This was originally written March 17, 2011 - I've since edited out all of the parts I didn't really want to post out here in the public domain.
Interesting week - I spent most of it sick and miserable. That's meant no working out - which makes me more miserable. I'm sure my family is ready for me to not be sick anymore. Completely off my topic (which I know I haven't gotten to - but remember, this is MY place for ranting, so if you don't want to read it, click...) ever noticed how those we love the most are those we take for granted and treat the worst? I'm working on that...
Anyway, I've been reading a GREAT book the last couple of weeks: The Speed of Trust by Stephen M.R. Covey (Stephen Covey's son). It's not often I read a book that changes the way I see things - this book has totally changed my perspective, and I find myself looking at the world through the eyes of trust. The first level of trust I'm working on is self-trust. How does this relate to weight-loss and fitness? Wait for it.... wait for it....
How many times have I promised myself that I would get up early, go to bed early, work-out at such and such a time - not eat badly... and every time I do NOT do that it creates what Covey calls a "trust tax" - it makes it that much more difficult to trust myself. He suggests making - and keeping - small promises to yourself to build up a "trust dividend" - a growing confidence in myself that I'll do those things. This week I've been unable to put alot of this to work in terms of fitness due to my illness - but the coming week should be fun! I've made up a list of small promises that I'm going to keep this week - let's see what kind of results THAT brings!
Another book I've been reading is called "What the Dog Saw" by Malcolm Gladwell. I like his way of looking at the world a little differently and asking different questions (same reason I like "Freakanomics" so much.) The book is compilation of his essays that have appeared in the New York Times. Anyway, the title of the book comes from a story he was doing on a dog whisperer - a guy who could take the most hostile canine and with a simple touch turn him into a happy puppy. One of the people studying him asked "wow, what's he THINKING when does that?" Gladwell asked, "What does the dog see?"
The story that caught my eye was that of an experiment conducted with kids - I think they were 6 years old. They were put in a room and shown a small cookie and a large cookie. Then they were given a bell. They were told if they rang the bell, a person would come in and give them the small cookie, but if they WAITED until the person came in on their own they would get the large cookie. Amazing how many of the kids WAITED - and what they did to try and distract themselves from the task of waiting. The self-control and discipline they were exhibiting is amazing. They were willing to sacrifice something "good" for something better - they were willing to be patient and "save" for what they wanted rather than the instant gratification we seem to jump at so often.
So where do we go off the rails? Kids can do it - why do we search for that instant "numbing" with food? And is the answer as simple as finding something to distract us?
I'm finding that exercise does just that for me. When I'm working out hard I don't WANT to eat emotionally - in fact, it's easy. The work-out itself is not what causes me to lose weight - put bluntly, you cannot out-exercise the damage your mouth can cause! Figure that running a marathon burns anywhere from 2600-5000 calories, takes an average of 4-5 hours, and is EXHAUSTING. It doesn't take that long to pound back that many calaories! If you eat badly, no amount of excercise can lose the weight (I think I've mentioned before - I've bicycled 8,000km/year and not lost any weight.) BUT, the act of excercising - excercising HARD, really pushing myself - seems to distract me from the bad food, the bad habits. Is this my answer? Will this give me the insight/discipline to do what needs to be done? I don't really know - the answer will be revealed with time, my young padawan.
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
What Women Want
Okay, I'll admit it - I'm a Mel Gibson fan. From the Patriot to Braveheart to the Lethal Weapon series, they're all great. Last night my son wanted to watch a comedy (it was late - that's when he usually wants to watch something.) and so I grabbed 4 movies and let him choose - he chose WHAT WOMEN WANT.
My favorite part of this movie is actually the Hat Dance to ol' Frankie crooning (I really do want to learn to do that someday!) I mean, that's just soooo SMOOOOOOTH! - but last night there was another part that grabbed me.
It's near the end of the show. Darcy (Helen Hunt) has cut-off contact with Nick (Mel Gibson) and he's wondering around in a daze. He's tried to vist her, then tries to call her - nothing. He goes to the fridge, opens it, and says, "What am I doing? She's not in the fridge!"
