Category Archives: Daily-Ink

Helping students with job hunting

There’s a lesson I do yearly with incoming grade 9’s when they are working on resumes. I have them fill out a restaurant chain’s application form, and then we discuss what is important to share on application forms and resumes, then they get into threes and do mock interviews, with an interviewer, interviewee, and note-taking observer.

I share my experience as a busy Starbucks manager in a downtown store that received 90-110 applications a week, explaining how I didn’t have time to give applications 1 minute each, because just that first once-over would take me 90 minutes plus… so I’d look at just one question on the application to narrow the 90+ applications down to less than 12 that I looked at more closely. I make a big deal out of bad applications going into my ‘circular filing cabinet’.

I talk to them about how to emphasize strengths on a resume, but be careful not to exaggerate things you can’t really do. Then I share how I got a reference to help me get a job by emphasizing a strength, and I also share an embarrassing story of how I got fired because I exaggerated my abilities on an ordering system in a restaurant.

One interesting thing that happened when I was talking about references this year, was that after sharing a slide saying ‘Your references will be checked’, I shared this slide and talked about how these days potential employers will Google you.

A student who was very active in a local political campaign, in our recent election, asked if his political posts shared on social media could be an issue? I paused and had to say that personally, I like to see students involved in politics at a young age, because it shows that the student cares about the future, and their community, and is willing to volunteer time… However, I felt compelled to add that some people very well might see it as a problem if they disagree with your views. I wouldn’t have shared this a few years ago, but now it is something that I think could affect someone getting an interview. I also added that if a person who is going to be your boss holds your politics against you, they probably aren’t someone you want to work for anyway.

I enjoy doing this lesson with the new Grade 9’s. They get to know me a bit better. They get to laugh at my embarrassing story about getting fired, and the mock interviews prepare many of them for that first job interview that they will soon be doing. Because in the end, the application form and resume only get you in the door, and then the interview is what gets you the job.

Beyond just keeping the streaks alive

One of the most influential books that I’ve read in a while is Atomic Habits by James Clear. I was already on my fitness path when I started listening to it, and ideas in this book cemented the patterns I needed to stick with. I’ve shared some tips before, and I’ll re-share them here after a few thoughts.

Usually I struggle during my busiest times. That’s when there is always an excuse not to work out or spend time writing, etc. However, recently I’ve struggled when I’ve had more time. It’s weird, when I’m busy, I make time… when I have time, I take too much time and wallow a bit. This has been hard with my workouts. I take my time between sets. I don’t push myself as hard as I should. I spend too much time on my phone and have to rush my workout. It seems that I’ve gotten into a rut where the workout doesn’t give me the satisfaction I usually get.

Part of the struggle is that when I push myself, I seem to stay sore for too long and my back tightens up. So, instead of going at 80%, and spending more time stretching, I just go at 60% and waste a lot of time. This isn’t as bad as not working out. And that’s an important point. I’m keeping my streaks going. Besides one ‘one dot day‘, I’ve been able to maintain an amazing record of workouts, I’m on track to meet my archery goal of 100 days of shooting this year. With a few lapses, I’ve almost done meditation every day this year, And I have a perfect record for writing every day. I’m keeping my streaks alive.

The part I’m struggling with now is that while I’m fitter than I was at 34, 20 years ago, I’m feeling like I need to inject something different into my routine. It has been a couple months now of going through the motions and while that’s better than not exercising, it’s also not very rewarding. I think I really need to re-evaluate what my targets are for 2022, knowing that I’m going to stick to my current targets until the calendar year is over. I need to think about what my fitness goals are going to be? I need to increase my meditation and do some in silent sessions rather than just guided ones, because I feel that I’m not getting a lot out of the 10 minutes that I try to meditate each day… and yes, I know meditation is about the process and the trying, but I’ve been doing this for a few years now and my monkey brain still treats each session like a contest to see how many things I can think about while trying not to think about so many things.

I know I’m always hard on myself. I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing. But right now it’s not enough to just keep the streaks going. I feel I need to do more. I need to inject a little enthusiasm into what I’m trying to achieve, and have some (realistic) targets to aim for. Keeping the streaks alive is extremely important, but the streak itself can’t be the reason I’m doing things. I can be both happy about my consistency, and wanting to focus more on my progress, and I guess that’s exactly where I am right now.

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My tips I shared a while back:

1. A year-long calendar poster. You get to see at-a-glance how you are doing and you can motivate yourself to meet your goals at the end of the week if you are not on target.

