February 21, 2007
New Tagline in Order?
I don’t know how it happened, but somehow a picture of me got submitted to a website called www.imageoak.com under the category of "karate women." My traffic has exploded in recent days because of it. I went to the site and was trying to figure out what exactly it is and how and why I’m on there. Apparently, someone has to submit a web page/picture for inclusion on the site. It’s an image directory so to speak.
So, what I want to know is, who submitted my picture to the site? I’ve been getting hits from all over the world from this site and I’d really like to know who to thank for all the additional traffic. So, I’m calling you out. Who are you?
I’d also like to mention here that I am the number # 1 site for the following searches on Google:
"i suck at sparring"
"black mama sex"
"sexy female black belt"
So, with that in mind, I’d like to thank all those lonely guys in Ireland, England, Spain, Italy, Indonesia and other countries throughout the world for such wonderful search engine optimization help. It makes me proud. I think I’m going to add a tag line to my blog that goes something like this:
"Black Belt Mama: Disappointing Men Looking for ‘Black Mama Sex’ since 2006".
February 20, 2007
Tell me one good thing
I thought that testing for 2nd kyu was going to be at the end of March. All this time, I’ve been concentrating on getting through the birthday hell month (Big I and Mr. BBM) and then I could concentrate on testing. That’s not going to work now. Testing is now the first week in March, which means I have less than two weeks to be fabulous.
The good news is that this is the same material that I did in December, but just didn’t have enough time in yet to get the rank. And I will have a new gi to wear by the time testing is here too, which I’m sure will give me an additional boost in the way of snappiness if that’s even a word. (I’m keeping the lid on what I got until it has arrived.) Thank you, by the way, for all the great suggestions and cautionary tales about what gi’s you have. It was very helpful.
Last night in class, we had our instructor, another black belt, the other brown belt and myself. We each took turns doing an individual kata and then everyone had to say something good and something that could be improved. I can’t remember doing this before at the dojo, but I think it was a very good learning device.
I was thrilled to hear that my techniques are good, that my kicks are high and that I do the kata well. I was also very receptive to the suggestions for improvement: must add the kiai’s (which I always forget to do), and try to stay on a more level plane as in no bobbing up and down through the kata.
My open hand kata is Pinan Yondan, and I’m actually starting to like it, which is amazing considering it’s a Pinan kata and they are not my favorites. I also have to do Odo No Nunchaku and Choun No Kun, which is a bo kata. I used to be so afraid of the nunchaku kata, but I now feel that I have a very good handle on it and that I do it pretty well.
When my instructor was doing an individual kata last night, I told her that the good thing about her kata is that she becomes a completely different person when she does her kata’s. It’s amazing to me that one minute she’s my instructor and as soon as she begins the kata, she becomes this wicked looking karate master. It’s very cool. I think I need to work on developing some multiple karate personalities of my own. Maybe the new gi will help. . .
February 19, 2007
Self Defense against a Shower Rod
Our bathroom makeover is nearing completion. It is now possible for us to actually use our bathroom again. We still need to put the stone up around the shower stall and replace the flooring, but we’re taking our time with that part (i.e. waiting until we hit the lottery so we can pay someone to do it for us). Pictures will follow soon.
There was, however, one casualty in the bathroom renovation. My middle finger suffered quite an injury when my husband, a little loopy from paint fumes, started swinging shower rods at me Star-Wars-style in Target the other night. He smacked me on the butt a couple times as annoying husbands will do, and then I was done.
I brought my right arm up and was going to use an inside block/knife hand to knock the pole away from me, grab it, disarm him, and of course, retaliate. (The girls were with my parents by the way.) What I wasn’t counting on was the whack that came down across my knuckles from his other shower rod wielding hand. The rod smacked across my middle, ring, and pinky finger and it hurt. My middle finger took the brunt of the smack.
My husband thought it was pretty funny and kept saying that I "punched the shower rod," and that he didn’t hit me with it! Yeah, right. If I only had my tunfa handy at the time . . .
So, I told him that when he wakes in the middle of the night to find the shower rod jammed up his nether-regions, I’ll just tell him that he happened to roll onto it while sleeping.
That kind of thinking can work both ways, don’t you think?
Ooh, and this marks my 200th post!
February 14, 2007
Happy Hallmark Day!
Happy Hallmark and Florist Day everyone! When I was in college I spent two years working in flower shops and let me tell you that Valentine’s Day only comes with a negative connotation after that experience.
For days leading up to V-Day, I spent hours upon hours slicing thorns off of roses and stabbing my hands endlessly; and on the actual day I spent hours trying to get forlorn looking men in and out of the store in a timely fashion by packing up whatever flowers we had left into a presentable looking box. I was always glad to see the 15th arrive.
In elementary school, Valentine’s Day was fun. I carefully wrote out Valentine’s and delivered them with care to all my friends (and enemies because you have to in elementary school as Big I found out last night).
In Junior High, Valentine’s Day stopped being fun as hoards of girls got called to the office to pick up flowers that their boyfriends had sent to the school for them. Now that I think about it, they were probably flowers from their parents or from themselves, sent to make themselves feel special. How many boys in Junior High really had $50 or $60 to put out on roses?
I rarely had a boyfriend over Valentine’s Day, so it was always dull. High school was more of the same. I had a boyfriend for one year but the teddy bear and rose he brought me left me unimpressed. The feeling that I thought would be there just wasn’t there. It was a relationship that was going down the drain anyway.
But when I got home, it was a different story. Starting in Junior High, I think my Mom realized how tough V-Day can be for a boyfriendless adolescent. Valentine’s Day became a day when my Mom broke out the good dishes. She cooked up a feast, made a pink cake and as a family, we ate dinner by candlelight. My sister and I always got a little wrapped gift-not a lot, just something that made us smile.