What?! You mean I'm not the only one that walks to the fridge and stares in it when there's NOTHING in there that I want? Move things around a little, after-all, there might be something REALLY AMAZING hiding under yesterdays left-overs. The problem is, so often I don't RECOGNIZE that what I want is not in the fridge! Emotional eating does not mean sitting over a bucket of ice-cream and crying. (though it can - but I'd guess that most people who are engaging in that behavior recognize it and choose not to do anything about it.) No, emotional eating can mean anything from trying to fill an emptiness to perking yourself up. Food can be used as a drug (I know, I've done it many times) - it can deaden the bad feelings and heighten the good ones. And I think I've figured out that almost all of it stems from not being able to recognize the feelings and deal with them in the moment. So what do I want? It's not in the fridge.
What I want is on the road somewhere. Yup, that's right - the road. I want to be on my bike grinding up a steep climb and feeling the burn. Or running down the road with nothing but the rhythm of my breathing to listen to. (Okay, and occasionally a little AC/DC!) The weather has finally turned a bit warmer, and now I can run outside. Tomorrow, if the weather holds, I may even try to ride my bike outside!
So, if you see a bundle working it's way down the highway tomorrow, say "HI!" - it'll just be me out for a morning ride - and hopefully I'll be feeling nothing but my legs screaming at me in that special way.
My favorite part of this movie is actually the Hat Dance to ol' Frankie crooning (I really do want to learn to do that someday!) I mean, that's just soooo SMOOOOOOTH! - but last night there was another part that grabbed me.
It's near the end of the show. Darcy (Helen Hunt) has cut-off contact with Nick (Mel Gibson) and he's wondering around in a daze. He's tried to vist her, then tries to call her - nothing. He goes to the fridge, opens it, and says, "What am I doing? She's not in the fridge!"
What?! You mean I'm not the only one that walks to the fridge and stares in it when there's NOTHING in there that I want? Move things around a little, after-all, there might be something REALLY AMAZING hiding under yesterdays left-overs. The problem is, so often I don't RECOGNIZE that what I want is not in the fridge! Emotional eating does not mean sitting over a bucket of ice-cream and crying. (though it can - but I'd guess that most people who are engaging in that behavior recognize it and choose not to do anything about it.) No, emotional eating can mean anything from trying to fill an emptiness to perking yourself up. Food can be used as a drug (I know, I've done it many times) - it can deaden the bad feelings and heighten the good ones. And I think I've figured out that almost all of it stems from not being able to recognize the feelings and deal with them in the moment. So what do I want? It's not in the fridge.
What I want is on the road somewhere. Yup, that's right - the road. I want to be on my bike grinding up a steep climb and feeling the burn. Or running down the road with nothing but the rhythm of my breathing to listen to. (Okay, and occasionally a little AC/DC!) The weather has finally turned a bit warmer, and now I can run outside. Tomorrow, if the weather holds, I may even try to ride my bike outside!
So, if you see a bundle working it's way down the highway tomorrow, say "HI!" - it'll just be me out for a morning ride - and hopefully I'll be feeling nothing but my legs screaming at me in that special way.
Monday, March 07, 2011
It's over - whew!
No, not directly related to weight loss - though I suspect that the removal of this particular stress from my life will help!
The best place to start is the beginning - so here we go!
June 16, 2009 the local constabulary conducted a raid on a local business, Pic-A-Flick Video. A number of years earlier I had been a partner in this business, but had sold it to my partner, Dale Cahoon. On this particular day the police seized all of the movies. Why? Dale was running a "Clean Flicks" type of business - renting and distributing edited copies of movies.
Background: In the US, a Denver judge ruled that Clean Flicks was in violation of copyright and ordered the liquidation of their stock at all stores within District 7. There was an orderly liquidation and none of the stores incurred a loss, though they were no longer able to access edited movies. FYI - District 7 included Colorado and Utah. Dale found an editing company in Idaho - outside of that district - and that's where he was ordering his movies from.
Back to Canada - Canada's copyright laws are not like the US. A fact that our gov't has tried to correct a number of times, but they keep putting stupid things in. Like the most recent version: You can legally make back-up copies of any movie you own, but only if there's no security measures put on the original. Ever seen a DVD produced that DOESN'T have some form of security on it? That means you can't copy ANY movie, including changing the format to put it on your ipod. It's a poorly written law, is largely unenforceable, and I expect that it'll get tossed like previous versions.
