Gil Can Run!A blog on Running and all the crap that runs through my head while doing it

Apr 19th Catching up

Yes, I took it a little too easy over the weekend and didn’t write! But I will make up for it today. I did run exactly on the schedule I planned. Giving me Sunday and Monday off. I got my miles in on Saturday, Tuesday, and this morning. This morning, I didn’t bother to pace myself, because it was the second day of running in the rain, and the first day I had to be ready for work. So with a time limit I just let myself run as I was comfortable, instead of trying to hold back. Mind you, I kept pretty well to my forced pace on Tuesday morning, in spite of getting hailed on for the last km.
Except for the weather the running has been easy. It’s difficult to keep spirits up when it’s days on end of bad weather. Getting pelted by dime-sized hail for 1/2 a mile yesterday was no treat either. There was no hail in the forecast, I just kept my head down, eyes protected and did the best I could. Other than that, things are pretty much on auto-pilot today coming out of the long weekend. Next week, I have Monday and Tuesday off again. We celebrate kicking the Nazis out on April 25th, and in Italy when a holiday lands on a Tuesday, they give us Monday off. Same way with a holiday on a Thursday, we would get Friday off. Then May Day is coming up, three weekends in a row with at least an extra day.
Meanwhile a song came up on my mp3 player, and I listen to the song all the time, but I never sing along to it, because it uses words I can’t use. Because we have words in our language specifically designed to oppress people. It’s not just that this word was used and then they decided to use it for the express purpose of making people feel inferior, or seem inferior. It was created, designed, specifically for that purpose. I’ve said this many times, if you’re unsure if you should, or could use a word, then don’t use it. If you’ve been told that it’s offensive and you shouldn’t use it, then don’t use it. There’s no gray area here. There’s no “passes”, just don’t say it. Can’t be much simpler than that, comes up in a song you like, don’t sing along. Don’t care if you’re all alone, don’t do it, censor yourself, show some humility. You will learn from the experience. Sometimes, sitting in silence, no matter what, and just listening to the world around us is the most instructive thing we can do. Being humble, policing yourself, choosing to keep your mind open and your mouth closed is very beneficial.
It is very difficult sometimes, we are trained to defend our ideas, our positions, our beliefs. Frankly, if your ideas, positions, and/or beliefs are worth a damn, then they don’t need defending. If someone questions you on these and you can’t mount a proper defense, then perhaps you need to look at why you can’t, not that you’ve been called out for trying to hold onto an indefensible position. You can look at it in a very literal sense to get the lesson in the figurative sense. Look at the Battle of Thermopylae. The Spartans (there were also Athenians, etc. there) commanding the army took the best DEFENSIBLE position in the pass, and held off the entire Syrian army simply because they could defend their position. It was true that the way around was unknown to the invaders, until someone betrayed the Spartans. It was true that the terrain made it so that a small, capable fighting force could withstand the attack of a much larger army. The way in which the Syrians continued their attack was indefensible. When their navy was defeated then their continued attack was indefensible. They could not sustain what they were doing, they were defeated. When you can’t counter, when your ideas and beliefs cannot be defended, then they must be changed or abandoned. You must humbly accept that you were wrong. It’s ok to be wrong.
This is the value of taking time to listen, instead of always talking. Learn when you are right and when you are wrong, and then just shut up and learn. So much of this life, so much suffering, and strain, and hurt comes from people just not being willing to admit that they’re wrong, or they don’t know everything. I had this discussion tonight, in a very limited way, with my starter students in a local middle school. I asked them to count how many students were in the room. When they said ten, I corrected them and told them there were 12 (me and their regular teacher). I told them, “I don’t know everything, neither does your daily teacher. There’s always a chance for us to learn something new.” Did it help quiet them down, not so much, they are only like 11 years old. Oh well.

Have fun, keep running, and remember; if Gil can run then so can you!

Apr 14th It was a Good Friday, indeed!

I tried for 9 min/mi again, it did not work out. In fact, I was faster today. Not by much, but it’s ok. I think it was mainly due to the heat. I was sweating a lot and did not bring water with me. So I think I just wanted it over with. My arms started cramping; not my legs, my arms. It’s been a very long time since I’ve been completely drenched after a run. But overall, it was good, I worked hard to focus on my form and only toward the end did I really notice some bad things. Turning my arms in definitely being one of my major flaws. So all in all, not bad.
The rest of the day has been spent cleaning, shopping, cooking, and even a little work. I’m trying to get things caught up and set for the big push toward the end of the school year here. It will all be over before I know it, and I want to make sure it’s as smooth and stress-free as possible, so taking a couple hours today to take care of some things was a good idea.
Meanwhile, there is one severe drawback to having skin like mine and running long distances in the beautiful, and intense Sun here: my sock and singlet tan-lines are out of control. The rest of the weekend forecast is saying overcast and maybe even rain or thunderstorms on Sunday. It looks like next weekend I will have to take charge of this situation. I’m not too much interested in my looks at all, but I mean this is ridiculous. Shame on me, and drag if you must it’s ok.
But today was definitely a relaxing day, and you need those every now and then. If we don’t relax and enjoy, as messed up as this world is. As Donnie and company are looking to start, literally, World War 3, and all this other mess that’s happening. Corporate bullies treating people like trash. Racist and fascist shitbags spouting their fecal matter all over society, as fucked up as all this is; we all have to take some time for ourselves and enjoy what little we can. Today was definitely that day, to just enjoy what I could. If you’re not smiling at the things you can smile at, then what’s the point of being pissed off about all the bullshit? If you can’t enjoy those little parts, then there’s no sense in any of this.
Just like Orange shit-boy there, spending more on the military, bombing the shit out of things with millions upon millions of dollars of ordinance, yet telling us we can’t do the very basic things to make our own area of the world as nice as possible. In fact, telling us we need to pollute it and make it a mess, and forget educating people, or doing anything good, or kind, or nice. What’s the point in all the military mess if we don’t have anything nice at all? I mean, I think we can have very nice things without any military at all, but that’s besides the point. It’s really useless if you have nothing worth “defending” in the first place.
I don’t understand how so many people miss this. Life should absolutely be an enjoyable experience, regardless of where you are born, or how you are born, what you look like, who you love, how you dress. We should be allowed to enjoy our lives. Anyone and anything which is hindering our enjoyment, which is not injuring others, is wrong. I’m not saying there isn’t pain in life, and there isn’t bullshit. Bad shit is going to happen. People will get sick and die, natural disasters will devastate areas, the world itself is completely neutral. It neither desires your survival, nor your death, it merely goes about its business. At the end, entropy requires your destruction, but that’s ok. So there will always be pain and some discomfort. My issue is with human beings intentionally adding to one another’s pile of bullshit. I don’t understand that at all. All anyone need do is stop being a fucking jackass. That simple. Yet we applaud jackasses, we watch them on TV and love them, and give them million dollar endorsement deals (the “Cash me ousside girl”) and let them steal the presidency. Yeah I said it, stolen.
So I had a good day today, but still, fuck your economy, fuck your competition, fuck your advertising. Fuck your centuries old ideas and the rotten shit that springs from them. Leave your arrogance and your ignorance aside, stop being offended when people say this shit is broken and needs to be fixed. When someone says they are being hurt by your bullshit, just shut up and listen to them. Don’t get all sore because you’re being called out. Learn something. Check your ego at the door, you’re nothing special, none of us are. I am no better than the very worst person to ever walk the Earth, and I am no worse than the very best. We all have our shit, and we need to leave it behind when we deal with others, and treat everyone like they were…you know…human. Just saying, maybe we should give that a try, given that what we’ve been trying for the last few hundred years hasn’t been working. Even though we keep repackaging it into something slightly more palatable, it still seems to fail miserably. So maybe, actually changing is the way to go? Just a thought.
But in the meantime, I am going to enjoy what I can, and I can only hope for more wonderful days like this. It was an amazing day on so many levels.

