Telling stories...

While perusing through the blogs on my Google Reader and Xanga subscriptions, and lamenting yet again the strange malaise I find myself in with regards to the long gaps in between posts on this blog (when one of my 2007 New Year's resolutions was to post 2 times per week - ha!), I came to a realization:

I am not a very good storyteller.

Looking at the many blogs I am subscribed to (~60+ at last count), they range from blogs of personal friends from high school, college, church, as well as a few working professionals, musicians, and some couple-of-degree-separation people whose writing I simply connect with. Many of my friends are talented storytellers and can imbue the mundane events of their days with spirit, humor, and dramatic tension. Now that the Internet privacy taboo has relaxed some, they will also often use photos to illustrate their lives so that the world can see, but primarily for the benefit of giving their friends and family a continued connection into their lives.

I, on the other hand, have no gift for weaving the events of my life in such a way as to form an interesting story. My recounts of events tend to come out rather bland and lengthy (as many have let me know). Heck, I am also horrid at relating stories in person (as anyone who has tried to pry the story of how Shal and I began dating can attest).

What I find somewhat odd is that I love reading and listening to stories, and I feel like I've read enough to be able to recognize quality... yet frustratingly I can read my own storytelling and deem it boring. It's kind of similar to music - I can analyze the poetry of lyrics in good songwriting, I can listen carefully to each instrument in a mix and ferret out little nuggets of musicianship that inspire awe and a sense of beauty in me... and yet every attempt I make at creating my own song ends up with me giving up half-baked because I can't stand my own banality.

I also do enjoy writing, but rather than storytelling, it may be primarily in the realm of making observations - whether humorous, poignant, tragic, or other. Perhaps I'll just have to develop this style of writing instead.

Weekly musings

This week's links and thoughts...

How to be the perfect boyfriend/girlfriend

Videos of the week, courtesy of Alex. While funny (in a British humor kind of way), there's actually a decent amount of truth in these about the ways men and women are and relate to each other.

VideoJug: How To Be The Perfect Boyfriend

Favorite points: It's important to seem interested no matter how confused you are, because girls value communication above everything... Deodorant is for after the shower, not instead of it.


VideoJug: How To Be The Perfect Girlfriend

Favorite points: Men like grunting, fighting, and measuring things... Men like explaining things.

Radio

While my music tastes have evolved mostly into rock and folk with a strong focus on a "band" sound and strong songwriting, there are occasional times where I just want to listen to some of the amusing, brainless pop/hip-hop/R&B music from back in the '90s during junior high and high school when I first started listening to music. Now that Movin' 99.7 has reformatted itself from an oldies station to "modern" pop/hip-hop/R&B current and classic stuff, I'll occasionally tune in to catch stuff from C&C Music Factory, Diddy, MC Hammer, and classic Madonna and Michael and Janet Jackson. Check it out to be transported back in time.

Look, I'm still young-ish!

Last week I joined Facebook, which, for those not in the know, is a social networking site akin to Friendster, except, well, successful. It's made significant inroads into impacting the modern high school and college culture - being able to leave messages for people, post profiles, and neat features like being able to post photo albums and then tag the photos with your friends' names so they can click on their own name and see the photos where they show up in albums other than their own. I rarely check it, but it's a nice vehicle outside blogger to keep tabs on what's going on with the high schoolers.

Kindred spirit

I've read with some interest the story and politics of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, due to the flood of national media coverage as well as Danny's unabashed fandom. I like a lot of what he has to say, but one thing that is definitely a point in his favor? While other candidates play baseball or football, Obama plays blacktop hoops. The article mentions that one reason he sees the court as a sanctuary of sorts is because the game is a great equalizer - you may be teamed with a powerful Congressman and a blue collar construction worker, but during the game it's all about winning and taking on whoever's got next. The article's description of his game: "Barack Obama is a wily player of pickup basketball, the version of the game with unspoken rules, no referee and lots of elbows. He has been playing since adolescence, on cracked-asphalt playgrounds and at exclusive health clubs, developing a quick offensive style, a left-handed jump shot and relationships that have extended into the political arena."

Just call me Lance Armstrong

Back in college, I used to ride my bike to and from class from my apartment. Despite the numerous hills in Berkeley, as well as cars and pedestrians and a couple of falls, I enjoyed the feeling of being able to whiz to class on the other side of campus within 10 minutes when walking would take closer to 25.