At one point, one of Dale's shipments was seized by Canada Customs on the basis that it violated copyright law. He appealed that, and eventually got all of his movies returned to him, along with a letter apologizing for it and confirming that he was able to do what he was doing. At this point Dale made a deal with the editing company: rather than sending up all the movies, they would send ONE Master copy, and he would be able to make the number of copies he needed off of that and simply pay them a fee for the movies he burned. He asked if my son and I would like to do the work for him, and we said okay. That's how I got involved in this mess.
After the seizure I went down to the police station and gave a statement - I was there for about 2 hours. At numerous times during this interview the officer who was leading the investigation indicated that they had been doing this investigation for 6 months and that they "knew everything" including my ownership of the company. I pointed out to him that they didn't - that I didn't own the company anymore. He said I did, and as evidence pointed to the Alberta Registry documents showing me as an owner of the company, and a director. I pointed out to him the dates of DISSOLUTION - the company was a dead company and no longer functioned. When I had sold my interest to Dale I had not had myself removed as an owner or director because we DISSOLVED the company. Dale had simply bought the assets from the company. The number of other easily checked errors in his investigation piled up.
Two days later the Constable and a couple of other officers executed a search warrant of my house. I had a pretty good idea that they were coming. They had come the day before and ASKED if I'd give it to them - I called my lawyer and he indicated that I should make them do the work of getting a warrant. They seized some computer equipment from me and my label printer. (A couple of months later I was able to get that returned to me.) In a subsequent interview a supervisor from Calgary (I cannot remember her name now.) admitted to me that there was no law here - that they were attempting to set a precedent. I asked her to estimate how much time/money they had spent so far on their investigation and was told somewhere around 6 months, and probably $100,000 or so. I re-iterated that this was a joke - and that even IF what we had done was illegal, we had a "get out of jail free card" in that letter from Customs. Shortly after that I learned something else - this was not a "criminal" case. Even if found guilty, it's like getting a speeding ticket and does not create a criminal record.
For the next YEAR I regularly asked for my equipment to be returned to me, and what the progress of the case was - no charges were pressed - until ONE YEAR later. (I got my label printer back) A week before the one year mark, the officer approached Dale to ask him if the two of us would sign a form allowing the police to hold onto our equipment until their investigation was complete. I told him to "pound sand." - I'd go to court first. NO JUDGE would grant an open-ended seizure like that, and he knew it. The day before their one year deadline (at which point they would have had to return everything and drop it) they filed charges.
At that point I had to go down and get fingerprinted and photographed, and appear at court for first appearance - ideally to enter a plea and set a trial date. I went down and got photographed and printed. (At which point I learned that they still had all the movies and equipment still at the police station - that I had been lied to about it going up to Calgary for processing. They had told me that the reason for the delay in pressing charges was because they had to send ALL those movies to be checked. We told them numerous times we had already attested to the fact that they were NOT originals. That, unlike piracy, we were not wanting EXACT duplicates, that these were edited. In fact, Dale showed the officers conducting the seizure of his store how to tell which ones were originals and which were edited. Fact is, in court the prosecutor said they had sent TWO movies to be checked.)
Our first trial date came along - and the prosecution asked for a month more time, as they hadn't gotten disclosure to us yet. The next date came, and the same thing happened. The next date came, and the same thing happened. This went on and on...
Finally, they got us disclosure - it was a joke! The Crown handed me a copy of a single DVD that consisted of every document they had gathered and every interview they had done. (including the HOURS of transcripts of their interviews with Dale and I.) They had done ZERO further investigation. At any rate, we were finally, so we thought, going to be able to enter a plea and get this going.
Not to be. For the next 4 months the Crown had one reason after another for another delay. Fortunately for me, my lawyer was giving me advice, but was not actually retained by me - if he'd been showing up in court every time I'd have racked up over $10,000 in legal fees just to have him stand beside me while the Crown asked for another extension.
