October 10, 2007

• Patience.

   

  Patience is a virtue, possess it if you can.

  Never find it in a woman but always in a man.

   

  I’ll never forget my intermediate school band director saying that to me.  Hahaha!  (He also told me, "Don't worry, Frank, one day you'll lose all that baby fat.")

   

  Having run around being on call for the past 56 hours at the hospital, I was quite fatigued when I showed up at Sunday afternoon volleyball, which is weekly and consists of level B and C players.  And when I’m tired, my tolerance for poor play weakens while my competitive nature does not.  So as you can imagine, I was a little grrrrumps at times.

   

  I’m not a great player.  On my best days (which are few and far between) with a lot of leniency and loose definitions, I am a level B player.  But my competitive spirit is AAA.  I hate losing like butt nekkid men running around hate cactuses.  I am also harder on my own play than I am with that of the others. 

   

  So it drives me double decka hecka craaaaazy up in heeeyah when I make a good play (pass, dig, set) and for lack of skill or effort the other person muffs the ball, or when I’m hitting left side and someone on my team thinks that we’re playing tennis.  When that happens I get a feeling in my stomach like I just ate some undercooked kal bi and a look on my face that I just snorted some Taiwanese bitter melon juice into my left nostril.  

   

  In this situation (casual open gym with B/C players), however, I simmer down.  I give constant encouragement (nice try!  you got it next time!) and high/low fives.  But when I’m tired for non-athletic reasons the invertebrate brain takes over the vertebrate brain and I get frustrated.  And it came to a boil Sunday when I was in the setter spot and for nine straight serves I had to yell out, "help me!" because the passes never came within 15 feet of me.

   

  I was basting in my own private cauldron of loathing and misery when I looked around and saw that everyone on the court was smiling…except for me. 

   

  Patience is like algebra…it's not fun but it’s something you learn that will help you in the long run.  At that moment I started to remember times when others were patient with me.  My father when I woke him up at 2 AM to listen to my heart because I thought I had one of the arrhythmias I read about earlier that day…  My resident when I was a struggling intern… My wife when she has to endure my sasquatch snoring...  I realized in that moment that I was allowing my impatience to prevent me from enjoying myself.  The malodorous fruits of impatience are not worth ruining the one trial run we have in this life.

   

  So when the guy next to me line-drived the volleyball right into my forehead, instead of being irritated like a bug had just crawled up my butt and died, I simply smiled and enjoyed the moment. 

   

  My bad, guys.  I’ll be my old, encouraging self next time in order to prove my band director right.  But that doesn’t mean that I’m going to spike softer.

   

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  BONUS FEATURE!!!!

   

  Xangans separated at birth from their twins?

   

         

  Misstease (XC from back in the day)                 Hyoyeon from SNSD

   

    

  Jonasapproved aka stinker who parties w/actresses!  Down Lo Mein from NotoriousMSG 

   

           

  Junshien  aka wedding photog superstar        Yi Jianlian from the Milwaukee Bucks

   

                            

  Bobashop aka brightest smile on xanga        Cheshire Cat from Alice in Wonderland

   

                                                             

  Ibizajb aka Luscious Love Potion #7            David Hasselhoff

   

  Bwahahaha!  Radjbo told me that she looks like a certain "adult" actress, but since The Franksabunch™ is a family show, so you'll have to figure that one out yourself!

   

  I’ll be at the San Jose State – Hawaii football this Friday in Man Jose, so look for the tall superhero on ESPN waving the Hawaiian flag!!

  • 10:04 am
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