Here they are, in all their greatness! (and foolishness)

From left to right: Yannick, Myself, Jean-Luc and Marc

As it happens, they’re 3 of my dragonboat teammates. This picture was taken following our last competition, for which we’re proudly showing our gold medals!

• Jean-Luc (yes, as in ‘Jean-Luc Picard’, except he’s not a Picard) : Loud, outspoken, freakin’ strong dude. He’ll be a perfect motivation and energy booster, and I have not an ounce of doubt that if we need strength, he’ll show up.
• Marc : He’s the runner (and a damn good one at that), as well as the does-way-more-than-he-looks kind of guy. He’s always there to lend a helpful hand to everything and everyone he happens upon. Very dependable and very skilled in many fashions, albeit kinda quieter than Jean-Luc (OK, that’s not very hard to do).
• Yannick : I haven’t known him for very long yet; however he’s quickly shown as a very dependable and adaptable kind of guy who likes to have fun. He seems willing to try out anything you might dare him to, and in thus he didn’t hesitate for very long when I asked him to join the Team. I can’t wait to get to know him better.

What’s very cool with the brand new MdV Team, is that we’re all very fit enough to take on any kind of physical challenge. It also happens that we’re all studying in engineering, and very much capable of a number of mental challenges. More importantly, we’re pumped and ready to tackle anything they might throw at us.

I will soon organize with them to produce a presentation video, which we’ll be using to actually apply for the Show. Of course, when it’s done you’ll be the first to know about it!

So, all of this being said…

BRING IT ON!

So after this impromptu hiatus, I’m finally back and will hopefully start posting regularly again. What happened is I clearly underestimated the no-break pace on the weeks following my Dragonboat training camp. We’ve had competitions at Pickering, ON and Ottawa, ON, and had a blast, as well as very good results.

Lame excuses aside, I did tell you in my last post that I’d describe the latest challenges people submitted me to. So, without further ado (I’ve always wanted to write that sometime) …

Challenge #9: “Le Moment de Vérité”

“Le Moment de Vérité” is a TV show from my home province, Quebec, which theme is basically to submit a team of 3-4 people to (*gasp!*) a challenge of pretty much any kind. Sounds familiar?

One disadvantage of this one is the language, but I’ll do my best to translate the essential for you non-francophones. For the rest, take it as practice! It’s good to have some French skills handy. Anyway, so it’s been submitted by my cousin Souyuan, and she simply challenged me to take part as a competing team in that show!

Here are examples of challenges that were submitted and done in past shows:

• A woman learned and recited all highway exits on highway 20, the famous road from Montreal to Quebec City
• A guy trained to succeed a DDR song
• Another guy successfully did 2 hockey slapshots at a speed above 70mph

So! That’s gotta be interesting. I already recruited one friend to be part of the team, and I have yet to find 2 others. When it’s done I’ll update you guys with pics. Oh, we also need to film a video as an application for the show, so look for that in the weeks to come.

Challenge #10: The PicLetters (or something)

Source: vivaterra.com

Next up is another photo challenge, but my buddy Patrick wanted to add a touch of artistry. This time, I need to search and find letters in objects around me, and take a picture. For example, an orange might make me think of the letter “O” (but don’t worry, I’ll try to come up with something better). I need one picture for each letter of the alphabet, which makes for 26 pictures. Of course they all have to be taken by myself, bla bla bla.

It’s brought in the spirit of making me look at ordinary things a different way. Therefore I might add a thought or two to some of these pics if anything pops in my head. Imagination time!

Challenge #11: Origami!

Source: Wikipedia

After Art comes Craft. Well, in the expression “Arts & Craft” it does, anyway.

My friend Janie wants me to fold pieces of paper. Actually, a LOT of pieces of paper. One thousand, to be precise, and that’s not counting those pieces that will be, ah, discarded and not take part in the final Piece (as in Art Piece. Masterpiece. Whatever).

As Janie put it, how about folding a thousand cranes? Wikipedia (a.k.a. The Source Of All Knowledge ) explains the whole quite fascinating history, which here is an excerpt :

Thousand Origami Cranes (千羽鶴 Senbazuru^?) is a group of one thousand origami paper cranes held together by strings.

An ancient Japanese legend promises that anyone who folds a thousand origami cranes will be granted a wish by a crane, such as long life or recovery from illness or injury. The crane in Japan is one of the mystical or holy creatures (others include the dragon and the tortoise), and is said to live for a thousand years. In Asia, it is commonly said that folding 1000 paper origami cranes makes a person’s wish come true. This makes them popular gifts for special friends and family.

Source: Wikipedia

I will therefore learn how to, and actually make, a thousand origami cranes, and hold them together with strings or something. I’ll show it to you. I will become the Origami-guy Master. Pro. Thing.

Oh, and I’ll let you know if I indeed meet the wish-granting crane, unless it asks me not to. I mean, I don’t want to be rude or break tradition or something. I’ll also have to think of a wish to make, which I may or may not tell you.