Finally, we got to enter a plea - and then a date needed to be set for trial. My defense was really simple - Color of Right. Simply put, I had done what was reasonable and necessary to make sure I was on-side legally. At the pre-trial conference between a judge, the Crown, Dale's lawyer, and my lawyer, the judge slammed the Crown for this mess. Basically, there is NO VICTIM (Dale's company bought one regular version of every copy of the movie, so "Hollywood" was not out any revenue - and then he destroyed that copy.), we had a "get out of jail free" card, and there was little chance of a conviction, and there was a good argument about whether there was even a violation of the Copyright Act. My lawyer said he wasn't even going to argue about the law, my defense was simply "color of right" - and the judge agreed that it would be pretty difficult to convict me.
Shortly after that the Crown called and made an offer to settle - they'd drop all the charges against me if Dale pleaded guilty and accepted a "substantial" fine. That got rejected by Dale. (Hey, I had no problem with it!)
Finally, today, a deal was worked out. Basically, Dale would plead guilty to one count of being in violation of the Copyright Act and pay a $1,000 fine and forfeit all the movies seized, and all charges against me would be dropped. My lawyer was unable to be there today (was in Phoenix) but I didn't expect anything significant, so wasn't worried. I believe Dale had a good argument to make that he did NOT violate copyright law. BUT, to make that argument in trial would cost him somewhere around $40,000. $40,000 to defend a business which had been shut down for two years, and still run the risk of losing. Or, pay a $1,000 fine and have it go away. He plead guilty and paid the fine. The Crown dropped the other 3 charges against him, and all 4 charges against me - and then asked that all of my goods seized be forfeited as well. WHAT?! NO CHARGES AND YOU WANT TO SEIZE MY PROPERTY??!!
I made an application to the judge that it didn't seem right that all charges could be dropped against me, and yet I could still be "made to pay". We discussed that for a good 10 or 15 minutes, and then the judge made his ruling. He accepted the $1,000 fine recommendation, tossing out all the charges, Dale forfeited his goods - and then gave me back all of my stuff. I wish I could remember the judges exact wording, but I don't. It left the Crown Prosecutor speechless.
In the end I learned this: justice is not done in the legal system. The police officer involved made a determination that a crime had been committed, and from that point on it becomes up to the individual to prove otherwise, and that's expensive. I've seen CCRA (Revenue Canada) do the same thing with taxes. Make a claim for $50,000 - knowing it will cost $20,000 to fight it, and settles it for $10,000. Financially, you've got to settle it, right or wrong. Dale lost his business - but even if he won he wasn't going to get that back, it was dead. So, the government spent how much $$$ to get a $1,000 fine? We were ready to go to court IMMEDIATELY - and had provided to the police all the evidence - we never tried to hide anything, we never tried to distort facts. We told them exactly what we had done, why, and how. Yet, the process took almost a full two years and alot of money - and stress! We weren't doing something evil, we weren't trying to break any laws, and I don't believe we did.
That's it. The whole story in a nutshell. Obviously there's been lots of drama I've not included here - I mean, it was TWO YEARS - but you get the picture. Dale's in a bit of an interesting situation, where he can't even say "I'm innocent" 'cause he plead guilty. But, I have yet to see any evidence that shows that he actually broke copyright law.
In the on-going saga of Hollywood vs moral choice... Hollywood argued in the District 7 court that it wasn't about money, but about the directors artistic ownership. (Which still didn't explain why it was okay for airlines and TV stations to edit, but not for anybody else to.) Offers were made numerous times to purchase the already edited versions of these movies - but they refused to sell them. Well, now you can buy some edited versions! Avatar and The King's Speech are available in edited format. Here's an interesting article in the Deseret News about The King's Speech.
The best place to start is the beginning - so here we go!
June 16, 2009 the local constabulary conducted a raid on a local business, Pic-A-Flick Video. A number of years earlier I had been a partner in this business, but had sold it to my partner, Dale Cahoon. On this particular day the police seized all of the movies. Why? Dale was running a "Clean Flicks" type of business - renting and distributing edited copies of movies.