2. The best time to start a new streak is RIGHT NOW. I mentioned this in the video, don’t wallow in disappointment. There are only 3 weeks (starred) in the chart below that show weeks that I didn’t get at least 4 workouts in. I didn’t let those weeks define me.

3. Reduce friction. Here are 3 examples:

  • My stickers and sticker chart are right next to my treadmill. I make it easy to track and see this.
  • I have a pair of runners and a shoe horn in my exercise room. I never have to look for my shoes, and I don’t need to tie them, the shoehorn allows me to slide my feet in while still being tight enough to run in. Also, my headphones, and all equipment are where I need them… Always ready, and I never need to search for them.
  • Don’t exercise at your maximum every day. Some days I push really hard, and some days I go at 75%. A day when you are feeling low, give yourself an effort break, but don’t give yourself a break from actually doing exercise. If you end up doing 3 workouts at a lower effort, you’ll have the drive to push when you feel up to it. Make the friction about how hard you work out, rather than if you are going to work out or not.

4. Share your goals with others. You are more likely to hold yourself accountable if you have made your goals public. That’s partly why I did my original post in January, and promised in that post that I would do this update.

5. Be vigilant at your busiest times. It is really easy to say, “September is too crazy”, or “I’ll get started as soon as things calm down.” There will always be an upcoming busy time to deal with. Things won’t calm down (sorry, but you know this is true). If you want this to work, make it work when you are busiest and the rest of the year will be easy.

Mixed tapes

A couple days ago I shared how we had to wait for songs to come on the radio to record them. Today this 7 year old memory came up on Facebook:

Oh, the hours put into making the perfect mix. The frustration of making a great mix, but realizing too late that one song should have been left off. The too long gaps between songs, which were actually better than the too short gaps with a song getting truncated (which at least happened less frequently, unless you were recording from the radio and had to cut off when the DJ started talking).

The challenge of getting the volume of songs consistent. The stretching of songs near the start and end of the tape. The tangles, pulled out and then retracted with a pencil.

But above all, the time it took to make a good mixed tape… that’s a thing of the past that carries a lot of nostalgia, and would be hard to meaningfully share with someone who never had to do it.

Going to bed too late

I tend to fall into bad sleep patterns. It’s easy because I like to stay up late and I also like to wake up early. I wish I lived in a country that did siestas.

There is something about being up between 10pm and midnight that I enjoy, even when I’m exhausted. But when I get up well before 6am, a midnight bedtime is a bit hard to do several days in a row. When I was younger, I could live off of 4.5 to 5.5 hours of sleep a night, but as I got older it definitely affected my ability to be productive during the day, and I realized I needed more sleep.

But every now and then I get into the bad habit of staying up way too late. And often that triggers insomnia, which makes matters worse. I need to force myself to go to bed earlier. This is one place in my life where i battle with myself. There is a huge knowing-doing gap.

I still woke up before my alarm this morning, but I’m slow to get going, and needing to talk myself into my workout. I get things done at night at the expense of a productive morning. It’s not a great cycle.

This is just me making it public that I need an earlier bedtime, because for me the public declaration is a good step towards action… or is it non-action when I’m talking about adding more unconsciousness? 😜

I had to wait

A couple days ago I heard a song I liked being played and I opened Shazam. This handy app told me the name and artist of the song, and shared a link to iTunes. It was in my library in under 2 minutes. Growing up, this was a different story.

I’d hear a song I liked on the radio and maybe they’d re-announce the title and artist at the end of the song. If not I’d just have to hear it again before finding out more. If it became popular and I really liked it, I’d have a cassette recorder next to the radio and hit the Play and Record buttons together simultaneously to record the song to listen to it later… often trying to time when the DJ would stop talking over the intro, so I didn’t get his voice, but maximized the amount of the song I got.

I would only buy the song if I heard and liked enough of all the songs from the album to justify buying the whole thing. I remember having an entire side of a cassette with either Freeze Frame or Tainted Love ‘on repeat’ because I kept recording either one as I heard them on the radio.

And there was no YouTube. If I wanted to see a music video, I had to watch MTV, with 3+ minute long commercial breaks, hoping they would show the video I wanted to see.

We don’t often think about the conveniences we have today compared to our childhood. Conveniences that are now expectations for kids, but would have been pure luxury or us.

Family recordings on 8 millimetre film, that was played on a projector. Waiting for a roll of film to be developed, after waiting for weeks or months for the roll of film to be finished and ready for processing. Missing your favourite show and hearing everyone talk about the episode that you wouldn’t see until reruns started being played 13 weeks later.

