I’m much too sore after having so little fun over …

I’m much too sore after having so little fun over the weekend. Saturday I stayed at home doing things so meaningless I cannot even remember what they were. Watched Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, which was one of the stupidest movies I’ve ever seen, but had me laughing pretty hard nonetheless. I also watched Heat, which was awful. It was all I could do to bother watching the ending. Full of meaningless shots, bad editing, shallow acting and piss-poor direction if any at all, it was quite a disappointment.

Then, fed up with all of this meaninglessness, I went outside for some Aimless Meandering. I ended up at DV8 to chat about putting on a stage version of a Star Trek episode with Alien, Paul and Dean. Half of the tables had been moved out into the empty lot next door where a group of foreigners was having a little barbeque/fireworks-themed gathering. I don’t like DV8, I have to say. It was ok back in the good ol’ days when Seamus was the DJ, but there’s really no reason to go there anymore. Peso is much better, or at least it was the last time I went, which was months ago. I don’t even know if it’s still open.

With half of the tables gone, the place felt like a rat-infested warehouse, almost totally devoid of character. I think our moods suited the atmosphere as well. Dean regaled us with tales of Bar Fights Old and New, and a curly-headed Canadian fellow tried to convince me that his level of consciousness was superior to everyone else because he hadn’t gotten married, and that cell phones are inherently evil. I had to disagree with him on the second point since I adhere to the “Cell Phones don’t Annoy People; People Annoy People” doctrine. In other words, not a lot of Star Trek-related business was taken care of. We’re looking at maybe doing Journey to Babel.

Yesterday, Sunday, I spent a few hours making several final edits in the Damn Book before being seduced by the wonderfully sunny day outside. I walked down to the Gongguan MRT station and took the subway to Jingmei, where I thought I might scope out the housing situation there, since it’s next to a mountain park area but has lots of restaurants and stores as well. I soon found that there’s only one real estate agency there, and it just opened two days ago. The agent showed me a couple of small, windowless rooms for more than I am paying now, and I concluded that I wouldn’t be actually saving money by living in that area, so why bother? If I’m going to move out of downtown, I might as well go all the way out to Danshui, Beitou or Xindian. Otherwise, I might as well just stay in the city and look for a place on a quiet alley near one of those small parks. It will be a long, slow search, methinks. Which is ok, as I’m not having too terrible a time where I am now.

I picked up a bottle of wine and went home to change before I went to sword practice. I keep meaning to stop attending, but there always seems to be something keeping me coming back. I would also like to start studying pushing-hand techniques or other styles as well. Our bearded lawyer friend Brian Kennedy wrote an article about foreigners studying martial arts in Taiwan that includes some quotes from me, but I have no idea if or when it will be published. The CTS TV news piece was on Sunday night. My Japanese roomie and I watched it in our living room, and then when I went downstairs the old doorman told me that he had seen it as well. He was all smiles as he described his surprise to see me stuttering for the camera. I’m glad he enjoyed it, though.

In other media, the ICRT interview is proceeding as planned. Jeff Steele, who interviewed me over the phone, picked up a cassette tape I made when I was in the army with my Walkman and a microphone. Listening to it the past couple of days has made me more than a little nostalgic for my time in the army. I made most of the recordings from my bunk, around Taps, when the older soldiers would give us rookies a piece of their minds, and Reville, when the summertime cicadas and birds were just waking up. I miss it, actually. More than that, I miss me, me at that time. Sometimes I think the army was the end of my youth.

Perhaps that is one of the reasons I just want to get the Damn Book published and done with; it’s time I moved on to other things. I need to decide which local publisher to go with: Asian Culture or Defense Technology. The former has a broader base and more publishing experience, while the latter has a (probably) better understanding of the book’s contents. Part of me, quite a lot of me, actually, just wants to be rid of the thing. But I also want to get as much as I can out of it before I do so.

All the Audiogalaxy-inspired bouncing about me abode, the long treks around Jingmei and other nearby environs, and finally sword practice conspired to make waking up this morning more than a little uncomfortable. Luckily I found some analgesic cream in the medicine cabinet, so that I can smell funny as well as move funny. If you’re going to be sore, you might as well go all out.