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saffronhareWonderfully full weekend -- and, for once, I wasn't "in service" to other people's priorities. So, while it was busy, it was fun to be doing the things I chose for myself to enjoy and participate in. Not sure how to adequately describe the difference, there, but it was awesome.
Saturday's TKD tournament was a relatively low-impact experience. There were people who had traveled from Nebraska, Iowa, and even Oklahoma, but it wasn't as huge or high-pressure as the state tournamenttends to be. Even so, there were precious few women in my age division (33+), and *none* at my belt level...which made the competition brackets a little bit odd.
FionaPie and I competed in forms (poomsae) only in the morning, and then we stuck around to volunteer for the afternoon, which let us be very close to all the sparring. WOW. She got firedupfiredupfiredup and so did I. We set a goal to compete in a sparring event sometime this year. She's thinking she'll do it at State (in March), but I may wait until another smaller tournament rolls around. Maybe even this one next year. (I don't own a set of sparring gear yet, and bringing one's own gear is a requirement.) So we'll start hitting the sparring classes at the TKD school we go to, if you'll forgive the pun.
Fiona earned a gold medal in her division; I earned a silver medal. Pretty pleased with my performance. The judging was very old-school: each judge will simply indicate which, of the two competitors on the mat, they think performed better. It's kind of a thumbs up/thumbs down thing. With five judges, the score was 2-3, which means two of the judges thought I did better. Not bad. One mistake I made, though, still has me shaking my head this morning. There's an "elbow slap" move, which calls for me to swing my elbow across my body and then slap it against my palm (as if I'm making contact with my target). It makes a very satisfying sound. The right side went well, but on the left side, I totally *missed* my palm. That's never happened to me before. So the only sound for that move was the pathetic flapping of my sleeve as my elbow swung right by my palm. How does that happen?!?!? I failed to connect with MY OWN ELBOW. Yeah. AWESOME.
After that,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
diermuid and I attended a Boy Scout awards dinner thing, where the food was pretty good even if the talking was interminable, and then I got to be the Designated Drinker at the after-party with a few friends. Sunday was sleeping in, a hot bath, and then a Dionysus ritual at Gaia Community. I got to see some folks I don't get to spend much time with, which was a very nice way to wind up the afternoon. You know a ritual is pretty darn good when nobody really wants to leave. :)
Oh...and I'm on an Elizabeth Bear kick. Loved Dust and All the Windwracked Stars, but didn't like the Shakespeare series, so I stopped reading that one after about 25 pages. Working on the first book in the Jenny Casey series, Hammered, which I'm liking a lot so far. I figure I'll try the first one out of a few difference series and see which ones I want to follow. Could mean finishing three whole books this month, which is unprecedented for me.
Saturday's TKD tournament was a relatively low-impact experience. There were people who had traveled from Nebraska, Iowa, and even Oklahoma, but it wasn't as huge or high-pressure as the state tournamenttends to be. Even so, there were precious few women in my age division (33+), and *none* at my belt level...which made the competition brackets a little bit odd.
FionaPie and I competed in forms (poomsae) only in the morning, and then we stuck around to volunteer for the afternoon, which let us be very close to all the sparring. WOW. She got firedupfiredupfiredup and so did I. We set a goal to compete in a sparring event sometime this year. She's thinking she'll do it at State (in March), but I may wait until another smaller tournament rolls around. Maybe even this one next year. (I don't own a set of sparring gear yet, and bringing one's own gear is a requirement.) So we'll start hitting the sparring classes at the TKD school we go to, if you'll forgive the pun.
Fiona earned a gold medal in her division; I earned a silver medal. Pretty pleased with my performance. The judging was very old-school: each judge will simply indicate which, of the two competitors on the mat, they think performed better. It's kind of a thumbs up/thumbs down thing. With five judges, the score was 2-3, which means two of the judges thought I did better. Not bad. One mistake I made, though, still has me shaking my head this morning. There's an "elbow slap" move, which calls for me to swing my elbow across my body and then slap it against my palm (as if I'm making contact with my target). It makes a very satisfying sound. The right side went well, but on the left side, I totally *missed* my palm. That's never happened to me before. So the only sound for that move was the pathetic flapping of my sleeve as my elbow swung right by my palm. How does that happen?!?!? I failed to connect with MY OWN ELBOW. Yeah. AWESOME.
After that,
diermuid and I attended a Boy Scout awards dinner thing, where the food was pretty good even if the talking was interminable, and then I got to be the Designated Drinker at the after-party with a few friends. Sunday was sleeping in, a hot bath, and then a Dionysus ritual at Gaia Community. I got to see some folks I don't get to spend much time with, which was a very nice way to wind up the afternoon. You know a ritual is pretty darn good when nobody really wants to leave. :) Oh...and I'm on an Elizabeth Bear kick. Loved Dust and All the Windwracked Stars, but didn't like the Shakespeare series, so I stopped reading that one after about 25 pages. Working on the first book in the Jenny Casey series, Hammered, which I'm liking a lot so far. I figure I'll try the first one out of a few difference series and see which ones I want to follow. Could mean finishing three whole books this month, which is unprecedented for me.
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Date: 2013-01-28 07:35 pm (UTC)I think you'll like Jenny Casey even more than we did. Dangerous resonances, yanowutimeen?
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Date: 2013-01-28 08:37 pm (UTC)It was wonderful to be at ritual yesterday and to see the new space, finally. Can't make it to Imbolc next Sunday, but I'll keep an eye on the calendar. I've made it to, what, four GC events this past 12 months (if we count FNSC). WHOA, right? Who knows what could happen next.