Ni Pi Po In The Bag

In a flurry of productivity I was able to get Ni Pi Po completed.  I'm not saying it looks good, but I can get through it in a halting fashion.  This is notable because I'd just finished Rohai Shodan the week before.  Although I'm using the word "completed" you should know that this means that I can make it through the kata with zero timing and zero elegance and probably a plethora of mistakes. 

My progress report as of Monday night:

Haku Cho
Haku Cho Dai
Hakutsuru no Onna
Hakutsuru no Otoko
Wando
Ka Ku Fa
Koryu Ni Pi Po
Ni Pi Po
Rohai Shodan
Hakutsuru

I'm a year and a month in since I've started this.  Reed says this is excellent progress and way ahead of schedule.  The regular schedule is to get all the kata complete by one and half years.  The last six months is all about refining as much as possible.  In my case I'll need as much time as can to make sure I stop making larger mistakes.

So one more to learn which is the largest of the bird katas.  I also need to learn five more bunkai.  I think I've got the first five, but since we haven't touched on them too much I can't recall what I do and don't know.  I need to get those recorded so I can reference them easier and post there here for your viewing pleasure.

Rohai In The Bag

After a brief introduction to Rohai months (years?) ago I'd completely forgotten even the few moves, but was left with a vague sense of a few of the moves.  But, as part of my exam, it's one of the kata I need to know.  Everyone in class actually knows this because it's considered a fairly elementary form.  All the better for me since I was able to pick it all up last night after doing it about twelve times.  The proof being that I was able to do it this morning even without practicing it last night when I got home.

But I'm jumping ahead in review of the evening.  As I might have mentioned the class schedule goes like this:

4:15 to 5:15 is the kids class at the health club

5:30 to 6:45 is the blackbelt additional group at Sensei's garage

7:15 to 8:15 is back to the health club for the adult class

As you can imagine this means a lot of driving around and it's during rush hour.  Which means exactly what you'd think.  Just getting to Sensei's house can be an exercise in patience and calm. 

Monday's heat and humidity were on my mind as I drove to his house.  I like to drive my motorcycle if the weather is nice, but I opted to take the car due to air conditioning.  Thankfully a storm was coming in and the temperature had dropped to 84f.  Sensei had set up several fans so his garage was breathable, but half of us had opted to wear t-shirts.  I was soaked after a few minutes.  I don't understand how the others wear their gis with that kind of heat.

After a few runs of Rohai we decided to work on Sensei Daniel's bunkai.  He's working on his fourth degree and as a result the attendant bunkai (the technique derived from the form) is complex, violent and physically challenging.

One of the forms he's doing is Unsu.  I don't have a sense of it, but in contains a 360 degree kick.  This didn't mean much to me, but after a quick demo and a slow start we all got into the spirit. 

The 360 starts by a right-kick (in this example) which is captured by Uki.  We roll in the air to our left and before we hit the ground we do a back kick with our left and drop to a tripod stance.  In the case of this bunkai we are supposed to continue turning, come up to our feet and gouge the eyes out on Uki as we drive them to the ground.  Weee such fun!

After my third attempt I was warmed and ready to go. I flew and twisted through the air, executing the kick perfectly, but in my enthusiasm I turned to see where my foot was going and over-rotated a bit.  So when I came down my right hand didn't land well and I ended up mangling my fingers.  Probably a small sprain, but my right hand is a bit swollen.  It didn't bother me last night, but this morning I'm a wreck.  Swollen hand, my left foot feels pretty bruised and my left knee hurts like hell.  What the heck did I do?  

Melancholy Removal

Not to wax too philosophic, but family issues once again weigh in on my life priorities.  My mother took a cliché fall and was found to have a broken hip.  Due to her dementia this was a big deal, however her care was exemplary.  She had a new hip in one day, but the anesthesia proved to be troublesome during her recovery. 

My wife and I traveled to the East coast to help my Father out and visit with my Mom while she sorted out her recovery.  Without going into too much detail the stress of the trip didn't leave a lot of time to practice kata.  I'd planned to run every other day and do plenty of exercise to counter the tension.  But by the end of the week I'd only practiced twice and never ran.  When I got home I was concerned that I'd forgotten everything and was very out of shape.

I got home on a Tuesday night and the jetlag proved to be too intense so going to class was lost to going to bed early and trying to reset my clock.

Fast forward to last night.  We are now moving into the Summer and the heat was pushing the low 90s and due to a bunch of cloud cover, humidity was incredibly high.  Blackbelt club met at Sensei's house and he directed Olivia and me to go through the first four kata for our test.  A half hour in Sensei and me were dripping sweat while Olivia didn't have the decency to even look vaguely warm. 

Adult class was like a trip to heaven due to the air conditioning.  Since it was a Monday we just stuck with a continuation of Olivia's and my work.  This meant that we were doing Bunkai for the evening which was good for me since I can barely remember them.  I ended up actually remembering a few, a few were actually taken from the kata which made them fairly easy to perform and then the rest were awesome take downs. 

By the time I got home I was completely wrung out.  I barely spoke with my wife and crashed hard after a long, cold shower.  I'm definitely looking forward to Wednesday. 

Long Thin Legs

Amidst review of our kata, Reed Sensei reminded me that I needed to go lower in some of my stances.  It's no doubt a direct result of the people around me that I don't appear to be even trying.  The folks who've been doing the cat stance since they were ten years old appear to defy gravity with the depth they can achieve while in comparison I look like I'm barely bending a knee.  

It's not like I'm not aware of it, but it bugs me that I'm unable to really get deep enough to even look vaguely capable.  As I've gotten older I'm hyper aware that I'm losing muscle mass.  To add insult injury, without meaning to, Reed said I really need to hit the stance low and beautiful because of my long, thin legs.  Ouch!

The old joke in the gym was, "what are the four meanest words said by a loved one?"  You're arms look smaller.  

I know I'm vain, but over the years I don't have the physique to even pull that off to myself anymore, but I winch over the simplest comments.  How weak am I?  When I was younger I wanted to be a body-builder because I was skinny all through my adolescence and I worked hard at it through my twenties.  Now that I'm in my fifties I look at the weights in the rack and have a hard time developing the energy to even pick up the light ones.  I can barely stand to watch my hard won muscles decay before my eyes, but the amount of work I do around the house doesn't really leave time for me to indulge myself in that kind of activity.  Thank god for karate.

Anyway, the gist of my melancholy was that after the comment from Reed we were doing deep fudodachis (sp?) and even though my thighs were parallel to the ground I noticed that I do have long, thin legs.  No hint of muscle.  Sigh.