It was so nice to know that we could expect a treat at the end of the carnation filled days. So, instead of waiting for Junior High, I started the same tradition in our family when Big I was just one year old.
Tonight, we will dine by candlelight, eat a special dinner and cake and both of the girls will get a little surprise or two. I hope that as they get older, they’ll continue to look forward to our special V-Day celebrations, and that it will make those boyfriend-less school days a little easier on them.
How will you spend Valentine’s Day?
On a different note. . . for my fellow karate-ka, if you have a heavyweight gi, what kind do you have and what do you think of it? Either leave me a comment or shoot me an email.
February 11, 2007
One time, at karate camp. . .
In the past two days, I completed 9.5 hours of training in karate, kobudo, and ju-jitsu at an IKKF (International Karate Kobudo Federation) training camp. Last night I went to bed earlier than my children, and tonight I am only awake thanks to a three hour nap that I took with Lil C upon returning home today. Exhausted is not enough to describe how I feel right now. Getting hit by a truck? That might be close.
I don’t know how to possibly describe everything that happened and what I learned over the course of the weekend, so this entry may be a little haphazard due to the multitude of information (and from the pounding headache and aching muscles and joints).
On Saturday, I spent time working on basic blocking drills, sai, nunchaku and tunfa. It was a brutal day that served up a giant slice of humble pie. So much for that confidence thing when in a room with very high ranking black belts and only a handful of lower ranked belts like myself. And I thought I was a high rank. Not exactly.
The first session was taught by Hanshi who is a 9th degree black belt. We went through the basic 10-step blocking drill and then he showed us how to block not just one level but one and a half. So basically what that means is that instead of just blocking something that might come at your stomach area or solar plexus, you’re also covering in case someone tries to hit you in the face. It seems like such a simple concept, but when you see the difference and add it to your drills it makes a HUGE difference. That session was very informative and gave lots of food for thought. I only wish I could have had someone there taking notes for me.
The next session was tunfa. Another high ranking black belt taught this session, which ripped through the tunfa kata’s at warp speed. I had trouble keeping up and found myself sacrificing good form for speed. I really hope that I won’t have to rip through the kata’s that fast when black belt testing rolls around. If so, I’m going to have to get to work on making things a lot faster.
We then took pieces of the kata’s and worked on bunkai (applying the techniques from the kata). The attacker came at us with the bo and we tried different blocks and punches with the tunfa. This was very cool, and really showed you that if you don’t block right, you’re going to get hit. Some techniques may feel awkward, but they’re there for a very good reason.
We then took a break for lunch and I got a chance to lunch with one of my instructors and another black belt from our dojo. We compared notes on the things we learned and I was very happy to have some down time. I really needed it at this point.
When we came back there were sessions on ju-jitsu and sai. I was interested in ju-jitsu but I was a little bit afraid to be quite honest. Some of the other students were calling that instructor "Sensei Pain" and I wasn’t sure I was up for it. I decided to stick with sai. Another high ranking black belt taught this session and we also ripped through this kata very quickly. He paused to point out lapses in technique here and there, but we did the kata a number of times before working on application. We used a bo vs. sai and that was a welcome reprieve from the extremely fast kata.
We wrapped up for the day and I went home with every intention of returning that evening to watch black belt testing. There was one woman testing for black belt and I wanted to take Big I back to watch. But when I got in my car and drove home, the girls were at my parents house, and I needed a rest.
I woke up this morning feeling stiff and exhausted despite the nine hours of sleep I got last night. I arrived at the dojo and the session choices were either ju-jitsu or bo-sai which is a 4th degree black belt kata. I decided I’d brave the ju-jitsu.
For people who don’t know anything about ju-jitsu, it’s a really cool martial art that uses joint locks and small movements to take out your opponent. You have to be really careful when practicing so as not to snap your partner’s shoulder, elbow, wrist, etc. I thought we would only get to the basics, but by the end of the session, we were working on some throw downs, mounts, and what I like to call martial arts "twister," because that’s exactly what it felt like, only the red spots that you see are in your head when your partner is cutting off the circulation to your brain.
Despite the occasional discomfort, I absolutely loved ju-jitsu. I can’t believe I was so afraid of it the first day. I wish I would have gone to some of those sessions. When the session was over, "Sensei Pain" invited us to come "play" at his classes which are local. I am so excited because I’d like to go at least occasionally and pick some new techniques up. I think it would be a great addition to what I’m already learning.
The final session of the day was a kicking drills session. Another high ranking black belt taught this session. He was a very good teacher, but very hard core. We started with some two-person stretches that were KILLER. Ju-jitsu was nothing compared to those stretches. If you’re shy, you have to get over it really quickly because there I was facing a person I didn’t know. Next thing you know, my ankle is on his shoulder and we’ve criss-crossed our arms in front across my leg and the pain, oh the pain. We then turned our foot behind our partner’s neck and got into a side kick position. Then, we took it one step further and turned so that our toes were facing downward over our partner’s shoulder in a back kick position.
After that we worked on kicking drills that are great for self-defense and for sparring. We moved very quickly and I was so tired at this point that I took a light kick here and there because my body and head were just not working together as well as they should be.
We wrapped up with a viewing of all the photos from the weekend. I look very serious is all the pictures I was in, especially the ju-jitsu twister pictures.
It was a weekend filled with knowledge, pain, and pushing myself to extremes. I have so much to work on and so much to learn. I feel like I’m starting all over again after this weekend. I need to make practicing a part of my daily routine if I want to excel. . .
And most importantly right now, I need some ibuprofen and a bed.
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