Author Archives: David Truss

Back on track

I ended up only shooting arrows once, last week, for the entire month of March… and I didn’t shoot well. Today I was back on track.

My personal best is a 289. Today I short a 288 in my first round, with no 8’s (all gold):

Then I shot a 287 in my second round with two 8’s, but also my first three X round in a while:

I made a couple minor adjustments since my last outing and they seemed to really work for me. Now I just need to get back to shooting a bit more regularly, and I think very soon I can break into the 290’s. I’m approaching one year (April 25th) since I first hit 289, and so I hope to crack this before my 1 year anniversary.

If I keep shooting this consistently, I’m sure a new personal best is within reach!

Spice it up

I make a pretty good rice stir fry. It’s a simple recipe that I made up one day when I saw we had a lot of veggies and leftover rice. My secret, very little soy and ‘way too much‘ hoisin sauce, sesame oil, garlic, and fresh ground pepper. And, a home made pepper sauce that is a family recipe my sister makes for me. I’m not a great cook, but I do some creative things at times and this is one of those times.

When I say ‘way too much‘ of something, I don’t mean drown in the flavour, but I notice that recipes always seem to be conservative with flavours and they try to find some kind of artistic balance. I say screw that when I’m being creative in the kitchen. Most recipes don’t add nearly enough garlic. Most recipes sprinkle black pepper. Most recipes that use sesame oil measure it in teaspoons or at most a couple table spoons. If you saw how much of these I add, you’d think I was ruining the dish… but none of these tastes are overpowering, and my dish is not boring or bland. It has kick, it has zest, and it sends my family back for seconds.

I make a few family concessions. My wife likes way more cilantro than my daughter, so I use a small amount in the dish, but have more chopped for my wife and I to add to the plate. My wife doesn’t like beef in it so I cook a side pot of beef in a similar sauce for my daughter and I. We each get our own version of the dish.

The point is, I really go crazy with certain ingredients, and I think that is seldom done in recipes you find in books. Some flavours deserve a good overdose, others you have to be careful with. Garlic, go nuts. Rosemary, be gentle. Fresh ground black pepper, double the recipe’s suggestion. Dill, be reserved.

Yes, you can have too much of a good thing, but more often than not a recipe simply won’t give you enough of the good stuff, and that’s how I go ‘off book’ on a recipe. That said, my brother-in-law shared some good advice with me recently. He said that the first time he follows a recipe he does it exactly as it is described. That way he can judge what earned it a place in the recipe book, before he gets creative. Good advice. Don’t try to fix something that isn’t broken. But if you taste a recipe and it needs more garlic, well then the next time you cook it, go a little garlic crazy.

The unseen casualties to come

I am saddened by the physical destruction, and especially the death and disruption of innocent lives happening now in the Ukraine. But I think (and hope) this will end soon. However, this war will affect far more than the Ukrainian people. As US President Joe Biden said,

“It’s going to be real. The price of these sanctions is not just imposed upon Russia; it’s imposed upon an awful lot of countries as well, including European countries and our country as well,” Biden said. “Both Russia and Ukraine have been the breadbasket of Europe in terms of wheat, for example — just to give you one example.”

This will have a massive impact on the world’s poor. Many reading this will feel the financial cost of increased prices, but that burden can be absorbed. We simply will have less buying power and less options of things to buy. But we won’t go hungry. For people living at or below the poverty line, and especially in developing countries where limited food choices become both expensive and scarce, it’s a different story. People will go hungry. People will revolt. People will die.

Since WWII many of the global conflicts have been about oil. The conflicts of the future will be about food and water. No matter what the reason, global conflict affects us all more and more in the interconnected world we live in. It’s one thing to look at the horror of lives lost in a conflict like this, still another to know that more casualties are coming.

Pessimism vs Optimism

How often do we give up on something before we even start?

… Don’t try something because the thought of failure is too great, or embarrassing?

… Decide that success is out of reach.

We blunt our own tools with pessimism. And while blind optimism isn’t necessarily good, a little optimism can go a long way, especially when our default is usually pessimism.

Choose to be optimistic, to seek out reasons to be fr and feel the positive difference in your life.

“Pessimism blunts the tools you need to succeed. Optimism is a faith that leads to success. “ ~ Bruce Lee

Lowbrow comedy

There is all kinds of talk about Will Smith slapping Chris Rock at the Academy Awards because Chris told an insensitive joke about Will’s wife. I’m not going to discuss the issue of choosing a physical attack. I’m not going to judge, everyone seems to have an opinion, and no matter how you look at it, it could have been handled differently. But I am going to say that sometimes an extreme event needs to happen to change an unhealthy pattern.

