I recently read this book called In Heaven As on Earth: A View of the Afterlife. Obviously, it was fictitious, the author was Christian I think, but the way he explains what all goes on after we die didn't exactly pertain to any particular religious dogma. I guess that's why I liked it so much. Nothing gets me more ticked off than some elitist Bible-thumper on a power trip about how all non-Christians are on a highway to Hell, simply for the fact that they aren't Christian. I'm Catholic, so while I share most of the same religious beliefs as people like this, it's very disappointing to me to think that people can be so ignorant and pompous. But anyway, back to the point. In the book, the main character, Daniel, has just died after a stint of cancer that lasted a couple of years. He gets into heaven, (no pearly gates) and wakes up in a room with no windows and no doors, that has a pleasant green color to it. No furniture, just a structure that sticks out of the wall acting as a bed and a smaller one that is like a chair. In short, the book is about his adjustment to heaven. He has a guide that helps him to adjust and choose his profession in heaven, and also he is able to visit his son and wife who both died before him. He has to deal with temptation from a Satan figure, and also finds out that people, by their nature, choose which way they go when they die (Heaven, Hell, or Purgatory) and one when one realizes where they are, they have the freedom of choice to decide where they want to go.
A very interesting and compelling read, to say the least. Probably the most satisfying thing about it for me was it made me think. It took a different perspective of a normally stagnant issue and made it interesting. To me that makes the book a classic, a treasure.
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Monday, October 12, 2009
Today...
So, today is my birthday. I always feel so awkward on birthdays. Everybody throughout the day wishes me a happy birthday, but I haven't ever understood why it's so important. Essentially, it's just another day. All I can do when my family starts singing "Happy Birthday" is smile awkwardly and pretend to be excited. I think a lot of people though make it out to be more than it is, just another day, and then they set themselves up for disappointment. "I can't believe I'm at school on my birthday," or "Why do I have to go to work on my birthday?" or just when people have an average day in general, it's like a disappointment because in our society, birthdays are over-exaggerated.
I'm not disappointed, I just feel that I've learned to not care so much about it. I don't feel any older, (or younger for that matter) so to me, it's just another day in the record books.
I'm not disappointed, I just feel that I've learned to not care so much about it. I don't feel any older, (or younger for that matter) so to me, it's just another day in the record books.
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Continuation of "Talent"
I accidentally clicked "publish" before I had finished. So, as I was saying...
Alberto Contador, the 26 year old phenom from Spain is arguably the most exciting and explosive professional cyclist since Lance "The Boss" Armstrong. Contador began his cycling career at an early age, showing great potential as a grimpeur or climber. The typical climber is feather-light, and almost dangerously thin looking. Their muscles are composed of slow-twitch fibers, which allows them to more easily ascend the higher mountains than the bulky sprinters.
Contador joined with Lance's old team, Discovery Channel in 2007, and the first thing he "proposed" to the team director was that he wanted to win the first race he was scheduled for, which was Paris-Nice. It's an old hilly stage race that is a classic and would surely elevate the status of anybody that won it. Holding to his word, he won the race on it's tough last day. This set him into perfect form for the Tour de France in July.
When the 2007 Tour finally came around, Contador was stoked to win it. Being one of the best climber in the race, he quickly got into a high placing as soon as the mountains came along and he got himself into the white jersey, awarded to the highest placed rider under the age of 25. Although he climbed with more ease, he could never seem to shake the determined yellow jersey wearer (the first placed rider) Michael Rasmussen. A couple of days before the end of the Tour, it looked like it was over for Contador with no mountain stages left. But then, Rasmussen was sent home by his own team for lying about his whereabouts during a routine drug test. Contador has in a sense "inherited" the jersey, rather than earned it, and for this he received a lot of skepticism. Anxious to prove himself in the next year's Tour, he was denied the chance because of his name appearing on the list of several cyclist involved in the huge doping scandal "Operacion Puerto". He was later cleared, but had still missed his chance in the 2008 Tour, being barred from competition in it. Instead, he focused on the Giro d'Italia, the Italian version of the Tour that takes place in May, and the Vuelta a Espana, the Spanish tour taking place in the months of September and October. This gained him some respect from both the cycling press and fans alike, but winning the Giro and the Vuelta is not the same as winning Le Tour.
