Changing of the seasons ...

This post probably would've been more appropriate a month ago (when I originally thought about posting it). But alas, laziness is a powerful force.

I'm sad that ultimate frisbee season is essentially over. Sure there is the occasional pickup game, and there are winter leagues. But for the most part, ultimate ended as October came to a close. My ankle still hurts from my last league game more than a month ago. I came down awkwardly after I jumped up to catch a disc. It was against this insanely tall guy, and I remember seeing the guy in my peripheral at the top of my jump. I guess I just expected to hit the ground sooner (not fully realizing how tall this guy really was) because when I did land, I wasn't expecting it and just buckled to the ground. I sorta laid there for a few seconds to make sure I was okay. I thought I had messed up my knee, but after a bit, I got up and walked off the field with a limp. I went back in to play later in the game because I felt fine. And I even played pickup games once or twice after that. It felt fine until about 10 days after that I noticed that there was still a nagging pain. I've been boarding twice this season already, both times kinda wondering if my ankle would be okay. And now that it's been over a month, I'm trying to see a doctor and possibly get an MRI to see what the heck is going on in there. My friend, Shelan, hurt his ankle snowboarding last year, and it was this sort of nagging thing all season. It didn't inhibit him from boarding, so he boarded all season, but it did bother him. Finally, this summer he had an MRI done and had to have surgery on it. I'm worried my thing is the same thing, so I'm trying not to wait too long (unfortunately I'm leaving the country for 3 weeks next week).

Anyway, so here we are at the beginning of December, and already we've had two pretty good snow dumps which seems abnormal for the city. I have my snow tires on and ready to go, but I'm still not quite ready for winter. Maybe it's because I don't want ultimate to end or perhaps because of the bitter cold we had this week (the other day I walked into work in a sub-zero wind chill and a high for the day in the teens). Regardless, I guess I get 3 weeks of respite from the cold as I go on vacation and will return in the heart of ski season.

On another note, I hope to better define myself and my life as this year comes to a close. I've been thinking ... a lot ... rather, it's probably more correct to say that it's been bothering me a lot these last couple of weeks ... because I haven't really tried to sit down and find answers that much as of yet. I think this has been a long time in the making ... questions about grad school ... my mild depression in July. Finally, through a variety of factors, mainly conversations with friends, I realize that I have some higher level philosophical questions to answer about myself. So much like my ankle, this has been nagging me these last couple of weeks. I wrote down some questions on a piece of paper. I spent a few minutes and just wrote down some questions that seemed relevant. I don't know if I got them all, but I haven't really tried to answer these questions yet. I hope to do a lot of introspection on this vacation (although I wanted to do a lot over my Thanksgiving break, but that didn't really happen) ... to at least start finding some answers. I know my brother's going to be busy with wedding stuff, but in some selfish way, I'm hoping he can help me because I greatly value his input.

So I'm not trying to make it seem that I'm this messed up person. I think this is a good thing that I'm going through right now. I could be perfectly content continuing on this path of life for a few more years. But in the end, I'm going to have to tackle this in order to be happy (which I'm not quite sure how to define at this point). So I figure it's better that I address this now than five years from now. Better now when I am single and flexible rather than after I have a family and am more rigid. Ah, life. Isn't it fun?

How sad?

Okay, I haven't watched many Hindi movies in my life. Frankly, I used to think they were a joke. I've been more open to them these last few years and have seen some pretty good ones. I'm trying to watch more because I have wanted to learn Hindi these last couple of years, and many people have told me that watching Hindi movies is a good way to learn (since I already know Gujarati). Well, I've accumulated a lot of Hindi movies based on recommendations: Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, Black, Dil Chahta Hai, Lagaan, Sholay ... and others. I haven't watched any of these yet, but I really plan to. I tried watching Veer-Zaara over Thanksgiving, but the DVD was scratched so it wouldn't play properly ... wonderful.

The sad thing is that I went to get my hair cut today, and this Russian lady was cutting my hair. We remembered each other from before (we always seem to have a good ole conversation). Well I mentioned that my parents were en route to India today and that I would be going next week. So she proceeds to tell me how she loves Indian movies! She said she was exposed to a lot of Indian movies in Russia (to which I was like, "Really?"). Apparently she saw a little snippet about this "really good looking actor" who had blue eyes so she went to the Indian grocery store and rented Mission Kashmir (apparently she was talking about Hrithik Roshan because she said his dad was a famous director, i.e. Rakesh Roshan). I remember watching part of that movie, but never finishing it because we were going somewhere (garba, I think). But yea, this lady also knew how Raj Kapoor used to be big. But isn't it sad that a Russian immigrant probably knows more about Indian cinema than me?

It's D's Day!

So we had a birthday party last weekend for me and two of my friends, Jolene and D. A couple of weeks prior, the Democrats took over Congress. What do these things have anything to do with each other, you say? Well, the Rocky Mountain News' cover the Wednesday after election day had in a HUGE font "It's D's Day!"

I couldn't resist. That was just too perfect. I got a little carried away, but here's what I came up with. I printed out a 16" x 22" poster of this for the party.
Me, D and Jolene (from left to right)

Life

So I pretty much haven't read at all in this past month. Since finishing The Catcher in the Rye, I put a hold at the library on this book called Choke that was recommended to me by a friend. It's by Chuck Palahniuk, the same guy who wrote Fight Club. Well, rather than reading another book in the meantime, I waited, even though I should've known it was going to be a while because there were a couple of holds on it. After a couple of weeks, I got Diary by the same author. But, I barely read it at all. I still had my heart set on Choke. I realized that this book is a metaphor for a lot of things in my life.

Incidentally, I finally got Choke today.