Have fun, keep running, and remember; if Gil can run then so can you!

Apr 13th Gotta Catch Up!

It is Easter Break here! So I only worked three days this week, but it was a crazy three days, trying to wrap up paperwork and whatnot during that time. I did get my running done, well I did well on Tuesday, ran short Wednesday, but totally made up for it today. I was shooting for a steady pace today, slow and steady, 9 min/mi. I was a little faster than that, which I’m not wholly pleased about, but only 6 seconds per mile off, so I’ll take it. I don’t feel completely exhausted either, like I have been feeling for a couple weeks now.
given that it’s a holiday weekend, I am going to try and front-load my workouts and take it easy on Sunday and Monday. I’m actually well ahead of where I want, or need, to be with miles this month and I may consider rearranging my training schedule due to this. Meanwhile, I need to look into a race one of my students told me about coming up at the end of May, and it’s time to start planning races for when I’m in the US this Summer. Definitely going to run the Branford Road Race, which I missed last year. Also, Labor Day I will run the New Haven Road Race, but only the 20k. Don’t even know if they’re doing the half marathon this year, but it seems silly to me, why bother with the one extra kilometer? Traditionally it’s a 20k, and that’s that. Then Gulf Beach is hopefully in the cards for me as well. Depending on what I come up with for a job situation, the Self-Transcendence Marathon may be in the mix as well.
Spring has definitely sprung here. The grape vines were growing, green leaves glistening in the Sun on my run today. The German tourists were parading past my apartment this afternoon. There’s a special irony to a bunch of old Germans parading down my street to see the oldest synagogue in Italy. But it’s also Easter weekend, so there are all manner of tourists in town, because up and down the entire region, it is universally understood that Trani hosts the best Easter celebration. Ah, all night Stations of the Cross.
They really parade through the streets, priests, monks, penitents, it’s wild. And I was telling my class how funny it is to see real Capuchin Monks and think about how that’s where the drink, cappuccino, comes from. One of my students, was unaware that the two were related, I got so excited. One of my weird facts actually educated someone! So that was a lot of fun. Then we talked environment. They didn’t understand why they are always asked to talk about the environment during the speaking portion of their English exams. I explained that it was because it is an important issue, and therefore they figure everyone will learn and be able to talk about it. I also explained to them why it’s important, and about how we’re in the 6th major extinction event in Earth’s history, and how it’s most likely our fault this time.
Which is another thing, because I was talking about this the other day, you all remember. Then one of the bookfaces pages I follow posted a piece about how we need to stop factory cattle farming because it’s making wild horses in North America go extinct. So I mention that horses don’t belong in the Americas anyway, and people got all sorts of offended by this and called me stupid, and mentioned that the horse evolved originally in America, and all this nonsense. Yes, but it went extinct and other creatures took its place, and then when it was reintroduced it drove those species out and damaged the biodiversity. It is an invasive species, and I get that people love horses and whatnot, that doesn’t make them any less damaging. It’s amazing how people simply ignore reality over their feelings. There are times for that, but not when it comes to the environment. This is the problem we have. Everyone watches nature shows and feels bad for the little deer, or bison, or springbok, or whatever is getting hunted. I won’t lie, I hope they all escape too.
But here’s the thing, many people would actively interfere if they could, because how dare that predator kill the cute whatever. The predator needs to eat too. Lions can’t eat tofu. We can, they can’t. Some creatures are specifically required to eat others, and that’s the way it goes. We can’t let our feelings on the matter get in the way. Just like I’ve been seeing people sharing an article about Taiwan banning the use of dogs and cats as meat. Why? Because they’re your pets? For other people they’re food. What puts the dog or cat on a pedestal above cows, chickens, pigs, or any other animal. This selective care for things is most of the problem in the world. Like so many vegans and vegetarians only caring for animal rights, and completely erasing the horrors of human rights violations toward people of color for centuries in their fervor to “prove” that the plight of animals deserves equal footing in the pantheon of bad shit we humans do. Yes, we need to demand better treatment for animals, but as I discussed last week it is a different argument.
It’s so weird how the things I post end up showing up in other ways a little after I post them. It happens often to me. As I don’t believe in supernatural phenomena, I don’t claim some pseudo-scientific prescience. However, I think I see patterns and I see the way things come together well. I think it gives me a way to take good educated guesses as to what is coming. I think I put puzzles together well, basically. Not saying that gives me any special say, just saying I tend to somehow have a good grasp on what is going to trend, even though I keep a healthy distance from, well, most all pop-culture and things like that.

Have fun, keep running, and remember; if Gil can run then so can you!

Apr 9th Happy Palm Runday!

