A Salty Adventure – August 16 to 22, 2014

A Salty Adventure – August 16 to 22, 2014

This week I went to Salt Lake City and Provo in Utah for a family vacation, and I had a really good time it was very hot, sometimes reaching all the way to 36°C (97°F). I shall now attempt to regale you with what I did on this vacation of mine.

Saturday August 16, 2014

On Saturday I had the chance to do some Parkour again after a multiple week lull in my Parkour practice, and see the people of Breathe Parkour one last time before I move to Edmonton, and it was a good practice day.

We started out the class a little bit early, and there were a couple new faces that I had never seen before, only one of them turned out being brand new, and it is good to see that Parkour is still growing.

We were split into groups based on our experience level so that the newer people could focus on the base skills, and the rest; Scott, Spencer and I; could focus on other skills. The skills that we started out with was Tacos, and then we moved on to wall runs. After the three of us had done this for a while and I had successfully done some proper muscle ups, we moved on to doing some basic bar stuff, involving just getting our swings on the bars working properly. The final thing that we all did was move up to the foam pit and work on whatever we wanted to work on. I personally did a side flip, and showed the new girl how to do back falls.

I spent the rest of the day packing.

That was my Saturday, onwards to Sunday.

Sunday August 17, 2014

On Sunday my mom, dad, and I traveled 12 hours to Salt Lake City, Utah. I watched movies and read on my way down, and that was my day, exciting right?

Oh yea, we also had Indian food for dinner at a restaurant named the Copper Bowl, and it was very good. Go check it out if you are ever in Salt Lake City.

Monday August 18, 2014

On Monday morning we went shopping to get my brother, who is on an LDS mission in Utah, some sweet stuff.

After that we went on a hike to a place called Cecret Canyon, yes that is spelt right. It was a pretty awesome hike and I saw a bunch of chipmunks, an interesting bird, some cool rocks, and a really big pond called Albion Basin that is part of Utah’s water supply. In fact here is a picture of the basin.

The final thing that we did that day as a family was go to an awesome Mexican restaurant called “Red Iguana 2” where I had a meal called the Mole Negro (Mole-eh), it was a mole made from chocolate, and it was delicious, sorry, no pictures for this.

Tuesday August 19, 2014

On Tuesday I went to see the Salt Lake City LDS Temple, it was a very beautiful temple and the grounds were very nice to see as well. My parents and I spent time walking around the grounds and looking at all of the different buildings and stuff that are there like the Lion House, the conference center, and the assembly hall. They are all very nice buildings and I enjoyed spending time with my mom and dad, and taking pictures of stuff.

That was my Tuesday, on to Wednesday.

Wednesday August 20, 2014

Today we went shopping at a mall called The Outlets at Traverse Mountain, it is a mall that has sweet sales at all times, so I got a lot of necessary clothes for school, and also some stuff that I just wanted.

We also went to Chuck-A-Rama for dinner. Chuck-A-Rama is an all you can eat buffet that has a lot of different kinds of food and it is a favorite of a lot of people down in Utah.

Thursday August 21, 2014

Thursday was a day full of walking and cousins.

We began the day out with a hike to a place called Bridal Veil Falls. It was a great hike where I saw different wildlife, trees, and creeping things.

The first thing that I saw on this hike was an old tram station for the tram that used to take you up the mountain to what was apparently a restaurant on top of the mountain, it isn’t there anymore because an avalanche took it out of business.

After this I proceeded to see many slugs, bugs, and snails. I even have a picture of me with a slug here.

We then proceeded to get to the falls while were quite nice to and there was this pool full of trout, and one albino trout.

We continued walking towards what we found out was a dam. The river behind the dam had become full of grass and weeds because the water was more stagnant, but the grass and weeds still flowed in the current, which was pretty cool.

On our way back to the car this older gentleman came up to us and started talking to us. He talked about the fish, and hidden treasure, and history, it was a little strange, but it was okay.

The next thing that we did was go and hang out with my cousin Michelle Ask if they are okay with their names being on the internet and her family. As I haven’t seen her in a number of years, it was nice to see her again. We all went to dinner, and I played with her kids for a little while to.

That ended my day, onwards to Friday.

Friday August 22, 2014

On Friday morning my parents and I went to the Manti City LDS temple, it was a beautiful temple and the time we spent there was wonderful. It was a hot day when we got out of the temple, and I was glad when I was able to change into a pair of shorts and a t-shirt.

In the afternoon we went shopping for my mom, she didn’t buy anything.

The last thing that I did was go and hand out with my cousin, her husband Wes and Wes’ sister Lillie, and play board games. We played Settlers of Catan as a group, and then Lillie and I played Jenga for a little while until I went back to my hotel.

The End

That was my week, very little Parkour was involved, but that is the way it goes sometimes.

Quote of the week

This quote is from Will Smith who has been in a lot of great movies over the years, some not so great, but oh well.

“Don’t chase people. Be yourself, do your own thing and work hard. The right people – the ones who really belong in your life – will come to you. And stay.”

Will Smith

Find image here

I just really liked the sound of this one, and I think you can see why.

Well, that is all I have for now, later everyone, and remember “Happiness starts with a smile, smiles don’t start with happiness.”

Nathan Aris

Rafting the Bow - August 9 to 16, 2014

Sorry for the delayed update, I am working with minimal internet access right now.
This week was a busy week, and I had a good time with it, but let’s not waste time and get right to it.

Saturday August 9, 2014

On Saturday I went rafting in the Bow River with about 50 people, it was fun and I got plenty wet.
We started out our rafting trip at a place near the Golf Canada Calgary Centre and Lafarge, we all loaded up and got into the river. Now, because of the type of people that we all are it wasn’t long before people started getting pushed into the water, and then people began pulling other people from other rafts into the water, then I ended up on another raft after I pulled someone into the water from that raft and my raft got pulled down stream, and then other stuff happened and there were water wars, etc. So I got really wet, really tired, really hungry, didn’t get sunburned, had a great barbeque and corn bust, and had a great time, so I would call that a successful use of time.