One item of note is that we made it through Rohai Shodan which was a big deal for me since it's the second to last kata I needed to learn.  I can't totally remember it but we'll be working on it for the semester and that'll help me quite a bit.  

A Modest Celebration

I've been out for the week because work sent me to California!  The weather was overcast and cool the whole time, but I learned a lot and meet the people on my team.  Did I mention that I have a new job?  It's been about four weeks now. 

I practiced as much as I could while I was in my hotel room, but everything was pretty distracting so I don't think I learned too much beyond what I knew before in terms of the new kata. 

Upon my return I had to get ready for the Celebration last night.  This is the testing for colored belts and all the black-belts were asked to attend due to the numbers of students.  I proctored/watched two of the oldest students and they did really well, but I guess everyone did.  I wanted to watch a few of the real fireballs, but didn't get a chance.

Afterwards we went to the local pizza place and I was saturated in the sounds of family and happiness.  I hadn't realized that I would enjoy the family atmosphere so much.

Back to the adult class - I think there were eight of us and we worked on some basic strike/block drills for a few minutes before we broke into groups and worked on our testing kata. 

I'm still struggling with NPP, but can't figure out if that's normal.  No one seems stressed about it except me.  Olivia asked me if I thought I'd be ready by next May.  I'm not sure, but it's a whole extra year to work on things.

Stinky Rolling

The beautiful blue sky has given way to grey, moody clouds that appear to be perpetually threatening rain, but never produce.  Unfortunately that creates an higher than average humidity and that means exertion, not matter how little, will be rewarded with a greasy, clinging sweat.  

This also means that I need to special care when cleaning my gis.  If I leave the Gi in the washing machine too long the materials get a bitter, acrid odor that the dryer seems to bake in.  In yesterday's case I didn't notice this until I was being choked out with an ankle and realized the bad smell was coming from me.  That was in the first 15 minutes and I had two more hours to go.  Yuck.  I also felt for everyone that had to hug me for the bulk of that time.

In BB class we decided to do ground work for that hour and do test prep for the regular adult class.  The big local celebration is on the 30th and Reed wants us all to know what the kids are expected to do so we can judge in stations.  

In the BB class we started with the full mount, doing an armbar and then swinging one leg around and tucking the foot under the chin for an additional choke.  This hints at having some strength and flexibility with one leg I didn't seem to have, but at least I could get there.  The next move was to fall to the side while maintaining the armbar which is a fairly common move.  But what if the guy on the ground knows to grab his own arm to stop the bar?  We then drive one of our feet into the elbow of the farthest arm while slamming their head with one of our legs. 

We continued with escapes and extremely complicated figure-four armbars which were all quite fun and painful.  At one point I realized we appeared to be in a laboratory.  Reviewing why something worked and why something didn't.  This is a divergence from our normal work, but because the discussion always goes to "most fights go to the floor".  

The practically of Sensei Reed never ceases to amaze me.  As always, hyper traditional Karate (or at least in my experience) doesn't really cover anything about going to the ground other than putting people there.  So when he has time he learns as much as he can and introduces it to the blackbelts.  Simple escapes and how to deal with basic MMA type shenanigans.  We wouldn't be able to deal with an experienced person, but might be able to escape someone if the opportunity came up.

In the Regular class we went through each self-defense move that the each belt level was going to be expected to know during the test.  So from white belt all the way to orange the moves get progressively more complex and violent.  The final one does a pull of the leg and ends up breaking multiple pieces and parts.  Damn!

Heat Back Stroke

In the afternoon the temperature started climbing pretty high for the Thorn city. The mid 80's in Fahrenheit. With a slight breeze this is somewhat durable, but standing in the street practicing kata makes this gradually increasing effort.  I'm not sure if it's dehydration or just the body's inability to shed heat after a long winter, but Olivia and me were finding it harder and harder to get motivated to do kata over and over. 

I made the spectacularly poor choice of wearing a black t-shirt.  By the time we'd got through a few katas I was completely soaked.  But because it was relatively dry the shirt was fairly dry by the time we stopped.  We ran through Ni Pai Po and Koryu Ni Pai Po multiple times. 

I don't mind running through NPP over and over again because it is steadfastly refusing to stick in my brain.  After a multitude of times and a lame attempt at videoing after class last night I've actually retained a few more moves.  Olivia tells me that she ran into the same problems when she was learning it, but she only had six weeks ahead of me on this.  I guess that's a life time in Karate learning. 

Mark came back when I was guessing he wouldn't.  Due to his age and fragility we talked and made sure that he wouldn't be chosen as Uke anymore.  At the very least we are supposed to be very conscious that we need to be careful with him, especially with take downs and throws.  We don't want to be responsible for a detached retina.

We got to class and did a test prep I think.  Well we were supposed to do ten kata anyway, which is vaguely like a test.  I'm roughly on my eight one, but I'd call it seven point five because I can't through it without help. 

We ran through the bunkai for KNPP which is just a quick exchange, but it ran out the clock.

The additional note - I found out that Olivia might be eligible to take her Nidan test with me next May.  Time in belt is based on attendance, so even though she got her first belt long ago her eligibility is based on her recent restart.  I hope this isn't the case because I'd like her and Kevin to test with me. 

Firehose Part Two

I went into class last night thinking to myself, "okay, Tater.  You've got two reasonably decent nights of sleep under your belt.  You're going to be a machine tonight." Well, I get there, and I actually remembered to bring my staff - a gift from my wife over ten years ago, I think I'm good to go.

Because our Kyle is getting ready for testing we started the blackbelt session with a review of his kata.  We each got to give three observations.  I'm not particularly good at this because I get caught up in trying to see all the details and can't back out to see the whole thing. 

With that we started heavy work on Ni Pai Po.  Even though we started on Monday, which I'll admit I wasn't very alert for due to lack of sleep, I assumed I would have retained something.  However, nothing remained.  I had to do each step over and over again and had to ask for help each time.  Thank god everyone was patient because I was losing patience with myself.  By the end of the session I had the first quarter back down. 

After the BB session we went to regular class, which has become a rather small affair.  We lost all of our new people and some of our others due to schedule.  So there was four students last night.  I love that now, but it makes me sad for the school generally speaking.  We worked on NPP for the whole evening and I left generally feeling better about the whole thing.