OK, today I definitely re-injured my foot, that was most likely dumb, but it will get better. I took it easy the last half mile, I only wanted to do 8:30s today, and again I was fast. I really do need to slow down. That it’s a sunny holiday, there were tons of people walking the port this morning, and I was forced to weave in and out of them and make quick cuts and turns as people stepped out in front of me. That’s probably how I injured my toe, or re-injured. Well, hopefully it will be better soon. It is getting annoying and a little depressing.
But it’s Sunday, I have a few things to clean up, some laundry to do, some food to cook. Not much to do today, and I really do need to relax. next week I get even more time, as I don’t work Thursday-Tuesday. Italy does not have an official religion, but let’s face it, this is a Catholic country. As much as it is a country, I mean the idea of “Italy” is pretty much a lie. The North came together easily enough, then they forced the Kingdom of Two Sicilies to join and robbed them. They had been robbing the South for generations as much as they could anyway.
That doesn’t mean the Kingdom of Napoli, or the Kingdom of Sicily, nor the Kingdom of Two Sicilies were perfect. The fact is, all of European history has had a competitive economy. They’ve called it different things; feudalism, capitalism, even today with the EU it is a competitive economy. They’ve traveled the world and forced a competitive economy on the rest of the world and then claimed it as it was the rest of the world’s choice. Will we reach the breaking point of competitive economies and switch to collaborative processes in enough time to halt the next great extinction event, which it seems we are part of right now?
That is what we are up against. The Holocene Extinction, and we are the cause. For those who don’t know the current period of geologic history is called the Holocene. Do we survive it? Maybe, maybe not, but the fact we’re causing it can’t bode well. More than that, why do we think this is ok, even if we do survive? Competitive economy. But it’s not ok, but after hundreds and hundreds of generations, it feels like the normal, natural thing. It’s not, it just feels that way. We are conditioned to believe it to be natural, but when you look around the world you find examples of collaborative economies as the norm, until forced into competition by colonialism. So who needs to change then? If competition is what causes the colonization, which brings the over-farming, over-fishing, over-hunting, over-killing, over-use, racism, sexism, jingoism, bigotry, caste-systems, religious antagonism which are all part of the cause of the over-arching problem (the Holocene Extinction), then clearly we have to move away from competition. We have to get back to a natural, collaborative experience. We have to listen to what science tells us on stopping the use of the things which are causing this.
There is the possibility, and prepare yourself, that we are already too late. It is possible that we have pushed things too far and have already signed our own, and most of the species on the planet’s, death warrant. Think about that, no matter what bullshit the world of humans has put on you, it’s entirely possible we’re already on a dead planet. It’s possible we are merely the last few synaptic impulses, we are the proverbial chicken running and kicking with its head already cut off. Which means all these grand works insecure peoples are building as testament to their greatness are meaningless. As the article I posted above states, it takes the Earth on the order of several million years to recover its biodiversity after a major extinction event. Even if another sentient species were to evolve, a discoverer, explorer on the order of homo sapiens, there would be nothing noteworthy from our time here for them to discover. We’re not like the dinosaurs, who had 65 million years to leave traces. We’ve been around for 200,000 years, we’ve had the ability to record our deeds for about 5,000 of those years. Think about that, 195,000 years of human history with no written record. We’ve only started the processes of domination which have brought about the conditions causing this extinct event about 500 years ago. That is when we started exploring, started dropping pigs, and chickens, and rats, and horses places where they didn’t belong. Speaking of which, you realize the horse was extinct on the American continent until the Conquistadors let some of their horses go. All wild horses in the Americas descend from horses the Conquistadors brought with them.
In 0.25% of our time on this planet we have managed to begin the next great extinction event. A species which has existed for only 0.0033% of the entire existence of the planet, has created an extinct event in just a quarter of a percent of the time they have even existed.
But then let’s look at the mechanics of what happened, I mean I just mentioned the Conquistadors, they called themselves “The Conquerors”, no shit. What were they conquering? What great enemy did they have? Folks who didn’t have half the technology, and no competitive economy? Wow. But really, what they were conquering was the very thing they were claiming they were fighting for. Follow me here: Let’s say the European settlers and conquerors of the Americans, Pacific Islands, etc., were really spreading “God’s Love”. So if God is in everything and everyone and is all, then God certainly is the Earth, as much as God is a person, or an animal, or the Sun, or anything else in nature. So if you’re “conquering” nature, are you not by default conquering God? But, as much as homo sapiens claims religiosity, the fact is that it’s always been a competition to make themselves gods. That’s always been the thing. They want to last forever, because we know we will die. Kind of ironic in man’s quest for immortality we’re going to end up wiping out any trace we ever existed. Unless of course we all change the way we are doing things, and find a way to mitigate the damage already done, and survive the Holocene Extinction. The only way we can do that, is to drop all this competitive nonsense and come together. I have news for you, the conquered people aren’t the ones who need to change, they’re not the ones that need to come on board to the competitive way, if the competitive way is the way of destruction. The European way needs to end, and the only way that happens is if Europeans and their descendants in other lands, stop trying to control everything and oppress others. That is the first step, there are more steps after that, and we are really short on time. So people need to get off their asses and start to make it happen yesterday.

Have fun, keep running, and remember; if Gil can run then so can you!

Apr 8th What a Day!