Sunday August 10, 2014

On Sunday I went to church, and had a games night. At the games night we played ‘Do you love your neighbor’ and ‘Never have I ever’. We played these games for a long time and had great fun, you should all try these games out some time.

Monday August 11, 2014

On Monday morning I went for a bike ride through Fish Creek Park. As I was biking I saw this railing where I thought immediately upon seeing it, “I wonder if I could walk that” (picture below).

As you can see it is a very long railing, but one day I will walk it. Just for a point of reference, the lady in the distance is about 1.73 meters (5.67 feet) tall. If you are wondering what lady I am talking about I am talking about this lady.

After my bike ride I needed to go to mall because my glasses had gotten stepped on while I was rafting, so I went and did that and then I went around and did a bit of necessary shopping at different stores, but I won’t bore you with the details of my shopping escapades.
The final thing that I did on this fine day was go swimming at a lake. I was with a group of people, about 15 in all, and we spent our time taking pictures, which I do not have, doing flips into the water, meeting some of the new people that joined us and generally frolicking in the water, oh we also threw each other into the water a lot. One of the memorable ones from the night for me was when I went to throw this one girl into to the water and, not wanting to be thrown in, wrapped her arms around my waist. Upon her doing this I thought something along the lines of “Well, can’t throw her in now, better go in with her” and walked off the dock, everyone had a good laugh about that, and I am pretty sure that she bears me no ill will about me doing that.
Onwards to the Tuesday.

Tuesday August 12, 2014

On Tuesday I had some of my cousins come over and stay for the night. The girls, and my mother went to see the musical “Wicked”, while the boys, my dad and I went to watch X-Men Days of Future Past. It was very good, not as good as Guardians of the Galaxy, but it was very good. Hugh Jackman was great as Wolverine as usual, and I got to have some popcorn, Hooray!

Wednesday August 13, 2014

This was a day of furniture shopping, with my mom, because she knows more about furniture than I do. We went to Ikea and spent some time looking at futons, desks, tables and chairs for my new apartment, and found some items that I think will work for me which is good.
I also went for a good bike ride and came across a nice area to practice my balance and precisions. Here are some pictures of what I walked.

I spent a bit of time there just practicing, and worked up a sweat doing so, mainly because it was hot outside.

Thursday August 14, 2014

On Thursday I went to see Global Fest with Raeanne. Global Fest is an outdoor event that the world takes part in, there are vendors, and displays of different places around the world, and they end each night with a fireworks show.
In order to avoid the hassle of trying to find a parking spot we rode our bikes to the event. It was a nice bike ride, but unfortunately it started raining as we started out so we got kind of wet on the way there, oh well.
When we got there it was still raining, so we walked around the different vendors looking at what they had to show. Most of them weren’t selling anything, but the African booth was selling different wares such as hand carved goblets, and statues. Learned about a city in Mexico that would probably be really good to do Parkour in, the city is called Guanajuato, hopefully I will get the chance to go there some day.
The last thing that was done on this day was watching the fireworks. The fireworks on this night were put on by Japan, and they did an okay job, not the best, but it was okay.
On to the last day of the week.

Friday August 15, 2014

This was a day that I spent the better part of moving a sectional couch to my cousin’s house in Lethbridge, it was a good workout and my cousins made my dad, who was also helping with the move, and I a wonderful steak and corn dinner.

The End

Well, that was my week, sorry for the lack of Parkour, too much has been happening lately so I haven’t been able to do much of it.
Now for a quote

Quote of the week

This is a quote from Robin Williams as the character John Keating in the movie “Dead Poets Society”

“No matter what anybody tells you, words and ideas can change the world.”
      – Robin Williams as John Keating

Well that is all I have for this week, hope you all enjoyed, let me know what you thought with a comment or an email, and I will see you all later.

– Nathan Aris

Edmonton Trips – August 2 to 9, 2014

This week I actually didn’t do any parkour, but I did do a bunch of fun things so let’s get to it!

We shall start with Superior Saturday!

Saturday August 2, 2014

On Saturday I went to Edmonton with Raeanne, Louisa, their parents, and Louisa’s boyfriend. We went to Edmonton to go for a bunch of outdoor activities, and go see a laser show. It was nice and warm in Edmonton on Saturday so it was great weather for all of these outdoor activities.

We started the day with a picnic in Rundel Park. After driving for 4 hours it was nice to be able to get to out of the vehicle and walk around a little bit while eating some food.

After the picnic I waded in the river for a little while to cool myself down. The water was nice and warm, but it was filled with garbage consisting mainly of tires. It was pretty sad to see all of that garbage in the river, as I like walking around nature when it hasn’t been disturbed and/or ruined by people not caring at all about nature.

The next thing that we did was go on a short hike in Rundel Park, we ended up going across this big bridge that was really high above the river near the end of the hike, and because I am me I decided to spit into the water a little bit. I also got the chance to work on my balancing a little bit because there were some guard rails that were wide enough to walk on, and that was fun to do.

The next thing that we did was go to a different part of Rundel Park so that we could play some disc golf. Unfortunately there was a tournament going on when we got there so we were unable to play any disc golf, oh well. We were also told that there was supposed to be a place to go swimming, but the place ended up being an indoor pool that you had to pay to get into, so we just went swimming in the river which was warm!

After some frolicking in the river Raeanne and I went to play in the parks, I personally think that you can never be too old to play in the park, and then took a nap on a park bench, well she slept curled up on the bench, I just sat and rested.