Flash forward to this morning.  I had another decent night of sleep, but I wanted to try NPP first thing and could only manage to get through the first quarter before failure.  Sigh.  Then I try KNPP (Koryu Ni Pai Po) and got all confused.  I didn't have my phone with me to consult about the policy so I wasn't sure about where I got confused.  That was aggravating.  I ended doing a couple of other kata to console myself.  Hah!

While you wait for my next riveting video here is a guy that does it crazy hard core. 

Another Firehose Night

Although I went to class on Wednesday it still feels like I've been away from class for a long time. Consequently I tend to get focused on my stuff and forget there is a syllabus of a sorts moving forward during the course of the year.

When I got to the blackbelt session we went to work on Ten Ryu No Cone Ni (bad spelling I'm sure), a bo/staff kata.  Although I'd rather be working on my stuff this has been fun to practice.  Since we are using staffs we practice in the street; which garnishes us looks from the neighbors. The only problem last night was that the heat has started up in the Thorn city and there wasn't much of a breeze. 

Reed followed this up with the Dai version which I have no recollection even though we went over it a bunch of times.  It takes the moves from the Ni version and mixes them up and ads a bunch more.  Ergh. 

We finished up and headed over to class where we learned the beginning of Ni Pai Po.  Unlike Koryu NPP which is incredibly long and diverse, NPP seems completely different to me.  I was told at one point that they would blend together, but I don't see how.  What we learned was nothing like the Koryu, so that's good for me that I won't confuse them, but I was so tired yesterday that I absorbed absolutely nothing.  I normally video after the class to help me with memorizing the actions.   That slipped away because I left after the class instead of chatting. 

This morning I couldn't remember much of it, but a few moves.  Thankfully Koryu NPP remains intact and I'm able to do it better and better. 

Beach Kata

My in-laws came into town for a week to celebrate our niece's graduation.  As part of the activities my wife planned an outing to the beach for several days.  To be able to make the trip affordable she planned the time to occur during the work week.  Normally, I wouldn't be able to go along, but I recently switched jobs which offered me a new take on how I do things. 

During the first week, my boss visited me in my cube and asked if I knew that I could work at home full time.  I wasn't aware of that, but it was seismic change in how I think about work.  I mean, you go to work, and then you are done and then you come home.  By taking your work with you, where does it start and then stop?

I got to put this to the test by going to the beach with my wife and family and drug my laptop with me.  It turned out to be doable, but somewhat frustrating until I found a good wifi signal.  Short story - I can work wherever, but it's not preferable to my work environment. 

Because the family would take long walks on the beach while I worked or go on trips I had the place to myself.  This meant that every time I wanted to stretch my legs I could work on my kata.  Thankfully the weather was pretty poor so I didn't have an incentive to go outside.  The living room was spacious so I was able to practice Koryu over and over. 

We got back yesterday in the afternoon so I was able to attend BB class and the regular class.  Much to my pleasure I was able to get through Koryu pretty regularly with Sensei Reed.  My footwork needs a lot more help, but generally I've got the thing down.  Thankfully for the beach practice.

We also realized that May is my anniversary date.  That means I have another year to be eligible for testing.  I would have like to be further along with the kata by this point, but I'm glad for what I have.  I have six of the ten and a part of one of the others coming up.  The bunkai for each of the ones I have is fairly simple, but I haven't learned them yet. 

The generic work of both classes has left me sore in a good way.  Good to be back in a hopefully regular schedule.

Knees Reborn

I remember reading this fantasy story when I was young. After being tortured, a wizard heals himself and at the relief from pain he groaned.  His cell mates assumed he was groaning from pain.

During one of the numerous visits we had in the last week, my friend the PT came over from Idaho and suggested I take some Ibuprofen for an unrelated muscle ache.  Later, when I was in the shower I bent down to clean the wall and was so surprised that the pain in my knee was absent that I lost my balance. 

I actually thought something was wrong.  I took a couple of tentative deep knee bends and found that I was apparently cured for the afternoon.  Much to my distinct pleasure I found out that on the next day the pain had not returned.

When last night started coming up I had a mental reminder to take a small dose before class started.  I remembered and took some before I went and low and behold I had a great hour which included the ten ryu turning jump into a kneeling position.  I could lower myself without a problem.  What happiness!

I practiced Koryu a few times and my frozen toe still makes it difficult to come up well, but my knee didn't hurt so I was very happy there as well.  

On a side note, I got my blood pressure taken and it was down to 120/80.  I've been holding at 193 pounds due to eating well and cutting my drinking down.  All in all doing well physically, but I'm due to take another colonoscopy next month.  Sigh.

Crinkly Knees

One of the moves in Koryu (Ni Pai Po) is that I drop to one knee and then spring up with a elbow strike.  Unfortunately the repetitive action has made my left knee feel like I'm grinding glass under the knee cap. 

The Senseis are practical and have asked me to not kneel for awhile, but it feels like everything we do lately requires a kneeling position at one point or another.  Then my knee goes back to complaining. 

Last night I got to the BB class and we worked on learning/refining ten ryu no con ni.  The second in a series of three staff kata.  My lack of weapons experience makes this very attractive and generally speaking pretty darn fun.  It's action packed and the end contains a spinning jump.  Of course you have to land in a kneeling stance.  Argh!

We practiced that the whole hour which was a lot of exercise considered all the starting and stopping we were doing.  Since we were using staffs and there were four of us Sensei had us move into the street.  Of course the neighbors all stopped what they were doing and stared at us for awhile which I enjoyed.  However, attention spans being what they are people soon went back to whatever they were doing.  We joked that they would be staying longer if we started hitting each other.

Regular class consisted of reviewing Wando and doing elbow techniques.  Since I'm in the "advanced" group I had to take a lot of falls on the hardwood.  I'm feeling it pretty good/bad today.  Super stiff.

NPP Process Check

It's been a month now since I started working on Koryu Ni Pai Po.  In a big press, Olivia and I worked through the whole Kata last night.  The result below is rather hurky-jerky, as befits a new kata, but you can see that I get to the end with occasional prompting.

This is one of the few super long kata that are in all the black belt testing levels.  Although there is nothing necessarily hard about the techniques there is a lot of them.  I guess I have another coming up with a similar length.  Ugh.

Koryu Ni Pi Po - so slow it hurts

Here's my current progress report on my 2nd degree:

1. Haku Cho
2. Haku Cho Dai
3. Haku Tsuru No Onna
4. Haku Tsuru No Ottoko
5. Kaku Fa
6. Haku Tsuru
7. Rohai Shodan
8. Wando
9. Ni Pai Po
10. Kuryo Ni Pai Po

I clearly have to keep working on KNPP for awhile before I move on, but it's nice to see some progress.  I gather from Olivia that Ni Pai Po is the more current form and they are close enough to cause a headache.  Yuck.

