2026-04-24 12:43:00
‘Back In My Neighborhood’, our summer anthem for those sweet visits with family and friends, is out into the world! Hear it now:
Bandcamp
Spotify
Apple Music
YouTube Music
Amazon
Tidal
SoundCloud
We wrote this song after visiting Clara's small hometown of Grand Bend, Ontario, recognizing that even after having played in some of the most amazing cities in the world, there's nothing like bringing it back to your roots.
Be on the lookout for the upcoming live music video we shot for this one - we're bringing back Kitchen Sessions, for those who have been following our journey since the beginning! Thank you Nitanee for letting us crash your kitchen with very little notice :)
Hope you enjoy 'Back In My Neighborhood'! Please send it to anyone you think would love it, and please give this post a toast if you love it!
Lyrics:
With the skyline callin' my name
Yes, I left in a hurry
I waved goodbye and boarded that train
Didn't think I'd be returning
I've been away for a while now
And I've finally come to see
I survived the city life
But damn it feels good to be
Barefoot in my grassroots, homebrew
Barbecue party in the backyard
Sippin' that blue sky, sunshine
Strummin' my heart like a guitar
Catchin' those late night firefly feelings
I'm feelin' so good (so good, so good)
It's a vibe, it's a vibe, yeah
You and I
Back in my neighborhood
Was just a small kid on a big curb
I got a Polaroid to prove it
And the last thing anyone heard
Was that one day I outgrew it
Lookin' back at this old town
Had it better than I knew
City life is a wild ride
But I love being out here with you
Barefoot in my grassroots, homebrew
Barbecue party in the backyard
Sippin' that blue sky, sunshine
Strummin' my heart like a guitar
Catchin' those late night firefly feelings
I'm feelin' so good (so good, so good)
It's a vibe, it's a vibe, yeah
You and I
Back in my neighborhood
I ain't the same as I once was
No, I'm wiser than before
City guy on the outside
But I'm country at the core
Barefoot in my grassroots, homebrew
Barbecue party in the backyard
Sippin' that blue sky, sunshine
Strummin' my heart like a guitar
Catchin' those late night firefly feeling
I'm feelin' so good (so good, so good)
It's a vibe, it's a vibe, yeah
You and I
Back in my neighborhood
2026-04-24 11:15:00
I received a few comments about my post on "You Should Aim to Make Fuck You Money". Most of the comments were about me promoting materialism and putting money ahead of everything such as family and love.
I think some of my readers missed the main plot. It is my fault for not writing it clearly. Making "Fuck You" money means having the ability to say no to things that you hate. It also means knowing when to focus on doing things that you enjoy. Life is more than just making money; you know you have enough when you can say "Fuck You".
While a few said I am putting money ahead of family and love. Money will never be ahead of family and love. However, money enables many things and experiences. I still remember my silence and helplessness when my family asked for tuition fees. How I worry about supporting the family when I suffered my large financial loss. I can't even look at myself in the mirror as I know I have failed as a provider to the family. My wife and kids are very supportive. The only way to express my gratitude and love is to give them the best life that I can afford. I cannot drag the whole family down due to my stupidity and ignorance. My "Fuck You" money is different from others. I just want to let my family to live the life that they deserve. It is never about buying things but finding opportunities to do things together.
It is fine that you do not want to make "Fuck You" money. Your priority is different. Maybe you already making "Fuck You" money that's why you can say such things. May you never need to feel "helpless" over money issues.
2026-04-24 08:31:50
I meant to write it for some time, so let’s start it well. I really like Bear.
It has been really nice and changed my perspective on a lot of things. So I decided to do a short list in no particular order about the things I like here.
1 - The community. You guys are amazing! All the messages I have received were nothing short of pleasant. People are very willing to reach out to talk about your post and give their input. Thank you to everyone who read my posts and sent me a message or mentioned them in their own posts. I’m very grateful and honored.
2 - Personal post. A lot of the bigger blogs here have a very neat and professional style of writing. Probably because of their background and practice. But the posts that intrigued me the most were those filled with emotion. The ones that make you feel like reading someone's diary, with messy writing, abbreviations, grammatical errors, no formatting, and pages flooded with bottled-up emotions. Those always got a grip on me.
3 - Photos. I love photos! Sometimes I leave a toast in a post solely because of the picture. I started to post some too, even made a gallery. Please post more pictures/photos, you can use the Robert Birming add-on if you don’t like how it looks “raw”, he has a lot of useful stuff, I super recommend it.
4 - Emails. I like the lack of comments. Having people email me their opinions and compliments feels so much more thought out and personal. It opens margin for a private discussion, a back and forth of ideas. I appreciate it a lot more than when I used Komments in the past. (by the way, for some reason, I got a lot of Russian comments there even with the links deactivated)
So, that is it! I was not expecting to be so well received here, so I made up my mind to make an appreciation post. Thank you very much, everyone!