The second last thing that we all did in Edmonton was go to The Old Spaghetti Factory there in Edmonton for dinner. The restaurant is in the downtown area of Edmonton so naturally there was some construction going on giving me the chance to do some more practice for Parkour. This time I was able to practice some lache’s on some scaffolding that was set up near the restaurant. It was fun and some people were very impressed by it which made me happy because I love hearing that I have a talent which people can enjoy watching.

For dinner I had some chicken pastas, it is a pasta place after all. The food was good and the décor was very impressive and gave off a nice rustic feel, pretty sure that rustic is the right word.

Here are some pictures from the dinner.

This is Raeanne and I.

This is Louisa and her boyfriend, Reg.

And this is Pictureception, thumbs up for a meme, OH YEA!

After dinner we all went to the Telus Science Center to see a Pink Floyd laser show, but before that we went and looked around the Science Center, okay everyone else went and looked around. I was mostly enraptured by the machine that was outside. Here is a picture.

For all of the pictures see my Facebook page here.

After that we had enjoyed the laser show, we all piled into the van and went home, I slept for about an hour on the way back, and then didn’t sleep when I drove myself home, which is a really good thing.

That was Saturday, on to Lord Sunday!

Sunday August 3, 2014

Sunday was a pretty basic day, I went to church, ate food, and watched TV.

On to Mister Monday.

Monday August 4, 2014

Today was a sunny and warm day, and because it was so nice out I went to the Calgary Slack Lining meet up that happened. There was about 20 people at the get together, Raeanne and I included.

Before I got to the event I went to a friend’s house to fill up 100 water balloons for the meet up. It took a while… a long while, and I had about 20 pop on me… yea.

So anyway, on to the meet up!

I got to the meet up a little after it started and when I got there everyone already had everything set up, so we got right to slack lining! As this was my first time trying slack lining I wasn’t very good, but I had a very good time trying it out. We also had a series water fight and a played a lot of Frisbee throughout the day.

That was pretty much all I did that day.

On to Grim Tuesday.

Tuesday August 5, 2014

Tuesday wasn’t grim, just the opposite in fact, it was a very good and productive day. Just in case you haven’t been clicking on the links I have been providing, each of the things that I am calling the days of the week by is actually the title of one of the books in a series called ‘The Keys to the Kingdom’, I enjoyed this series, and would recommend it as a book series that you could enjoy when you are in the mood for an easy read.

So I said that Tuesday was a good and productive day, here’s why.

I got a fair bit of necessary shopping done, it was nice to clear that off my list, I won’t bore you with the details of my shopping escapades.

The fun thing that I did on Tuesday was go watch The Guardians of the Galaxy. Allow me to paint a visual in your mind so that you understand how awesome it was. Imagine Chuck Norris riding a T–Rex wearing sunglasses and has Gatling guns mounted on his sides surfs a wave of magma. Now multiple that by 10, there you go, that's how awesome it was.

Now on to Drowned Wednesday!

Wednesday August 6, 2014

On Wednesday I went to a family get-together in Waterton where we went on a hike to Bertha Falls. We started the day out by playing in Waterton Lake, a lake that is quite young because it isn't a sand lake yet, so there were lots of rocks to skip while there. I went into the water after a while and even though it was at least 25°C (77°F), the water felt like it was only 5°C (41°F), so it was really cold. After much frolicking in the water, mostly on the part of my second cousins, we went for the hike. As it was a simple hike I carried one of my cousins on my shoulders for half of the hike.

That as my Wednesday next one in the lineup is Sir Thursday.

Thursday August 7, 2014

Unfortunately I did not get knighted on Thursday, so I am not a Sir, yet, but maybe that will happen one day. What did happen on Thursday was I went to a restaurant for breakfast, spent a long time packing for my moving trip to Edmonton on Friday and hung out with a friend named Liva for the afternoon.

The restaurant that we went to is called Pfanntastic Pannenkoek Haus, you might have seen it on this episode of ‘You Gotta Eat Here’. It is a Dutch pancake place that serves the most delicious “pancakes” you have ever had. I put quotes around pancakes because they aren’t what you are used to having when you have a pancake, unless you live in the Netherlands that is. I had a De Bosrand pannenkoek, which had ham, eggs, mushrooms and cheese on it so it was absolutely delicious.

Packing was packing.

Liva and I went for a walk and talked, it was a good time and I took some pictures. You can see them all here on my Facebook page.

On to the Lady Friday.

Friday August 8, 2014

On Friday I went to Edmonton to sign the lease to my apartment and move a whole bunch of stuff into my room. I spent 3 hours driving there 15 minutes of which were in a serious downpour that made me very nervous to be driving because of how hard it was to see. When I got to Edmonton I spent two hours moving in the stuff I had brought and cleaning the apartment, with some help from a friend who came to keep me company. After we had finished putting everything away and cleaning the dirty apartment, we went to A&W for dinner and had some greasy burgers. After that we came back to Calgary, and I went to a dance that was happening out near Red Deer River Meats, way out in the boonies South West of Calgary. The place had a giant swing set that you could get some serious height on and I spent some time pushing some people on the swings and pushing myself on the swings to. Overall it was a very good day, very late, but still very good.

The End

That was my week, I hope that you enjoyed reading about it, and as always, if you have any questions send me an email using the form on the right and leave a comment, but before we officially finish I will leave you with a quote.

Quote of the Week

This quote is about reading because there is nothing better than a good book that takes you away.

“There’s no such thing as a kid who hates reading. There are kids who love reading, and kids who are reading the wrong books”
      – James Patterson

Found here.

I feel that this applies to people of all ages, not just children, so go out there and find the kind of books that you love to read, because there is something for everyone.

That is the end of this post everyone, talk to you all later, or maybe it will be sooner.

– Nathan Aris

The Gravel Pit – July 26 to August 1, 2014

Intro… Hello everyone! So I am actually starting to write this article early in the week so that I can hope to meet the deadline of a Friday release that I had previously established for myself.

So this week I had a good time, and enjoyed my time doing the many different things that I did. So onto what I did this week.

