1994

i remember hearing very little about what took place in 1994 in Rwanda. back then i would have been 13 years old and probably could have cared less anyway. last year, i worked with a lady for a short time in yellowknife that was from there and heard a few stories of her time as she lived there during the terrible things that happened in 94. now, i just finished reading a book about it that gives quite an insight into what went on.
Paul Rusesabagina tells his story of what he saw and how he saved some lives. here is a quick paragraph from the book that i found pretty insane. to put it in a bit of context, he is talking about how the UN, US, Canada and other countries were useless in helping avoid, or stop the massacre.

       "Even a proposal to jam the frequencies of RTLM {the rebel radio station} was rejected, on  the grounds that the Army National Guard airplane required for the overflights cost  eighty- five hundred dollars an hour to fly. If that plane had been kept aloft for every second of the genocide it would have worked out to about twenty-four dollars for each life taken that might otherwise have been saved"
if you are looking for something to read...this one is well written and extremely eye-opening.

the hottest final ever

so saturday in australia is bringing possibly the hottest final of all time. seriously...
sharapova vs. ivanovic. watch it.




and yes i was disappointed that djokovic took federer out of the tournament, but at least roger lost to the 2nd best player in the world and not some guy no one has heard of.

are you serious?

as much as i was hoping for this to happen, i never thought it would. nadal lost to unseeded tsonga last nite in australia. in straight sets! i havent got to see this kid play, but after this run in this tournament, im gonna be keeping an eye on him anyway. sounds like he plays some pretty inspired tennis. and anyone that knocks out 'rafa' is already in my goodbooks. for all you nadal lovers, youll just have to wait for the clay court season for this one dimensional athlete to have a chance...

the final 8

for those of you who dont know, the Australian Open is happening in melbourne as we speak. the first week is over and the last 8 players on the mens and womens draws are set. there has been some brilliant tennis and some surprising upsets so far, and one almost monumental loss by federer in the third round. but he hung on and pulled it out in the 5th set. in the womens draw sharapova is playing henin in the quarterfinals, which is crazy and should be a good one.
djokovic is going to be tough to beat. federers quarter is way harder than nadals, but we will see what happens. any predictions?
p.s. on an unrelated note, i cannot stand the patriots.

top 10 of '07

 ten of my favorites from 2007...

kenya

last year at christmas, my parents gave me a gift certificate for KIVA.ORG so i could lend it to some businesses in developing countries. one of the ladies i lent some of my money too is from Kenya and i just received an email from one of the directors of the organization from Kenya. We dont hear much about this on our news over here, and who knows if what we do hear is accurate. anyway, here is a glimpse, first hand into what some of the people are experiencing...


*********************************************************************************************************
Dear Kiva Lenders,

I wish to thank you for your continued concern and support during this
very difficult moment in Kenya’s history. We have been a peaceful
Country in a generally troubled region and people sort of took the
peace for granted.


The country is now battered almost to a pulp and blood spilt with
vengeance, senseless killings and wanton destruction. Markets, food
stores and shops have been looted. Hospitals are dysfunctional and
health centers incapacitated by riots and barricades. The violence,
death and destruction witnessed in the Country for the last couple
weeks has jolted the Nation into conscience and every body is now
craving normalcy.


While peace is slowly returning to all affected parts of the Country,
the impact of the riots has been devastating. Hundreds of people have
been killed turning thousands of innocent children into helpless
orphans and over one million people have been displaced, becoming
internal refugees over night.

The impact of the riots is most felt in the micro and small business
sector. Over 1 million small businesses were looted and or burnt down
destroying the only source of income to millions of Kenyans. Most of
the fighting and destruction occurred in slum areas in Nairobi,
Mombasa, Nakuru and Kericho in Rift Valley. These regions are home to
over 70% of Ebony Foundation’s clients and as you can imagine almost
all of our clients in these regions have been affected by the riots.
Only one region- (Mount Kenya) which is home to about 20% of EbF’s
clients was spared the violence. The economy in this safe region is now
getting stretched as the residents have to now house the displaced
population.

what?

check this out.
Canadian winter golf

no one likes cauliflower, so whats the point?

a few weeks ago i was put on vegetable cutting duty at a friends place to help her get ready for having some people over. i have been thinking about this ever since...
why bother with cauliflower? i never liked it before i had to cut it, but after cutting it, i like it even less. its taste-less, not attractive to look at and makes a big mess when you try to cut it.
seriously. why do people eat that stuff? if they tell you they like it, they are lying.

first time for everything...

oh canada
Originally uploaded by xjermsx

our holiday is coming to a close. we get on the plane tomorrow and should be back in saskatoon sometime wednesday nite. then back to the real world. back to work and back to the cold. it will be good to be home.
sunday nite was one of the funnest nites ive had in a long time. we headed down to the "most famous arena in the world" to watch an orginal six match up. i would have been stoked to watch any teams play in MSG, but to see the Canadiens take on the Rangers was awesome. i felt six years old again. the game went into overtime and shanahan got in alone and sniped one top shelf. so the outcome wasnt what i was hoping for, but not a bad show for my first NHL game...

ny

artwork
Originally uploaded by xjermsx

24hrs in NYC so far. a few pictures are up on flickr. check them out.
this place is pretty crazy.
most of these ones are from the rooftop of a friends apartment.
more to come.

xmas 2007

xmas 2007 consisted of waking up early, and driving to banff.
kris and i had front row parking and got on the 3rd gondola up the hill.
after about 8 hrs, lots of crashes and some neck deep snow later, we were exhausted, wet and ready for a meal and a sleep.
we found a place in canmore that was open to serve us xmas dinner. muriettas.
its a sweet place. if you are in alberta, track it down, its worth it.
now its bed time. round two tomorrow. this old body is having a hard time taking that much punishment.
but i think i can handle it one more time.
pictures to come.
merry xmas from the bighorn motel.

