Matt's Blog.

Everyone’s graduating and it seems like I’m going to be the last one to move on. I don’t know if the time is right. I’m always wondering if I’ll be able to find something after I graduate. That’s the biggest fear: not being able to find a job or a job that will lead me somewhere. I hear all the horror stories of guys just wandering listlessly through the workforce and not being able to find anything out there. I wanted something in government, but this whole life in the bureaucracy, is it really what I want to do now? Is there a future in that here or would I have to move east to find something? Maybe should I prep myself for a career in education to to fall back on. Teaching has been something I’ve been thinking about. It would mean another semester or two in school, but I could live with that.

I honestly thought something like this would have resolved itself a lot sooner, but I guess things change and my indecisiveness got the best of me. But in the mean time, I should make the best of what time I have left as a student… all I know is that I will definitely miss being one when it’s all over.

…because I’m bored and I’ve been reading way too much Esquire.

• The name Brown Rug came about when I bought an Xbox one Christmas and it asked me to come up with a user name.  I couldn’t think of one so I got the system to come up with a random name. It generated ‘YellowRug’ for me but I thought it would be hilarious if I replaced ‘yellow’ with ‘brown’ because brown reminded me of poo, and I thought it was funny that my name online would remind me of a crappy brown rug. Ten minutes after registering, I realized how lame the name was and I was bummed because it would cost me $10 to change it. So the name stuck. And it was my fault.
• Some of my friends also call me Yew Chon, because that’s how the gwei lo pronounces my Chinese name.
• Some guys’ thing is cars, cameras or computers. My thing is guitars.
• There has always been two constants in my life that I’ve relied on when things weren’t looking good: God and music. My faith gives me hope for tomorrow, music gives me something to do in the meantime.
• I remember my first show, it was at my high school talent show during my senior year. The band was nervous but at the same time we were stoked. My high E string broke the night before while I was restringing my guitar, and we just managed to get a drummer and a singer at the last minute to play our songs. It lasted for only 10 minutes, but after our set the auditorium exploded. From that day on, life just changed.
• Even if I never play another show in my life, I still consider myself blessed to have played. It takes an amazing amount of coordination and luck to get the right people together. To have done it once and to be a part of it is something I will never forget.
• A lot of people don’t appreciate my laid back approach to things. To me, it just keeps me sane and healthy.
• Looking back at all the stupid crap I’ve done in the past, I consider myself lucky for having some pretty forgiving friends.
• Now that I think about it, I’m pretty fortunate to have parents that have put up with me for all these years.
• My guitar heroes are both named Tom – Tom Morello and Tom Delonge. Cool.
• I’m 23 and it’s still hard for me to stop calling myself  ‘boy.’
• I don’t think people really appreciated the pop-punk era during the late ’90s early ’00s. But in 10 years, I think my musical tastes will be vindicated (hopefully).
• Very few things in life make me angry, but if you tell me I can’t do something, I will go out of my way to prove you wrong. I take those challenges personally.
• Did you know Tom Delonge’s middle name is Matthew? When I found that out I screamed. Fate will one day bring us together.
• The one song that has gotten me through some tough times has been ‘Fix You’ by Coldplay. It’s the only song that can make my eyes well up.
• What she’s got to have: kindness, compassion, honesty and a sense of humor. Plus she needs to have nice hair. I have a weird hair fetish.
• A man should always know how to cook one dish really well. Which is why I have taken up cooking these past few months.
• The first song I learned how to play was ‘Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life)’ by Green Day. That song taught me so much on how to play: rhythm, strumming, picking, and the realization that I could actually be good at this.
• Principles are important. They made me the person I am today.
• Rain or shine, I will run. The physical meditation clears my head and brings me peace.
• I like making mix tapes. If you want one, ask.
• I waste way too much time on Youtube. For instance, last night I watched videos on Bees last night. Bees. Did you know 20 hornets can take out a colony of 30,000 bees in 2-3 hours? Nature you scary.
• Everyone needs to listen to Zee Avi. She is amazing.

Four females from my past, four lessons learned.

Girl 1: Don’t wait too long to ask her.

Girl 2: Don’t pass up on a good thing.

Girl 3: You can’t make chicken salad out of chicken shit.

Girl 4: Don’t invest too much into her unless you know. Also see comment on Girl 1.

The last one kills me.

I can’t seem to string together an actual post these days. I probably have A.D.D., judging from the amount of incomplete drafts I’ve compiled on my blogging dashboard. That’s why this update will be in point form, because a) I have no focus but at the same time b) I realize it’s time I need to make an update with some actual substance.

