Goals and Resolutions

I gave up on resolutions a few years ago.  I used to make them like they were a batch of cookies.  Made so many that by January 2nd, I would forget what I was supposed to do or not do.  By March, I would forget them all.  They were fun to make but a pain in the butt to keep.

Read the Bible daily, exercise more, eat better, don’t listen to gossip, and that’s for one year.  Like I said, I never got too far from home plate.  Now I set goals instead of resolutions.  What’s the difference?  Well by setting goals, I can afford the odd stumble or even a fall or two.  As long as I keep my goal in sight and keep striving for it, then I’m ok.  I don’t beat myself up as much as I would do for a broken resolution.

Now some of you might say, ‘But aren’t they both one and the same?’ Not really.  You see, at least in my interpretation, a resolution is a formal intent or a will to do something.  A goal is basically the result you hope to attain.  So instead of making a bunch of hard-to-keep resolutions, I can now make a goal that could maybe envelope them.  A goal to maintain a specific weight would mean exercising and eating right but will also leave room for little hiccups like a day off from exercising or an evening pigging out on pizza, without the guilt.   Get where I’m coming from?

It reminds me of a runner in a marathon.  He falls and hurt himself but he gets up and heads for the finish line.   When he crosses, it would not matter how many spills he had or how many times he walked.  What matters is that he crossed that line.

Whether you made resolutions or goals for the new year, make them realistic and don’t go too overboard.  I have a friend that would always have these big and drastic resolutions.  He once said he was quitting coffee altogether.  ”Buddy, why don’t you just cut back your daily consumption instead?”  I said to him.  He didn’t listen and no, he didn’t quit drinking coffee…well maybe for a couple of days.

So whether you are setting goals or making resolutions, I hope they are/were realistic.  Don’t be too drastic as I don’t think any of us could change who we are in one year.  I know, I have tried.

Happy New Year to you and yours!

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Gangnam Style Can Cause Death!

Gangnam_Style_PSY_31logo (Photo credit: KOREA.NET – Official page of the Republic of Korea)

 

Told you there was something I didn’t like about this song.  Turns out that it is a killer!   You can read my blog about it here.

 

A man in England died Saturday after an office party performance of “Gangnam Style” led to chest pains and an eventual failure of the heart.

Eamonn Kilbride, 46, had just finished dancing to Korean pop star Psy’s wildly popular “Gangnam Style” at his company’s office party when he noticed chest pains around his heart and passed out onto the floor of Lancashire’s Whitehall Country Club.

Paramedics tried to revive the man, but their efforts proved unsuccessful. He was pronounced dead at the Royal Blackburn Hospital a few minutes after 11:30pm.

A spokesman for Blackburn coroner’s office told Britain’s Daily Telegraph that Kilbride died from acute heart failure caused by coronary artery atheroma, which can often derive from vigorous exercise.

According to Kilbride’s wife Julie, the former IT manager was a “loving husband” and avid golfer who “was always the life of the party and loved dancing.”

“We were having a fantastic time at the Christmas party and Eamonn had just finished dancing to ‘Gangnam Style,’” she told the Telegraph.

“He was up on stage and entertaining everybody. He said he had a bit of a pain and just collapsed.”

 

 

 

 

 

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Gangnam Style Not My Style

William Hung?

I need help! Fast.  What’s the issue now?  I am glad you asked, thanks for the concern.  Well it seems as though I’ve lost my taste in music! Yes, music!  I love all genre of music.  You name it, I love it.  Now that doesn’t mean I love all songs, I said genre.  Saying this, there’s this song that I am supposed to love. (Yes, supposed to love.   It’s in the script.  Society dictates.) that I really can’t get excited over.  Do you know what song it is?  You guessed it, Gangnam style by Korean singer, Psy.  What the heck is a Gangnam anyways?  I always mispronounce it as ‘Gangman’, which actually makes more sense.  Gangman Style.

