I Love This Stuff

[Mr.Chimney]

1) Our cat had dental work done at the animal shelter he lived at before we took him in. As a result he is missing some teeth and sometimes his lips don't fully close; without the teeth and the lips to hold it back, the cat will subsequently have its tongue ever so slightly stuck out when it fails to close its lips properly. I love it when he has this sort of snarl (we refer to it as the "Shawinigan", so-named for its likeness to former Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien's face) and he doesn't realize it for a while.
2) I love really excited dogs that are out for walks with equally excited owners. I also hope to adopt a dog as soon as I can afford to so I can be one of those people.
3) I love having a few hours to spare and being in a position in one of my grand strategy games (at current, Europa Universalis IV) where I am ready to start a major war that I know I can win. At current I am playing as what would become Siam - I have taken over all of Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, and am the senior partner in a personal union (meaning that two countries have the same King or Queen) with the Ming Dynasty. I am going to inherit China and use it to conquer more lands.
4) I love finding out that a restaurant is amazing without anyone else telling me first so that I can suggest it to my friends.
5) I love going to a new city or region and discovering that the public transportation is simple and effective. In fact I love riding public transit when I have nowhere to go simply so I can see the area more from the eyes of someone living there.
6) I love having a morning to go looking for new music and discovering a new group or artist that particularly speaks to me.
7) This one is oddly specific. Most people in Canada (and possibly elsewhere) know Fatboy Slim's "Right Here, Right Now" as the song that played during car commercials in the 90s. When my girlfriend and I went to Malta we had a balcony in a beautiful hotel in St. Julians. Every afternoon we would take some cheese, fresh fruit purchased from whatever market was around that day, Maltese bread, a can of Cisk beer, and some Diet Kinnie out on the balcony. We listened to the Fatboy album You've Come a Long Way, Baby on the provided iPod dock and played video games on Steam for an hour as we relaxed after a day of walking and sightseeing. We at first listened to it out of laziness, but it grew on both of us at the same time and we ended up listening to it almost every day while there. The upshot of this is that a song which most people around me associate with car commercials is for me a portal back to beautiful weather, superior culture, and remarkable people. I love that story and the fact that Fatboy's song means more to me than it does to most others.
8) I love feeling my muscles burn as I leave the gym and knowing that I had a good, motivated workout.
9) I love being witness to long-standing religious conventions, particularly involving song and especially if I cannot understand the words to the service. I think this combination of song and ignorance of language helps me because it invites me to see and be inspired by the deliberate application of one's own life to religious and philosophical reflections. The lack of understanding means that my bad parts cannot attack the faith itself as a means of getting to me. It is in fact because of what I felt was a divine intervention brought about by the faith of another that I have faith in my own skills.
10) I love being where I am now knowing that countless suicide attempts, sorrowful nights weeping alone, insane bouts of rage, moments of being demeaned by my parents, and other horrible tales have led me to a better place than I was for years. I love not hurting myself anymore; I love knowing when enough exercise is enough; I love being able to come here, even if it is only when I'm "medicated", and admit that I have a problem; I love being hireable; I love letting someone love me. I have made it one hell of a long way and I love the sense of strength it sometimes gives me to be able to have survived what I have.
11) I love used bookstores owned by fascinating people. They always have something neat to read and their collections always have stories to them. I hope to one day have a place that smells of old books, coffee, candlewax, and bread.
12) I love smoking my pipe when I have a fresh batch of tobacco.
13) I love discovering a new author and finding their theories to be interesting, applicable, and readable.


Your turn! I also find a lot of my loves to be a bit weird, so if you have any like mine knowing that would be pretty awesome.

[Mr.Chimney]

14) I love a certain type of day where it doesn't get above 70 degrees, the sun never appears, and a brisk wind blows. Those are my perfect weather days. That and freezing in the winter - I mean like -40 freezing.
15) I love it when I say something to the cat and he "replies" by way of an unusual mew.
16) I love nailing a description of something such that it becomes visceral to the person I'm describing it to.
17) I love the feeling of being done something and having a good excuse to both not do anything and to not beat myself up for it.
18) I love going to Quebec and seeing the provincial flag flapping in the breeze.

[manuel_moe_g]

So happy you took such effort to post about your loves, Mr.Chimney! Cheers, all the best!