• Alcan starts tomorrow, and from talking with some veterans on the team it seems like the season is starting to fall apart. But I knew this year was going to be tough. Roughly a quarter of our core from last year returned, the rest filled with first time paddlers or paddlers that were away from the sport for some time. We’ve been reduced to being a team that used to be in the higher echelon of the dragon boat community to a much lower ranked team. I think what’s annoyed me the most was that we’ve lost so much of our crew from previous years. I don’t mind the failures that this team will probably endure in the next couple of months, but the personnel loss hurts. We lost good people that made the past couple of years enjoyable. Not to say that any of the new members recruited were awful, but when you only have a few returning members come back, the cohesion and chemistry of the team isn’t as strong and the culture that determines a successful and fun team isn’t there anymore. But these are things I can’t really think about now. We need to endure and believe, and sometimes believing is enough of a push to achieve some success – small or large. While many of our crew is inexperienced, I believe we can make up for it in the fact that we can still pull through when the pressure’s on. There will be a lot of that tomorrow and on Sunday. After this weekend, we’ll see what this year’s version of Red Fusion is made of. Sorry if this isn’t making any sense… I’m tired and that isn’t really conducive to me writing something the least bit inspirational or deep. Blagh.
• It’s been almost a year and I think I’m ready to move on. I’ve said that so many times, and I just hope it stick now. It’s just not worth the pain anymore.
• I’m enjoying my summer for once. I feel as if I’m accomplishing things and making the most of the free time I’ve got. Doing new things, experimenting, being reacquainted with old and new friends, and staying the eff away from World of Warcraft. Gah, what a waste of time that was.
• I don’t know why, but I’ve started experimenting with cologne. So far everything smells bad on me except for a nice bottle from Ralph Lauren. It was the only one that I tried today that didn’t make Sammie T. sneeze or forced Bryan to make disgusted faces at me. For some reason I still smell like that Diesel cologne after a thorough shower and washing of my arms.
• New headphones. Yay or nay?
• iPhone or an Android phone? The choices…

Aaaaaand I think I’m done. Adios.

I’m having second thoughts about it.

Not taking that extension back in April was a risk. A big risk. One that had financial implications. While I’m not as broke as I like to exaggerate when discussing it, the future outlook of how much I’ve got to play around with for important things looks grim. I’ve also got to deal with going to school, something that I thought was going to be rather exciting, but after looking at the deadlines I’m looking at, I forgot how much school sucked.

I need a new job, the one I’m at is bringing me down and I guess it’s starting to show. I’m not as energetic about doing my work as I was a year ago. I’m not doing the best that I can do, and I’m not really being the kind of person that I expected people in the same role as I. It’s hypocritical I know. The only thing that’s keeping me going is that I still have the support of most of the managers there. If people still rely on me, I guess that should count for something. Also the fact that finding a job is hard.

On the plus side, maybe not taking that extension was a good thing.

I’ve spent more time with friends than I did when I was still holding down a 8-4 job in addition to a closing shift at Scotia. I’ve got some resemblance of a life now. I’ve got time. Never did I realize how precious time is. Now I treasure it whenever I can.

Things maybe aren’t all bad. But the whole job hunting thing still sucks. Oh and school sucks too. Can’t forget that either.

I like how a simple weekend getaway can serve as a therapeutic escape, like forgetting about life back home. Work. School. People. None of that came into mind while I was out there. All that really mattered was what we were going to eat, where we were going to hit up next and hoping we’d wake up early enough before we thought the day was wasted. When I came home, I remembered it all again. How much work sucked, wondering when I’m going to graduate and stressing out about people in my life. But I guess that doesn’t really matter right now, because no one can truly get away from it all.

But to think a weekend away from here made it seem like nothing mattered at all. That’s a pretty cool thing.
(It’s late, and I’m not sure if this is making any sense)

Things that are on my mind right now:

• From what I’m seeing on the twitter feed, the city feels royally bummed out about tonight’s latest debacle. In the past I would be too, but this year I’m feeling pretty numb. I think the loss to Calgary during the 2004 playoffs was the last time I was emotionally connected with the team. After that, I just started to gradually not care. But, on the plus side, my main man Shane O’Brien scored a goal tonight. Mike Gillis, re-sign this man please.
• I don’t like making public very private things, but I will say this: it’s hard not caring, or even pretending not to. In the end I guess I still do care.
• School starts tomorrow and I’m not ready. Even though I’m officially only taking one course and on the wait list for another, it seems like I really need to cut down on the things I have planned for the summer.
• Graduation… how’s that going to work out?
• I can’t wait for Portland. As much as I love Vancouver, I need to get out of this city.
• This summer I will learn ‘Doesn’t Remind Me’ by Audioslave. That song has been bothering me for a long time now. It needs to be learned, but darn it tremelo picking is hard.
• The Fray never get old. Listen to ‘Uncertainty.’ Lovely song.