For the last few years, comedians at these events have followed a pattern. They have all used the opportunity to get in front of famous people and roast them.They use their host position and their comedic skills to attack the audience. As Ricky Gervais said, “Let’s have a laugh at your expense, shall we? Remember, they’re just jokes. We are all going to die soon and there’s no sequel.”

The thing is, there have been many sequels. More and more, these award shows have become venues for jokes that are lowbrow attacks on famous people. They are funny in a disparaging way. They are hurtful. They are mean.

This isn’t the only kind of comedy. Being famous doesn’t give others permission to use this form of comedy.

This was not a good move by Will Smith. I’m a fan of his work and this is the most out of character thing I’ve ever seen him do. But maybe some good will come from this. Maybe hosts will try to be more highbrow with their comedy, and still be funny without attacking the audience. Funny doesn’t have to be at anyone’s expense. Funny doesn’t have to be mean.

Routines to return to

I’m learning that I need to stick to my routines even when I’m on holidays. This morning was a challenge because I did my usual morning routine after dinner last night and so I was wired and couldn’t fall asleep.

Write, meditate, exercise. When I start my day early enough to do those things, I have a great day. When I skip one, I spend much of the day thinking about when a will ‘catch up’, and that’s not a good use of my mental energy. And when it’s the workout that I miss, my physical energy isn’t there either.

What routines work for other people, how do you use your schedule to your own benefit?

Hit the road running

I won’t pretend that I didn’t do any work over the last couple weeks of March break. I’m on a Ministry committee that required two online meetings, and there was a district deadline for online learning that required a fair bit of communication with my bosses. But for the most part I really let work go from my mind and enjoyed my break.

Now on the eve of returning to work, work life is creating back into my brain. There are new covid protocols to review. There are neglected emails to look at. There is a ‘To Do’ list pushed to my calendar for my return.

I’ll enjoy a nice family dinner tonight, I’ll do a bit of planning for the week, I’ll get a good night’s sleep. And tomorrow I hit the road running.

I hope fellow educators got some rest and relaxation, and feel refreshed as we head into the home stretch.

The cry of the bird

I wrote this in my Grade 13 year in Art class (‘Early 1986). It wasn’t an assignment, just something I chose to write near some doodles of a loon.

—

The cry of the bird

The beauty of the bird disguises the pain

But it’s call is not heard anymore

Unless you go north where it is slowly but surely disappearing there too

The pain is not that of the individual bird but that of the species

It cries out but nobody listens

The beauty is lost

Who can find beauty in a world of pain

Goodbye beauty

Goodbye bird

Goodbye pain

There is nothing left to feel the pain

Its life is over

The bird will not sing for our grandchildren

There will be nothing but a flying animal that they may some day read about in a book

An illusion on paper

That sings no songs

Feels no pain

Perhaps it may have beauty

But it is not the same

It is not the same.

_____
*Update: A friend sent this to me. I forgot that this poem was printed in our school yearbook.

The Bruce Lee themed leadership event

Back when I was a middle school teacher, I ran a student leadership program and we did a yearly Leadership Retreat. One year I did a retreat where I weaved a Bruce Lee theme throughout the 3-day event. The first time we got together I started my talk by showing the opening scene of Enter The Dragon:

After that I started every gathering with a Bruce Lee story, including his one-inch punch,

Empty your cup, and other stories to pump him up as a really incredible man and martial artist. I painted a picture of a brilliant, super athlete that had everything going his way.

On the last day, I shared the following information about Bruce Lee:

  • His parents moved him from Hong Kong to LA because he was in a gang and they were frightened that he’d get in a fight that would cost him his life.
  • He had horrible vision and learned to fight close because he couldn’t see what an opponent was doing at a distance. And he wore contacts for all of his adult life.
  • One leg was an inch and a half shorter than his other leg, and that’s why he had such a deep stance.
  • He lost out on the role in the TV series Kung Fu, that he helped to create, because he was ‘too Chinese’ for an American audience. And this is why he moved back to Hong Kong to create the movies that made him famous.

None of these could be seen as things that worked in his favour, but in each case he took what were disadvantages and made them into advantages. So often we are defined by what we perceive are our limitations, Bruce Lee took what others would use as excuses and made them into things that defined what he was capable of. He didn’t accept road blocks, he used them as launching points.

—

I often wonder how much more we could have learned from this man if he hadn’t died so soon.

Jet lag

It took me my entire stay in Ontario to get used to the time zone. Now I’m back in BC and I can’t keep my eyes open after dinner.

I don’t know if it’s travelling itself or the change in time zones but I’m definitely not 20 years old anymore and need to respect the needs of my body after travel.

Sweet dreams.