She is learning the kata in reverse order from me, but it appears that she had some experience with these before she took an extended break so she's learning at a rapid pace in comparison to me. 

In the adult class we learned Ten Ryu no Cone something.  It's my second weapons kata so I got a kick of learning something new, but my brain is pretty full so I had a lot of problems with it. Still cool stuff. 

A Little Progress

Holy Cow!  I lost a month when I wasn't paying attention.  Well, that's not accurate.  My wife and I decided to add a new bathroom to our house and as the primary workers all our time has been consumed trying to get it done. We had originally thought it would take two weeks.  How cute. We found out that you always multiple by twice when making the estimate and that's still shy since we are still working on it.  Thankfully we are down to paint and some fine trim.    

Since we've changed the schedule a bit, I now go to the Black Belt only training first which provides a great warm up, but we had our first warm day yesterday in some time and the garage where we practice was overly hot.  A few of the others wore t-shirts and immediately chided myself for thinking I should be fully suited.  I was immediately sweat soaked. 

While I've been gone one of the few returning black belts has started studying for 2nd degree as well.  They wanted us to study together, but while I was gone she learned the entire Koryu Ni Pi Po.  So last night she had the dubious honor of teaching me the rest of the kata.  Due to it's length we were only able to move forward a bit more.  Daniel Sensei says that I'm a little over half way. 

We finished up the session with a couple exercises devised from the kata Pachu. There is three elbows and then a take down.  Always fun. 

On the way to class I noticed a man by the side of the road.  He was on his side and there was some blood.  I assumed he was hit by a car so I pulled over as quickly as I could and ran over to him.  A small group of people went to his aid and we found out he stumbled while mowing and fell on his face.  He had a hell of cut on his face from his glasses.  He was pretty disoriented, but his wife had come out.  We had him on his feet by the time I left.  I realized later that he might have been on blood thinners by the way of he was bleeding. 

In regular class we worked on foundational moves from the kata Wando.  Which was a nice review for me because it's one that I need to have squared away for my test. 

It took me a very long time to get to sleep last night, probably due to the excitement of being in class, but I got the added bonus of foot cramps when I finally relaxed.  When I did get I sleep very hard and had pleasant dreams.

Two Stubbed Toes

In preparation for tournament Reed has declared, as he put it "selfishly" that we are going to work on sparring drills for the evening so he can get squared away for this weekend.  After work on drills for the last month I kind of felt motivated about getting back in the ring, as it were.

The blackbelt meet up, where we normally work on our specific rank items, in my case katas, got dumped for a night of test kitchen.  By this I mean we did all sorts of tests to see how we can punch faster.  We are all sorts of fighters and by this I mean we have people springing on their feet to people, like me, who stand aloof until it's time to go.

The thought was that bouncers have a faster launch so we timed and compared as much as possible and we couldn't get a conclusive measure.  People who do this more often than others work their bodies as much as possible to get an advantage.  However, I was able to close the gap when we had and experienced person go flat footed and have me bounce.

I should note that bouncing in this case is not going up on toes, but dropping a bit.  You still get the mechanical advantage of movement to movement, but not burning calves.  This worked out great for me because I'm a sloth fighter. 

During regular class we did drills to warm up and then we did a gauntlet style round robin on Reed and Daniel.  They never left the rings and the rest of cycled through fighting them continuously. 

The new rules for this tourney are based on half-points and full points.  This was an adjustment while I was judging, but by in large it makes for a longer more interesting match.  Full points are awarded only for a kick in the head, knocking an appointment off balance or knocking your opponent down and following with a punch.  While we didn't have any clean attempts I went for a lot of head kicks that got spoiled because I was too slow. 

Then the inevitable occurred while sparring Daniel Sensei.  I jammed my left big toe on his shin.  It didn't bother too much, but last night the ache set in and walking around on my heels this morning because neither of my big toes is working.  Cripes, what a predicament.

You get a sense of how I'm walking at 1:20ish.  But you'll want to watch the whole thing to see how that guy got that walk.

Two Straight Hours

We had a slow start yesterday.  Everybody wanted to chat for a bit so we ended up yapping until Reed showed up.  I spent the whole time with Daniel Sensei working on adding to Koryu Ni Pai Po.  For whatever reason this kata is coming along nicely.  It's one of the two very long ones I have to learn for my belt test, but strangely its coming along faster than I than the first four.  Is it his pacing?  Is it the kata?  Hard to say, but I'm happy that we've got the first third of the kata done.  Maybe not expert or finished, but remembered.

The only problem was that my left knee started acting up due to the move that has me go to my knee and immediately spring up.  My bum toe doesn't allow me to flatten my foot all the way down, so springing up puts a lot of weight on my left knee.  Owwww.

In the adult class we did our bow in and Reed Sensei immediately pulled me to the side to show him all the kata.  For whatever reason I was unable to do two of the kata clean.  Tired?  Too focused on the new ones?  I wasn't sure, but we went through them and worked on some spots and then it was back to koryu.  Since it was going smoothly enough we added even more steps. 

Further along on section 1

I ended up doing what you see in the video about twenty times.  It's now way more refined with a lot less stops.  Not a very flattering snapshot of me though, hah!

My Right Foot

I might have mentioned in the past that I've stubbed or jammed my toe in class, but I really can't remember specific incidents; just that's in occurred.  Since I was going to my doctor to do my annual check I thought I'd ask her about it.  I noticed in the last year that the joint won't actually bend back.  And when forced by a body weight move it's very painful. 

Here's the result:

Significant degenerative changes in the first metatarsophalangeal
joint with joint remodeling. Moderate degenerative changes in the great toe
interphalangeal joint. Enthesopathic changes at the insertion of Achilles
tendon. Mild overgrowth likely representing degenerative changes at the dorsal
portion of the navicular bone. Partially fused accessory ossicle os naviculare.

I'm not sure what that says, but my doctor says some bones have fused and I appear to have an extra bone in their as well.  With that information I found myself a bit depressed because it means a lot of what I do in Karate is a bit compromised.  Time to find some workarounds!  I wonder how running is going to be in the Spring?

Last night I was told to hold off on Hakutsuru.  Since Daniel Sensei needs to work on Koryu Ni Pai Po and I need to learn it, he put us together.  We were able to finish one section before we ran out of time.  One section is a loosely based how he breaks the kata apart.  It's fun an interesting. 

Here's the first portion:

Our shared space is bumping between classes.