Yesterday, after a gracious bike tuneup by Mike L on Memorial Day, I was able to take my bike onto the light rail with me to work, then riding back the 8+ miles to Mountain View. It felt really good. Some things that came to mind:

- Effective multitasking is always satisfying, especially when you can combine activities that are often mundane (working out + getting home)
- Overpasses are killer on momentum
- When I drive to work and I can see the mountains ringing the valley clearly without much smog, it's particularly satisfying to know that I helped in some small way with that
- My butt feels awfully bony and sore today after ~40 minutes on a hard, uncomfortable seat. I may need to get a nicer cushion and a blinker

Gonna aim to bike home at least once a week. We'll see if I can hold to that.

Wiser?

The older that I get, I figure everyone is dying
They're all dying for a change
I know that I am dying for some action
- Derek Webb, "Dance"

Entering the last year of my twenties, a couple of observations:
- I am now as old as some high school kids thought I was 5 years ago (another account of the same story). Since I was 29 5 years ago, I guess I must be in my mid-30s now.

- The older that I get, the more I'm realizing how much more growing up I still have to do. Our current Sunday School series is going through "Growing up as Asian-Americans", and I'm slowly coming to grips with how much I'm influenced by the cultural mores I've grown up with, and how I'm more strongly motivated by guilt, fear, and remorse rather than the promise of joy, peace, and happiness through God's grace. This will be a theme for me for a while.

- That being said, I'm all the more grateful for little things I've taken for granted in my earlier years - great parents + family, privileges, health, friendships, and everything else. Blessed. Thanks to God for everything.

On beauty

Two good posts recently on the beauty of God's creation and how every person is created to experience it in the very core of our being. Worth reading both of them in their entireties at the links below.

Excerpt from singer-songwriter Shaun Groves:

Here in this frozen sanctuary, mountains for walls, frothy silver clouds for ceiling, I’m stunned by the scope of creation outside the cul-de-sac. I’m happy. Not because of where I am but because being here I’m more aware than usual of everything good and beautiful in the world. Why does nature do that to some of us? Why don’t I make more time to walk in it? Some saint once said that if he looked at creation long enough God looked back.

And this morning He’s talking back too.

Here in all this perfect beauty a man is on the stage making liberal use of words like “imperfect”, “wicked”, “depraved”, and “sinful”. The paradox isn’t lost on me. There’s something, for me, about the collision of beauty and busted that grabs my heart and mind with both hands and demands their attention. The contrast is brutal. But the beauty also works to console and inspire me, to make me long for and realize what God is making of me: beauty.

Excerpt from Maria:

Other experiences that often move me to aesthetic pleasure: listening to a beautiful song, feeling its soul-thrilling melody bring inexplicable delight and joy; reading something well-written, enjoying each well-turned phrase and felicitous expression; seeing beautiful colors in nature (flowers) or man-made (clothing, shoes, purses, art), relishing in the bright hues, the intensity of shade, the suppleness of texture. There's something refreshing and restful about these simple pleasures.

Weekly Musings

Some thoughts from the week...

TV finales

A lackluster season of 24 ended not with a bang, but with a whimper. But at least they've acknowledged that they can't just plug different variables into the same formula and come back with the next season - I fully expect CTU to be retired (Bill tp Nadia: "Jack's not coming back. Let him go"). I'm kinda disappointed because this season started with great promise in the first 4 hours. Instead of dwelling on what went wrong, here's a list of what I thought was good about season 6 (spoilers for folks who want to watch on DVD):

Jack in the 1st 4 hours - he seemed to be a broken man after his 2 years of torture. Unfortunately they brought back "the old Jack" far too quickly - it would have been fascinating to see him continue with that vulnerability.
Assad - a unique character that was killed off far too soon. Plus, according to the gf, he was the best-looking guy on the show.
Tom Lennox - great acting, did slimy, principled, and cutthroat all very well.
... and that's about it.

Lost ended much better. It may have re-hooked me into the next few seasons as they finish up the story. Who would win if Sayid had to take on Jack Bauer? God forbid that they ever team up on anything.