We had to wait. That waiting doesn’t happen anymore.

We live in a time warp

When you are 10, 5 years is half a lifetime. 10 years is half your life at 20, and 20 years is half your life at 40.

By the time you hit 40, your first 20 years are a distant memory, and you remember choice moments, but you don’t remember those years like when you were younger. The distance in time causes you to lose your ability to hold on to old memories. You can’t hold an ever accumulating amount of memories, and so some fade away. So time stretches the past into a distance too far to see everything.

Meanwhile, 1 year at 10 used to be 1/10 of your life. A year at 20 is 1/20th of your life and a year at 40 is 1/40th of your life. Each year, the lengths of a year as compared to the rest of your life diminishes. So time also shrinks the future while it stretches the past. We live in a time warp, and time goes by faster every day.

Sometimes it’s good to reflect on this, if only just to appreciate the fleeting moments in a day, and know that unless we appreciate the time we have, we can only appreciate the memories that we know will fade away.

I’d rather tell you than smell you

I started my career teaching middle schoolers for 9 years. Every spring I had a chat with the kids about how their bodies were changing and it was time for them to start showering more frequently, if they didn’t already shower every day. And if they weren’t already using deodorant, it was time to talk to their parents about getting some… and then actually using it every day.

I always started with the same line, “I’d rather tell you than smell you.” I would follow up with, “…and if I tell you, I’m doing you a favour, because I don’t get as close to you as your friends do, and so if I smell you, your friends can smell you too. And because I’m doing you a favour, I’m not going to be embarrassed about telling you.”

I will admit that a few times over the years I chose to have a female teacher address this with a female student. This was because in these circumstances I thought it would be devastating to the child if I said it, and the intent is to help them, not horrify them.

Now that I’m in a high school I still use that line. I said it last Monday as we started weight club, and I’ll share it again in the spring. I had the conversation with a boy in Grade 10 a few years ago, and he thanked me publicly, in front of friends and their families in a grad speech. That was something I never expected.

It’s not mean, it’s an uncomfortable thing to share, but not as uncomfortable as the student’s friends would feel, sitting all day next to someone that could use a shower or some deodorant. It’s easier for me to say something, than it is for their friends.

Fall colours

I just came back from a walk with my daughter. We passed this tree and I had to stop and take a photo:

Growing up in the Caribbean, I have to say that the explosion of fall colours was as captivating as experiencing snow for the first time. We moved to Toronto (North York) and the main highway downtown is the Don Valley Parkway, which follows the Don River lowlands and is surrounded by trees. This time of year the drive is breathtaking.

Seeing this tree brought back memories of seeing fall leaves for the first time and thinking that there was no way these colours were from real trees. It’s amazing that so many vibrant colours can stem from the death of leaves. Fall is here, enjoy the weather, and beautiful scenery, because winter is coming.

Create a Vaccine Passport Shortcut on IOS

1. Open Notes and add a note titled Vaccine Passport (or another easy to find title)…

…and insert a photo of your Vaccine Card.

Close and remember the name you picked.

2. Open Shortcuts (if you can’t find it, pull down on your Home Screen and do a search).

3. Add a new Shortcut

4. Go to Ellipses (…)



Then change the name and icon to what you want.

Click Done.

5. Click ‘Add Action’

6. On the next screen, search ‘Notes’

Scroll down looking for your Notes title. Click on it.

On the next screen select the Ellipses (…).

7. Click ‘Add to Home Screen’

Then click ‘Add’ one more time. The icon is now on your Home Screen. Long press the icon to edit Home Screen and move it where you want it.

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Done! Now when you press the icon it opens your note with your vaccine passport.

Favourite food on the menu

When you find that one dish that you love having at a restaurant, don’t deviate. Order it every time. Why? Because if you decide to try something else, more than 9/10 times you will be disappointed.

I am a huge fan of food from all over the world. I take chances with food. I eat ‘street food’ when I travel. I like variety. But when I find a food I like at a restaurant, I mean really like, then I don’t stray from it.

Why take a low risk for a small reward? I already really like a dish, so why try something new and get disappointed? Even if there is that one dish that might be slightly better, the reward is small since I’m already enjoying a favourite. And besides, more than likely the different dish won’t be as good, and I’d leave the restaurant feeling let down.

When you find a favourite, stick to it. Enjoy and savour it, knowing you aren’t missing out, you are getting exactly what you like. Save the experimentation for new restaurants, or restaurants where you don’t already have a favourite.