Seriously, just wonderful weather, great classes this morning. I ended up going much faster than I intended, and in the end I’m in a little bit of discomfort because of it. But today was just fantastic, so clear I could see all the way to the Gargano Peninsula (The “Spur” of the boot)! But, between the coffee and the poor hydration this morning, the warm weather and speed, I’m just drinking tons of water right now because I feel like Alien is boring its way through my gut right now. But I also finally figured out how to change the playlist order on my mp3 player. Since I did not end up getting a proper Sony Walkman replacement yet, due to inventory issues. So the one that I have is cheap and pretty crappy. But for the first time in a month I heard different songs! Ah, that was nice.
So, I’ve been tracking my miles as usual on my Garmin, but I’ve also been using Charity Miles recently. But sometimes it gets messed up and doesn’t record for some reason, and you can’t add from a fitness watch or anything, because the whole way Charity Miles works is they put an advertisement on your phone and the company is paying Charity Miles for that ad you “see” and part of that money goes to the charity you select. But I don’t look at the damned ad anyway, I don’t care what company is sponsoring me, they have plenty of money to give, I do not. I will buy their products if I need them, not because they are paying for ad space, and some of that money goes to a worthy cause. So that’s 10 miles the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society won’t be getting today. I used to raise for the MS Society, and will again in the future surely. However, currently one of the members of my running club was diagnosed and subsequently fought and is now in remission of Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. For support, a large portion of the running club has been running with the Charity Miles app. Any of you who follow my personal FB page have noticed I’ve been posting from the app with the tag #M4M, that’s where that comes from, Miles for Melissa is what we’re doing.
This brings me to today’s point. I don’t do any of this to get a pat on the back. I don’t do what I do so people think I’m a nice person. I do what I do, because it’s the right thing to do. It’s the right thing to try and stop unnecessary human impact on the environment. To stop human beings from dehumanizing other humans for their own purposes in the forms of racism, sexism, religious, or gender bigotry, ableism, or any of the other bullshit we do. It’s right to try and get people to look at animals as our evolutionary cousins, and that they should be treated with some dignity and respect, and we should learn to live with them, instead of trying to force them to live within our structures which they do not understand. To encourage humans to do what we are meant to do, the only purpose we have, to look in our ourselves, as an extension of the Universe, and explore it all, and figure it out, to discover, not to conquer. It is right to demand peace, to demand a death of fascism, to demand we move on from the old ways and the old philosophies, and the hatred, and start to realize a better world. Not for me, not so I am held as some hero, shit forget me. This is just about doing what’s right. Personal story-time:
This year one of my grandmother’s older sisters, in fact her last older sister, died. Aunt Helen (as we called her, her name was Elena) was 102 years-old. Aunt Helen’s husband, Uncle Tony, had died years earlier, somewhere in his mid-90s. Well, they never had children. Without sharing the gory details, while Uncle Tony was a generous man to family and friends, he was a womanizer, and that caught up with him early in life. Anyway, the nieces and nephews that were in the area would help out. Get Aunt Helen to the store, just come over and say “Hi”, take them places, it was like we were all their children and grandchildren in a way. I’m pretty sure almost all the men in the family ended up working with Uncle Tony in his carpentry business at some point in our lives.
But everyone pitched in to help out when we could. Usually I would cut the lawn, rake the leaves, clean up the outdoors, things like that. After my grandfather could no longer go and help them with plumbing issues, the job usually fell to me, unless it was something that I simply could not do. Then when I started working with Uncle Tony I would start fixing other things around the house Uncle Tony couldn’t do anymore, siding the garage, fixing window casing and things like that. They would always hand me, and everyone else money for doing these things. None of us (to my knowledge) did any of these things for the money, or so anyone else would talk about how good we were, we did these things because they were the right thing to do.
If you’re doing things because of the money, or because of the praise and accolades, because you want a pat on the back, then you’re doing them for the wrong reasons. Yes, even your damned job. Life is not supposed to be one long transaction, it’s just supposed to be action, and discovery. You should do the right thing in the hope that one day, if everyone is figuring out that doing the right thing is the way to go, this world won’t suck as much as it does. Lead by example. Yeah, when people are being really shit and need to change their ways, I call them the hell out. But still, it’s up to them to “come to Jesus,” to “bring the mountain to Mohammed.” They have to do the work, they have to make the decision to change their ways. I’ve changed over the years surely. I’m always looking to correct wrong ideas of my own, to improve myself, and the impact I make on this world. I can only be a voice of guidance (I hope) if I’m living up to the standards I’m setting. You see it all the time now in International relations, Country A admonishes Country B; Country B says “Right, but look at the horrible shit Country A does.” Usually Country A is the US now, good job on never changing foreign policy over decades regardless of administration idiots. But, my point is, if you’re a hypocrite there is almost zero chance anyone will listen to you. If you do your best, even if you slip up, make mistakes then it is ok. We are all going to make mistakes at times, and we have to take our lumps and move on. You can’t get all shitty and defensive about it, admit your mistake and move on.
But that’s that, if you’re doing what you’re doing for the wrong reasons, you will fail. If you are being a hypocrite you will get found out. Be true to yourself, fight for what’s right. Keep looking to improve and when you mess up and someone calls you on it, take a minute and take a step back and look at yourself, and see if you can make it better. If you can’t then so be it, if you can, then be willing to change, have some damned humility. Humility is the greatest lesson in this world. I think that’s why so very many of the runners I meet are such decent people (there are always exceptions though); because this endeavor is so humbling. Pushing your body as far as so many of us do really does have an amazing effect of keeping you grounded, because as great as so many of us feel at the end of our runs, there is so much during each one of our runs that are right on the edge of disaster. Sometimes, disaster does strike too. I’ve seen leaders of races collapses. I’ve passed Elite runners sitting on the side of the road, I’ve had to move to the side of the road to let ambulances past to get to fallen runners ahead. We’ve all read headlines of runners (and some of us knew runners) struck by cars and killed or maimed. I myself was struck by a car, with no ill-effects (amazing). Weather, wind, wild animals, so much can go wrong externally, and internally. We all love my gastric distress stories, I know!
Humility, that’s the key, be humble, and get involved. That’s what we need to do. If you’re having trouble with that humility, start running, you’ll learn it soon enough. Oh, other good practice I’ve been working on. If you comment online, or someone comments on something you said, say what you need to, but if it’s not an argument, just let your friend have the last word. Even if you have something clever, or fun or whatever to follow with, let them have the last word.

Have fun, keep running, and remember; if Gil can run then so can you!