Regular class was all about prepping folks for tournament.  Striking and movement drills left sucking wind.  I had to admit I was liking all the effort he was making us go through.  I am very exercised! 

Reed and Daniel will be heading off next weekend to tournament so we get to get the prep work and exercise.  I'd dearly like to get to one of these, but time and money always seem to get in the way.

Ground and Pound

Usually after an extended break I show up at class and it's immediately into sparring or something equally challenging.  Of course last night was no different.  Because of the change in schedule for the new adult class I was somewhat warmed up by practicing kata with the blackbelts for a bit.  Adult class was all about groundwork last night.

Although Reed Sensei referred to our work as Judo, the telltale throws and associated actions were missing.  We practiced five ground based holds and the transitions from each.  I was paired with Kyle for a bit, but Reed felt like he was too light for me.  I was placed with Kevin, one of the returning adults from way back.  The time off didn't seem to impair his skills though.  He was very fit. 

Reed couldn't remember the Japanese names for the positions so I'll just use informal nomenclature below.

1. Side grab with zig zag legs.  Basically your legs look like the bottom of a swastika and you control the arm while you press up against the Uke's side.

2. Smash that face.  You are in the 69 position, pressing your belly against Uke's face.  Your arms are under his and you grab his belt. 

3. Cradle.  You are perpendicular with one arm under the leg farthest away and one around the head.  Hands preferably locked.

4. Full mount.  The only twist being that you are choking them with their own arm.

5. Triangle side mount.  Keep the choke but you are now on one side with your outer leg perpendicular and rigid.

Kevin proved himself as a worthy opponent and I found myself gassed almost immediately.   I had good recovery, but I could only go for about ten seconds at a time.  He escaped me three out of five and I was only able to escape once fully. 

A fun return, but boy am I tired. 

Old School Melancholy

I just got back from my trip up North and returned to cold weather and snow.  Since the Rose City isn't particularly known for it's snow it's a bit of a surprise.  However the drive in to work was easy and quiet because of it.  The drivers around here take it easy when anything out of the ordinary happens.   

My visit up North was filled with nostalgia.  Seeing friends after a four year void was emotional and exciting, but my highlight was visiting my old school.  Since I've been gone my old teacher has decided to pilot his own style while keeping the basics from Tang Soo Do.  The hyungs/katas are the same as well as the blocks, punches and kicks, but after that there is a divergence. 

He decided that after some analysis he would eschew the wait for the attacker and simply try to execute all moves into the attack or avoid the attack but both need to the defender to have very good timing.  This is thing evolving thing for him and the class, but they all seem to like the practicality of it all.

After several years of traditional Okinawan Karate I must admit my ability to refocus was a bit tough.  I got the feeling that my Teacher kind of wanted to discount anything I learned; to exhort the superiority of what he was going through.  I found myself bouncing back and fourth.  I really wanted to just enjoy being in class again and just enjoying the exchange of knowledge, but in the end I just felt a bit frustrated. 

My take on traditional study is that is that we are following something "traditional".  So you don't always get the most practical approach to self-defense.  The other end of the spectrum would be something like reality based self-defense, but I always felt they lost out because of the lack of beauty, if that can be said about something that's all about hitting and kicking. 

The class went by way too quick, but he let me lead the warm-ups and at the end he had me to do three katas.  I explained the white crane stuff I was studying, but I don't think anyone really cared.  I'm assuming they just thought I was doing some kung fu kind of thing. 

In retrospect I would have liked to anonymously participated in class just to enjoy the nostalgia. 

First Night Of Adult Class!

I shouldn't expect that something like this would be so exciting to me, but last night was our first class of adults only.  After several years of working in and around the children that made up majority of the class I was having a hard time imaging how the class would actually flow. 

It's been over four years since I've been in an adult only class.  At my old school we had grown so much that we had split due to space considerations.  The adult class always remained fairly modest, while the kids class swelled so much that my old teacher had to make two kids classes. 

Here, due to the time we have in the space, expansion isn't going to happen easily.  Our main class ran from 4:15 to 5:15 so bringing in new adults was going to be extraordinarily difficult.  I figured the new adult class we be relegated to a small number of people until some recruitment could happen.  I was fairly surprised when we ended up with twelve people!

Two brand new folks and a host of others from the past now could make an evening class giving us a strong start.  Jason is a big red-bearded man and would probably make a good Viking impersonator, while Tom looks like he's had a hard life.  Tom had some martial arts experience a long time ago, but has long since forgotten all.  Both had the look of people trying to get their feet underneath them, but neither complained about the repetition of moves or the work on basics.

Reed focused on teaching the intro to Pachu.  Since Shudokan doesn't have a style per say, we adopt others.  In this case we are using Ryuryu, an traditional Okinawan style. 

We worked on footwork and then added hands.  A lot of fun and a slightly different method to absorb material.

The Black-belt class which used to be called the after-class consisted of me, Mark and Daniel. After I did some kata work Daniel had us work on something called the three elbow flow.  I guess it has a long complicated name that he didn't catch, but it was one of the exercises taught at a recent seminar.  Another thing I missed in the last month. 

The sequence:

- Uke starts with a right punch.

- We cover our ears (not really, but that's what it looks like), step forward with left.

- Block with right, turn right, push down with left arm, turn with elbow strike to face.

- Left hand goes down and right hand goes to back of head.

- 6/12 o'clock throw, holding arm and kneel on "gun".

A fast, fun technique that I hope to take to the north with me next week. 

A Cup Of Tears

The jokes around the water cooler are often filled with my stories about the previous nights Karate class.  I had always been sensitive about sharing that part of my life, but recently the tears of the young students give me a desire to vent in the coffee room with my friends.

Knowing that the time with the kids is coming to an end due the advent of the adult class I'm now experiencing a moment of sadness because I realize a lot of kids will stay with the class for many years and I won't be there as a constant. As much as they vex me so their constant excitement is something I do enjoy.  It's just that it turns into a lot of screaming really quickly.

When I got to class I thought it was going to be test prep again, but I think Reed sensed it might not be a good idea to grind it in just before the big event.  So he took one piece of the lower belt kata and made a game of it.  This created a lot of enjoyment for the crowd and I thought it was a wonderful way to get a lot of exercise, but one of the boys slowed down and Reed had him takes some deep breaths and step aside for a moment. 

