robots = skynet

I recently stumbled upon pictures and videos of some fairly frightening robots that have been created in the past few years...

1. The mesmerizing yet scary dancers
   
2. The violin playing robot with the freaky double jointed wrist
   
3. The 'Big Dog' is one of the more frightening (if you haven't seen the youtube video...it's a frightening 'must see' {Also, you must see the parody video as well...})
   

When watching these- it brought to mind several questions...most alarmingly - have they not heard of skynet? Do they not understand that these frighteningly amazing robots are bringing us closer to judgement day? haha i'm kidding (well kind of... I do get slightly nervous that the machines will eventually turn on us - for example the elevator in my building, which will randomly take me to the wrong floor for no apparent reason other than perhaps for its own twisted pleasure)

Anyways, what I'm trying to get at is that we're giving so much of our lives away to technology. From our source of entertainment to the way we communicate with each other - technology is at the centre. I'm especially guilty of this - facebook, email, msn, twitter, text messaging (this blog...) - my communication seems to use every possibly technological method. As much as I appreciate technology and the amazing ways that it helps to increase our quality of life and our ability to connect with people, places and knowledge, I also think that in some ways it's cheating us.

When a baby is born prematurely, for the first few months of its life, it is surrounded by machines, which allow it to live and grow. Without these machines, the baby would not survive. However, despite all of our most amazing technological advancements, the premies usually do best when they have face to face interaction with their mother: when they can hear her voice, see her face and be close to her.

I think this translates into our own lives too - well at least the face to face interaction part. I think there is something to be said about being with other people - hearing their voice, seeing their facial expressions, being close enough to touch them. I don't think there's any way that technology can reproduce that feeling of closeness to another human being.

I guess the question is: what percentage of our interactions with others uses devices and what percentage is real, genuine breaking bread with another person? I used to have a rule with one of my friends: for every conversation we had online, we had to have at least one real, face to face conversation. While it seems a bit strange, it really helped to keep a good balance. Maybe it's time to enforce the 1:1 rule again. I mean -- if we don't humanize our interactions, we're no better than the machines -- and we'll be just that much closer to having terminators running around.

What am I doing?

That's a question that I've been asking myself a lot lately.

During the past few weeks I've been faced with a lot of questions about my future.

The number of times I've been asked the question ' So what do you want to do when you graduate' in the past month is alarming. Alarming because I have no idea.

Lately my life has assumed an extremely regular pattern: School, work, study, overdose on caffeine, sleep and repeat. Sure, I mix other interests into my week as much as I can but I feel like my life is kind of like a sprint on loop- I'm always out of breath, but the race doesn't seem to end and no matter how much I want to, I can't stop or I'll get left behind.

In our parents generation, money, education and career success were the most meaningful parts of life. But it seems like for our generation its not enough - we all want more: marriages that last, jobs that bring satisfaction, lives that are exciting.

Sometimes I wonder if this is selfish - if we should be satisfied with having what our parents wanted and if shouldn't try to have it all.

But as the time before graduation slowly gets shorter - I need to start making some hard decisions. Do I follow the dreams for my life that I've had ever since I can remember - the dreams that maybe aren't my own but are my parents, and teachers and family's goals for my life? Or do I find my own dream? And how do I even know what I want?

I find that a lot of times we put so much distance between ourselves and what we want because we're afraid that once we get closer it won't be as good as we'd hoped - or worse that we won't be able to make it work.

There's a quote from Good Will Hunting that I really liked - it's when Will (Matt Damon) is talking to Sean (Robin Williams) about Skylar (the girl he liked)

Will: ... but this girl is like, you know, beautiful. She's smart. She's funny. She's different from most of the girls I've been with.

Sean: So, call her up, Romeo.

Will: Why? So I can realize she's not that smart, that she's boring? You know? I mean...this girl is like perfect right now, I don't want to ruin that.

Sean: Maybe you're perfect right now. Maybe you don't want to ruin that. I think that's a super philosophy, Will, that way you can go through your entire life without ever having to really know anybody...

Maybe it's not a perfect connection to what I'm talking about but I think that sometimes everyone's like Will - we have this ideal picture of something that we want: whether it's a career, a hobby, a guy (or girl)... and we're afraid to get close because either it won't measure up to the perfect picture in our head or somehow our own imperfection will mess things up.

I'm definitely guilty of living like that and I think it's a terrible way to live - because if we always play it safe we're going to wake up some day and we'll realize that we lost 10 years of our life to a routine.

new

2009 - it’s the beginning of a new year and of course - new year’s resolutions.

I happen to be one of those people that makes a list of 10 or 15 things I ‘resolve’ to do differently in the new year. Of course, by the end of January I usually find that since I can’t seem to keep them all, what's the point in keeping any?

This seems to be the new mindset. While searching through articles on the subject, most of the entries were the same:

What’s the easiest way to keep your resolution this year?
Don’t make one at all -- Why bother making resolutions when in the end they'll end in guilt and frustration?

So is it really time to give up on resolutions all together?

The other day at the meeting house, an interesting quote was addressed:

“ When we look on the world and declare it a mess, we have only ourselves to blame. We humans have created the problems that threaten our existence. The hope we have is that if we made the choices that got us into this situation then we can set a new course, make new choices and turn this all around. Of course, this requires that our new choices are truly better choices and that we stick with those choices with the same fervor and consistency as those who got us into this mess.” - Kim Francis

I guess we could stop making new year's resolutions - but really - the beginning of a new year might be the perfect time to start making truly better choices. Throw in a little fervor and consistency and maybe the choices will stick!

As for me - here's to hoping that I reach January 31st without falling off the wagon.

P.S. I found a link that gives some pretty good ideas on how to make new habits last...hope they help!

Starting out...

I’m sure you’re probably curious as to how I came up with the name of my blog.

Well, surprisingly there is a somewhat sane explanation.

When brainstorming for potential names, I got stuck... literally my brain seemed to hit a glitch and the same word would run through my head for what seemed like hours...it was a disaster. Unwilling to accept defeat, I turned to google for help (as I often do) and found a hilarious name generator which asks a variety of random questions and strings together your answers to create a ridiculous name http://www.blogthings.com/meganamegenerator/

The first name that it generated (which turned out to be a keeper) was ‘Dim Sum Simon’ - apparently combining my favourite food with my grandfather’s first name.

**Note: if you are unfamiliar with the best food on the planet {dim sum} - wikipedia provides a brief explanation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dim_sum . I've eaten dim sum at several different restaurants in the GTA, but my absolute favourite spot is on the third floor of a china town mini-mall, located on Dundas, just east of Huron. If you’re interested in trying it for the first time or already understand its proper position as king of all other foods, let me know - I’m always up for it!

Once I had made the decision on the name, I then had another major choice to make: the direction that the blog will take.

I decided that not only do I want this blog to assist in developing my knowledge in certain areas of interest (specifically music, books, tea and local restaurants), I also want it to raise thought provoking questions that challenge my own opinions and beliefs about my faith, current events and politics etc.

Most of all, I want to try to make this blog both real and honest, and in order to do so I would really appreciate any comments and feedback that you can offer! ☺

Thanks & I hope you enjoy!