Apr 6th So far, so good

It’s a beautiful day. Threw on my “No Meat Athlete” singlet and put in 5 miles. Relaxed and enjoyed the rest of my morning. Even managed to catch the season opener of Archer, after I saw the premiere of Season 3 for Rick and Morty last night. Really, not a bad day at all right? Right.
On my way to work today, and I’m thinking about this horrible “article” I saw with just the worst headline. It was for some vegan website about someone named Ruby Rose. I am aware there is a series called “Orange is the new black,” but have never seen it, and apparently she is an actress on this. We’ll get into my rejection of most pop culture in a minute. Let me stay focused on this supposed piece of journalism.
The first issue was with the headline which was something to the effect of, “Ruby Rose says if you want to defeat Trump go vegan.”  So I’m thinking that maybe this will be a big piece about how learning to have compassion for all living things, human and animal, and respecting everyone and everything’s rights would bring about a change in consciousness that this world sorely needs. Nope. Strike one.
So I read the article and they spend the first part of it talking about who she is. You drew people in on this person’s star power, and then, instead of following the inverted pyramid, like a good journalist would, you’re talking about who the person  you’re quoting is, and why we should care at all about her. Then talk about Donnie Pee-party’s (aka Lord Dampnut) attack on environmental regulations. Strike two.
Now, at the very end of the article, they finally quote what this Ruby Rose person said, and guess what they actually fucking said? She said that if you were angry about the erosion of environmental protection, fighting back against this could be aided by adopting a vegan or vegetarian diet. Not about defeating Trump, just a sensible quite about how much environmental damage is done by the factory farming of meat. Which, that nuance I’ve discussed before. Overall the number 2 contributor of greenhouse gas emissions. Zero new information and completely misrepresented what this person said. Strike three!
More importantly; I am not vegan, and I don’t follow a vegan diet, but I understand the difference between being vegan and following a vegan diet. Vegans use no animal products or animal labor at all. Someone eating a vegan diet simply doesn’t eat anything produced from animal life or animal labor. Fairly easy distinction. You’d be surprised how many people just think it’s about what you eat.
The good news is, they didn’t try and liken animal rights to human rights in any way. But they did a horrible job representing the issue, what the person said, and made all parties involved look bad. It’s so tiring. It’s at least irresponsible, at most plain ignorant. But stuff like this doesn’t help anyone. It hurts the philosophy of veganism, it makes people fighting against Comrade Donnie look stupid, and it helps further the idea that journalism can’t be trusted.
I’m going to level with you, this blog was not my idea. It was a friend of mine who convinced me I had something worth sharing in my own weird way. My brain is an interesting place and when I’m on, I tend to have a very unique way of showing it, that is entertaining and informative. I don’t care if people love me, or like me, or take to heart what I say. I’m here, and I say why I say in the hopes that people pull their heads out of their asses and stop treating their brothers and sisters like shit and the planet like business in liquidation. The irony there is, that some of the time I seriously wonder if it wouldn’t be better off if humans went extinct and the Earth were left to heal itself.
Beyond that, this famous person with this statement, the horrible soft drunk commercial with that Jenner woman, Scarlet Johannesburg playing a Japanese cyborg; I’ve been reading a lot of justified, righteous anger about advertising. I get that I just called TV and movies advertising. That’s all they are. I’ve watched entire TV shows and realized I just watched a 22 minute commercial for various products and ideas. I’ve watched movies and left the theater realizing I just watched a 90 minute advertisement for products, services, or ideas. I understand the human need to be entertained, to be distracted. But there is no mistaking that everything you watch, listen to, and mostly read, at this point in history is a market-tested, and profit-driven advertisement for something.
This is why I do my best to pay as little attention to pop culture as I can. Yes, I love watching Archer and Rick and Morty, but I’m always looking out for what I’m trying to be sold.
Be entertained, but don’t get sold.

Have fun, keep running, and remember; if Gil can run then so can you!

Apr 5th I am hardcore

Yep, I admit it, proudly. Not because my foot hurts and I ran 5 miles on it. Not because of all the marathons, or anything like that. It has nothing to do with sport, accomplishments, or anything of the sort. What is “hardcore”? It’s  not some fucking marketing slogan for “extreme athletes”. It’s not how many tattoos you have, the clothes you wear, the piercings in your body. None of that makes anyone hardcore.
Hardcore crosses most barriers, culturally, socio-economically, religiously, and on down the list. It’s about who you are and how you look at the world, and your place in it and those around you.
When I was growing up, they called us “latchkey kids”. Our parents were either divorced or together, widowed or widower, but either way, kids were pretty much left to their own after school while their parent(s) were working. It was lower middle-class nonsense. What happened was us and those like us would congregate, we’d figure shit out on our own. Usually our guidance was whatever music we were listening to. My friends and I found groups like the Bad Brains, Cro-Mags, Murphy’s Law, Agnostic Front, Madball, Minor Threat, Warzone. What they were saying in their music spoke to our experiences. The conclusions they drew were of the same ideas we were forming. Some of my friends found Straight Edge, or veganism appealing to their ideas, to their morality, others were about beers and barbecues, some became devotees of Krishna, but that didn’t matter. We kept our bond to each other. We were, and still are, brothers and sisters.
We learned that this brother and sisterhood extended past our immediate circle. We shared that with any and all who wanted to roll up their sleeves and get to work doing the right thing. What was the right thing? Whatever lifted everyone up and out of the shit we saw happening in the world around us. Was all this perfect? Did we find some sort of Utopia? Nope. Nazi fucks, fascist skinheads, fake motherfuckers would come around. They’d come to shows and start shit, trying to recruit people who didn’t know better, or were there for the wrong reasons. Fights would happen. We did the best with what we had and what we knew. Some of them had a change of heart, deep down I don’t think most of them did.
Yeah, we were outcasts because of how we dressed, the music we listened to, the tattoos, piercings (I never really participated in the tattoos until I was older and never was keen on piercings). Yes, most of us are working-class people who struggle because so many of our co-workers don’t look on us with brotherhood, they don’t stand with us, they don’t work together they work for themselves. But does that make us oppressed? For the most part no. We have our problems, we have our struggles, we don’t forget them, but we always have brothers and sisters to lend a hand, we are always there to lend a hand too. There’s always a benefit show, or some event to help out.
The weird thing about being hardcore is, you’ll always be hardcore. I see plenty of people who take the style, affectations, maybe cover themselves in tattoos and piercings for a time to “rebel”. But so many of them will one day take out the piercings, cover or even remove the tattoos, and go to work for themselves. At the time, so many in the “scene” will have thought them to be so hardcore, but in reality, they were there for their own reasons. You can’t be hardcore if you’re only in it for yourself.
That’s the thing, we aren’t an oppressed minority, we are kids who find their own way and find out, as much as we bust balls with our friends and even say mean shit to them, we actually like people and we want to improve our lots in life. But still we have people who come in and “cosplay” (for lack of a better term right now) hardcore and then take the makeup off and go about life like it never happened. They appropriate our subculture for however long they want and when it doesn’t serve them anymore, they leave.
This is the problem when  real oppressed groups have their culture imitated by the oppressors. Why it’s so offensive for oppressed people’s is this:

When you take the makeup off, the dress off, the boots off, or whatever, you go back to your everyday life where you are not a part of that experience, that culture. People may ohhh and ahhh about how well you represented whatever romanticized version of whatever person you were pretending to be, but at the end of the day you don’t deal with any of the negative aspects of whatever.
However, every day, the people from that culture have to constantly deal with the negative aspects. Negativity, usually thrust upon them by the culture you are “escaping” by romanticizing some small part of theirs.
Simply put, when you’re done being “Pocahontas” for the weekend, you go home and are Sally Smith. You go to your job, go about your life and that’s that. About 22% of the 5.4 million native peoples living in the United States today live on reservations. With poor Healthcare and little to no aide from a federal government who historically eliminated native peoples and forced them off their lands and into reservations with no resources to speak of in the first place, unemployment is very high, 40-80% on most reservations. 28.2% of all natives, regardless of where they live, are below federal poverty standards.
Any minority culture you try and “honor” with your costume, has statistics and stories like these. You want to “honor” people, how about you demand they get equal protection under the law, equal opportunity, maybe look into why they are oppressed, maybe challenge your friends who blame the group’s problems on (insert racist reason like “drinking problems” or “laziness” or “lack of father-figures” here). Get in their faces about it! Tell them to fuck off with their nonsense, motherfucker in Sandy Hook didn’t have his father around, no one blamed his lack of a “strong male role model”. No he was just an “unstable, lone-wolf”.
Point is, the people you are imitating are who they are every day, all the time. I only gave one example, and general statistics. Why, because I can’t know the psychological trauma which must come with knowing only 100 years ago the United States Government was still trying to remove you from land that was always yours, because there was some resource on it that some European man was going to come and commodities, and you weren’t going to get a dime of it. The trauma that must be felt as the citizens of Bismarck, ND voted against having a pipeline run through their community so now the government is forcing it to run through yours. Even though you’re told it’s your land and you can be autonomous on it.
I can’t imagine the psychological trauma of centuries of being treated like property, even having that codified in law. To then be told you were getting your freedom, only to be placed into an apartheid state, still treated no better than property for another 100 years, then when you finally have at least the law stop allowing it by word, still being 7 times more likely to be murdered by a police officer during a traffic stop. Then when you get upset about it, you’re told to calm down, just do as they say.
I can’t imagine these feelings, because I’ve never experienced it all the time. I’ve had instances where someone momentarily thinks I am Hispanic or Latino, I’ve had moments where people think I am Arab Muslim or sometimes have gotten Pakistani Muslim. But often these instances are fleeting and the tension passes as soon as my ID is seen or my voice is heard. I don’t deal with it every day. When I go home at night it doesn’t make me feel like I don’t belong, and I have only once feared for my life. I have no idea how the constant pressure must feel. And neither do you.
So whatever the culture, whatever the obstacles they face, don’t cheapen the beautiful things they have, and don’t try to make the beautiful things your own. Unless you’re willing to take on all the ugliness they must face as well. And it can’t be for your profit or well-being like Raquel Donutholes (Rachel Dozelal) who had no problem suing Howard University for rejecting her for “being white”, yet now claims to be “black”. She’s not, she’s just looking for a cross to nail herself upon to make a profit.
That’s basically what appropriation is: I’m going to take this good thing and pretend it’s mine, but you can keep all this bad shit. Or, I’m going to profit off this good thing from another culture but they can go fuck themselves and it’s their own fault they don’t profit off it, even though when they use it, we look down on them for it. This is what’s happening, this is why appropriation is a problem.
Now, you want to do something, be hardcore. Get dirty, fucking help people. You might lose some friends along the way, but don’t worry, you’ll make new ones. Life isn’t about making friends anyway, it’s about finding truth and sticking with it. Don’t put on a front and don’t take things from people when you have no skin in the game.

Have fun, keep running, and remember; if Gil can run then so can you!

Just in case anyone has trouble with the lyrics:

Putting on an act that just isn’t working
You stole from your friends when you thought they weren’t looking
Your whole fucking life, you put on a front
You pushed it to the point when my trust slips through your hands
Trust
You don’t understand
Trust
Slips through your hands
Oh thought you were the one
It’s what you haven’t got
Try to play it cool
Why be something that you’re not?
It’s just the fucking point that you steal, that you miss
You pushed it to the point when my trust slips through your hands
Trust
You don’t understand
Trust
Slips through your hands
Trust
Slips through your hands