This is one of the rambunctious boys who was really trying to keep himself together, so I'm not sure what set him off.  We ended the class with elbow techniques and it was going pretty well, so he stopped and thought we should go through the jump ropes.  This is basic dexterity which gets more and more complex.  By the end it becomes double-dutch and we have to get through both in one jump. Again, everyone seemed to be doing really well, but the same boy ended up in the corner crying loudly.  I was thinking it was low blood sugar, but apparently he hit his toe.  However, the loud wailing was distracting to the class.  You could see many of the students wanted to help and console, but knew they needed to be focused or they'd get waylaid by the rope.  Eventually he calmed down.

Just before we finished with the double-dutch pass through Reed gave me the chance to give it a go.  I made it through the first time.  So happy.  It requires a trust in your own timing. 

Next week

I'm off on vacation to visit my old home in the far North and visit my old school!  I'm so excited!

I'm also hopefully going to go to the first adult class - depending on packing and travel prep. 

 

Pre Celebration 2018

I'm fighting a cold, but my weight is up pretty high so I felt driven to get to class and get a minimum of exercise.  In retrospect that probably wasn't a great idea.  I hadn't slept well on Sunday night so I was swaying on top of what felt like a slight fever.  As usual I checked my blood pressure before hand and was appalled by 156/92.   The doctor is going to have a field day with me next Monday. 

Celebration prep is in full swing.  So the class schedule was side-lined to make way for a "station" model to run the kids through.  Each of us black-belts had one station.  I was bunkai, Mark was kata, and Kyle was elbow techniques. 

Although we had a rough start the bulk of the time went fairly well.  The oldest of the group at 13 years old looked absolutely polished compared to the 10 year olds or younger.  Even with their exhausting friskiness most of them looked fairly good once they were reminded what they were doing.  And it does make you appreciate the really good ones.

Instead of going to after-class I went home and had some soup and went to bed early.  I don't think this is optimal because I need to practice kata more, but if my morning practice was any indication I was going to be a mess anyway.  Sigh. 

I might end up missing Wednesday's class due to a birthday obligation, but I definitely want to be in good shape for Monday and the big show (celebration).

Whiplash Hustler

Even though we are preparing the under belts for the upcoming celebration/test Reed Sensei is still trying to focus on keeping the class consistent.  So it was self-defense night which means the moves we practiced were going to be in their test anyway.  As usual, I'm deeply impressed with all the things he has to keep track of during a class.  Each grouping of children have to have their specific technique for the test.  Since we had fourteen kids split into about four levels this can be very complicated.

I got to be the Uke and take the hits and falls last night.  These aren't necessarily a big deal in the sense that I just throw a punch and then eat the floor.  If I do the technique correctly I fall well and it looks good, but Reed is a big, strong guy and wants to do the technique correctly so it can get a bit painful at times.  With this in mind I was trying to be conscious of how I fell.  On the first go, I almost took out the front row with my legs because the hardwood was smooth and I went spinning.  After that we were good to go.

Then I rotated through the kids acting as Uke to each of them.  For the students that had a behind the leg trip I was a treat because they get to throw/trip a 200 pound guy.  The only problem is that I have to work hard not to yank them off their feet or fall on them.  I was working so hard at that so I didn't hurt the kids that I didn't take care of myself in the fall.  I fell poorly twice and got a gigantic neck ache from it.  Last night was a miserable sleep because of it.

I didn't get to work on with the new Black-belts on their Oyo.  The oyo is a two man routine that has both people do portion of the kata.  The one for kyoku Roku dan is brutal, complex, and entirely fun.  I haven't done it since the test and have started experiencing some longing to relearn it.  However, my own studies have precluded that. 

After-class was at Sensei's house, which is a bit of hassle because of traffic, but the space is comfortable for four people.  Anymore than that we tend to trip over one another. I went through the katas before he got there and instead of doing detail work he switched out to do the bunkai for the five.  Entertaining to say the least.  They are fairly simple which makes them feel a little underwhelming after all the effort I'm putting into the katas, but also makes me happy because my brain is pretty full at this point. 

So now we wait for the adult class to start up.  Feb 5th is our first night.  I imagine it'll be pretty small until the interested parties start getting themselves into the regular schedule.  Many of the students from the school's past are showing signs of interest as well as new people.  Very exciting!

Birds Of A Feather

I felt a little shaky last night before class.  I wasn't sure if I was coming down with a cold or just experiencing some ill-defined nervousness.  My wife had been fighting a cold for the last week and I'd rather not get it if possible.  So my hypochondria kicked in to review every little pain.  Great.

Mark and I went up to the classroom and found an aerobics class in session.  There had obviously some rescheduling at the health center.  Now Mark and I would have to sit around before they cleared the space. 

While we waiting I used the blood pressure machine they had in the corner.  It's the kind you sit in at the grocery store.  I normally have to sit quietly for a moment and relax before I get my taken.  It was the worst I'd ever seen.  168/90.  Well into hypertension.  I couldn't believe it.  I had Mark sit down and take his BP and his was only moderately high, but still good.  I've got to call the doc today.

After warm-up I was given the new black-belts and given the task to see how far I could get them through their test.  I ran them through 3 katas and then run through the bunkai.  We completed all ten and I was incredibly pleased to remember most if not all of them, but lost some footwork.

After class was a review of the Bird katas and clean up of a few issues. Then Reed said, "lets start Hakutsuru!"   Noted for it's overall length, Hakutsuru is a challenge because it takes a long time to do the whole thing and the moves are set to a 10 second pass for movements.  Oh boy.  At least I've got video of this one from John Sales.  Hopefully that'll help.  In the mean time I'm learning the yoy and it's incredibly complex.  More to learn.

Tears And Progress

It had been a week since I'd been to class and that feels like a hundred years.  I wonder about how the shared training and the stresses it brings can create such a powerful drawl to the group.  I may not like all the people there, I might not like training some days, and I can feel my frustration clearly due to the division of training others and practice myself, but in the end it all pulls me back like a vacuum and when I walk away I feel so much better mentally and physically.

Last night was typical in that Mark and I arrived early to warm up and end up chatting.  He then pointed out that the last couple of classes had been trying in that the new boys were just running around out of control. Neither Mark nor Kyle had been able to keep them in check.  Apparently they were disruptive enough to even warrant Reeds attention.

I groaned thinking this was going to be another lost night with kids who could care less, but mentally pulled up my boots and focused on the task at hand.  After warm up the Mark and I were to split task between the black-belts and the ultra white belts. 

Working with the new black belts can be pleasurable because they are reviewing the work I did last year, but since I don't practice it often I'm often a third wheel.  Trying to remember the content is hard as can be, but reliance on muscle memory is nice.  Regardless, I told Mark to take care of them - I stick with the kids as much as I don't care for it. 