Background: In the US, a Denver judge ruled that Clean Flicks was in violation of copyright and ordered the liquidation of their stock at all stores within District 7. There was an orderly liquidation and none of the stores incurred a loss, though they were no longer able to access edited movies. FYI - District 7 included Colorado and Utah. Dale found an editing company in Idaho - outside of that district - and that's where he was ordering his movies from.
Back to Canada - Canada's copyright laws are not like the US. A fact that our gov't has tried to correct a number of times, but they keep putting stupid things in. Like the most recent version: You can legally make back-up copies of any movie you own, but only if there's no security measures put on the original. Ever seen a DVD produced that DOESN'T have some form of security on it? That means you can't copy ANY movie, including changing the format to put it on your ipod. It's a poorly written law, is largely unenforceable, and I expect that it'll get tossed like previous versions.
At one point, one of Dale's shipments was seized by Canada Customs on the basis that it violated copyright law. He appealed that, and eventually got all of his movies returned to him, along with a letter apologizing for it and confirming that he was able to do what he was doing. At this point Dale made a deal with the editing company: rather than sending up all the movies, they would send ONE Master copy, and he would be able to make the number of copies he needed off of that and simply pay them a fee for the movies he burned. He asked if my son and I would like to do the work for him, and we said okay. That's how I got involved in this mess.
After the seizure I went down to the police station and gave a statement - I was there for about 2 hours. At numerous times during this interview the officer who was leading the investigation indicated that they had been doing this investigation for 6 months and that they "knew everything" including my ownership of the company. I pointed out to him that they didn't - that I didn't own the company anymore. He said I did, and as evidence pointed to the Alberta Registry documents showing me as an owner of the company, and a director. I pointed out to him the dates of DISSOLUTION - the company was a dead company and no longer functioned. When I had sold my interest to Dale I had not had myself removed as an owner or director because we DISSOLVED the company. Dale had simply bought the assets from the company. The number of other easily checked errors in his investigation piled up.
Two days later the Constable and a couple of other officers executed a search warrant of my house. I had a pretty good idea that they were coming. They had come the day before and ASKED if I'd give it to them - I called my lawyer and he indicated that I should make them do the work of getting a warrant. They seized some computer equipment from me and my label printer. (A couple of months later I was able to get that returned to me.) In a subsequent interview a supervisor from Calgary (I cannot remember her name now.) admitted to me that there was no law here - that they were attempting to set a precedent. I asked her to estimate how much time/money they had spent so far on their investigation and was told somewhere around 6 months, and probably $100,000 or so. I re-iterated that this was a joke - and that even IF what we had done was illegal, we had a "get out of jail free card" in that letter from Customs. Shortly after that I learned something else - this was not a "criminal" case. Even if found guilty, it's like getting a speeding ticket and does not create a criminal record.
For the next YEAR I regularly asked for my equipment to be returned to me, and what the progress of the case was - no charges were pressed - until ONE YEAR later. (I got my label printer back) A week before the one year mark, the officer approached Dale to ask him if the two of us would sign a form allowing the police to hold onto our equipment until their investigation was complete. I told him to "pound sand." - I'd go to court first. NO JUDGE would grant an open-ended seizure like that, and he knew it. The day before their one year deadline (at which point they would have had to return everything and drop it) they filed charges.
At that point I had to go down and get fingerprinted and photographed, and appear at court for first appearance - ideally to enter a plea and set a trial date. I went down and got photographed and printed. (At which point I learned that they still had all the movies and equipment still at the police station - that I had been lied to about it going up to Calgary for processing. They had told me that the reason for the delay in pressing charges was because they had to send ALL those movies to be checked. We told them numerous times we had already attested to the fact that they were NOT originals. That, unlike piracy, we were not wanting EXACT duplicates, that these were edited. In fact, Dale showed the officers conducting the seizure of his store how to tell which ones were originals and which were edited. Fact is, in court the prosecutor said they had sent TWO movies to be checked.)
Our first trial date came along - and the prosecution asked for a month more time, as they hadn't gotten disclosure to us yet. The next date came, and the same thing happened. The next date came, and the same thing happened. This went on and on...