In 2009, with a new team, Astana, filled to the brim with the greatests of greats, riders like Levi Leipheimer, Andreas Kloden, and the inemitable Lance Armstrong, freshly returned from retirement, Contador (or Armstrong) looked set to win another one. In the end, Contador prevailed, attacking and distancing his opposition and his teammates, physically and mentally, as Lance undoubtedly gave him some grief for his inexperienced moves, premature attacks, and unnecessary jabs at his own team. (In stage 17, Contador attacked a group containing the Schleck brothers of Luxewmbourg, teammate Andreas Kloden, and himself, and he only managed to drop Kloden, damaging him in the overall classification.
Even after the Tour was over and he had won, he further alienated himself by verbally bashing Lance Armstrong in a press conference, saying that their relationship "was zero".
Inexperienced or not, Contador is showing that he is a great champion, but will he be able to live up to the unassailable heights the media has projected him to soar to? Only time will tell.
Alberto Contador, the 26 year old phenom from Spain is arguably the most exciting and explosive professional cyclist since Lance "The Boss" Armstrong. Contador began his cycling career at an early age, showing great potential as a grimpeur or climber. The typical climber is feather-light, and almost dangerously thin looking. Their muscles are composed of slow-twitch fibers, which allows them to more easily ascend the higher mountains than the bulky sprinters.
Contador joined with Lance's old team, Discovery Channel in 2007, and the first thing he "proposed" to the team director was that he wanted to win the first race he was scheduled for, which was Paris-Nice. It's an old hilly stage race that is a classic and would surely elevate the status of anybody that won it. Holding to his word, he won the race on it's tough last day. This set him into perfect form for the Tour de France in July.
When the 2007 Tour finally came around, Contador was stoked to win it. Being one of the best climber in the race, he quickly got into a high placing as soon as the mountains came along and he got himself into the white jersey, awarded to the highest placed rider under the age of 25. Although he climbed with more ease, he could never seem to shake the determined yellow jersey wearer (the first placed rider) Michael Rasmussen. A couple of days before the end of the Tour, it looked like it was over for Contador with no mountain stages left. But then, Rasmussen was sent home by his own team for lying about his whereabouts during a routine drug test. Contador has in a sense "inherited" the jersey, rather than earned it, and for this he received a lot of skepticism. Anxious to prove himself in the next year's Tour, he was denied the chance because of his name appearing on the list of several cyclist involved in the huge doping scandal "Operacion Puerto". He was later cleared, but had still missed his chance in the 2008 Tour, being barred from competition in it. Instead, he focused on the Giro d'Italia, the Italian version of the Tour that takes place in May, and the Vuelta a Espana, the Spanish tour taking place in the months of September and October. This gained him some respect from both the cycling press and fans alike, but winning the Giro and the Vuelta is not the same as winning Le Tour.
In 2009, with a new team, Astana, filled to the brim with the greatests of greats, riders like Levi Leipheimer, Andreas Kloden, and the inemitable Lance Armstrong, freshly returned from retirement, Contador (or Armstrong) looked set to win another one. In the end, Contador prevailed, attacking and distancing his opposition and his teammates, physically and mentally, as Lance undoubtedly gave him some grief for his inexperienced moves, premature attacks, and unnecessary jabs at his own team. (In stage 17, Contador attacked a group containing the Schleck brothers of Luxewmbourg, teammate Andreas Kloden, and himself, and he only managed to drop Kloden, damaging him in the overall classification.
Even after the Tour was over and he had won, he further alienated himself by verbally bashing Lance Armstrong in a press conference, saying that their relationship "was zero".
Inexperienced or not, Contador is showing that he is a great champion, but will he be able to live up to the unassailable heights the media has projected him to soar to? Only time will tell.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Talent
One of the things that irks me about people in general, is the over-recognition that someone receives when they are discovered to be talented. So of these prodigies are pampered and raised on a pedastal and their egos are blown up beyond comprehension. In the world of sport, this is very prevalent. In professional cycling specifically, there is one individual to whom I believe this treatment has been given. Not necessarily through his own fault, Alberto Contador has been elevated to a status as a professional cyclist that he simply cannot live up to.
Alberto Contador Velasco, a 26 year old
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