Thanks for reading! You can leave a comment here
2026-04-24 05:49:17
ever since the COVID-19 pandemic, it seems a certain group of people who spend way too much time on the internet have adapted a principle of "turning your brain off". don't think, just consume.
i mean, i get why. i get why you'd want to scroll through tik tok 2 hours a day. i get why you'd want to indulge on junk food. i get why you'd want to go on temu and buy a haul of stuff you don't need. i get why you'd want to watch an anime about an average joe in a JRPG-esque fantasy world getting super OP skills and a bunch of hot girls who all want to [REDACTED] him. life is frustrating, and sometimes you just want to melt your brain and numb yourself to it all. i get that, i really do.
if anything, that just makes me hate it even more. i can't help but believe that the rich men want us to follow this principle, because it's a distraction from more important issues. issues that they, the rich men, caused. don't get it twisted; this is all their fault.
we can sit here on our computers and type out condescending comments against folks who spend too much time on social media, telling them to "touch grass". but i'm not going to do that. it's not helpful. instead, if you are one of those folks, and you're reading this, i have a question for you.
why? why do you indulge in social media, fast food, temu/aliexpress/wish/shein, and wish-fulfillment fiction, while still complaining about how bad it is? it's not healthy. it's an unhealthy addiction, just like gambling or drugs. and i have a proposal to help you break free from it:
mark down a week on your calendar. throughout that week, uninstall your social media apps. plan to take a walk or bike ride (if you have a bike) once a day. if there's something you've been wanting to do for a while, such as reading a book or working on a project, do it. think of a skill you'd like to learn, and take time to learn it. take a piece of paper, and write down how you're feeling each day. the first step is always the hardest, but you will see that it's worth it.
and whenever you choose to do this, good luck. i believe in you. sincerely.
2026-04-24 05:23:16
I used to think that I could build a routine, and keep it as long as I was disciplined enough. There is comfort in that mindset, in believing that as long as we find something that works, we can hold on to it and it’s one less stressor in life.
I was wrong.
Routines are not fixed. They shift because we shift. They depend on circumstances, energy, and the version of ourselves that exists in a particular moment.
When a routine is in place, life feels a little calmer. There is less decision-making that needs to be done, less friction. Small actions repeat until they become almost second nature, and even things that used to be difficult are at least manageable. That sense of rhythm can make everything else feel more grounded, and more in control.
I think about that when it comes to early mornings. There was a time when waking up before the sun, even as someone who is not a morning person, became my norm. It was not easy (I still complained a lot), but it was consistent enough that it stopped feeling like I was going to crash out. It was just something I did.
When my days no longer needed me to wake up early, I let that structure go and built something that was more me, as a non-morning person. Slower (later-ish) mornings were made for that time in my life. But returning to early mornings now feels harder than expected. I hate being reminded that just because something felt natural before does not mean it will feel that way again.
That same pattern shows up in other aspects of my life too. Writing blog posts, for example, is something that benefits from a steady rhythm. When I had that in previous years, it felt easier to show up and publish consistently. Once that cadence broke, getting back into it requires more effort than I expected, even though my desire to write has never left.
Journaling for myself is also the same. It used to be part of my daily routine, something I did without much thought. I would wake up, drink coffee, and journal. Nowadays, I fall behind and have to catch up later, which changes how it feels. It’s become something I need to manage instead of something that just fits in my day.
I don’t even know how this train of thought started, but it got me thinking that routines are less permanent than I thought they were supposed to be. They are tied to specific parts of our lives, and when those parts change, the routines often do too.
There is a tendency to see a broken routine as something to fix, to try to return to what once worked. Returning is not always simple. Instead, it’s better to just find something else that fits into who we are now, not who we were when that routine first took shape. And so that's what I'm attempting to do.
I’m in the process of rebuilding routines that fit me now, rather than forcefully recreating something that worked for early-2025 me. I think I’m just trying to accept that there will be times when things feel less structured, and that this does not mean I am off track.
TBD on if I'm successful or not, or if I revert back to myself from the before times -- whoever that may have been.
If you'd like to comment, please send me an email, or sign my Guestbook.
2026-04-24 04:57:00
Sometimes I am quite annoyed that I have lived my entire life in a digital age. Everyone around me has their heads in their screen. I can't really say much, I spend just as long on my computer each day as some of my friends spend on tik too. If I am bothering to ratify that then most of my time on my computer is productive and the leisure I do get from it is healthier than watching tik toks(it should be noted that technology can be used for leisure and productivity simultaneously, eg: blogging). But I don't actually want to ratify it today.
20 years ago, I assume that most people didn't carry around video cameras that connected to the internet and broadcasted their view to strangers on the internet. But something I have actually seem in movies is "home videos/movies". So before we all had internet machines in our pockets, it was still normalised to film you family and loved ones? Not for broadcast but for the sake of private media.
I think this is a wonderful idea, while I dont have experience with home videos because well, "there's a camera on your phone why would you ever need to buy a seperste camera", said the mother of the photographer.
If someone in my family has ever gone to take a photo of me or us, they would say "smiiiiilleeeee". Thats performance, and when I think about it I dont know if the thing to do to capture memories is to put on a performance rather than carry a digicam in your pocket and occasionally capture memories of you and your friends or family in the moment.
Similarly to Hermans Commodification of travel , you cannot do a place and you cannot do a moment. Especially not while performing for an internet box that will gamble a photo of you on the attention economy.
I am going to try and find a digicam at an op shop and I am going to start making home videos for and of my family. Make private media, not for performance but for yourself.