Finally, they got us disclosure - it was a joke! The Crown handed me a copy of a single DVD that consisted of every document they had gathered and every interview they had done. (including the HOURS of transcripts of their interviews with Dale and I.) They had done ZERO further investigation. At any rate, we were finally, so we thought, going to be able to enter a plea and get this going.
Not to be. For the next 4 months the Crown had one reason after another for another delay. Fortunately for me, my lawyer was giving me advice, but was not actually retained by me - if he'd been showing up in court every time I'd have racked up over $10,000 in legal fees just to have him stand beside me while the Crown asked for another extension.
Finally, we got to enter a plea - and then a date needed to be set for trial. My defense was really simple - Color of Right. Simply put, I had done what was reasonable and necessary to make sure I was on-side legally. At the pre-trial conference between a judge, the Crown, Dale's lawyer, and my lawyer, the judge slammed the Crown for this mess. Basically, there is NO VICTIM (Dale's company bought one regular version of every copy of the movie, so "Hollywood" was not out any revenue - and then he destroyed that copy.), we had a "get out of jail free" card, and there was little chance of a conviction, and there was a good argument about whether there was even a violation of the Copyright Act. My lawyer said he wasn't even going to argue about the law, my defense was simply "color of right" - and the judge agreed that it would be pretty difficult to convict me.
Shortly after that the Crown called and made an offer to settle - they'd drop all the charges against me if Dale pleaded guilty and accepted a "substantial" fine. That got rejected by Dale. (Hey, I had no problem with it!)
Finally, today, a deal was worked out. Basically, Dale would plead guilty to one count of being in violation of the Copyright Act and pay a $1,000 fine and forfeit all the movies seized, and all charges against me would be dropped. My lawyer was unable to be there today (was in Phoenix) but I didn't expect anything significant, so wasn't worried. I believe Dale had a good argument to make that he did NOT violate copyright law. BUT, to make that argument in trial would cost him somewhere around $40,000. $40,000 to defend a business which had been shut down for two years, and still run the risk of losing. Or, pay a $1,000 fine and have it go away. He plead guilty and paid the fine. The Crown dropped the other 3 charges against him, and all 4 charges against me - and then asked that all of my goods seized be forfeited as well. WHAT?! NO CHARGES AND YOU WANT TO SEIZE MY PROPERTY??!!
I made an application to the judge that it didn't seem right that all charges could be dropped against me, and yet I could still be "made to pay". We discussed that for a good 10 or 15 minutes, and then the judge made his ruling. He accepted the $1,000 fine recommendation, tossing out all the charges, Dale forfeited his goods - and then gave me back all of my stuff. I wish I could remember the judges exact wording, but I don't. It left the Crown Prosecutor speechless.
In the end I learned this: justice is not done in the legal system. The police officer involved made a determination that a crime had been committed, and from that point on it becomes up to the individual to prove otherwise, and that's expensive. I've seen CCRA (Revenue Canada) do the same thing with taxes. Make a claim for $50,000 - knowing it will cost $20,000 to fight it, and settles it for $10,000. Financially, you've got to settle it, right or wrong. Dale lost his business - but even if he won he wasn't going to get that back, it was dead. So, the government spent how much $$$ to get a $1,000 fine? We were ready to go to court IMMEDIATELY - and had provided to the police all the evidence - we never tried to hide anything, we never tried to distort facts. We told them exactly what we had done, why, and how. Yet, the process took almost a full two years and alot of money - and stress! We weren't doing something evil, we weren't trying to break any laws, and I don't believe we did.
That's it. The whole story in a nutshell. Obviously there's been lots of drama I've not included here - I mean, it was TWO YEARS - but you get the picture. Dale's in a bit of an interesting situation, where he can't even say "I'm innocent" 'cause he plead guilty. But, I have yet to see any evidence that shows that he actually broke copyright law.
In the on-going saga of Hollywood vs moral choice... Hollywood argued in the District 7 court that it wasn't about money, but about the directors artistic ownership. (Which still didn't explain why it was okay for airlines and TV stations to edit, but not for anybody else to.) Offers were made numerous times to purchase the already edited versions of these movies - but they refused to sell them. Well, now you can buy some edited versions! Avatar and The King's Speech are available in edited format. Here's an interesting article in the Deseret News about The King's Speech.
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