Saturday July 26, 2014

Parkour

So I started out my Saturday by going to my normal 11:30 Parkour class at BreathePK. When I got there I found out that Sylvia, someone whom I had practiced with at No Limits AFC. It was good to be able to catch up with her after a long time of having minimal contact. It was quite a big class this time as well, I think that there were about 14 people there which was AWESOME! Of the people there I only knew seven of them, but that isn’t too bad considering that three of the people there were new. I did get the chance to talk to one of the new people and found out his name, and a bit of his life story.

Brodie, the teacher of this class, started us off with a basic jumping jack warm up because of the large number of people that we had in the class, and then moved us on to a good series of stretches. After we had finished those we were ready to begin training.

Training was a little bit different this time than it has been in previous times as Brodie was trying something new with the class. This new thing was instead of splitting everyone up by their level, he provided a skill from each of the first three levels for everyone to practice and then let us choose what we wanted to practice, and then give us some more skills to work on later in the class let us choose again, and then repeat the process once more. Overall I think that it worked really well, and the rest of the class thought it was really good. (See this link if you don't know what the leveling system at BreathePK is.)

Throughout the day I worked on a good number of skills that I need to gain more experience in because I am just not that good at some of them. The skills that I worked on were my cranes, box jumps, wall runs, dive rolls, kongs, and hurdle jumps. Box jumps are nothing more than practicing jumping onto a box. What’s that? It sounds really lame?! Well, it is something you do to get better at jumping onto things and getting better at dashes, so they are so not lame. A hurdle jump is a basically a double step that you can use in numerous applications such as wall runs and some of the vaults we do.

While our class was going on there was also a break dancing class going on, so it was quite interesting to see some of them doing some of the things that they can do because many of them are very good.

A funny moment from the class was when I threw my shoe to Brodie and he pretended it was a football and he ran "the whole nine yards" through the gym with it. It was quite awesome, and provided a good memory.

Game Time

Later on in the day I went to a friend’s house to hang out and play games, which is an awesome thing to do in your free time!!! That is if you have free time, I don’t like not having free time.

So the first thing that we did that night was play a game called Pandemic, and own the game, which was awesome because apparently it can be hard to win this game, but we totally won, so TAKE THAT PANDEMIC!!!

The next thing that we did was play Nintendoland, which was a great game. We all took turns playing as the character who used the WiiU and had a blast playing until 10:00 at night.

So that was my Saturday, pretty awesome huh? I even got a picture of the people that I know from Parkour.

Sunday July 27, 2014

On Sunday I went to church as I usually do, and I hosted a dinner for people with a friend as I usually don’t do. My friend ended up doing most of the cooking and so we ended up having homemade pizza and Tex Mex salad, which were both superb. We had a group of 6 people show up so it was a great time full of riveting conversation, and funny stories.

That was my Sunday, now onto Monday.

Monday July 28, 2014

So on the last Monday of the month of July I had the chance and downright pleasure of playing twister. Outside. With slime used for the colored circles. It was both gross and awesome! We played two games of twister, had an awesome time and got slime all over us, because we kept pushing each other into the slime, and the organizer dumped the remaining slime onto us while we were playing. It was great disgusting fun that required a shower once I got home, but I had a blast.

Tuesday was a hot day, a very hot day, the temperature peaked in Calgary at about 32°C (90°F), and I don’t care where you are from, but that’s hot. My last day of employment is quickly approaching, and Tuesday was my third last day before the contract that I have with ABB Inc. is done. It is interesting having the feelings that I do about leaving the company after 14 months of employment in order to go to school. I am excited because I am able to take a break and then start up school again, but I am also nervous because I am starting school again and I want to do well. I am also completely moving away from home for the first time ever, which also makes me nervous. I know that it will be okay, and that I will do well at school as long as I work hard, but it still makes me nervous.

Middle of the day meal

Okay, I am done reflecting, on to what I did on Tuesday.

On Tuesday I went to lunch with a co-worker at a place called Rocky’s Burgers, it is a small standalone restaurant that is located at the Crossroads Farmers Market in Calgary and it is a place that makes AWESOME burgers. This co-worker of mine is from China, and, according to what she told me, the only reference to western food that they have in China is KFC, McDonalds, and one other restaurant that serves terrible examples of what kind of food we eat in the west, so having a burger from Rocky’s Burgers provided a great stand point for just how good Western food can be. The meat was moist, the bun was soft, the fries were fresh and all the food was hot off the grill, so it was a delicious meal.

After work Adventures

Once I finished work it was time for some Parkour, because it was Tuesday, and Tuesday is Parkour day. This day of Parkour was a little different than my usual Tuesday Parkour, because this time I went downtown for a Jam, a Jam is what a get together where you do Parkour is called. We started in a place called Century Gardens (see this link for the Google Maps location) and worked on some jumps and rolls before we went to two other places near the Telus Science Center.

The first place that we went to after Century Gardens is a place that we nicknamed “Josh’s favorite spot aka The Gravel Pit” because there are two gravel pits (see this link for the place in Google Maps). It was a great place for practicing things like Dive Kongs, and Kong where you “dive-jump” to get to the obstacle, other vaults, flips, and jumps. We spent about an hour there I think, so it was a good place to stop.

The second place that we went to was called the Lego blocks. Now unfortunately the area isn’t shown yet in Google Maps because it is still pretty new, but I will try to get a picture to show all of you, but you can still view the area at this link because it will show you where it is. This place was good for practicing strides, precisions, plyos, and bar-to-pre’s. Not quite as good as The Gravel Pit, but still a good area.

It was a hot Tuesday, but it was a good Tuesday, and I had an awesome time in downtown Calgary.

Wednesday July 30, 2014

Wednesday was another hot day, this heat seems to be a thing that isn’t going away and hopefully winter, or at least fall, returns soon. I only ended up doing a few things on Wednesday because that was just the way the day played out.