When my wife first introduced me to this song, I watched the video thinking at first that it was William Hung, (Remember him?).   “That guy is still around?”  I asked.  I didn’t see it as more than just a joke or a parody  of some sort.  Then I saw him on Ellen and other talk shows.   I thought,  ”Why are they making fun of this poor dude?  Enough already.”  Little did I know that he was for real and that Gangnam style was here to stay, at least for a while, and would become the most watched YouTube video and would also catapult Psy to international fame.  While I sit here blogging about being anti-Gangnam, Gangnam Style is sweeping the globe.  It’s viral.   People are eating this thing up like hot bread.  Mmm…hot bread with butter dripping down your arm... Did I mention that I love bread?  Do they have Gangnam Style bread?

Psy?

Pardon my digression there.   Do you think that maybe if I can understand what Psy is saying, I might be a bit more inclined to overcome my first impression I had of just a weird looking korean guy doing some crazy dance moves?   (Not crazy as in ‘good’).  It might work.   I mean I do like to sing along to my favorite songs.

 Oppan Gangnam Style
Gangnam Style

Na je nun ta sa ro un in gan jo gin yo ja
Ko pi han ja ne yo yu rul a neun pum gyo gi nun yo ja
Ba mi o myon shim ja ngi tu go wo ji nun yo ja
Gu ron ban jon i nun yo ja

(I still don’t like it!)

Now I don’t mean to trash Gangnam Style or Psy himself.  In this mad mad world, if you are looking for some comic relief and to enjoy a song with lyrics you cannot decipher, then this is your cup of tea.  After all, the beat is, the beat is, the beat is technotronic.  (remember that one?).  But it does kinda have a nice-ish beat, doesn’t it?  Hello, even a washed-up MC Hammer is doing the Gangnam!  So if it brings you happiness, then great!  Unfortunately for poor me, it doesn’t.  Well maybe for the first couple seconds when I first saw it.

But what the heck do I know about music anyways eh?  Gangnam Style hovers somewhere outside my realm of musical awareness.   Just not my cup of tea but this blog is JUST MY TAKE.  You can ignore my cry for help.  I am fine being uncool, listening to real music.  Now where is my Elton John cd?

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The Food Of Love – Soca

 

Soca Queen (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

Chances are, you have never heard the word Soca before.  You may have heard Soca songs but just thought it was called Caribbean or Island music.   Soca is an acronym for SOul and CAlypso.   It could also very well mean SOul and Caribbean as it is the soul of the Islands.  Our ‘feel good’ music, our party music, our come together music.

 

Soca is my favorite music.  With an uptempo beat like no other, lots of brass and bass, I cannot sit still while the beat of a sweet Soca music is in the air.   I jump and wave, wave something, wine my waist, whatever the song urge me to do.  Or I try the newest soca dance move.  There’s always a new dance.

 

Soca is one of those types of music that could pick you up when you are down.  It lifts your spirits and get you in a party mood, whether you are into partying or not.  Soca is the ultimate dancing music and an opportunity for dancers to grab a girl, any girl and ‘wine up’ behind her.  (Wining is the gyrating of your hips).   Dancing soca music is quite simple.  You basically do whatever you feel like. Move an arm there and a leg there,  it’s all good, as long as you try to maintain a rhythm.  There’s nothing quite like seeing a ‘whitey’ keeping up with the islanders dancing Soca.  A couple of months ago, I was at an after party and I noticed a white guy wining on a black girl.  He was giving such a good account of himself that I went over and fist bumped him.

There are some notable Soca artistes known for producing songs that are specifically aimed at getting you to get off your chair.  Allison Hinds, known as the Soca Queen, Machel Montano, Skinny Fabulous, to name a few.  The old stuff with guys like Mighty Duke, Crazy, Gypsy and Blue Boy is still untouchable though.

 

It does not exactly make you want to fall in love, except maybe with the music, but it does a fine job in elevating your heart rate and putting a smile on your face.  Soca could very well be the best therapeutic genre of music out there.  It is not however, the food of love.

For a sample of Soca music, go to YouTube and type ‘Soca Music’.

 

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The Food Of Love – Country?

Keith Urban crooning for the ladies

I grew up listening to old country music blasting throughout our house on Sunday mornings.  (Yes, we listen country in the islands.  Bet you never thought that).  From Hank Williams Sr. to Jim Reeves to Kenny Rogers, we had the lovesick blues.

