Gentle Readers,

What an amazing weekend I had. Friday was a day off thanks to the people who make the rules believing that some guy got the death penalty two thousand years ago. I spent it with my family in peace and harmony. I did some serious cleaning in the basement and threw out a bunch of crap that I'd been keeping around for no good reason. I did some baking. I made grain free cookies.

( recipe under here )

Even though I had to stop doing the Whole30 thanks to crazy blood sugar swings, constant hunger and an unhappy digestive system (pretty much the opposite of what's supposed to happen), I do still like the cooking and I wanted to bring something nice to blinkus2000's Dinner and Cigar party that he and xiphia could eat.

I headed off to their party just as finatedancer and peredur arrived to drop off their daughter for the night so they could go off to their own party. I had to get them to pull out of the drive way so I could leave.

I arrived just in time for dinner and we weren't even through the salad course when blinkus had my pants off. This was thanks to their new dining table's lazy susan causing a glass of a lovely red wine to be knocked into my lap. Shortly thereafter I was in his pants and enjoying a delicious steak and tasty tasty veggies. Everyone seemed to love the cookies after dinner too so that was nice.

We too a pause to digest and await the other arrivals and then it was onto the balcony for the cigars. Blinkus had arranged a lovely array of food pairings for the smokes including smoked oysters, limes, grapes, chocolate covered bacon, smoked salmon, some lovely sausages and cheeses, and my favourite, chocolate covered caramelized lime. The chocolate was unsweetended and smoothed out with coconut oil that had sauteed some chillies. Delicious.

The smoking was interesting. I could taste the differences between the different types of tobacco (no inhaling, just like Clinton). I'm not sure if I was able to fully appreciate the cigar that was mine, but I did have some awareness of it's qualities. I also finally learned what a cheroot was thanks to shyska bringing a bunch of tobacco and similar products that came from Afghanistan.

I also got to play with a Kennect and I have to say, the technology is pretty awesome.

I got home in time to say goodnight to my swordboyfriend who was up for the weekend due to his wife's blacksmithing date. And then to bed.

Saturday was nice and relaxed. I took mister_robinson off to see Lee Valley and Princess Auto while I looked for some tools to deal with the ash polls that I bought from sperry to make practice weapons. After we got home I spent the rest of the day shaving my shaft.

I made a lovely dinner with mennonite saurkraut and local sausage and a side of sweet potato fried in bacon fat. I watched an kinda terrible movie with lydia (oh so heavy handed) and then my cold finally said "you're Done!" and I fell down.

Today I did some armouring and then had a bunch of friends come over for fencing and potluck. I had such a good time and I have to say, I love Spear fighting. It was so much fun. Also did messer, sword and buckler, pole axe, rapier and lots of talking about fighting. Maybe we'll add some armoured combat next time. The weather was perfect.

Then for the potluck (I think I will need to make it clearer that the potluck is for dinner next time) I made a bit of pork ribs that even the texan complimented.

Just a fantastic time.

I'm not sure if this has recharged me for work or if I'm frustrated that I have to go back.

Gentle Readers,

Last nights class went pretty well. I had the foresight to do a bit more
reading in other sections of the book so as to clarify a couple if the
footwork questions I had. To be honest, I was pretty unsure the action would
work well given the timing. However it did even with the extra movement. The
stepping under the incoming attack was a bit nervous making but it still
worked. The timing has a lot in common with the timing of some of the aikido
sword sequences I did. I guess there really is only one art of the sword.

Overall the level of synchronicity within the german sword work is
fascinating. I really wish I knew more about the german grappling to know if
it carries through like fiore does.

Speaking of such, I'm selling some books. Details to be added when I am not
using a phone.

Books for sale: http://forums.armourarchive.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=1937330

Gentle Readers,

If I wasn't baron, I'd probably be talking about the amazing day of classes I had a practicum yesterday. However, since I am baron I spent the day in meetings and socializing and getting ready for court. Still, there were all kinds of lovely classes and they all went super well.

Today, however, I got to enjoy some training time. The first was craig's revelation about the order of the wards as they are presented in every german manual: his theory is that each strike breaks the one before. However the order is different for Ringeck and Lichtenauer in Tobler's "Secrets" so I'm wondering if craig missed something. That being said, the order he used did work that way so perhaps there is something off between the translation.

Anyway, after that we spent a couple hours videoing some of Craig's interpretations for uploading to Youtube so he can win some internet arguments. Well, and also share his interpretation which is cool too.

Gentle Readers,

I had a pretty good night last night. While it was unfortunate that no one
else was there, it was nice to be able to go over the class I'll be subbing
for on Saturday. We will be looking at managing distance and preventing your
opponent from success if he moves too close.

The sca practice that followed was also small, consisting of myself, lrt and
wilhelm. We got lots of fencing in and I was please at the improovement of
my opposition but I was still getting hit when I felt I shouldn't be. I am
pretty sure that the problem there is a sloppy recovery. I am recovering my
arm first and sometimes I don't move my body at all. I am really not sure
where this habit came from but it has got to go. Not only am I not removing
their target, but I am also giving them a moment to safely stab me.
Wilhelm had a pair of longswords so we did a bit of thrust-oriented play
(not cut and thrust) . I did ok against him but against lrt he would creep
in close, I would try to take the time with a thrust but he would withdraw
his body slightly to void and then thrust back in over my arms. I think that
to solve this I need to thrust from a safer position and keep moving. Not
pausing in distance as with the rapier.

Gentle Readers,

I was away for an event this past weekend. I had a lovely time camping in a giant industrial space. I was the martial in charge for rapier because we the Hammers had wanted to do something to increase our visibility. I suspect that the two gentle who were added to the order did that much more effectively.