By setting my bar low, I was able to be pleasantly surprised by their work ethic.  We had two boys that may be 8 years old and one 9 or 10 year old girl.  The girl did great and helped me manage the boys.  The were fairly dedicated to the task at hand (doing c steps back and forth), but watching Reed do all the variations creating a lot of confusion  in the boys.  At one point one of them started getting tearful because he honestly couldn't separate all the information.  After I got them to look solely at me we did well, but the confusion of left and right was tough.  I found myself slightly proud of their perseverance. 

At the end of class I told the Mom that if they had a reward for good behavior at the house they should get one.  She ends up telling me that she saw us as a place to cement good behavior in the kids; that's why she pays the big bucks.  I literally started grinding my teeth.  Unbelievable.  When will parents understand that karate is not external method to create behavior in their children.  My favorite part of this is that she's considering taking class with her kids.  I wonder if it'll dawn upon her sometime.  Oh well.

After class was at Reed's house which is way down South and in the hills.  There was only four of us so I was able to focus on the kata and review progress.  Working only with adults feels intoxicating, but I wonder if I'll miss the kids just a little bit.  Only two weeks before the Adult only class starts.  I hope we can pull in more folks!

New Year, Fast Star

I hate showing up late for class because I'm never quite in the correct mind set and never quite warmed up for immediate action. 

I got called by work just as I was leaving the house.  I had to make some calls and send some emails, but I was on the road as quick as I could which had me arrive to class with about a half hour left. 

After I bowed in Reed had me be the kicking demo dummy.  He was demoing the hook kick for the orange belts.  Which meant in my first two minutes I got kicked three times very hard.  Sigh. 

I ended up helping the new black belts with their test preparation and was pleasantly surprised that I was able to help a little bit, but overall couldn't remember the overall moves.  Brain is full. 

After class turned out to be me and Daniel Sensei.  We went through all my Bird katas and refined as much as my brain could handle. 

Here's my current progress on Ka Ku Fa.

Five Birds and a Fat Thumb

The class schedule is a bit spotty due to the holidays, but I assumed everyone would be back at class last night.  It ended up being me as the only adult other than Sensei Reed and six kids.  On top of that it was fight night.

Because so many of the kids are fairly new, sparring and prep for sparring took most of the class.  Jabs leading to a cross was a nightmare.  Reed has endless patience and knows not to get wrapped around trying to fix everything.  That being said, the repetition that he provides is awesome because within a few weeks I've seen the kids pick up all the basics.  Foot work seems to be the biggest challenge.  Telling someone and showing someone doesn't always sync for the kids.  In time they finally pick it up as they realize they have finer control over their limbs.

Eventually we got around to the sparring portion of the evening.  As part of that Reed and I did a demo of bowing and point system.  However, on the first start two of our judges immediately started sparring.  We had to start that all over, by explaining the judging.  So I had Reed punch me and I asked them, "which one get the point?"  They all had a different answer.  Needless to say, I almost beat Reed for once. However he doesn't know how to move to half speed so the kids couldn't tell what was going on.  For my troubles and bad technique I ended up spraining my thumb a bit.  Thankfully, it's on my left hand so I can type, but I'm a bit concerned that the swelling hasn't gone down. 

In the after class I just worked on my bird katas and did some refining.  I hadn't practiced but once or twice since the last class and it showed.  Lots of hiccups, but by the end of the hour I was able to get through Ka Ku Fa fairly well.  This morning I was able to get through Onna pretty good as a result. 

Bruised And Birds

I'm still incredibly sore, so I was experiencing a bit concern about how active we were going to be.  I honestly thought it was going to be fight night again and didn't think I could face any fast movement.  However, I got in late and everyone was holding a Bo (staff) so I was pretty sure sparring was out. 

Sensei felt like it was a good day to start everyone on a basic Bo kata for some reason.  It was kind of fun.  The kata is Ten Ryu no Cone Sho.  I have no idea how to spell that, but the first couple of moves that we learned are pretty neat and have good bunkai.

That was literally the whole class.  I guess because it was so small he felt like that was a fun day.

After class we working on Ka Ku Fa and refining on all the other bird kata.  Lots of notes that I got to work on this morning in my ice cold house.  The heat is having a problem on our brand new furnace.  Yeah.

Rolling With Loose Intestines

Where to start?  In just two hours I feel like I've packed in enough to write a book, but I will spare you my blathering and just focus on the good bits.

Yesterday I was experiencing some severe digestive problems.  So the age old question came up  - do I go to beatings on the off chance I might need to exit in the middle of things?  I decided to go to class because I felt pretty empty which seemed like I would be less likely to have an accident.  

I joked with Mark that if I got punched in the stomach things would probably go badly for me.  Since we aren't usually that impact intensive in class I felt like I would be safe.  What I forgot was that Monday could either be basics or self-defense.  Much to my chagrin it turned out to be self-defense.  

To accelerate my discomfort we started out with jumping jacks.  I've never done such light jumping jacks.  Thankfully we only did fifty.  I was gritting my teeth by the end though.  

The class turned out to be to be super small.  Only four kids and the four blackbelts.  Reed and I ended up working with the kids on how to escape from a bear hug.  I'm not sure if this would ever happen in real life, but if it did these kids will be prepared.  

Our two new students Chase and Sage were totally down with all the work so it was pretty fun.  Only one part of the work was me getting elbowed three times in the gut by Reed.  Thankfully there was no blowout.  Then the next move was to grab my ankle and pull necessitating a two-hand break fall on the hardwood.  As a result I kept checking my inseam in the mirror to make sure I hadn't soiled myself.  Luck was with me.

As usual, I end up getting to Afterclass before everyone else which confuses me because I'm not usually the first person out of class.  But this means I get to work with Daniel Sensei individually.  As a result we completed Ka Ku Fa, but I don't think I retained any of it because Reed came in and said, "okay let's do jujitsu."

Thankfully Mark had warned me that this might be the case, but being forewarned doesn't mean that I was forearmed.  We do this so infrequently that I can only remember one or to things.  

The list from last night:

• Escape from full mount using a bridge and cross arm grab.
• Passing the guard with the "praying hands" - elbows in the inner thighs, force one leg down and move up.
• Stopping the passing of guard by locking down one leg.
• Breaking a one leg stop by pressing weight and using a foot to dig in their lock.
• Doing an arm bar - "Olgo Plata" - foot across throat then fall into arm bar.
• Defeating arm bar with two hand grab and then move to knees to start the process of moving to mount.

