Gentle Readers,

I finally made it back to Aikido today. What with Pennsic and preparations for the same I haven't been for about a month. Imagine my surprise when Sensei R calls me up for the first sequence. Then the further surprise when he tells me to get on my hands and knees perpendicular to him. Anyway, we were practicing forward rolls off someone's back. I was actually pretty pleased with mine. I exhaled at the right point and managed not too put too much weight on the kneeling person as well as not slamming too hard into the mats.

This changed with some of the later ukemi but overall I feel like I had a pretty good class. It was really positive reinforcement for coming back and I'm looking forward to Friday.

Tonight We've got a birthday party to attend for someone we haven't seen in a few years. It will be lovely to visit I think, but I'm still not sure what to bring.

In other news, I'm really enjoying all of the In Detail posts that people are making. Perhaps I'll try it later, but right now, I'm just trying to get back into posting regularly. Speaking of daily posting, I forgot to mention that we finally managed to have Kira-Lynn over for dinner (for Lydia's birthday to boot). It's always so good to hang out with her.

Tomorrow: more martial arts.
Friday: time with clinkerfiacio.
Saturday: more Birthday Parties.
Sunday: possibly some sewing. I've promised Lydia some clothes for her and a doll of her choice. She picked one of her barbies. They are getting some Early-Mid 15th century Italian clothing I think. I'll have to double check with her.

Full week, no?

Gentle Readers,

I wanted to get this down before I forgot any more of the details. There were 5 of us testing that night. One fellow doing his 5th Kyu test and the rest of us (Me, A, a Karate Black Belt and young (tween) girl).

The tradition at our dojo is for there to be a class of some of the more unusual techniques that Aikido has to offer followed by a short break and then the tests. As I was unsure about bus timing I ended up getting there an hour early. I sat and had some smoothie and read an article about the coal ash ponds failing in Tennessee. Eventually I got changed and got on the mat. Sensei K check in with me to make sure I felt ready. I told him how I had been doing visualizations and that I felt like I was in a good place. Then we did some bizarre finishes on Tski Iriminage and then, all of a sudden, it was time to test.

I took a moment to introduse myself to Sensei Don (the head of the Dojo) so that he at least knew what I looked like.

The 5th Kyu and the Black belt did their tests first. On one hand I had to wait, but fortunately I was prepared enough that I didn't start feeling nervous. Their tests went pretty smoothly and while Sensei threw in some unusual stuff, it wasn't too weird and it helped me remember that he was going to do that to me too.

As expected they also did randori. The two of them did pretty well too.

Then it was my turn. Thankfully my feet had not fallen asleep while I waited in seiza. I was able to knee walk to my spot without embarassing myself. My partner was someone I just met named Karl. He was a fantastic partner with amazing ukemi. He did a fantastic job of making me look good. We began with suwari waza. I think I got most of it. Then to standing. We started with Shomen uchi Ikkyo and then went on into the specified actions for the test.

He threw in a few others, but the only one that I didn't manage was a Kote gaeshi which I just couldn't get.

Once that was finished, it was time for some Randori. We faces 5 blackbelts. That was a little intimidating. I was a little rough and static at first but I managed to find my groove and keep it even after re-spraining my thumb in the middle. My last 4 throws were great.

Sensei was pleased with my variety of technique but felt that I need a longer stance. I'm not sure what that means but bushidoku was generous enough to video my whole test so I'll be able to obsess over it quite a bit once I get a copy.

Gentle Readers,

I had an awesome Aikido class this morning where I sprained my thumb.

In other news, my Kickboxing dojo just expanded classes to every day and Cortejo is not working tonight so I can go to Armoured practice.

I should:

Gentle Readers,

So today is being a great day so far.

Aikido was good this morning. I was able to identify problems thanks to insite from sensei K, I was able to at least be aware of the correction, even if I wasn't doing a great job of correcting the action. K also thinks I should be thinking about my 4th Que test, and to be honest, I've been putting it off, but really I think I shouldn't be worried about it until I can managed to get my name plaque done and up on the board.

It was pretty demanding though and I could feel myself getting slower and slower as the class went on. Sensei N at Kickboxing (I think that's the correct term) pointed out that if you are doing a repetitive exercise and your speed and rhythm have not changed, it's your brain and not your body that is making you stop. My body was really complaining this morning. We weren't doing things that were that demanding, just falling down and getting up again. I'm hoping that means I'm doing better with my intensity.

Other good things: we're about ready to review my design here at the new job. If everyone is cool with the direction then I get to zip off and see if I can get it to work. It's going to be developing some new and valuable skills so that's pretty awesome and thankfully it's got some divisibility into some nicely sized chunks so it won't be too overwhelming. I won't be looking at it thinking how the hell am I going to even start. That helps keep the procrastinating to a minimum (and lest you think I'm procrastinating now, I'm going to use the excuse that my first presentation meeting got bumped to the afternoon).

Things look good for the event this weekend. We have a place to stay and things to eat, even a packing list. The only tricky part is making sure we have room for everyone/thing in the car. There will be multiple tourneys and at least one affair of honour.

In addition, it looks like my chainmail is in Syracuse, hopefully to be delivered soon so if we can work out timing I'll both get to pick it up and see Mister-Robinson, maybe even in time to use it at the event.

Also, I've got rabbit stew for lunch.

Gentle Readers,

Today, the randomly blocked sites from work include Google Docs and Photobucket (but not flickr or gmail). Site blocking is a random and stupid way to protect your network. Could be worse I suppose. Could be using Keywords.

In other news, today was the end of an era. Last week at Aikido, I ripped my left nipple piercing and it's been unhappy ever since. I took it out today along with the other one so I wouldn't list to the right. Not sure how I feel about this yet. I've had them for at least 15 years. At one point I was at 10 and now I'm down to 2. I guess I'll have to get some tattoos to compensate.

Gentle Readers,

I took a sick day today and slept the first half of it away. It was not as restful as I was hoping as I woke up every hour or so and the sleep that I did get was filled with vivid frustration dreams. After one, I had to get up to get cortejo to promise not to make binge grocery purchases, especially ones that involved 2 cases of 10 Penny ale.

I finished off the last seam on the zupon after I got up and it's now hung up to relax before i sew the hem. Then buttons and loops and I'm done. I made add the side slits later or I may just put them on the next one.

Given the 50 years behind that the fashion trends of the baltics are, I'm wondering if maybe the Zupon is perhaps a corruption of houpeland. The look is similar.

Sensei yesterday had a good turn of phrase discussing the nature of the Uke in practice, but at the end of class neither of us could remember it. It had to do with a good uke responding fully to the nage so that the nage knows if they have it right. There was something else to it, talking about the nature of responding. I should have tried harder to commit it to memory.

I danced at the dance practice yesterday and didn't fight at the fight practice. The local duke mocked me a little for taking so long to get my kit together, but I think it was partly because I was teasing ladyblacksmith.

We elected not to stay for food and came home and had tea with Kira-Lynn instead.

I slept so much, I don't know why just writing this is making me so tired.