrying.
17. I have told two of them this.
18. I used to fall in love too easily.
19.Now I worry I’ll never fall in love again.
20. I’m afraid that 100 things about me is way too narcissistic.
21. I hate it when people talk about my love life without me there to correct them, or provide insight.
22. I hate it even more when people call me a manwhore.
23. I dislike one-night stands, but kinda like short flings.
24. I can name every girl I’ve ever kissed.
25. I was described as ‘grounded’ and ‘subtle’ by one of them.
26. I have never used either of those words to describe me publicly.
27. Nor, I imagine, has anyone else.
28. She was correct on both counts.
29. I expect no one reading this to believe either me or her.
30. I am too competitive for my own good.
31. I haven’t lost at Scrabble in a long, long time.
32. I am terrible at poker, mostly since I can’t bluff.
33. I vastly prefer brutal, painful, soul-rending honesty to even the most well-intentioned of white lies.
34. I can get over anything, if people are honest. I can’t if they’re not.
35. I run at about 99% honesty, 1% failed attempt at concealing things.
36. I am about as good with my hands as a retarded chimpanzee.
37. I once put together a Wal-Mart bought bookcase 7 different incorrect ways, before dumb luck prevailed.
38. I will make excuses to postpone everything else I’m doing, if I have a book I’m intense on.
39. Without any exaggeration, owing to Australia, speed reading and a day off, I was probably the first person in the world to finish the most recent Harry Potter book.
40. I chose my thesis by choosing my thesis supervisor, and picking a topic she’d like.
41. She transferred to another school.
42. I still love my topic.
43. I want to get a law degree and a Master’s, and there’s only one program I’m seriously considering.
44. I still am unsure about the idea of living in Ottawa.
45. I have the best family life I’ve ever heard of.
46.I’ve said that before on this blog.
47. I feel bad for people who can’t call their parents or siblings to ask anything at any time.
48. My biggest concern in life is that someone will think I’m using them.
49. I have met people who learned this, and used it against me.
50. Traveling in Australia made me more relaxed, easy-going and willing to go with the flow.
51. I’m having trouble finding my place living off-campus.
52. I miss being able to visit anyone I knew in less than 3 minutes.
53. I don’t miss being woken up at 3am by fire alarms, kayaks or vomiting.
54. I love being recognized when I walk around campus.
55. Senior admin knows me well enough to ridicule me when I’m making a walk of shame.
56. I don’t know whether to be proud of that, or worried.
57. I still can’t believe that I get paid to announce varsity sports events.
58. I spend more time reading about sports than I do for school.
59. I wonder if this means I’m doing the wrong thing.
60. I have posed with Paul Martin, kissed Amanda Marshall and had a phone interview with Paul Henderson.
61. None compared to meeting Peter Zezel at the Georgetown Mall.
62. I’m not actually a Conservative, but I am actually a conservative.
63. I don’t expect you to get the distinction.
64. If you do, I’ll probably see you in class this week some time.
65. I voted and campaigned NDP in the last provincial election.
66. Kids with skateboards have always terrified me.
67. I’m not politically correct.
68. I often have trouble talking with people who are.
69. People who use personal experiences in intellectual debates are often setting themselves up to be hurt.
70. People who hold grudges because of that are foolish.
71. Formal, structured debating in Canada is full of fools.
72. I very rarely win arguments, despite often winning debates.
73. I think sex is overrated.
74. I think making out is awesome.
75. The best kiss of my life was my first kiss ever.
76. I wish girls would just be open with guys on all counts.
77. The converse holds true.
78. I would walk roughly three kilometers, at 2am, in the middle of winter, to see a girl I liked.
79. Professors Duke, Pyrcz, Franceschet (both) and Dennis are people I want to emulate.
80. I love sports – playing, watching, following.
81. I’m good at Ultimate, good at squash, good at baseball.
82. I’m crap at soccer, crap at tennis, crap at basketball.
83. I once did an organized 10km race on a whim.
84. I did it in 0:56:22 in hiking boots, a mesh-back ball cap and Hawaiin clothing.
85. I want my first male kid’s name to be Kalten Charles Rivers.
86. Clifford Charles Rivers is also acceptable.
87. I don’t have any ideas for female names, but ‘Katie’ probably figures into it somewhere.
88. I want my wife to take my last name. A lot.
89. I don’t care that makes me seem backwards and obtuse.
90. I was born in Ontario, but consider myself East Coast because I chose to live here.
91. I wish I had been born in Newfoundland.
92. I love Scouts and being a Scout leader.
93. Anyone who thinks that Scouts is lame just had crappy leaders.
94. I shudder to think that one day my younger brother will be bigger than me.
95. I love to sing songs loudly and badly as they play on my computer.
96. This often leads to me being startled by people coming up behind me.
97. When that happens, I may chase them around the house with a frying pan.
98. White wine is in, red wine is out.
99. I can’t stand smoking, cheating or hypocrisy.
100. Ian best summed me up when he said "Rivers makes a lot of stupid mistakes, but always has the best of intentions."

Really Don't Want To - Crush

"I wonder what Tony LaRussa thinks when he puts Jason Isringhausen in a one-run game in the ninth inning. I bet it's something approximating this: I would rather chew on glass while walking through a pit of boa constrictors, naked and on fire, than watch this half-inning."

- Peter King, Monday Morning Quarterback, si.com

I often try to stretch bizarre analogies... but this one is absolute gold.

Great Big Sea - Rant and Roar

An Open Letter to the Incredibly Stupid Girl in my Class:

Literally means that something actually happened. It does not mean the same thing as figuratively. Why do people not understand this small and easy point?

Today, and for the sake of anonymity of those who don’t know the English language, you stated - in class, no less - that “During the last election, Paul Martin and Stephen Harper literally tried to take each other’s kneecaps off.”

Holy crap!! Really?! How on Earth can people say politics is boring?! Where was I when THAT happened? All the news coverage I saw just focused on boring, political stuff, like debates over childcare and Canadian’s role as peacekeepers. This is almost as vicious as figure-skating. Harper apparently hired Tonya Harding as a political advisor. Obviously you follow the news much more closely then I do.

I didn’t realize that a WWE match had broken out, with Harper tag-teaming in The Rock to kick Martin, and an aging Hulk Hogan’s ass. I can just imagine Peter Mansbridge, in a cowboy hate and glitter, screaming into the mike “And now, ladies and gentlemen, wearing red, the Conservative Crippler… PAUUULLLL MARTINN!!!! Sadly, in his last match he broke a hip when trying to wrest control of the Liberal Party from Jean Chretien, who finished him with his signature ‘Golf Club to the Head’.”

Oh. Wait. That didn’t happen. Why? Because they FIGURATIVELY TOOK OFF EACH OTHER’S KNEECAPS you useless mass of organic matter!

If you’re unable to use words with more than one syllable correctly, I have for you a suggestion: don’t. Had you just said “During the last election, PM and SH tried to take each other’s kneecaps off” I would have figured out the pragmatics of the situation without having to resort to the semantics. But because you desperately included an extra word in a misguided and unfortunate attempt to sound intelligent, you made a moronic statement.

Believe me- the rest of the class already knows that you’re about as quick off the mark as a retarded ant. There’s no need to reinforce it. I would suggest shutting up and switching into sociology, where they probably applaud your attempt to craft syntactically gorgeous, but completely imbecile phrases, but that would mean suggesting you still belong in a place of higher learning.

Pass grade ten English, then come back and try again.

Sincerely,

Chris Rivers