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Help, I’m Alive

Wednesday, September 22nd, 2010

My apologies for the lack of updates, despite my promise to the contrary. But here are my most recent list of excuses/reasons:

- I’ve had bronchitis for the past few weeks…hoorah for polution!

- School has been busy, but great. The students here are wonderful, but they most certainly keep me on my toes

- We bought a Nintendo Wii, Mario Kart and Mario Party 8 have eaten away most of my free time. And now I have Smackdown vs. Raw 2010. I may never blog again.

- The bronchitis thing

- Guangzhou has stuff to do: we went to a talk about the upcoming Asian Games, a comedy club, out to lots of restaurants, live music, quiz night, and lots more. Thus less time to blog.

- Hockey hasn’t started yet, so what do I have to write about? (Actually: pre-season predictions are on their way)

- I sprained my ankle the other day…while I was teaching a class

- Did I mention that I have bronchitis?

Until next time,

Tags: Personal
Posted in Glen News, In the GZ | 1 Comment »

Just to let anyone out there who may be worried know, I’m alive and well on this side of the earth. It’s been a busy few days since my last post, but ultimately very rewarding and has me excited for the coming year(s).

It all started shortly after my last post, when I was at the Toronto Airport and I hear the ominous words come over the loudspeaker “Attention everyone, American Airlines Flight 4112 to Chicago has been canceled”. Needless to say, I wasn’t too thrilled about that.

I ran to the counter to see what they could do for me. I NEEDED to make that connection in order to catch the flight to Seoul and then to Guangzhou.

(more…)

Tags: china, Guangzhou
Posted in Glen News, In the GZ, Personal, Teachin' and Learnin' | 1 Comment »

What’s Next

Saturday, July 24th, 2010

In a few hours I hop on yet another plane. It never seems to end with me, does it? I’ll be on a 36 or so hour journey to my next new home in Guangzhou.

Yet again, I didn’t do all that I wanted to this summer, and yet again I missed seeing a lot of very important people to me. If you’re one of them, then I’m sorry, really I am. I missed seeing most of my friends and many of my family members this time. As usual I crammed too much stuff into not enough time and things kept popping up left, right, and centre.

But I am very excited to head to a new school and start a new life in a new place. Guangzhou is by all accounts a very happening city that I think will suit me well. In the two times that I have been there it seems like an exciting place full of energy and enthusiasm. If that isn’t enough, Hong Kong, the coolest city on the planet, is a short train ride away.

As for what I’ll be doing: I will continue to teach High School Math at an International School. In addition though, I will be taking on a new class for me, Theory of Knowledge. This is the course that is designed to bring all of the subjects together a bit, and runs like a Philosophy class. I am pretty exciting for that. Also, I do plan on setting up a class blog for that, so I’ll be sure to post some links to that around here somewhere.

As always, should any of you happen to be in the area, please drop me a line (preferably not on Facebook as it tends to be blocked). I’d love to meet up and/or hang out.

Hope to see you soon,

Until next time,

P.S. And this is Post number 17…

Tags: 17 posts, apologies, china
Posted in Glen News | 1 Comment »

Saying Goodye

Friday, June 18th, 2010

I’m not ready for this, not this time.

June 26th used to seem like a lifetime away, but now it’s right around the corner.

I always seem to be going somewhere new, somewhere different.

Trenton, Brookfield, Wolfville, Dumfries, North Bay, Oakville, have all been my home, but now there’s here.

The first place in my “adult life” that I’ve stuck out for more that one year in a row. The first place in a long time I’ve come back to. But I won’t be doing that anymore.

I know it’s right, I know it’s time, but that doesn’t mean that I’m ready. So much left to say, so much left to do.

I wasn’t ready to say goodbye to the Grade 12s so I didn’t. Now they’re gone. I’m not ready to say goodbye to my friends. Hopefully they’ll wait for me to get the courage. If not, I hope they understand.

But I guess it’s time for me to go. Time to get close to somewhere else, before it’s time to go again.

Until next time,

Tags: china, creatively writing, moving, sad, suzhou living, wow
Posted in About G, Glen News, Suzhou Stories, Teachin' and Learnin' | 1 Comment »

Logistics for the Summer

Wednesday, April 21st, 2010

So it’s all said and done, my multitude of flights for the summer has been booked. I’ll be flying to the following places on the following dates:

Shanghai to San Francisco: June 26

San Francisco to Toronto: June 30

Toronto to New York: July 5

New York to Halifax: July 8

Halifax to Toronto: July 15

Toronto to Guangzhou via a zillion other places: July 24.

So…get your bookings for designated Glen-time now. It’s going to be a wild ride.

Until next time,

Tags: Asia
Posted in Glen News, Traveling Tales | No Comments »

I Never Win Anything…

Thursday, February 4th, 2010

Pardon me for buzzing a bit but I’m a wee bit excited. See I never win anything and tonight I did.

Tonight was my school’s Chinese New Year banquet and there were a series of door prizes. They early roudns ranged from hand towels to cooking wear even to travel vouchers. But I won the grand prize…and I’ve named it Phil.