The first thing that I did was go to my second last day of work and have a bunch of people ask me what I am going to be doing in the month before I go to school, and telling me congratulations to me for getting into school. I also didn’t have any work to do, but that is what happens when you are this close to being done at your job.

For lunch a group of the people that I know from work and I went out for lunch to a Brazilian Barbeque or Churrasco place called Gaucho here in Calgary. We had a great time and had a wonderful lunch of Rump Steak, Garlic Top Sirloin, Pork Loin, Sausage, Chicken Wings, and Parmigiano Beef, and no, I didn’t remember all of those off the top of my head, I pulled the list off of their menu.

The next things that I did that day was go to a religion class that I usually have on Wednesday nights and learned about some stuff there that was on the subject of following up on things. This is something that applies to many different things, in religion, all working fields, family, school, etc so it was good to learn about the subject a little bit so that I can try to improve in that area.

Thursday July 31, 2014

Today was my last day of work at ABB and now I have a month to do stuff so that I will be ready for my move to Edmonton in the last week of August. Either that or I can do stuff like go to Drumheller, and Jasper, WOOOOOOOO!!!

My last day of work began really early as I wanted to go and ride the bike at work one last time. It was a good ride of the bike, and I was awake for the whole day because of it. For lunch I went out for lunch with my boss, father, and one other coworker. We went to a restaurant named Los Mariachis for a Mexican lunch, and had a very good lunch there. I have been to this place a few times and have enjoyed it each time. I really like the dish called El Cuatro and I would highly encourage trying this place out some time.

After work I went to MEC to do some awesome shopping, by awesome shopping I mean that I bought a pair of pants and an exercise shirt.

On to the final day of this post, the illustrious Friday.

Friday August 1, 2014

Today I didn’t do all that much but I did do some good things, and got some stuff done.

The first thing that I did sleep in, Hooray!

The second thing that I did was go for a sweet bike ride through Fish Creek Park down to the substation that is in between the two communities Douglasdale and Diamond Cove. It was pretty good, and I took some pictures of stuff like rocks. You can see the pictures on my Facebook page.

The third thing that I did was go to the Calgary Alberta Temple and spend about two hours there. Had a good time, and the inside has AC so it wasn’t hot, which was great.

The fourth thing that I did was get a little bit more shopping done. I went and bought some water balloons, and also some sweat pants for when winter rolls around.

After that I went home and finished writing my blog post for this week.

The End

Well, that was my week, let me know what you though. Let me know what you thought about my writing, let me know what you did this week. I love to read comments and I look forward to hearing from you.

Now for a quote!

Quote of the Week

Better to have a short life that is full of what you like doing than a long life spent in a miserable way.
      – Alan Watts

That is all, stay sweet everyone.

– Nathan Aris

Super Powers - July 19 to 25, 2014

This week was a week of much adventure and fun, and I hope that you enjoy reading what I have to say about it. So here we go!

Saturday July 19, 2014

Parkour

On Saturday I went to my usual Parkour class at Breathe PK and was joined by a few of the people that I have known for a while. Here are the pictures of us looking goofy!!!

So from left to right it is me, Isabella and Spencer. Austin was there as well but he left before I could get him into the group picture.
I also have a picture of Brodie (the teacher) and me making goofy faces.

I am going to say this once and probably never say it again, hashtag let me take a selfie. (Sorry for the shake in the picture.)
Saturday was warm, but not too warm. I think the temperature in the gym was about 22°C (72°F), but that isn’t all that bad, still warm, but not bad.
We began the class by working on what are called wall splats. These are something that is used as both a safety measure and as a lead up to a cat leap. They are a safety measure in that if you miss your cat leap then you can do the wall splat to stop yourself from plowing into the wall face first. They are done in the same way as you see the cat leap done in the picture below, but instead of grabbing a ledge you plant the palms of your hands onto the wall and then you push off the wall like you are a frog bouncing off the wall.

Picture found here

After practicing wall splats we moved on to doing cat leap, they are done as I have explained above and as you see in the picture above. We did these for a little while and had some good fun with them. The grip tape that they have on the wall now scratched up the insides of my hands, but that will give me great calluses, which will make Parkour outside that much easier.
Next we worked on what are called bar to cats. Basically these are swinging on a bar, letting go of said bar, and then grabbing onto a wall. They aren't too hard when you are less than or equal to 2 meters (6.6 feet) away but when you are greater than 2 meters (6.6 feet) away it becomes hard to gain enough momentum to clear that large of a distance.
The next thing that we practiced was a series of movements that we slowly added more movements on to. We started this series of movements with a hip catch, these are a movement where you jump at a bar, grab the bar with your hand and then let your hips land on the bar while using your legs to slow down so that you don’t land on the bar to fast. After we had gotten that down we added in a cast, thing where you cast off the bar, to a precision, then we added a stride and we finally finished the series by adding in a vault. It was pretty awesome as it gave us the chance to work on not only a bunch of different movements, but it also gave us the chance to work on flow (making your moves flow together nicely).
That was my Parkour for the day, that next thing that I did was some something that I haven't done for a while, and that is do something "constructive".

Steampunk Construction

If you haven't guessed by the title the thing that I was "constructive" with was an item for the Steampunk cosplay costume that I have been working on for the past few months. This item was a homemade air tank that is going to connect to the Steampunk style pistol that I am going to be making soon. I had a friend come over to give me some help putting it together. We had a good time talking while we cut, drilled and glued the parts into the masterpiece of amateur craftsmanship that you see below. We also enjoyed the construction part as well.

We works on the tank on my back deck in the warm air and hot sun, so I got lots of vitamin D, and I have more hot air in me than ever before. Wait...

Super Powers!!!

