Entries from March 2008 ↓

As a kid, I would often go deer hunting with my dad and his friends. One hunting partner was (in)famous for harvesting a deer while squatting down to relieve himself.

Apparently, a young hunter in Texas has gone one step further. This newspaper photo is the latest email craze to be sweeping the world.

The other night my 12-year-old son — truly a rara avis — and I watched an episode of America’s Funniest Home Videos that featured practical jokes. Of course, many of the clips entailed someone getting the bejesus scared out of them.

Tuesday night, my son was alone at home for about an hour. Apparently he saw an news story about the tragic death of Michael Downing who accidentally stabbed himself through the heart while cooking lunch for his sons.

You may be able to see where this is going.

So, my wife came home Tuesday evening to find our son sprawled in a pool of blood on the kitchen floor with a knife laying on the floor beside him.

Luckily for both of them, she immediately spotted the tube of fake blood (left over from Halloween) laying on the floor also.

I can’t imagine where he gets his humor.

A thousand words will not leave so deep an impression as one deed. –Henrik Ibsen

Not too long ago, I was telling someone how much I enjoyed practicing a martial art — karate, in my case. I was caught off guard a bit when they asked me why I like karate. All kinds of stream-of-consciousness thoughts and reasons ran through my head, but what came out of my mouth was "the absolute honesty of it".

People are always talking. All day, every day, people are talking about what they’re going to do, what they’ve already done, where they’ve been, and how they feel about it.

Talk, talk, talk, talk, talk.

And even though people usually have good intentions, they don’t always live up to their words. Even worse are the people that dramatically overstate their claims or even just outright lie.

Let deeds match words. –Titus Maccius Plautus

In the martial arts, someone may talk a good game: listing their rank; detailing accomplishments in tournaments; displaying board breaking patches on their gi; naming famous instructors; even regalling with stories of real-life self-defense situations. But all that talk is just so much recherche vapor when you step onto the dojo floor. I’m still a rank beginner in the grand scheme of things, but once we start training — especially if we’re sparring –, I know literally within seconds whether you have skills or not. You cannot fake live techniques with a skilled opponent. You can either do it, or not.

Do, or do not. There is no ‘try.’ –Jedi Master Yoda