Apr 4th A beautiful morning

Seriously, wow. The weather is perfect for running. Not too hot, not too cold, no blazing sun, not a ton of clouds to wreck the beauty of the sky. The one thing that is against me is this horrible pain in my right foot. It’s the joint where my big toe meets the foot. It’s not swollen, it feels like a deep bruise, or some other injury like that. I can run on it, obviously, but it is super painful at the start, enough to change my gait and foot strike. But as I have said, I will run until I break. That’s what I did today. Well, ran, I didn’t break, I should have no problem getting out tomorrow morning, assuming I wake up in time.
I was thinking about seeing my family. While I really want to see everyone and say hi, I don’t really want to spend all Summer in the US. But I need to, I need to work this Summer, and I can’t work here and see my family and friends. Plus I have to get my license renewed and get a motorcycle endorsement. So Summer in the US it is. Everyone really needs to start making plans to come visit after that though. There are marathons, half marathons, 10km races, I’m sure ultras can be found. Yes, you need a medical certificate, but I can’t keep getting on airplanes all the time.
Right now, I’m just trying to sort a plan of attack for running this month. I keep getting side-tracked though. I’m bouncing between thoughts about work, the US, politics, socio-economic issues, racism, everything. Why do we make this world so fucking complicated? In no way is the way we conduct our society sensible. The worst is, as uncomfortable as I’ve always felt, I can only imagine how horrible that feeling must be for those who face the more insidious issues we create. My burden is only that I recognize the issues, and I know I must fight to correct them. It has to be corrected. Ignoring it is not an option. It’s not like a hurt toe. Because it won’t go away in time. It is a structural deficiency. As I’ve pointed out many times the beliefs our current system are based on, the “best ideas” of their time, the “best science” of its time, it was horribly flawed. Sometimes intentionally, mostly just due to ignorance.
Let’s get back in our time machine, and go back to the dawn of the anatomically modern Homo Sapiens. Let’s take one of those infant modern humans, and bring them today and raise them as any other child today. Are they deficient? Do they know less? Do they struggle with simple concepts we take for granted? No. They are anatomically modern, which means they have the same form and abilities as any of us. Educated in our modern system, with all the knowledge at our disposal, they should have no trouble grasping these concepts and learning just like any other human being. What’s the point of this thought experiment? Homo Sapiens has been around for a long time, and we’re not better than anyone who came before, and the people who come after will not be any better or worse, naturally.
Will our offspring have more knowledge to draw from? Better ideas? Better science? Better philosophy? Of course (particularly if they find this blog)! But anatomically they will still be like us, well unless some unforeseen evolutionary events happen. Yet the ideas our society are based on do not understand this concept. Not only did those who came up with the theories which run our society today believe that ancient humans were ignorant, incapable barbarians, naturally. They honestly believed in a difference between modern peoples. That the modern European male was the pinnacle of homo sapiens evolution. You can’t have a just society based on these ideas. Fundamentally dismissing most of the world’s population is going to give you a system of oppression no matter how well-meaning anyone using the system, or running the system, tries to be.
This is the basic idea of the “Ancient Aliens” shows and shit like that, I’ve talked about that many times. “It’s impossible these people could have figured this thing out, I mean they weren’t as wonderfully perfect a human being as I am, and yet I can’t even figure it out.” That’s the actual premise of those types of shows and ideas. When they say things like, “This stone was carved so perfectly, we can’t even do it today with our modern machines.” That is what they are saying. It is that sort of persistent thinking that the ideas which run the world are based on. There’s an inherent inequality in the thinking itself. How can the system that is built off it, be fair by any true measure?
Let’s look at it this way. I want to build a house, I don’t bother to level the foundation. Now, I build the house on top of that. My foundation is flawed, it is not level. I build a standard, timber-framed American house on top of this. Will my house stand for a particularly long time? I can’t even truly modify the home to stand properly. Due to the flaws in the foundation, there would be gaps between the foundation and the timbers, water would get in. There’d be decay and eventually structural failure. It may take a hundred years, it may take 10, but one day that house is going to fall no matter what, unless we constantly repair it and constantly shore it up, and eventually that’s all we do. How is that a sustainable model for the world? Not to mention, look at all the work involved? Why would we want a system which, itself, requires us to work. There’s nothing natural, normal, sustainable, kind, intelligent about it.
This is why I’m always saying, we need to look at things in a new way, we do need a true change in consciousness. We can’t just take an idea from the past, dust it off and give it a go. It’s still flawed. You can’t fix it. We have to first change our ideas, we already know the science and then the philosophy, which sprang from that, of the Enlightenment was mostly wrong. Why do we look to Capitalism, Communism, or any of the other ideas which came from those bad ideas to fix the problems we’ve created for ourselves. Also, why are people so resistant to changing when it is pointed out what we are doing is causing a problem in the first place? It’s time for a change, a real change.

Have fun, keep running, and remember; if Gil can run then so can you!

Apr 2nd The best days to run are the ones that end in “Y”

Got a little cloud cover today. It made the run a little easier. Still crapped out a little at the end. I wanted a 9 min/mi pace so I took the liberty. It was a really nice day to be out there and I stuck mostly to the lungomare. I have been trying to avoid the road to Barletta recently. Stray dogs make me sad and it seems like in the warmer weather people are paying less attention to things.
Colonialism was on my mind. I don’t understand how some people simply ignore the damage that has been done to this world, and what is still happening. It’s the same as the very subtle differences between Feudalism and Capitalism; the new system Globalism and the old Colonialism. It’s the same people who have always been dominated, firstly. Secondly, now instead of a colonial governor and direct rule of some overseas government, it’s a local ruler, propped up by some overseas government. The really sad part about it, the rebels are always supported by another colonial power. The big name conflicts get the press, and still we seem to ignore this. Assad is supported by Russia, always has been, the US was supporting 2 sides of the resistance to Assad at one point. This isn’t conspiracy, we can look this up. But all over Asia, Africa, Central and South America, this farce has played out over the course of decades. Not months, not years, decades. What the colonial powers figured out after the First World War is that they needed war in order to continue their dominance and their unsustainable economic theories, What they discovered at the end of the Second World War is that they can appear to be at peace, enough to appease their respective populations, while maintaining a war which continually demanded resources, and funneled wealth into their pockets.
Now, does it matter if there’s a sinister cabal of wealthy families meeting secretly to plot this out? Does it matter if there’s a conspiracy here and they all laugh and pat each other on the back while they enjoy a highball and make jokes? No, it really doesn’t. What matters is that we drop the bullshit. Recognize our collective brotherhood/sisterhood. People who come from the old colonies, or those who look like they might have originated there are treated like crap. Refugees, forget it. We need to stop, who are “we” here? The colonials, the Europeans, in general. I’ve talked about this here and there, told stories of some of the refugees here I have spoken to. School teachers trying to become truck drivers, etc. No good reason they can’t be school teachers here, just, they don’t look like what people are used to for school teachers. But it fits into the paradigm. Oppress these people as long as you can, take advantage of their situation, take advantage of them because you get your citizens to dislike them for whatever reason. When these “outsiders” finally gain a foothold and are “accepted”, maybe 2 decades or so, then create a new crisis to create new refugees which can be exploited. It keeps happening. It started in the outskirts of Europe, and has continued to ominously creep across the globe.
In keeping most of the citizenry poor and too busy focused on the bare necessities, you keep them easily manipulated into creating the situation where the “outsider” can be manipulated. You give your citizens just enough so they don’t question it. Usually, this gets called, “White Privilege.” It’s a fairly easy thing to see on a daily basis if you’re looking for it. What people tend to not realize is, it is a worldwide thing. It doesn’t just exist in America, or Australia, or Europe. It goes everywhere. A good example:
I have gotten into many arguments with people on the bookfaces. Once someone starts ad hominem attacks against me, I take the gloves off, and when it comes to arguments about racism, usually I end up called someone a cracker, whitey, or something else equally “rude”. Do I get banned for it? No, I get a talking to, about how using language like that “lessens” my point. The fuck it does. But you know, being a “Euro” I shouldn’t treat “my own people” like that, I guess is their point. But then a new friend of mine gets 24 hours off of bookfaces simply for referring to someone as “Becky.” Even though people have called her all sorts of horrible names which do not need to be repeated, and yet those people, even though reported are deemed to not “violate community standards.” This is a microcosm of the “real world” where some people have to constantly police their own behavior, and even then they may not survive, yet others can do as they please and never face any real consequence for what they’ve done. This is the essence of White Supremacy. This is happening all over the world, every day, whether it be online, or face to face. All the time.
That is what happens, this is how it works, and it’s sick and it needs to stop. It’s not up to those who are oppressed to meet some magical standard. I can show you so many examples of standards being “met” and the goalposts being moved. It’s up to the oppressors to change what they are doing. To give up the game and let a new system or equality, of justice take control. At the same time, there are probably going to be some well-deserved lumps, deal with it.