The next thing I did was go and get my super power for the week at the Super Power Distribution center. Never hears of it? It is a very popular place right on the corner of (square root of -1) Street and Imaginary Avenue. (In math taking the square root of -1 produces an imaginary number. So I am saying the corner of Imaginary Street and Imaginary Avenue.) make this note a popup box. So, that’s a lie, what I actually did was go over to a friend named Raeanne's house for a games night. While there we played board games like Mancala, one version of it at least, Jenga, and Apples to Apples. After we had done these different games for a while we went to a playground that was nearby and played grounders. The game of grounders was awesome and I got the chance to break out some of my Parkour skills while we were playing.
Man, I really had a busy Saturday, and it went a little late, but it was super good though.

Sunday July 20, 2014

So on Sunday I went to church and I went to a presentation. The presentation was on sex inside and outside of marriage and what some of the important effects that you, your partner, and your possible children, will have to deal with. The presenter also talked about there is this one woman who thinks that we don’t need to feel guilty about anything because Gophers don’t feel guilty. I find it funny that this lady compared humans to a species that does not have sentience and is unable to reason, and then thought that it was a legitimate argument for why we should never feel guilty for things.
That was my Sunday.

Monday July 21, 2014

Monday begins the work week, and that means I need to wake up at 5:40 in the morning again. How many of you groaned when you heard the time that I wake up in the morning? After I finished work I went to a get together at the Parkland Community Hall (don’t ask me why they call it a hall, because I have no idea) to play Ultimate WHICH WAS TOTALLY AWESOME. We played for about an hour and a half, and had a great time with the super competitive friendly competition. It was pretty humid out for Calgary, but it wasn’t as humid, or nearly as hot, as it was in Brazil during the World Cup so I didn’t complain. I don’t really remember who won but, I think it was the team I was on, and we won because we had some awesome players on our team, I don’t remember their names, but they were really good! After we finished the game we all had ice cream sandwiches for our snack, you know, nothing like processed sugar after you have been running for an hour and a half… I had two… What?! They were really good!

Tuesday July 22, 2014

On Tuesday I went on a bike ride with a friend of mine named Tuan. We went on our bike ride through a park in Calgary called Fish Creek Park, and we started our ride at a little after 7 and rode for about an hour and a half.
We stopped twice along our bike ride to look around and talk. On first stop we went to the river and skipped some stones while we talked, and then the second time we stopped we walked along one of the bridges that goes across the Bow river that got partially taken out by the flood that Calgary had last year, here is a picture of the bridge.

I also saw a picnic table that had gotten ripped up but the flood laying upside down near the path, so I mounted it and got Tuan to take a picture, see below.

I had a good ride on Tuesday, and I had a good talk with Tuan, so I'm really glad that he in it me to go rising with him seeing that I am moving to Edmonton for school pretty soon.

Wednesday July 23, 2014

I went to work on Wednesday, that’s it. No I was the guy you saw on TV flying through the air, that wasn’t the super power that I picked up for the week.

Thursday July 24, 2014

On Thursday I was in a two hour conference meeting for ABB Inc., it was pretty good and I learned some good things about the business. I also went to see my sister at the end of the day, it was good to see her again.

Friday July 25, 2014

On Friday I had Szechuan for lunch, and it was really hot because one of the guys that we were with wanted to get the “medium” spice level. If you don’t know anything about Szechuan, know this, what they consider “mild” we here in Canada consider extra hot. I was fine personally because I eat spice frequently, but the medium spice level pushed me to my limits.
I also made this on Friday, with my Neodymium magnet balls. In the first picture you can see that I had three of them left over at the very end.

The End

So that was my week everyone, I had a good week, and did a number of great things, and I am happy that I had the ability to have such a great week.
Now for a quote.

Quote of the week

It is the greatest of all mistakes to do nothing because you can only do little. Do what you can.
      – Sydney Smith

You can find an artistic representation here on Zen Pencils.
Remember any little thing you do is still something, and that is what matters.
Be good people, and always learn new and interesting things. Bye!

– Nathan Aris

July 12 to 18, 2014 – A Tea Party in Wonderland

This week was a week of stress and relaxation, and a lot of hot air.

In this past week I went to a Steampunk Tea Party, did Parkour, went swimming, and had experienced general merriment.

Saturday July 12, 2014 – Steam Up in Fish Creek Park

On this day I went to a Meetup for the Calgary Steampunk Assemblage, which is the Calgary based club for those who enjoy what is called Steampunk. The Meetup was an Alice in Wonderland themed tea party, which was an awesome idea by the way. I went to the Meetup with a friend of mine named who has made a Steampunk themed Portal Gun, which is super awesome because it lights up and has gears that turn on the back of it and stuff. Because it’s awesome, here is a picture of him with his gun.

As you can see it is quite awesome, unless you don’t think it is awesome, which is okay I guess, just don’t tell me that.

So at this tea party we enjoyed much old time revelry, in the form of invigorating conversation with many other people, rousing music from a musician named Peter and a competitive game of Croquet (seen below). The temperature was a blazing 34°C (93°F) while we were there, and for those who were in their full attire it was quite hot indeed. I myself was not in a full costume, my costume, which I am wearing most of in the picture below, consisted of a pair of black dress shoes, beige pants, a white shirt, a brown leather vest, aviator goggles, and a beige paratrooper satchel. So not to much at all. 

I am the guy second from the left hidden mostly behind the guy with wings, sorry about that I wasn’t in charge of taking pictures. I am also not wearing my full costume at this point in time.

As I said before I was able to talk to many different people during my time at the Meetup, most of them people I have never met before, which is awesome.

I was able to spend some time talking to an older man named John and an early 30’s guy named Alex while the two of them, Ethan and I were setting up the “rabbit hole” over the entrance bridge to where we were having the party. During the party I had a few conversations with a girl named Kris who was dressed up as a Steampunk cowboy, which was pretty awesome, it looked like it was a little bit hot though. While playing croquet I was able to talk to all the different people that were playing the game, also "I lost the game".