The tournament style I ran was called a Venni tournament. You get an ordered list of fencers, first one in is the king. Bouts to 3 touches. Winner becomes king. King wins in the case of a tie. Every one has 2 lives, but you can earn a new life if you win 4 or more bouts as king. As you might be able to tell, the closer you are to the end, the more of an advantage you have. Holkuld was at the end of the list and after becoming King (which he then changed to Queen and then to Royal Personage of Indeterminate Gender). He didn't lose a single fight.

Anyway, since I was running the tournament, I didn't get the amount of fencing I wanted. I did get some free play and did not do so well. I kept getting stabbed. I was able to take control, move in launch the attack, but managed to leave my self wide open to get stabbed. I was letting go of engagement, but not sure why.

So, later this evening at Capo Ferro I finally was able to realize at least one thing I've not managed to get right. We were doing some lunge drills against a dummy opponent. You move in, stringer, and then lunge to target,k eeping yourself safe. I didn't figure it out at first because we were doing the drills with the dagger to add some protection. We were also looking at stepping to the side and how much off the line you need to get. Our instructor has a habit of coming fairly far off the line which I have been emulating so this time we were trying a closer line. I should have been remembering what Sensei would say about the sword not being all that thick.

Anyway. I would step in, stringer, extend and lunch and as I did so my hand was moving to the outside line even though it was in 4th and supposed to be closing the inside line. At first the dagger hid this, but for some reason it was much more obvious with the left hand. Then I tried without the dagger and there it was. Plain as day.

Now I just need to practice doing it correctly. Identify the problem, then fix. Good advice.

Gentle Readers,

Saviolo temporarily left by the way side as OCS consolidates itself into a more Germanic frame of mind, we spent last night's class working on Meyer's thrusts. We looked at the basic thrust from Ox. First pull back your arm and lift your lead leg, then the sword stabs toward the chest, long edge up then turns and continues down to the low guard (with the rest of your body) on the opposite side of the body. Then cut back up and use that momentum to reset into your original Ox.

Once we had a handle on that we looked at the two face thrusts from Ox which are used as counter thrusts. First from Left Ox, as your opponent enters, step to the left with your left foot thrust to his face over his arm. From the right, turn your sword under his blade as you step left with your left foot moving your hand back up towards left Ox, then step with the right and thrust as before.

Finally we did the throat thrust. This is an attack with a disengage. Against an opponent in Iron Gate take Left Ox. Then step to the left and make as if to thrust as before. If your opponent goes to crown or other high guard, quickly drop your tip and circle under his arm and stab to the throat. If he does not take a good high guard thrust with the face thrust as before.

Gentle Readers,

I'm running a merge so I get to take a moment and type out some stuff about last night's fencing mostly for my own recollection. I've been reading through Meyer's Rapier. It's pretty clear, but practicing is hard because most of his sequences involve lots of stepping and I'm much more practiced at a more static rapier game.

We had done a few of the actions in class on Tuesday. Specifically we did the groin thrust and the neck cut. I managed to get both of these to work exactly once at practice last night. There were a couple of reasons for this I think. The first was that I hadn't brought my sword and so I was using one of the loaner schlagers. Like Cortejo's Frankie, they are just so light they move with almost no effort at all. Unlike Frankie, they are terribly put together with some effectiveness, I think I was fighting the weapon just as much as my poor form.

Things worked slightly differently when Wilhelm graciously let me use his longer blade and I was able to work on some of the Capo Ferro blade work with Lars. Unfortunately, I was still getting nailed in the face. I know I'm engaged with the blade when it happens and I know I've got forte on foible so it's got to be something in how I'm aligning my blade that is either allowing it to be forced offline or I'm just not in the right spot to begin with. I did do a much better job of making sure to not push to the outside in 4th but I am rising out of guard too much and so need to keep resetting. I'm also starting too close to my opponent to be able to adjust my position as I move in more optimally.

Gentle Readers,

I'm sitting here at Lotusice's house, just a little bit north of Baltimore. Craig and I are here for a WMA seminar/tournament. He's trying to make sure that people are aware of his (very good) interpretation of I.33 and is here doing his first time teaching outside of the Ottawa area.

For a 9 hour drive, it was pretty good, except for the expected white-outs around Pulaski (north of Syracuse). The strangest part is that it's pretty much completely down hill all the way here. At first I was confused as to how we could be going that far down but then I remembered that we were going towards the equator and so I guess it probably had something to do with curvature of the earth.

Anyway, Lotusice and family are lovely and showering us with hospitality. The kids and cats are friendly.

The event was pretty fun too. Craig's class went well. It was the first time I've ever been complimented on my skills as an assistant.

I also took a class on Dussak from Lee Smith who is from Vancouver, beating us for furthest distance traveled.

The tournaments were interesting in that they were judged and the combatants did not call their own blows. In fact they were not allowed to. That was interesting.

Also interesting is all of the people who sort of talk around the fact that they are in the SCA. When you get them to admit it, they act a little embarrassed.

I'm sure there is more but this is seeming pretty scattered so I should probably go to bed now.

Good night.

Gentle Readers,

( Notes from class )

Gentle Readers,

I am a provost in the Ealdormerian Academy of Defence. I fought my prize last November and passed, along with my fellow prizor, becoming the first to challenge and succeed at that rank. This summer, at War of the Trillium we have 2 more challengers who will be attemtping to meet the requirements of this rank. Since there are only two of us currently at the rank of Provost, I'm wondering if there are any acomplished fencers (white scarves and the like) who would be interested in coming up to provide extra challenge for our Prizors.

I can arrange for good food and drink and lots of fencing.