I still love country music.  I prefer the old stuff as the line that separates the new stuff from pop or rock genre is blurred and for nostalgic reasons.  Sundays were the days we relaxed and even though I am not sure how relaxing listening to a song about losing ones lover could be, we found solace in the country songs that could be heard emanating from just about every house that had a radio.

Country is often labeled as redneck music and sappy.  The dog left and the wife left with the truck of course.  There’s a joke that goes like this, ‘What do you get when you play a country song backwards?’  ’You get your house back, your wife back, your dog back…’ With a young, bright and good-looking stable of singers like Carrie Underwood, Keith Urban and Taylor Swift to name a few, Country is hipper than it has ever been.  It is no longer the music your parents listen to.

So is Country music the food of love? Well it could be the food for D.I.V.O.R.C.E and picking up girls in the bars.  There are some good country love songs that bring out that loving feeling but there are more that makes you want to take a baseball bat to your ex’s pimped out ride or make you believe that Earl really had to die.  So maybe it really isn’t the food of love.

The search continues…stay tuned.

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• The Food Of Love – Rap?

The Food Of Love – Rap Music?

English: Eminem performing at the DJ hero party on June 1, 2009 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

“If music be the food of love, play on…” Said Duke Orsino in one of my favorite quotes and one of my favorite Shakespeare novel, Twelfth Night.

Music could indeed be the food of love and much more.  It has the capability to transcends barriers, whether racial or otherwise.  It is one of the most powerful tool available to man but can also be a dangerous weapon if in the wrong hands.  Music can be the food for other things that are not so loving.

In a series of blogs, I will set out to look at some of the more popular genres that I regularly listen to and how they affect me and maybe even you.  Are they the food of love? Or the food of anger, hate and other anti-social behavior?  I enjoy all music and each affects me differently.  Now let’s unwrap rap music.

Forgive me if I step on toes or go against the grain with my take.

As a bar-hopping twenty and thirty-something, rap was my get-me-pumped music of choice.  If I wanted to get attitudal, rap was the pill.   At the bars, I would chill and listen to the likes of Easy E and NWA.  Under the influence of rap, straight or mixed with alcohol, I walked around feeling like I should be packing heat and wasting all haters who dissed me or got all up in my grill.  When the music stopped, I was unfortunately, still just skinny old me, who wouldn’t hurt a fly.  Some of my friends were more influenced and succumbed to the music.  Fights after the bar were all too common.  ”Step to me, punk! How you gonna play me, bi@@h!” were the common phrases tossed around.  (Now where have you heard them before?).

I  drove around with rap music pulsating through my windows and dared the drivers beside me to do something about it.  Rap made me feel tough. I wanted to have that ‘who cares’ attitude just like the rappers did. They looked at me menacingly from my tv screen and beckoned me to join some sort of rap brotherhood.   Even the way I drove was influenced by the music and videos I watched.   Leaning way too far back in my seat with one arm outstretched on the wheel and my head tilted.  Total gangsta.  If I was listening to rap, I had to look the part.  I wasn’t packing heat but I felt like I was.  I was ready to throw down.

Rap music preys on our young children’s mind.  With lyrics that promote bullying, drug use and criminal lifestyle, it appeals to their longing to fit in and be a part of the scene.  White teeny girls feel tough as they talk gangsta and hang with the rapper crowd.  Boys wear their pants around their knees as their idols do and use disrespectful language and signs.  Love is definitely not in the air.

This is not saying that rap music on a whole is bad and should not be listened to.  It would be hypocritical of me as I know that there are some very good rappers out there who deserve a listen.  Eminem is a master at his craft.  A few questionable lyrics in some of his songs but one of my favorite lyricist.  There’s also Rap Gospel for those who like rap but want something with a positive message.  Rapping is an art form.   I envy the way my fledgling-rapper nephew could put lyrics together effortlessly and spit like a quick-firing machine gun without biting his tongue.

In my opinion, no music genre right now packs a powerful but negative punch as rap does. From clothing, to speech, to video games, rap has the market cornered.  As for being food of love, I say nay.

Check back for my take on Country.

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