Half A Bubble Off

It was late in the evening and sudden impact of our foreheads connecting was alarming since it was accompanied by that ripe watermelon noise.  Both Reed Sensei and myself stumbled back for a second as my eyes attempted to focus for a bit.  Thankfully neither of us was hurt and that led to some laughter.  

However, that wasn't going to be the end of it and it certainly wasn't the beginning either.
Since it was a Monday we did a Test run through starting in the Black Belt Club (aka Reed's garage).  I felt pretty good going in, but my recent lack of practice started to show.  By the fifth kata the accumulation of mistakes make me stop and start over at one point - a definite low point.  

I will say that part of the distraction is that I'm trying to keep my eyes up.  I practice with my eyes down and that's a no-no for testing.  Through the course of the night I got better, but the first katas were pretty terrible.  

In between each kata is the bunkai.  These are designed to show that we can extract a move from the kata and make a practical defense out it.  The ones that were original to our teachers are often short and a bit boring.  So we've been developing them into some lengthier more elaborate exchanges. Last night we made a rather action packed one that started with me being the aggressor.  I try to do a forward collar grab and Olivia reaches in and grabs mine and pulls me down toward her.  I'm met with a knee to the chest.  This brings me into position for her to swing a leg over and catch the opposite shoulder and drive it down while yanking my other arm up.  The result is that I spin in the air, land on my back and she punches me in the face. After we did this a few times I notices my elbows getting a bit sensitive, but didn't think much about it.  Apparently my new gi is way rougher than I'm used to and removed the skin around my elbows in a couple of places,  ow!

After all the action I'm completely sore this morning.  My back is in knots, my thighs are super sore from knee strikes, but I'm motivated to practice and have already made it half-way through the test by 8am.