Dumb Luck

The other day a thought occurred to me as I drove down the road. It hit me just how many times in my life I’ve avoided literal serious injury or death by sheer, dumb luck. These were instances in which no common sense was yet available or, if it was, was studiously ignored. Broadly speaking, […]

Things can always get worse, but they can always get better, too.

I recently read a CNN article that explained that studies have shown that childhood trauma has been shown to later affect the grown adult’s relationship to money and finances. Basically, the instability and stress of living in a financially precarious household often causes extremes in people as they reach adulthood. Many become extremely conservative with […]

Redemption Song

Recently, for a number of reasons, I’ve been thinking quite a bit about redemption. To be clear, what I mean is the restoration of one’s reputation and credibility as a person in general or even in a specific circumstance such as work or with a particular loved one. Reputation, as they say, takes a […]

How not to do drugs…

A primer in harm reduction: As a society, we tell our kids from a pretty young age that drugs are dangerous. In school we give them the dry clinical facts about the harmful effects of each of the drugs; alcohol, cannabis and other illicit drugs. This information is useful but it ignores the reality that […]

I lost 10 years

10 years. I lost 10 years. 10 years in which I completely lost the plot. 10 years that I survived, rather than thrived. I wasn’t depressed or unhappy, but neither was I happy. But I was stressed. Constantly. 10 years when I was so strung out on work stress I couldn’t stop to ask myself […]

Gym Bullies

A few weeks ago there were a spate of articles in the UK press regarding the prevelance of sexual harassment in Globo (aka commercial) gyms and the Netflix documentary on the Bikram yoga guru that really opened my eyes to what women endure on the daily. Also, not so long ago, I witnessed another type […]

What not going to the gym feels like.

We are 2 months into this pandemic and gym rats the world over are agonizingly jonesing for an “iron fix”. Yes, not being able to train really, truly sucks. Some of the ways it blows are obvious and there is also some unexpected “suckage” which I will outline shortly. Surprisingly, though, there a few silver […]

No country for middle-aged Goth dudes.

The country I live in is small by any standards and the capital city is more of a largish small town. It reminds me of when I was living on an island in that you constantly bump into the same people. It’s the sort of place that when you are in a public place and […]

The evolution of a Powerlifter.

I happened upon strength training almost by accident. I had been going to the gym for a number of years, nay, decades, more or less consistently. So I went to the gym regularly, but aimlessly, without clear goals. I’d do whatever I felt like doing once I arrived at the gym and the exercise choice […]

La Perle des Antilles

This may sound maudlin, but sometimes hate does turn into love and sometimes, if you’re in the right frame of mind, a challenging situation is indeed an opportunity. By the time I left home at 18, I had moved house 17 times in 3 continents, 4 countries, 3 US states and the District of Columbia. […]