My first game of croquet was a great and interesting experience. It was good, because I was able to play a good game of croquet where I didn't win but, I didn't do all that bad either. Because everyone had a different color of ball in this game we took to giving each other nicknames based on the color of the ball they were playing with. I was playing with a black ball so I was Batman, and all the other people were named Sinestro, Hal Jordan, Mystique, and Robin. You should be able to figure out who is who in the picture below.

The reason that they decided to call me Batman was because of how I kept hiding in the shadows whenever it wasn’t my turn, and since they were calling me Batman, I had to talk like Batman, and since I kept hiding in the shadows they would beckon me by calling out “Batman! Batman! Batman, it’s your turn!” or something similar to that.

After playing my first game of croquet I went back into the shade of the overhang that we were having the event at to cool down, because I was HOT! I drank some of the delicious punch that they had made out of club soda and Saskatoon berry concentrate (drinking this stuff was also part of the reason why the people I was playing croquet with started calling me saying it was my turn all the time), and ate some of the great snacks made by Christie, the event organizer, and mingled with people some more.

After this went on for a while, until about 5:45pm if I remember correctly, a large group of us began making our way to the Bow river so that we could cool down for a little while.

On the way to the river we came across a woman walking her dog, I talked with her briefly and then continued on while some of the other people I was with continued speaking with her. After I had gotten about 20 meters (65.6 feet) away I heard some yelling from behind me saying "STOP HIM" or "CATCH HIM" I turned around and saw the dog running towards me, and as he ran past I managed to turn around and catch the leash that the dog was on. It was quite surprising to me that I was able to catch the dogs leash in the time that I had to catch it and it just reaffirmed to me that being healthy and doing an activity that pushes you to develop is really wonderful thing.

So after we reached the river, we began our glorious frolicking (I say that in the manlyist way possible) in the water, and by frolicking I mean we took off our shoes, got into the water and sighed a sigh of relief at the coolness running over our legs and feet. We took some pictures, skipped some stones, and had a good time before returning to the group area to end the get-together. Before I left I talked to a couple more people, and then got into my hot vehicle and drove away mightily into the sunset.

Actually I drove onto the road, and went home for the day, no majestic sunset for me this time, maybe another day.

Sunday July 13, 2014

On Sunday I went to Edmonton because I needed to go and look at a couple different apartements, because I was trying to find a place to live while I am attending school at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, AB. I looked at two different places this time, I went up to see one place last week, but that didn’t end up working out so I had to go back. So after bearing another three hour drive I arrived in Edmonton with my parents, and we went ot the first place that I had set up to view. It was a nice apartement but I didn’t want to just say ‘yes’ straight out, before I had viewed the second unit that was available. The second unit I looked at was better in some ways, and worse in others, it had a balcony, but it was more expensive and as a student I need to think about money, and the first unit was the one that I took. When I move I will share a picture or two of my apartement.

So it was a successful day, long though because of how much we had to drive for six hours, but successful.

Monday July 14, 2014

On Monday I went to an get together where we played kick ball. It started at 7 at night and we played until around 8 at night I think. The team I was on ended up winning, but we all had a really good time and that is what is important.

Some memorable moments from the night were whenever the ball was kicked and went one guy named Ben I would shout something at him and he would miss the ball. This happened three times and I don’t know if it is because I have the ability to control Ben’s mind or what, but I like to think that that was the reason, because it makes me smile.

Tuesday July 15, 2014

On Tuesday I went to a Parkour class at BreathePK, and worked on improving my skills in the heat of the oven. Imagine bacon inside of that oven and it becomes a wonderful visual.

We began this day by working on a few wall runs and then doing some climb ups. We practiced climb ups a little bit differently than I have done them before, for starters we were pretty much on the ground and we were allowed to use our feet when doing these, but when the idea is to teach the technique, it doesn’t really matter how it’s done as long as it’s effective. The next thing that we worked on in that class was back falls. Back falls are not really something that you do outside unless you get into a situation where you are falling and you can’t roll because they are nothing more than a safety measure intended to stop you from breaking your spine, neck or head, and I don’t know about all of you but I don’t really want to break any of those things.

After practicing those we moved onto practicing tic tacs which are basically a movement that you use to get really high, but in the opposite direction which you are moving in. This video demonstrates what they are and how to do them in case you are confused by my terrible definition.

That was my Tuesday class, it was great to learn some new things, and experience it alongside other people. I also had to get Cassandra to tell me what it is that we had done in that class right after we had finished it because I had experienced a serious lapse in memory, which totally sucked.

Wednesday July 16, 2014

On this day I went to a night class where we studied religion and then went to a lake in a community called Sundance where I did some swimming.

The religion class was good and much was learned on the subject we were studying. Don’t ask for the name of the subject though, I don’t remember the name of it, only what I learned.

The lake was awesome and it was also still warm by the time that I got there at 8:45 at night which was awesome because if you know anything about Calgary you would know that our lakes and rivers are usually quite cold.

While there I was asked to demonstrate a back flip and a side flip into the water, because that is what people think it means you do when you do parkour, oh well. I did them because they are very fun to do and I enjoy showing off the skills that I have spent time developing.

Overall it was a great day.

Thursday July 17, 2014

I went to visit my sister on Thursday, and we had a good time hanging out and spending time together.

Not really all that much to say for this day I guess.

Friday July 18, 2014

On Friday I went to a get together at a friends house whose name is Mary, Mary had a little lamb… Yeah, I went there, watcha gonna do about it.