The NBA and red meat

My carrot analogy with regard to the Warriors making the playoffs is apparently not a unique one:
From the Sports Guy, when the Celtics missed out on picking up either Oden or Durant in the NBA lottery:

You can't even fathom the pain. Everyone believes Celtics fans get a free pass with this stuff because we won 16 titles in 30 years. Actually, it's the opposite. Long-suffering fans of perennial losers don't know what they're missing. After all, how would they know? You can't miss steak if you've never eaten steak, right? But if you're fortunate enough to follow a perennially successful franchise, then that same franchise starts decomposing right in front of you ... what then?

Annoyance of the week
Eating a stalk of broccoli early in the week, I literally bit off a bit more than I could chew. I had to stretch my mouth so wide to get around the mouthful that when I bit down, I ended up scraping a flap of tissue off my inside cheek that's just kinda been hanging there since. Every so often when I chew on the left side of my mouth, I'll end up gnawing on that little piece of flesh.

Video of the week
Passed along by Shally: "The Machine is Us/ing Us"
About 5 minutes, worth watching all the way through - good, concise commentary on the direction of the Internet (currently aka Web 2.0):



Disturbingly amusing story of the week
Joy's story at our CG free week about her dream where her bf Mike tried to kill her with a knife, and actually stuck her in the leg before being subdued by two other random guys from Canaan. This sparked a conversation about common dreams that we'd had before. Apparently, women in relationships will often dream of their husband/boyfriend cheating on them. Me, I usually end up as a martyr in mine... as I mentioned back in January.

Music of the week
Listened primarily to Stanfurd's acapella group Testimony this week. Love the way they use various vocal sounds to mimic guitars and other instruments. You can hear some song clips here, here, and here.

Christian thought of the week
Started reading My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers online this week. Good excerpt in 5/21's entry:

When we look at these words of Jesus, we immediately find them to be the most revolutionary that human ears have ever heard. ". . . seek first the kingdom of God . . . ." Even the most spiritually-minded of us argue the exact opposite, saying, "But I must live; I must make a certain amount of money; I must be clothed; I must be fed." The great concern of our lives is not the kingdom of God but how we are going to take care of ourselves to live. Jesus reversed the order by telling us to get the right relationship with God first, maintaining it as the primary concern of our lives, and never to place our concern on taking care of the other things of life.

NYC Highlights

Couple of quick highlights from my family's trip to Manhattan last weekend, Thursday through Sunday, in no particular order:

Having lunch w/ Drew - fellow Cal Bear, 2000 NYC missions teammate, and Canaan's young adult retreat speaker for this year. Hadn't seen him in a few years, and it was kinda surreal getting together in the city where we had spent so much time ministering with and to each other.

Seeing my first opera ever - it was a good idea to read the wiki entry beforehand because I then had an idea of what the plot was. 'Twas actually kind of dark - adultery, suicide, all set to huge voices and elaborate sets.

Two speeches at the NYU Law graduation
1) A pair of law students gave a joint speech. One was a former member of the Israeli Army, the other was a member of a Lebanonese village that the former's company had attacked. They had both lost friends to the other side, but said that through their education they were able to learn how to respect each other enough to try to find common ground. Very cool.

2) Keynote speech by Newark, NJ mayor Cory Booker, who we thought was an odd choice - no connection with NYU, no name recognition. He ended up weaving an inspiring tale of battling against social injustice in the projects of Newark while he was just a councilman, camping out in protest against crack houses and drug dealers while getting pelted by garbage and feces, and being able to make a difference. He exhorted the soon-to-be powerful and rich lawyer class to stand up for what is right, exuding an Obama-like charisma. Keep an eye out - we may see him more on the national stage depending on where he wants to take his career.

Shake Shack - Home of New York's best burger. In the picture, you can see one of their trademarks: a portabello mushroom, stuffed with cheese, breaded, and deep fried, then placed on top of the burger patty - awesomeness.


The peace and quiet of Fort Tryon Park


The view from the top of Rockefeller Center


Lion King Musical - innovative use of puppets, props, and lights to simulate the animals. Solid entertainment.


Seeing the prayer table at Washington Square Park - reminded me of the missions trip. You'd be surprised how many people are willing to accept free prayer.


One particular almost "Far Side"-ish comic wall at MOMA - some guy basically drew a bunch of "then and now" commentaries on today's world, compared to before, that were clever, funny, and kinda sad at the same time. Some examples:




Symphony at Carnegie Hall, playing Mendelssohn, Elliott Carter, and Mozart's 41st Symphony - spent most of the time listening to the percussionists.