Just don’t be too surprised if you suddenly find me filming from a tropical villa with a hot chick by my side. Just sayin’.

–

Well, that’s it for now folks! I’ll do my best to deliver the next post much sooner.

Cheers!

For one of them I actually have to select a team of friends to do it with me, so that’s also part of the process. I’ll try and take a picture of us 3 or 4

Anyway, here’s the actual pic of THIS post:

The metro

I unfortunately didn’t catch his name, as I had barely enough time to actually take the pic; he was just getting out of the wagon. Still, thank you metro guy! Hope you get the chance to find your pic

Aside from that, I had the awesomest of awesome weekends. It was my dragonboat team’s training camp at Lac Mercier, Mont-Tremblant, and you have no idea how much fun we had. Weather was gorgeous, people were gorgeous (our girls being the gorgeous-est, of course), and we did more shenanigans than we can count.

Spending a whole weekend suffering, recovering, and having fun just glues people together. Our team is now FAMILY.

Quick post this time, I’m really tired. I’m on a fast day (it’s a nutrition thing) and I walked all around the Old Port and on half of the Jacques-Cartier Bridge.

And hence, here comes the second picture of Challenge #4!

Suzie and I on J-C Bridge

I would like to thank Suzie very much for her time and willingness! She’s a very nice person to talk to.

Looking at the comments I’m realizing that I have 3 new challenges to present! Really sorry for the wait; the next post will cover these!

Bedtime now. Cheers!

Souce: duelinganalogs.com

In life, shit happens.

Optimism won’t solve all your problems, unlike many buoyant, rosy top-of-the-world happy-talky would like to convince you of (Note the clever abuse of synonyms here).

OK, I’m also a happy-talky. Not rosy though, unless I’m wearing my ambiguous shirt (I thought it was red).

So.

If optimism is overrated, so, too, is pessimism. In fact, I don’t think there is any level of RATING pessimism that wouldn’t be overdoing it.

Pessimism achieves nothing, moves nowhere, and certainly won’t resolve the problem at hand (or otherwise expected).

Optimism on the other hand, has all these superb benefits we keep hearing about.

And DON’T GET ME STARTED on realism.

Cheers!

(PS: I’m pretty sure I will get at least 50 comments on this post)

Source: jonestein.mlblogs.com

]]> http://matchallenge.com/2010/05/05/optimism-is-overrated/feed/ 2 http://matchallenge.com/2010/05/05/optimism-is-overrated/ http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MatChallenge/~3/yqtLbkmDBg0/ http://matchallenge.com/2010/04/25/book-review-his-majestys-dragon/#comments Mon, 26 Apr 2010 03:47:31 +0000 Mathieu http://matchallenge.com/?p=347

Ladies and gentlemen, greetings.

It is with an utmost pleasure that I present to you my very first review of a book: His Majesty’s Dragon.

Gentlemen-speaking aside, this book contains a lot of it, and I found myself enjoying the politeness-and-intricacies abuse more than I cared to admit at first. Considering that despite my very limited free time, I went through this book in but a week, I daresay it’s possible that I might have enjoyed it.

To quickly describe the setting, imagine a 1800-style England, where “Kingdom” still means something, and Napoleon Bonaparte is reigning in France and invading everything around. Therefore he’s of course trying to invade the british, and he holds a most impressive Air Force with which he seeks to do just that.

Wait… Air Force? In the 1800s?

Yup. That’s where DRAGONS come into play.

It’s in this most unique mix of history vs fantasy setting that the main character comes into play. As he runs into a soon-to-hatch dragon egg (stolen from the french) and unexpectedly binds his life to the creature inside, he meets a forced career shift that he never cared for and which will pose a great many difficulties.

So, I mean. You got dragons, Gentlemen manners, Napoleon, dragons, badass lady-captains, gunships, dragons, dragon-science, epic feats of awesome, epic accelerated training with dragons, epic fights, random (non-)romance, intrigue, suspense, dragons, and hmm. Oh yea, dragons.

Do you really need any more arguments? I mean, really?!

Then go get it.

You are very welcome.

If you’ve read it already, or if you want to mention how you think gentlemen manners are for sissies, please get verbal in the comments below.

Cheers!

Anyway, if you want to compare with the old theme (eeeww!), it’s here. Quite a change, huh?

Ok, enough of that. I have officially started Challenge #3, so HERE IS THE FIRST PIC FOR ALL TO SEE:

First Pic: The Grocery Store

Pretty neat, huh? OK, maybe not that impressive. The grocery store was the easiest one, considering that I live right above one.

Still, it was very kind of this man to accept to pose (as in, taking a picture – NOT anything else you might think) with me. Thank you good sir!

SO: For Challenge #3, the Grocery Store is done, along with “A man between 40 and 60 years of age”.

Actually, that same day I wanted to get the Bridge picture too. So I went to Montreal’s Old Port and walked around there… figuring I’d find one easily, AND what the hell, it was so beautiful out there, I could use a walk.

