Monthly Archive for September, 2006

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Handspring

Written on September 21, 2006.

I was doing volleyball and there’s a kid there doing it for the first time (he’s about 7 years old). He takes gymastics so he’s always doing back flips, back hand springs, flips ‘n all.

On a side note (but relating to the story), a few weeks ago, I sparred with a jamming friend who knows Kung Fu. He said he used to be able to do hand springs ‘n all.

Well, today, I asked the kid how to do a hand spring. He said just run, put your arms out, straighten your arms and arch your back. Well, I did what he said and lo-and-behold, I hand sprung! Keeeeewwwlll! I always thought you needed lots of arm power to push off with your arms but I guess not.

Whoo!

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Karate Showoff

Written on September 20, 2006.

I went to the O.P.E.R.S Field day at UCSC. Last year we had a booth to round up students and that went pretty well. Last year, we did a demo where we show our stuff and I don’t think that went to well. It was odd ’cause we practiced a lot before hand but some people didn’t show up
and it got confusing and a little forced. Still, people were impressed.

So, anyyyywwaaayyy, since there is a lot of booths, I went down each row and on the final row, I saw a shade tent with UCSC Shotokan T-Shirts hanging off it. I found “my” people! Pretty soon after I got there, it was time to go on stage. We quickly arranged a bit. You know, very spontaneous. We first did Kihon (basics), Kata (forms), Kumite (formal) and Kumite (free sparring). It seemed to be even better than last year. Probably because it was spontaneous.

Afterwards, lots o’ people came up to give us their email addresses so we can spam ‘em – er, give them info on the classes.

Something funny happened. One lady came up and said, “are y’all any good?” “I quit for a year after I got my black belt.” “Am I gonna have to do everything again to keep my black belt?” When she said that, we asked her who gave her her black belt (’cause if she got it from a JKA guy, she could keep it). She pondered it for a long while saying, “Oh, I can’t believe I forgot his name! What was it?” We threw out some names for her but she still couldn’t remember his name. Later on, she asked Jon what black belt rank he was. When Jon said 1st dan, she said, “Oh wow, this is soooo wierd! I don’t know if I can come. We’re the same rank! This is embarrasing!” She said her teacher was 7th dan black belt (and that he was 75 years old). Than she looked down at the table and saw the JKA logo (and letters), She said that was where she got her belt from. As you could probably tell, it was awfully suspicious. I believe there is only two official 7th dans in the US and that’s Mori and Harimoto. So, all in all, it was kinda funny.

One of the booths was giving away free lollipops so I took one and put it in my gi top (since I had my belt on, the inside of my gi top was a little pouch). Unfortunately, I forgot about it and when I put my gi away, it slipped out!

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Lax in Blogging

Written on September 19, 2006.

Whoa! It’s been a while since m’ last blogging. Well, things have been happening but they ain’t worth blogging about. You know, planting snow peas, doing schoolwork. But things are gonna come up, let me tell you.

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The Orphan’s Lament

Written on September 14, 2006.

Whoo! I ordered The Orphan’s Lament (by Huun Huur Tu) months ago and it finally came! That album has all of my favorite songs like Eki Attar, Kaldak Khamar and, as always, The Orphan’s Lament. I was hoping that the liner notes had the romanized lyrics (like it was in the If I’d Been Born An Eagle CD). Unfortunately, it wasn’t. Darn! It’ll take me a lot longer to remember the lyrics (unless I just transcribe it myself). Oh well.

I also got Kidnapped on DVD at the library. I caught it on TV last month but I missed the first half. I could see from the second half that it was pretty good and I liked the Sco’ish accents so I looked at the library and they had already ordered it so I put in a request.

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Etiquette Book

Written on September 12, 2006.

Since it’s been very warm, we biked to OfficeMax to get some paper and office supplies. As we were wandering around, we saw some books. One of them was a thick manual on Etiquette. The title was conveniently “Etiquette.” And it was thick. It was almost like a dictionary! It had the little dark tabs like dictionaries have so you can easily turn to the letter of your choice. Well, it was similar to a dictionary. Instead of A-B, C-D, etc. one of the tabs are, “Kids and Teens.” Another tab is “Weddings.” Another is “Communication.” It had all you ever needed to know about anything polite. I’ll give a few examples.

When you want to talk to a hard-of-hearing person, you are supposed to tap on the deaf person’s shoulder to get his/her attention. Never shout, “Hey!”

Another is if you have bread, break it in to small slices (not bite sized!) and when you butter it, hold the bread in your left hand and spread the butter with a knife. Be sure not to hold the bread in your hand! You have to hold it to the plate.

It practically covered everything.

It talks a lot about who picks up the bill at a resturaunt. It said when to split the bill, if the man should take it or the woman.

If I made a etiquette rule on who picks up the bill, this is what it’d be. “When you finish eating, whoever says Un-dibs! first doesn’t have to pay the bill. If both persons say Un-dibs! at the same time, you have a chance to say Double Un-dibs! to still not pay. If that doesn’t work, split the bill.” That’s the most practical rule.

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