Time to BLOG
Perhaps a bit overdue. Just for reference, my knuckles have healed completely, even after breaking them open a couple more times. But it's because I have been BUSY. Yes, indeed. Lots of kung fu, work as well, and no time to sleep. Partly because I've been doing coding on the side for fun. Yes, for FUN. I like to code. Strangely enough. But kung fu's been a bit busier because we're preparing for our open house. Yes! Open house one week from today (well, now, one week from yesterday). So - Saturday, November 5th, at 1 P.M. You should come! See what kung fu is all about! It's a full demo, there will be lion dancing, and forms, and sparring sets, and even self-defense moves. Plus a couple of other things. You should come, especially if you haven't seen any demos previously. It'll be around 27th and Memorial, on the east side of the street. We'll be setting up on the grass there, it'll be hard to miss. Hopefully the demos will go well.

In addition to that, I have picked up and completed a majesty of a game known as Shadow of the Colossus. Seriously, the game is a work of art. It's a lot of puzzle solving, which I love. I liked it quite a bit, and it's even got some replayability by things you can unlock after beating it the first time. So I may go back through to defeat all sixteen of the colossi. Good stuff!

For further games, there is something else arriving in a couple of weeks here - Guitar Hero! Now you KNOW I have to get a piece of this action. I'm looking into getting two controllers, and I want to have some mad rock and roll dueling going on over here soon after the release. I think it's going to be a ton of fun. And half the game is about hamming it up. As you can see, it can get pretty crazy.

So I started watching Lost, the first season. It's pretty good! I like it quite a bit. I'm through the first disc, but I think I'll like it more and more as it progresses. It's got just enough of looming mystery to keep you hooked. As well as a bit of instant gratification while watching each episode, in little surprises they pop in occasionally. I particularly liked the third episode (fourth, if you count the premiere as two episodes). I can't say why, but it was cool.

And kung fu keeps me going. We had a busy day today, in particular. Started nice and early with class (I should have eaten before, though). We had a new guy there, who's been training for about a month, just during day classes. So this was his first time to spar at our school. Naturally, Sifu puts me against him, and we spar for a solid twenty minutes or so. I started going a little light against him, as it was his first time. Although, as I found out quickly, it wasn't REALLY his first time. He had trained for three or so months at one of Sifu's old students who started his own school without Sifu's full blessing. So at the kwoon, we don't particularly LIKE that school. But his sparring there was apparently with 13, 14 and 15-year olds, and purely in the style of point sparring. So after one hit, you stop, reset. He found out that just because you trade a hit, if you put your hands down, it doesn't mean the other person will, too. And I guess he didn't hit to the head at all there, so he wasn't used to that. Or getting hit quite as hard, I think. But he had previous experience boxing, so he had plenty of skills to draw from. He was actually very good, and a pretty solid attacker. He found out that throwing hard round kicks isn't always a good idea, especially when your shins aren't as conditioned as your opponent's. He popped me a few good times, mostly in the stomach, but my main defeat was from an EMPTY STOMACH. Ugh. It started giving me a bit of a gag reflex from not having any food in me to draw energy from. That kind of sucked. But it was a lot of fun, and I think he's going to like it a lot.

So after that, it was time to get food in my belly, then a bit of lion dance practice. We practiced a few times, it turned out pretty well, I think. We had an observer come by, too, peeking through the window. Turned out to be a Mexican guy, looking to be probably a little younger than me. I was the only bilingual one there today, so I talked to him a bit, and I think he'll come by the demo, maybe join up. Which would be cool. Both our Buddha and the lion tail were rather exhausted after practice, which was funny to see. They both collapsed on the ground between our second and third practice. That, and Cory (our tail) managed to push a little too hard and lose a bit of his lunch right as the third practice ended. It's hard work being a lion! But it's a lot of fun, too.

I've also been spending a bit more time with guitar stuff. Probably because of Guitar Hero. But I'm back to practicing some on the electric, looking at Satriani and Vai for goals to shoot towards. They are some rather talented individuals, there. I still need to get a full hard drive to dedicate to space for recording music onto. We'll see, who knows.

This full paragraph is dedicated to getting an extra hour tonight for Daylight Saving. Yaaaaay!

Well, okay, that's enough blog for now. Hopefully I'll have enough free time to find time to pay attention to my blog in the near future. My blog gets lonely sometimes. I should probably feed it more often, too. Okay! Random linkage! Two for today, since it's been so long. First, one which is just cool and somewhat funny. The second is one which you may find interesting, as a tool to find FURTHER interesting things. It's still beta, but oh, it's so good. Oh! One more, for Liz, who apparently wanted something more for the ladies. It's not really something to ENJOY, but it is something you might find as a good resource. You know, just in case.
- posted by Pootenheimer @ 12:42 AM | 3 comments