The best highlight of all...
Seeing my little bro get hooded - congrats, buddy. For most of your life I've known you as a student, so it's kinda neat to think of you as a working man - well, after all that "bar" stuff and the subsequent 2-month celebration. [Morpheus voice]Welcome to the real world[/Morpheus voice].

To the bitter end

I'm proud of the Warriors. You kept fighting, maybe a little too hard, and lost your composure in the end... but you didn't give up, and after the final horn sounded, both teams recognized the better team won in this series. Time to bask in the glow for a little while - the realization that the Warriors are relevant again. That's one mighty tasty carrot.

As for Spurs-Suns... Horry, what are you doing man? You're better than committing frustration fouls on guys smaller than you. There isn't much satisfaction from tonight's win with the Suns missing their 2/3 of their best big men, even if Phoenix was leading most of the way. Frankly, I like all three of the Western Conference teams remaining in the playoffs, and would root for any in the finals.

Some highlights from my family's trip to NYC coming up soon, but a quick shout out to my bro for graduating from law school - proud of you, dude.

Summer 2007 movies

Thanks to Maria for organizing an outing to watch Spiderman 3 tonight. Short reaction: it's reasonably entertaining comic book-style action and interpersonal drama, but overall a little bloated with too many characters and plotlines for any of them to be well-developed. A disappointment compared to the fairly tight narrative in Spiderman 2, and I'd also rank it behind Spiderman 1, which had quite a bit of new charm.

Other movies coming out this summer:

Will definitely watch it in the theater
Spiderman 3

Will probably watch in the theater after 2 weeks, but will be influenced by reviews
Pirates 3
Transformers
The Simpsons
The Bourne Ultimatum

DVD
Live Free or Die Hard
Evan Almighty
Fanboys

Maybe on DVD, depending on reviews
Shrek 3
Oceans 13
Fantastic 4 - Rise of the Silver Surfer
Rush Hour 3

Hard work beats talent when talent fails to work hard

I saw that quote in a good feature story on Kevin Durant, and thought it would be appropriate for a post dedicated to the Warriors' ousting of the Mavs in the first round last night.

There's probably nothing more frustrating to a sports fan than watching athletes who don't work hard. Some players have talent, some don't have as much, but it's easy to tell who makes the game look easy (but is playing hard) and who is just taking it easy. Example: Mike Dunleavy, who had all the skills (except quickness) but was almost always content to execute perfect chest passes rather than take (and make) big shots.

A close second in frustration-inducement would be watching players who play dumb. Some players may be able to leap out of the gym and hit threes from halfcourt with regularity, but they wouldn't box out or would commit turnovers at crucial points. Example: Troy Murphy, who would let his man grab offensive boards if he wasn't the one grabbing the defensive board. Also, the story about him sitting out the final game of the 2005-2006 season to protect his double-double average is just... yeah.

The Warriors have had a decent amount of talent over the years (you have to when you get that many lottery picks), but a disturbing shortage of heart, competitive spirit, and drive. Too many players earned the enmity of fans by not diving for loose balls, not keeping in shape, not playing defense, not making the extra pass, and in general not showing the grind-it-out commitment that is needed to win on a regular basis.

Now that the Warriors have been able to remake themselves with players who play somewhat smart at times, but above all, play hard, they've become America's darlings. No one would have thought that could happen 2 years ago, or even 2 months ago.

Last night's Matt Barnes dunk over Dirk Nowitzki probably epitomizes those two principles, and the title of this post, best:





When a 2nd round draft pick playing for his 5th team in 4 years can impact a game more than the league MVP - that's heart. That's hard work. And, maybe a little bit of talent mixed in. Barnes impacted this series more than I think Dunleavy or Murphy will ever do.

Who's to say what will happen in the next round (for the record, I think the Rockets are a better matchup, since Yao can't run with them and Boozer always kills us). For the time being, it's quite a treat to be able to enjoy a team that is finally working hard, playing smart, and having a surprising amount of success and a ton of fun while doing it. Hopefully they take this experience into the offseason, whenever it comes, and return ready to go in the upcoming years, making this a franchise that people want to play for.