DECEMBER 30TH!

on december 30th ill be in new york city watching the montreal canadiens play the new york rangers.
what a sweet deal.
this is one of those things that has been on my to-do list for as long as i can remember.
cross another one off.

finally done..

no, im not done school, and i havent decided what im going to do yet, but im finally done the website i started making a while back. the website is for our research group at the UofS. go check it out
HERE
it has pictures of the people i spend pretty much everday with and a little bit of info about what we do...

what to do?

polyethylene
Originally uploaded by xjermsx

time is winding down. im running out of time to decide. what should i do?
in about 3 weeks or so i need to let my boss know whether i am going to transfer into the PhD program, or just finish my masters degree. i could finish my masters one year from now, or transfer into the phd program and be done in 3 years from now.
seriously. any suggestions would be sweet. lets have 'em.

another season finished

With another tennis season coming to a close, Roger shows why he has been the #1 player in the world for 200 straight weeks.
he lost his first match at the Tennis Masters Cup in Shanghai, but came back to absolutely own Roddick, Nadal and the red hot Ferrer to win the title.
I believe he even served 80% first serves in a few of those matches. that is incredible. literally, that is like having a .800 batting average, or scoring a goal on 80% of the shots you get in a hockey game. insanely hard.
2 Grand slam titles short of Pete Sampras, Federer is in a good place to break the record in 2008. this man continues to write history everytime he steps on a court.
Speaking of Sampras, the two guys are doing a tour of Asia, playing three matches over there. This picture is from their match in Seoul. Harmony is going to their match in Macau. To be honest, i have never been more jealous in my entire life. make sure you enjoy it just that extra bit for me, harm.

road trip

road trip
Originally uploaded by xjermsx

i spent another weekend out at a beach camp with these sweet high school kids and a few more that wouldnt fit in this picture. yes a beach camp in november can still be a good time. games, food, hang outs, haunted houses and some serious time talking about faith, hope, and love were on the agenda.
we did it with a super-hero theme, hence some of the sweet costumes in the rest of my flickr pictures.
but we talked about what it might look like if we actually did the faith, hope and love thing. in real life. if we actually loved, and actually hoped and had a little faith. what do you think it would look like?
apparently there is some guy in the states who decided to live out the old testament for a year. he even convinced someone to let him "stone" them, throwing pebbles at them in central park or something.
anyway, as jason, dan and i were sitting in the hot tub, jason asked, why someone/everyone dont try living out the new testament. basically faith, hope and love.
why would it be an experiment, and not the norm? would God just kind of laugh and say "stinkin took you guys long enough to figure it out"
i dont know. any thoughts out there as to what it might look like if we used our 'super hero powers' of faith hope and love?
to those of you who were there, thanks for the sweet weekend. for those of you who werent, let me know what you think...

this is rich...

i took this little section from the top story on the yahoo.com homepage. if you are one of those women...nevermind.


"SYDNEY (AFP) - Santas in Australia's largest city have been told not to use Father Christmas's traditional "ho ho ho" greeting because it may be offensive to women, it was reported Thursday.


Sydney's Santa Clauses have instead been instructed to say "ha ha ha" instead, the Daily Telegraph reported."

one year ago..

mr. federer
see flickr for more from jerms

i sat in this stadium watching the top 8 players in the world with one of the best guys i know, jonny sly.
we watched federer dominate roddick, blake and nadal among others.
this tournament is starting again tomorrow back in shanghai and i wish that i was there. the city itself is an amazing place, but being able to watch 8 straight days of tennis was honestly the best week of my life. hands down.
if you get a chance try and take some of it in on t.v. its nothing like being there live, but its still amazing.

weekend away

team photo
Originally uploaded by intrepid trepidation

this crew made a trip out to arlington beach this weekend. we all stayed in this one huge, old school house. it ended up becoming lots of time to laugh, eat, think, and hang out. we talked about making quiet space. time when we can 'unplug' from everything that is happening around us. movies, tv, ipods, radios, cell phones, computers, pagers, pda's. the list could go on. none of this is really a new idea, but its just something i at least needed to be reminded of..that i dont always need to have all these things in the background making noise. that silence is ok. and even beneficial; spiritually and physically. i was also reminded that even though making this space is a good thing, there is also something to be said for seeing God in whatever things you are doing during your day. working, listening to lectures, interactions with other people, driving, jogging etc.

living in one house with 20 or so people equals some good pranks. opening a door resulted in a pitcher of water landing on my head, pouring powdered coffee whitener into sleeves and coat pockets, and a cup full of harmless maple bugs being dumped on a girl resulting in a scream equivalent to someone getting their foot caught in a bear trap were among the highlights.
click on the picture to see the rest of jessies pictures

taking it for a test drive

i just got the new Mac OS X today. Leopard is unbelievable. some reviewer, from pcmag.com had this to say:
"In his 4.5-star (out of 5) review of Leopard, Edward Mendelson (pcmag.com) maintains that Leopard is “by far the best operating system ever written for the vast majority of consumers, with dozens of new features that have real practical value.” Mendelson “found Leopard to be startlingly fast, brilliantly streamlined, and packed with conveniences and innovations. Leopard’s rich set of built-in software runs faster than I imagined possible."
there is some pretty sweet features and additions from the last version. if you have a mac, you should get it. ( i paid 69$ as a student) and if you dont have a mac, get one now, they all have leopard installed.