Have fun, keep running, and remember; if Gil can run then so can you!

Apr 1st Run rabbit run!

Well, there was no reason for today to be difficult, but never underestimate my ability to make my own life exceedingly difficult. So, when I got my new phone, I downloaded my favorite alarm clock app, and set it up, to a point. But for some reason, I left the weekend alarm as is, and just would change the time for Saturday and Sunday. That is to say, Saturday night I would set the weekend alarm for whatever time I felt like waking up and running on Sunday, and then Sunday night I would set it for Saturday morning at 6am, so I had plenty of time to get up Saturday morning, make breakfast, and get to work. But last weekend I forgot to reset Saturday. This morning, this stupidity of not just setting separate alarms for Saturday and Sunday burned me. Woke up with 5 minutes to leave the apartment to make the last train to make it on time for my first class. Got a shower, got dressed, got to the platform in time (barely). It’s truly rare that I feel like I complete asshole, this morning, yeah.
But work was good overall. It was the first time seeing my first class in a month, as they took their B1 exam a couple weeks ago. So I just spent the time introducing them to what the B2 exam expects from them. The second class, we were going over transportation vocab, and I ended up giving them a lecture on the importance of safety gear on motorcycles and seat belts in cars. Yes, that’s a problem here, people not wearing seat belts. Then one of the kids mentions how some people get seriously injured from airbags, namely they get scarring, and I say yes, but the alternative can be worse. Then we start talking about g forces and how the airbag is meant to slow the rate of deceleration. Was a wild one. But that’s not the most important thing today. But always a good talk to have, impress on them automotive safety.
Got home, managed a decent run, but low on calories I was not feeling 10 miles. Plus, I had neglected some sunscreen and the sun was pretty intense. So I got a little over 7 miles in. I felt pretty good overall, although hungry and definitely needed to drink some more water before I went out today. But I had a good pace and felt strong. I should be able to make up a few extra miles tomorrow, I have had a fantastic dinner and have been drinking water, taking care of myself tonight.
Tomorrow, running, cleaning, cooking, that is my day. A week and a half until the long weekend (It’s Italy, we get all of Easter off!) and the days should go by pretty quick. I’ll be busy. All in all, I’m doing alright, holding it down and getting shit done.
So, remember when I came back after my layoff and got my new computer and all that? I said I unblocked everyone on my block list because I was feeling generous and I was letting go of all the bad feelings I had about people and as long as no one performed any fuckery, I’d be fine to live and let live with all that? So one person, almost immediately, had to play “nope, I’m gonna get the last word” so that person went straight back on the block list. Don’t even know the person, they are a friend of a friend, and just a dumb son-of-a-bitch. An ex creeped on me and accidentally hit like and then unlike. Which was just funny to me. But then last night, a sort-of ex. I don’t know, I was told no emotional attachments, and then when I hooked up with someone else shit hit the fan. Well, there was never anything there save what it was, and when I’m told I’m free to do as I wish, I do as I wish. Well, I get the message “I see you unblocked me…” Fucking hell, just because I unblock you doesn’t mean I want to hear from you.
Now, I know this person well enough to know they had been drinking. And I haven’t answered, didn’t answer then, and won’t answer. If I saw someone who blocked me in my “suggested friends”, no matter what, I wouldn’t message them. I was blocked, that’s that. If the person wants to talk to me, they will bother to say something. And mind you, there wasn’t like an apology for the shittiness or anything resembling anything that would show any remorse or feelings of guilt for the crap this person pulled. It was like, “you should talk to me now.”

So, I will say it again, just because I let go of my need to block you doesn’t mean I want to hear from you, or talk to you. It doesn’t mean I miss you. I really do move on. Particularly if everything was on a foundation of “no emotional attachment”, like ok, why would I get my ass attached then? I just don’t understand why people think so highly of themselves. I get that I come off like I do sometimes, but I really don’t. I just roll with things as they are. But it’s just an annoyance, what makes someone think I want to talk to them. But if I’ve been angry at you for something and your lead isn’t an apology, even if I wanted to talk to you again, chances are it’s not going to happen.
Alright, so yeah. just bothered me. Still won’t block the person, I can ignore people just fine. Just need to vent that. I’m good now, I can go on with life. Onto Sunday, another bad-ass run, some more amazing home-cooked food, and cleaning this place up. I really am more and more pleased with my cooking. Each time I make a dish again, I do a little better. It really does pay off when you always think you can do better. I’m happy with who I am and what I do, but I always know I can improve, I always know I can be better tomorrow than I was today. That is what drives me. As I said, some days are better than others, but it is that idea which allows me to hone every skill I have. Never be complacent, never be “complete”. Always look for a better way, always look to improve, but never let someone else bring you down. Never let someone try and use that to sell you on anything. That’s where we go wrong. Self-doubt is a good thing, letting other people crap on you for that self-doubt is a problem. Being a better you is hard work, and no one has a magic serum or anything else to make it easy for you. No matter what you’re facing internally, all you can do is strive to be a better you tomorrow. As far as the external shit we force on each other. That’s the shit we need to knock the fuck off in this world.
The people that force their shit on other people, they always think they know what’s best. Look, I don’t know what’s best, I know what works for me, and I share it. I’ve always said, you take something from this great, you have a better way, fine. I’m not here to tell anyone what to do. But if you think you know what’s best, you’re always right, you’re something wonderful and special, and so everyone should always listen to you, I don’t want to hear it.

Have fun, keep running, and remember; if Gil can run then so can you!