At the grand finale of the evening they drew one last name for a prize, and I won. I never win anything, except for tonight. I won a Philips 32 Inch LCD TV.

I was so excited that I ran up and gave my head of school a hug, then I lifted her up a good 3 feet into the air. Then I picked up Phil and gave him a kiss (he’s in a box, so there’s protection). I was so excited that my hand slipped, and I felt him start to tumble from my grasp.

Thankfully I was able to reach my hand back and nab him just before he hit the ground. That would have been embarassing.

I have nothing else to add right now, I’m more excited that anything. Here’s a Google image result of Phil.

Tropical Paradise Not Included

To make things even funnier, I was a few hours late to the dinner, as I was coaching Middle School Floor Hockey, so I had to give my ticket to Elvina to put it into the raffle. To make it even funnier, last year she won plane tickets to Qingdao. Luckily she took me with her. I figure it’s fair now, I’ll let her watch my TV. To make things even funnier still, I found out that my head of school (remember the one that I lifted into the air) has a hurt ankle..oops. If she’s hurt, she can always come over and watch my TV.

Until next time,

Tags: china, why me?, wow
Posted in Glen News, Happy [Insert Holidy Here] | No Comments »

Moving Day

Tuesday, October 27th, 2009

We have officially moved!

Well after exactly three years at Getting Glenergized and a few short, neglected months at Backpackers Soul, the time has come to bid adieu. As of this post both sites are officially closed. Before you start to plan their respective eulogies, know that their hearts will go on in a new cyber-location. As of right now I’d like to officially announce the formation of my new on-line opinion platform, the easy to remember Glen Thoughts.

(more…)

Tags: firewall, site news
Posted in About G, Cruising on the Information Superhighway, Glen News | 1 Comment »

I’m Comin’ Home Again…

Friday, July 3rd, 2009

Well it has come to be that time once again. Yet again I am ready to take the summer off of blogging. Although, I suppose I don’t have a lot to take a holiday from here lately.

On Sunday I return to Canada for an all too brief time back in my country of birth. I will be there for just over three weeks (with a quick but exciting sojourn to New York City) before coming back to the Far East, where I’ll be traveling for a while before getting ready for my sophomore year in the Middle Kingdom.

This year has been simply fantastic for me. It certainly had some ups and some downs, but all in all China gave me more good days than bad days, and what more can you really ask for than that? Well great friends, fantastic students, career challenges, and new and exciting experiences sure don’t hurt.

So China, I’ll miss you. Canada, I can’t wait to see you, and New York, I can’t wait to meet you!!!

I’m coming home!!!!

In my tradition, I’ll leave you with some musak to keep you company over the next little while…

Kanye West featuring Chris Martin – Homecoming

Leonard Cohen – First We Take Manhattan

Until next time,

Tags: warm fuzzies
Posted in About G, Glen News, Traveling Tales | No Comments »

Breaking Up Is Hard To Do

Monday, February 23rd, 2009

They say that breaking up is hard to do, and well they sure are right.

With a heavy heart, I would like to inform you that this blog is breaking up. I know that this may come as a surprise to a lot of you on the outside, but trust me, it has been a long time coming. The differences between this blog’s rant and rave, nerdy opinions style, and the more personalized travel focus and description of my adventures, has just become too much to bear. As such, from here on out, those two sides shall never meet again.

The opinionated side of the blog won the real estate in the settlement, as such Getting Glenergized will remain focused on my personalized opinions and pursuit of life’s nerdy passions, with particular focus on politics, music, sports, and wrestling. While my travel adventures have fittingly moved to a new location, called Reflections of a Backpacker’s Soul. The new site has already imported any old travel stories, and has been setting up a nice bit of space. Both sides agree to stay friends, and are going to provide links and feeds to one another, to show no ill will.

More than anything, neither side wants to put you, our readers, in the middle, so please try to make time for both blogs. We understand that you may have less time for either of us, and we don’t want to get too needy, but we do love keeping you around, so please stick stay in touch, we’d hate to loose you.

Until next time,

(from Getting Glenergized)

and:

Safe Journeys,

(from Reflections of a Backpacker’s Soul)

Posted in Cruising on the Information Superhighway, Glen News | No Comments »

Summer Sabbatical

Thursday, June 26th, 2008

Well it’s that time of year again, where I say goodbye for a little while. I head back up to Kodiak for a 6th summer tomorrow (I know, I know, I said that I wouldn’t, but here we are…), where I will stay for all of July. After that, my August is mostly going to be devoted to my family and packing up to move to China. So I doubt that I will be posting for a while.

I may make a post or two in August, but don’t hold out too much for it, just keep me on your RSS feed and something will pop back up when I arrive on the far side of the world. Until then, be sure to enjoy your summer, if you feel like dropping me a line I can be reached at this e-mail address for all of July.

Enjoy your summer!!!!

Maybe with some Ella Fitzgerald….