Unfortunately, the only bridges I found were way too puny-tiny to even glorify with a picture. Bummer.

However, I did catch some other interesting stuff:

The Flash Player and a browser with Javascript support are needed..

So, that’s it for now! Soon I’ll also update you with the latest challenge I’ve received. It involves being broadcasted on TV and doing crazy stuff. Stay tuned!

Now, off to find that darned bridge. Big bridge. Biiiig big … OK I’m outta here.

- Food: Go to the store, buy, eat. Repeat. No questioning where it comes from, what’s in there, how is it fueling your body, will there still be more of it next week. Nah. It’s food, tastes good. Ever heard of that question asked to a kid, “Where do eggs come from”? He answered “the grocery store”. Yep, they magically appear there.

- Technology: What were you doing fifteen years ago? If I wagered a guess here, I’d say you weren’t spending hours per day on the internet. Now it’s everywhere and part of pretty much everyone’s life. It actually feels abnormal not to have it around. That is true with most tech pieces older than 6 months. OK maybe a year. Sometimes. And the iPhone doesn’t count.

- Fitness: Surely you’ve heard of amazing athletes. So amazing they could fly, or lift the Everest or something. Yet at some point in their life it seems they lose their edge, or worse, they regress. There are countless examples of people (not only athletes) that were slim, or fit and strong, and with time they get lazy, which eventually makes them out of shape.

And no, it’s not because they’re old. Otherwise this woman wouldn’t dance salsa and this man wouldn’t have that grace and quickness.

Impressive. I mean, it is! How can we lose track and attention to so meaningful parts of our lives?

Look at your situation. Consider the things you own (Josh Hanagarne has written an excellent post on ownership). Think of the pieces of story you’re living daily.

Some of these things might be good / positive, while others definitely feel negative. Sorry, let me rephrase that.

Some of these things are undoubtedly good. Are you fully appreciating them? Do you realize their full impact on your life? How are you taking care of them?

Other things might feel negative. However life has this cool way of making you always grow stronger out of obstacles. Isn’t growth what makes life worth living?

So, how do you face obstacles?

Are you fully appreciating your life?

Just a quick note to let you know I’ve been requested a guest post from one badass dude known as Adam T. Glass.

This guy amuses himself with 48kg (104lbs) kettlebells. I’m just saying. Go read his stuff!

Oh, and said guest post can be found here. By clicking on the link. It’s about dragonboat racing.

EDIT: A part of the text is inspired by my team’s inner philosophy. By the way, here’s my team’s website. Take a look! (click here for an automated translation)

Tell me what you think. Makes you want to try it out?

Cheers!

I promise I’ll try not to hit my proud swollen head on door frames.

Now, far from being one to rest on my laurels (it’s not even comfy), I’m looking at my list and I still got quite a lot of work ahead!

New stuff on the TODO list

First things first: I had forgotten to add yet another new challenge, numbered 8, submitted by Jean-Luc! He’s one of my Dragonboat teammates and training buddies, and we are to accomplish the iconic Iron Cross hold, for 3 seconds!

Here’s a video of a badass guy doing it for way longer:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ij549isP5NU

Fortunately I won’t have to hold that long. 3 seconds will be more than enough for a start! I haven’t tried yet because I still have to buy rings, but I can’t wait to! Meanwhile I’ll be focusing on exercises using strength-rubber-handles-whatever device we got at the gym and my martial arts school, to strengthen my lats some more.

The straddle-press-to-handstand (Challenge #6) is doing well, too; I’ve been training hard as hell in the last couple of months (the last half-year actually), and making awesome progress strength-wise. Also, I’ve been focusing on getting a proper handstand form and strength down first; I am now able to hold 2 minutes with wall support, and 6 seconds with no support!

Apart from the strength-related challenges, I decided to start working on the finger whistling (#3; I still suck at it), and the Pictures with Strangers Shenanigans (#3).

For the whistling, I will use a strategy similar to what I’ve done with juggling, but I’ll simply try to practice as many times per day as I can. I just need to find ways to remind myself to do it.

For the pictures, I will set a goal for myself to get the first picture down by April 2nd. Let’s see how it goes! I’ll keep you updated of course.

Oh, also, I have a life

So what have I been up to lately? Well apart from my internship and my insane training schedule, my Dragonboat team and I also took part in our first competition of the year!

OK, it’s way too cold to go outside yet… So it’s an Indoor Competition!

We haven’t done as well as we hoped; however considering that we had 14 recruits (over 20 paddlers total!) in the boat, and that we still held very well against the strongest teams, we can be quite proud of ourselves! Here is a video of our Finals race:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPfhIqbCdH0

Want to know more about this awesome/crazy sport? I’m currently in the process of writing an extensive article about it. It shall be out very soon. Stay tuned!

But before I get back to that, I need to take a shower. The thing with training is it makes you sweat. It might make you puke, too, but I’m not John Romaniello or anything.

Cheers folks!