After going through these drills we got to "roll".  Oh god the pain.  We were also only using half power, but I still got mangled by Daniel and Reed, but I enjoyed every bit of it.  So fascinating doing the stuff I see on UFC.  I'm so sore today though.  Ouch.

In February we are going to be starting an adult class! Just late at night.  This will be a challenge to sell to the wife.  Urgh. 

Hot Date After Fight Night

It was Wednesday and that means self-defense or Fight Night.  Before class we usually chat while we try to warm up a bit more.  I'm constantly worried about how slow I am off the line when it comes to a leading jab followed by a reverse punch.  For this school that is the bread and butter of point fighting. 

At my old school, we didn't get to go to tournaments because of the location (an island) so our sparring was a mix of reality and test of technique.  Since I've been at my new school I've had to retune and it's been really tough.  Points are awarded in a very rigid fashion.  For instance, a punch has to fully retract and a jab will never get you any points.  Keeping this in mind while someone is punching or kicking at you provides a lot of difficulties. 

We did a very long warm up with plenty of movement drills, which I have come to love because it's not something I think I do well in sparring.  And then it was on, but we really only had about fifteen minutes of actual time to do matches and those were fairly informal. 

I sparred Reed and Mark several times and tried some old and new techniques and generally felt better about the whole thing.  Although I didn't get any points on Reed I've begun to realize, with him, I don't mind about the lockouts because if I'm keeping score in my head of what's happened I know I'm getting something here and there.  That makes me feel better because I know he gets the benefit of the doubt in our judging and he's that good as well.

My final match was with one of our ten year old girls.  She didn't seem motivated, but no one else wanted to have a go, so I let my guard down at one point so she could give me a shot.  I hope I made her day. 

What it's like in class when I fight. I'm the guy on the right (not really)

I wasn't able to go to afterclass because my wife and I had a hot date before she leaves town for the week, but I have noticed in the last two days that my frustrating katas have finally started coming together!  I no longer dread them because of all the stop points.  I have a few, but they are rapidly disappearing.  Which makes the kata go way faster. 

New Stretch For Old Man

Preparations for the Quarterly testing have begun in earnest.  In our school testing is called Celebration for the colored belts.  I believe this is to put a positive spin on something that folks normally stressful and try to get people to see that progression is something to be celebrated.  

As per usual, Mondays mean I'm going to be tired because I didn't get a good night sleep.  However, I've been trying to keep my regular schedule during the weekend as much as possible so I get a good night sleep during the start of the week.  This appeared to be working as well because I was able to go to sleep around 10 pm.  This means I could get up at 5 without any problem.  

Alas, the plans of mice and men often go awry and I was no different.  I was awoken at 4 am by the retching sounds of my cat.  For those of you not familiar with this incredibly upsetting noise, it resembles a broken pump trying get started until the mess gets ejected.  Unfortunately for me I didn't move fast enough and caught some hot fluid and chunks.  Even after cleaning up I was unable to get back to sleep leaving me as a shambling wreck for the rest of the day.

As part of some lost moment during the day I ran across this video.  Quite the revelation as it relates to stretching.

Skip to 5:30 if you don't want all the other tips.

Anyway, I had a pretty good class with the girls.  Another revelation was instead of trying to get them to follow my lead, I simply have them show me what to do and make them go slow.  Due to the katas I'm learning it's hard for me to go back to the basics and remember the moves.  So I have the girls go slow and show me.  Somehow that's making it easier for all of us.  

I tried the stretching after class and found it to be quite nice!  The upward, supported stance didn't do much for me, but the wall one I can feel profoundly.  Yeah!

After class - report: Helped Kyle work on his Kyoku Shodan Oyo.  It was fun to remember all the bits and pieces and be somewhat helpful.  Then I learned a bit more of Ka Ku Fa.  
I hate to curse myself, but all the katas are coming a bit easier!

Ka Ku Fa dose 2

Sensei Reed says that he is an auditory learner and as such tends to teach that way.  I would have said that I'm a visual learner or practical learner.  In the sense that I need to act it out, but in truth I need all of these to learn.

I hear Reed or Daniel in my head when I'm coming up on a move.  They use funny comments so you can remember what the move should be.  I also visualize their move and try to act it out.  And finally I need to do so often that it's muscle memory so I only need to worry about things like depth and intensity.

Why this?  Well, it was back to my fifth kata, Ka Ku Fa.  I'm endlessly worried about keeping all these separate and the first four have given me pause just trying to keep compartmentalized.  However, Reed is okay with giving me more to absorb if he think I can manage.  I'm just never sure I'm ready of course, but he clearly has a sense of things.

So now I'm practicing in the morning and in the afternoon.  Now the stories from MaryAnn Sensei are making sense.  For years she's been practicing at work when everyone leaves for lunch.  I now realize she had to because she had to.

---

Class was supposed to be fight night, but due to illness and other holiday reasons, the class was only six color belts and three of us Black Belts.  However, Reed forgot the helmets and pads for the kids so we did self defense instead.  Strangely, helping the kids get things straight is exhausting because it requires so much attention. 

After class was simply working on Ka Ku Fa.  As a result I was able to do it this morning up to the point we left off.  It's different enough that I don't confuse any part of it with the others.  I'm about half way through by my guess.  I'll be practicing all weekend I believe.

Big Bird Five

Talk about the sound of inevitability!  I'm truly struggling to keep the four kata I have in my brain separated and as of last night Sensei Reed has added the fifth.  

The difficulty is that the kata are similar in that they have similar moves and similar structures.  As a result I've been practicing the woman and man kata as much as possible to get them really set, but I keep dropping a piece or two and having to start learning them over again.

I'm trying to figure out a way to identify areas of freezing, but the worst part was that I went back this morning to do the "of woman" kata and couldn't remember anything!  How frustrating!  Hopefully I can recall it tonight when I'm more awake.

So last night, during the second hour, he introduced to the first part of Ka Ku Fa.  Even more challenging.  Sheesh!

---

I've been worried about my health recently, knowing that I have a doctor's annual coming up.  So I've been trying to clean my diet and get back to running regularly.  My body isn't too keen on the running part.  My legs are sore and always seem like I'm overdoing it.  I have to remind myself that I took a long time off and returning to regularity is going to take a bit.  

During the first hour I was supposed to lead basics and decided to work on kicks.  What fun.  I was wheezing right away and by the time we got to side kicks I thought I pulled a thigh muscle.  Wow.  I actually had to stop for sec.  

It turned out to be an ibuprofen evening and bed early.