I’m out.

I was offered an extension for co-op yesterday. The decision came suddenly and I was only given until 9 AM today to decide whether I was going to continue working for the agency or go my separate way. I can’t really say that I thought it through, due to the amount of time they gave me to make up my mind, but after thinking it over I eventually declined the offer. When the initial wave of extensions being offered to some of the co-ops went out and I wasn’t one of them, I was resounded to the fact that I wasn’t coming back and that there wasn’t going to be a second chance for me. I looked at what I was going to do from now until the end of the year and thought maybe, just maybe this might turn out OK. Enrolling in classes as a part time student during the summer might give me some time and space to actually take up things that I wanted to do. I said the same thing when I knew I was going into co-op. You’d think that no exams and papers would be somewhat of a bonus, since not worrying about those things would give you so much time to do whatever you wanted. For me, coming home exhausted and working a shift a week at the theater in retrospect took away all the personal time I had.

I’m a guy who believes in faith. It comes from being spiritual and believing in God who can guide us through tough decisions. I’ve never had to make a tough decision in a long time. Most of those decisions were being made for me by outside factors that I couldn’t control, like not being accepted into co-op the first time around for the fall semester – which actually turned out really well going to school instead. This time around, I thought it was going to be the same clear-cut choice: God did not intend for me to stick around the office, he wanted me out and there wasn’t going to be any say in the matter. I was fine with that. In fact, I was glad the choice was made for me.

So for me to out of the blue be offered an extension came as something that gave me mixed signals. All of  a sudden there was an actual choice that needed to be made and I eventually made it. Did I do the right thing today? Or should I have accepted the offer? God wasn’t going to make the decision for me this time, not like the last.

As the day comes to a close, I’m starting to feel a little at peace with what I decided. This whole time I actually missed school and being a part of the whole campus vibe thing. I missed my 9 hours of sleep. I missed being around people I used to hang out with a lot before I got a taste of the ‘real world’. With potentially more time on my hand, I could pursue more things, hit up Portland and possibly Tofino with the homies as well as the Losers at Cultus Lake. The only reason why I would ever go for another term sitting on my butt the entire day answering the same thing over and over would be for the money. I remember Carrie mentioning this on one of my past posts: I’ve got the rest of my life to make money. And it’s true. Right now, I just want to enjoy being young and stupid.

So I’m going to bed, excited at the thought that I’ll be collecting my last paycheck next Wednesday and enjoying a two week break before I get back to school. Goodness knows I haven’t had a solid night of sleep in a very long time. And I’ll be looking forward to that once this is all done.

I should have seen the signs. When I’m over-confident about something that I think is going to happen, it usually never happens. The same thing applies to this situation, I thought I was going to get extended for co-op, reap some muchos dineros and not worry about money for a while. I’d have also quit my job at the theater – another thing that has weighed on me for a while now. Now I find out that I won’t be coming back and I’ll be back in school a lot sooner than I thought. I knew I wanted to be a student forever, but I didn’t want to jump back into it just yet.

I guess on the bright side it will be the end of early bedtimes and 6 AM wake up calls. I won’t miss those one bit. I’ll also welcome the fact that I’ll have more time to do things. You’d think with no exams and papers to worry about there would be so much time to do things, but when you’re coming home exhausted plus keeping your old job on the side, time seems more wasted on recouping rather than doing something constructive. Maybe with the sun coming out the energy level will be there.

Other than that, I’m looking forward to the summer. And with summer comes summer projects: start practicing more electric guitar, start saving money and cook more which, by the way, I am starting to enjoy (Thank you Thomas Keller). Add to the activities I need to do before the end of summer like surfing, grouse grind and hopefully a bike ride along the sea wall will be things I could do before the end of what I think is my last summer as a student. Oh the horrors of the real world.

And with that, I bid you adieu. I need to recover from all the hits to the head I took today in dodgeball. Tonight I learned that tall white people throw hard. Very hard.

Yellowcard – Down On My Head