So we began the night by playing a few games before we settled in for the movie that we were watching that night. We started the games by playing a game where we had to shoot some rubber ducky's off of the top of a barbecue using water guns, then we played a game where we got to launch some water balloons using towels, next was a game of making the longest string made out of twizzlers, and finally a game of radio except you used chopsticks and fuzzy peaches, think about that for a while. We all had a great time and at the end of all the games we settled in to watch National Treasure. During one point of this movie I said to everyone “Plot twist, the ship is haunted by Harpies!”. Unfortunately everyone interpreted what I had said as “Plot twist, the ship is haunted by Herpes!”. So, yea, that became the joke of that portion of the movie until the ship got blow up at which point the joke was “The herpes got burned with fire.” This misinterpreted comment made the night that much better, and memorable.

The End

Well that was my week, I think that it was a productive and busy week which is great, I will now leave you with a quote.

Quote of the Week

If you can dream it, you can do it.
      – Walt Disney

This is very true, and I would like to add to it that if you never dream of anything, or make a goal to get something or make something of yourself, you will never get anywhere or make anything of yourself.

That is all, peace out homies. (Yea, I said that, watcha gonna do about it!?)

– Nathan Aris

July 5 to 11, 2014 - Kayaking Adventure

Saturday was a day full of many fun things, I started the day with doing some Parkour, had the chance to do some Kayaking in the middle of it, and end the day off with watching a movie and hanging out with a friend.

Saturday Parkour

As I said I started the day out with some Parkour at BreathePK in the morning class which starts at 11:30. WE had five people in this class including me, there was the new guy Harrison, Austin, and two other guys whose names escape me at this time.

We began our class with playing a game of follow-the-leader in order to get our bodies warmed up, and I have to say, with the temperature in the gym being a little on the warmer side, aka above 25°C (77°F), we could have just sat in the gym and warmed up our muscles.

After we had our muscles warmed up we began our Parkour training. The teacher, Bobby, started us out by teaching, or re-teaching in some cases, us vaults by means of progressing steps. The first vault that we did was the Crane Vault, since this was nearly a week ago I don’t remember all of the steps exactly but they went something like walk up to the box, and put your one foot on the top of the box and bring your other foot into the position that you have it in for the crane for the first step, and then do the full crane for the second step. So it was a short progression, and it was over pretty quick.

The next thing that we did was work on our Kong vaults. He started out by getting us to get into a pushup position and jump our legs forward to beside our hand so that we could get the movement of bringing your legs forwards down. After we did this about five times Bobby moved us to doing the same movement but adding with bringing our feet past our hands and making a scooping action with our hands when we pulled our feet forward, just like you do in an actual Kong vault. The final thing that we did for this progression was move onto doing the actual Kong vault over boxes and ‘stack em’s’.

The next vault we worked on was our Dash vaults, this was a vault that was also taught in only a few steps. The first step was something like ‘jump up sit on the box and plant your hands on the box beside your butt making sure your hands are facing forwards’ and then do the full vault by jumping up into the air and pulling your legs into your chest and as you go over the obstacle sticking your legs out planting your hands on the obstacle facing forwards making a scooping action with them as you go over the obstacle, landing on the other side of the obstacle and finishing the vault.

The final vault that we worked on was called the Lazy vault. This is a vault that you use when you are running parallel to an obstacle that you want to get over, this picture provides an example of a situation where you might use it, and how you use it.

Practicing these different vaults was what we spent the training part of the class doing. It was great to be able to practice these different vaults and be able to relearn them by means of progressing steps as it allowed me the chance to try and fine tune all of the different parts of these different vaults.

We finished of the class by playing a game of capture the flag. This was a game where we were all so good at it that no one could win. There were a few points in this game that are worth mentioning, so I will mention them. At one point of the game I went to go make a run for the opposite teams flag and ended up having a friendly pile up with one of the guys from the opposite team, we laughed about it, and both went back to our starting areas. Another good moment was when I got one of the cubes we were using as flags and ran to get to the safe zone and got tagged by one of the guys from the other team, tripped and the did a barrel roll on the floor. Everyone laughed about that one, because it was quite funny to see me do a barrel roll on the floor.

Kayaking Adventure

After I went to Parkour, I went to a friend’s house to have lunch before we went kayaking. She made her sister, her sister’s boyfriend, and I a salad with ham on it, and these bean lasagna roll things for lunch. It was quite good, and we all had a good time talking and playing an African math based board game.

After lunch Raeanne and I went to the Glenmore Reservoir for kayaking. It was a beautiful sunny day out, which was great because I found out that I suck at kayaking.

We started out by going to a portion of the reservoir where a bunch of seaweed was poking through the surface of the water. On the way there I fell out of my boat into the water for the first time, Raeanne had a good laugh at my expense, and the people on the shore also enjoyed the show, but I managed to get back into my boat and we were off again. I didn’t manage to reach the area where the seaweed was sticking up before I fell into the water again, except this time it was shallow enough for me to just stand up, so I walked to a really shallow part of the water so that I could dump the water out of my kayak. Since Raeanne was still dry I decided that she needed to get wet as well, so as she approached I tipped her boat over, and she got really wet. After I had helped her up and we had both emptied the water out of our kayaks, we started going in the opposite direction to the place where the steamboat that Heritage Park uses is stored during the months when they are closed. It was pretty cool to see, walk on and climb on.

Here is a picture of me on the boat lifting structure.

I am actually quite scared at this point because of my fear of heights, but it was all good in the end.

After we spent some time on this thing, we went back to the dock, and turned our boats in.

After this we went back to my house and ate dinner with my family and then watched a movie, and made things with my Neodymium magnet balls, and then called it a day at around 10:00pm.

The End

All in all, it was a very good day, and I slept the sleep of the dead that night, minus the being dead part, which was great.

Quote of the Week

“No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.”
      – Regina Brett

Sometimes life sucks, but the worst things you can do give up and start feeling sorry for yourself, because all that does is make life worse. It chases the ones who care about you away, and it leaves you all alone, I know this from firsthand experience. Don’t worry about how hard things are because it will always get better sometime in the future.

That is all I have for now so be good, be happy, and move forwards.

– Nathan Aris