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Jordan Peterson on May 3, 2018 (Letter To A Friend)

May 21, 2018 — 1 Comment

One of my best friends bought me a ticket to see Jordan Peterson at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre in Toronto. Here’s the email I sent him: *Edit: The name tag says “Bucko”*

‘Yo!

So here’s my thoughts on the show. Unfortunately my audio recorder stopped recording after I put it back in my pocket. Rookie mistake…

Honestly though, there weren’t any new revelations, just paraphrasing some of the chapters at his own pace and off the top of his head (not scripted!). But I would commend him on being more clear and direct with his message.

In reference to chapter 6, Peterson touched on the van massacre and said that the driver aimed low, and he apparently arrived in court looking like he was going to accept a medal.

The biggest themes he touched on were standing up straight, telling the truth, and listening to people like they know something you don’t. As his tour goes on I’m sure things will shift at their own volition.

One of the biggest take-always I gotta say is that I talked with some of the people I was in line with (one gave me and many others the same name-tag), and an older married couple sitting beside me. Both times I was asked how I found out about him (the whole pronoun thing, more specifically the 24Hrs newspaper letter he wrote defending himself which hooked me in). There was a sense of “individual comradery” which I mean that we are not followers of Peterson because he doesn’t take the responsibility for us and therefore is our leader. That’s what tyrants do. He reminds us that we can take responsibility for ourselves and we attend his lectures in context to our own individual lives.

This is well written enough I think I’ll include it on my blog.

This was awesome dude, I wish you were here, thank you very much. I really feel like I see someone who will be remembered like Jung, and his fellow peers.

The VIP package that I got included a picture and got a question in…

Peterson: *shakes hand* “You’re very brave to wear that name-tag.”
Me: “Yeah well…” *shrug*
*photo taken*
Me: “Your symbol in between the chapters and all over our website and stuff… did you make that?”
Peterson: “Yes I did. 30 years ago. It’s this big and about that thick…” *gestures about 3 feet wide and about a foot thick* “It’s a symbol for music.”
I shake his hand and say: “Keep up the good work, doctor.” ‘
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Summertime In The Void: Myself in an Isolation Tank

September 5, 2014 — Leave a comment

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Last night I had the pleasure of visiting Toronto’s brand new isolation tank-spa (is that the right term?), called Float Toronto. I won’t bore anyone with the tech, but if you’re curious to know exactly what “floating” is, just check it out on Wikipedia. This was my first float I’ve ever done, and was really looking forward to it for the last couple of months.

Once I got showered up, and dimmed the room’s light, I got in.

It took me a few minutes to get relaxed, and ricochet myself off the edges of the tank enough so I was perfectly centered, and not touching anything. It feels great to float in really shallow water, thanks to the epsom salts.

I played with closing my eyes for a bit to see the difference of the darkness vs. my eyes closed, and there was none. You know how when you close your eyes and you see the ghosting of everything you’ve been looking at? Well, I just stared at them, and breathed really slow. After whatever amount of time of doing that, I saw an orange-chromed alien space ship with multi-coloured lights, which also looked like an orange slice (because the panels on the ship looked like sections of an orange). I saw this for what seemed like a split second, and then all the ghosting in my eyes slowly turned into a dark grey shape. This shape revealed itself as flower petals, that I was witnessing from the inside. I watched these petals bloom outward, as I watched dark grey spores float upward, away from me. Then a short time later, I’m pretty sure I fell asleep for the rest of the float. I forget the dream, but I only remember seeing my brother when we were just kids (like 7 or 8 yrs. old), this is something I’ve never remembered dreaming of before. I woke up to the sound of music, which Float Toronto uses to let people know it’s the end of the session. The music I didn’t like, until I realized sometime after it reminded me of the title screen music from the first Mass Effect game.

Waking up felt sort of strange. I knew I was asleep but when I opened my eyes it was still dark. I got up, and awkwardly opened the door. Stepping out of the tank was like when you see those guys in Sci-Fi movies come out of their stasis pods, and are all like “ughhh…fuuuuuck”. I say this because even with the very dimmed lights in the room, I felt pretty sensitive. I blindly made my 3-step motion to the shower for a good post-float scrub down, and started getting used to gravity, and light again.

After leaving the spa, I looked at Queen St. W. with fresh eyes, and the environment seemed new again. I put on some Com Truise in my ears, and started to groove on the beats, thinking about what I saw and dreamed about, and made notes so I wouldn’t forget. On the bus I quickly became annoyed at all the noise going on. I felt like it was all unnecessary, and everyone should just shut-up. I got home safe, and was thinking about how I should tell my lady the crazy stuff I saw.

I must say this was a great experience, and made me appreciate true peace and quiet, with no gravity pulling me down. It was a natural high, and soaking in the water left my skin on my butt nice and soft. Yeah. That’s right.

I want to thank Float Toronto for being super nice, and accommodating. I’m looking forward to my next 2 floats!

Boom.

-G

Rob Ford = The Penguin

November 27, 2012 — 1 Comment

So Toronto’s mayor Rob Ford, has finally been impeached. Many citizens are probably breathing a sigh of relief. I was talking to my girlfriend about it, and she said that Rob Ford looks like an ugly version of The Penguin. This got my gears turning, so I cranked out these memes celebrating his over-throw. I hope you enjoy.

Bathroom 059

November 1, 2012 — Leave a comment

I know I’ve been getting slow with updates. It’s funny when you never have time to just sit and think. Most of my thoughts come in between tasks, and if I remember, I’ll get them down to post. Anyway, on with my LATE bathroom pic….
I forget the name of this place, but they dump a bucket of cooked seafood ON THE TABLE, and you eat like an animal. I’m talking King Crab, Blue Crab, un-peeled shrimp, corn, sausage, and a whole lotta NOM NOM NOM. This was on 6th, in Austin, TX. My band, The Rabid Whole, was down for SXSW, so we decided to try it. And the chow was not cow, but from starboard bow! AH-HYUK! Thems rhymin’ words.

The Rabid Whole NEWS!

October 4, 2012 — Leave a comment

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Lots of stuff happening with The Rabid Whole lately! If you don’t know who my band is, just click The Rabid Whole tab on my blog.

First thing, we recently shot a music video for our song “Future”. It’s currently being edited and we can’t wait to show the world when it’s done!

We played Toronto and Ottawa, few weeks back, and we rocked the hell out of those cities! Lithium Magazine did a interview with us at the Toronto show, so here’s the video. Though ignore the mention of a tour for this fall (we may have shot off about that way too soon. But be patient!)

The Rabid Whole is nominated for a Toronto Independent Music Award in the “Best Electronic” catagory, so the band is going to be attending the awards this Saturday. Here’s the press release about it. We will be wearing our finest polyester to this shindig. 😛

Our next show is during Indie Week, here in Toronto next week. Here’s the Facebook event.

And if you’d like, here’s a full stream of our most recent album “Refuge“.

Hopefully I’ll see some of you at one of our shows!

On a personal note, I’ve helped brought lighting to The Rabid Whole’s live show, which I’m pretty proud of. I learned a whole whack load of new tech stuff in a weekend!

For my fellow Canadians, have a lovely Thanksgiving, this weekend.

Boom.

-G

Bathroom 055

October 2, 2012 — Leave a comment

Ahh yes. I remember this place exactly. I really needed to pee. After washing my hands, and getting this snapshot, I saw a sticker for a band with a very cool name. I forgot what it was. Shortly after coming out, a southern bell in front of the entrance of the bar, stood before me with goggles on her head. She pointed out how she liked mine. She said her name was “Eevee”. I turned to my bass player, Oscar, and we both thought “Pokemon!”.