I have come to conclude....

that there are certain principles of relationships that are the same irrespective of the identity of the parties involved.

1) Never let emotions or a perceived deadline rush you into a decision that you might later regret.
2) Do not judge an individual on their appearance. Ever.

I made both mistakes today.

Ok, let's be honest, I've made both mistakes millions of times. But today was the first time that I made the mistake in such quick succession that it made me realize that I might be generating trouble for myself in a few weeks time.

The beauty of this is that it does not only apply in the situation of picking a partner for a final assignment... but that it works for almost every social interaction imaginable where you have to make a decision to pick a person... for whatever reason.

Scenario 1:
You are getting old and getting pressure everywhere that you should get married. You succumb to this FALSE (fume for a bit) pressure and rush out to find a woman in your social circle. There are many potential suitors, but one that you're not entirely sure of. She's there, but you've never really gotten to know her and she doesn't come across as particularly appealing. You pick out of the limited pool of women left and get engaged. (Yes the scenario is absurd.)

A day later you get a chance to hang out with the other girl. You find out that in fact she's perfect. But of course the commitment is already made. (I've already established that the situation is somewhat absurd... is it really that difficult to imagne a final decision in this...geez. Haters.)

Scenario 2:
You are a businessman looking for a partner. There are potential people out there, but not many as others in your circle of influence are beginning to seize other opportunities. There is one person that you're not so sure of, and another that you know very well what you're going to get... but also not sure of. Feeling a false sense of pressure to decide quickly, you go with the one that you know what you're getting.

At a business lunch later that day, you find out the other person was perfect. But of course it's too late. The contracts signed and its done.

Scenario 3:
Girls. You all know what I'm talking about. I don't feel like typing out a 3rd scenario.

Moral of the story. I'm an idiot.

But of course, we all knew that already didn't we?

The pretentiousness of reading your own writing

I wonder if authors sit and read their own books again and again. This suggests some sort of pretentious arrogance - that something you wrote was worth reading more than once.

Of course, if other people think it worthy of reading more than once, why shouldn't you.

This particular vein of thought sprang forth as I rediscovered a blog I created some time ago. You can read it here. It's called "Devotions with Jonathan" and it's all about the Bible. If you're not Christian, you might not find it interesting - but you never know. I'm pretty poetic sometimes. (Yes I'm aware that makes me look like an egotistical airhead.)

My life has changed much since I wrote those blogs three years ago. One might even say that I've taken many steps backwards from those days. It's funny, because everything that I say there is still just as relevant to my life, but in a totally different way. Strange how that works. Reading those blogs, I feel like past Jonathan is finger wagging future Jonathan. And I can't even resort to the platitudal "Don't judge me" or "Don't tell me what to do" for obvious reasons. (Can you imagine someone telling themselves "don't tell me what to do?" The absurdity of the situation makes me actually laugh out loud.)

And yet my heart seems to have hardened somewhere along the line. I find myself caring less. I find myself nostalgically reminscing that those were good times, but things are different now. But pray tell what's so different now? I seem to have been a better person then; at least this is what my writings suggest.

My writings also suggest that my writing style has changed somewhat since then. I don't write in such long sentences. My thoughts are more clipped. I have far more paragraphs than I need. Apparently, the hours of video gaming have finally turned my brain into mush.

I was going to talk about a new endeavour that I was considering. That new endeavour seems like a poor choice after having spent the last hour reading my devotional blog.

Spiritual conviction is a funny thing.

Random musings

I often wonder at the phenomena of tweets these days. It's like the lazy person's blogging. Instead of taking the time to formulate a well-written, articulate blog post, people decide that they need to report their lives in 150 characters or less.

One begins to wonder whether anyone actually cares about the tweets and lives of others. The irony of this, of course, is that this blog also goes out to the vast wilderness that is cyberspace, to be consumed by all who care to read it - and then promptly forgotten as the wild musings of that crazy guy... who I don't even like anyway.

Short, clipped statements. I wonder what it is that makes the sentences get longer the more years of education that one has. Then the tweet arrives. Is it a revolution against those years of educational training that suggest to you that the more words you can fit into a sentence, the more academically chic you are? Does the pendulum swing and give us indication that we are moving towards a generation of peoples that express themselves in less than 150 characters?

I've been watching a lot of Mad Men recently. You know, the TV show? It intrigues me how brilliantly written some of the material in that show is. Layer upon layer to be peeled back only for you to realize that the layer has somehow gotten back on again to be unwrapped once more. When you peel the layer back again, you see it's strange and obscure connection with the previous layer... which you find once again wrapped on the package of the story. Intricate. Complicated.

Just the way I like it.

It was of course recommended to me by a friend who decided that Japan was a much cooler place to be than Canada. He may be right - both literally and figuratively. I can't speak for the literally part, I'll have to ask him, but I'll go with the figuratively. I mean, what is cooler than obscure Japanese anime where plot twists twist upon themselves to reveal yet another twist of the plot.

Final question: Does the above seem like one trying too hard? It really shouldn't, this post was whipped up in a frenzy of typing and took all of... 4 minutes. Perhaps more. Probably more.

As a side note, if you are confused - consider yourself not alone. I'm confused too. If you get it - enlighten me.

Because the above wasn't supposed to make sense.

Maybe you're the crazy one.