I certainly don't look like it, but apparently I'm still a fat bastard! I weighed myself in the locker room today.
170 pounds.
Shit.
This is crazy, too, because I feel like 155-160. And people say they've noticed I've lost a lot of weight. But 170 pounds isn't too far off of 174, which was the heaviest I'd ever recorded myself. Maybe the scale might be broken?
Who knows? At least I'm moving quicker. I'm feeling leaner. And my training is picking up.
I did some sequences from the kata Unsu tonight. It's been so long since I did that kata. It's rusty, but the core feeling of the moves is still there. I'm confident I can get it to a world-class kata by November. Also, my four basic kata -- Bassai Dai, Kanku Dai, Empi, and Jion -- are shaping up nicely. I'm particularly pleased with the progress of my Jion and Bassai Dai. They're shaping up to be very solid.
In other news, I'm seriously considering going for kumite at the world championships. This is despite my screwed ankle. I am going to tape the shit out of my ankle everytime I train and when I fight in Japan. I should be okay.
Monday, April 24, 2006
Sunday, April 23, 2006
He's back -- competitor already in the swing of things
I don't know what happened, but it's as if someone flipped on the switch and I'm back in training mode. The competitior within me, which was dormant since I got into tango last year, has awakened once more.
I don't think there was one single reason for this re-awakening, but rather a confluence of events ... the first of which happened last week. And that had a little to do with a woman.
For the 26 years that I've been training in the martial arts, I've had a personal rule not to get involved with anyone I trained with ... especially someone I teach. Despite all the women that I've come across in these past two and a half decades -- many of whom were attractive and some of whom were interested in me -- I pretty much stuck with this rule. There is, however, one woman who trains with me now who has been growing on me for the last few months. I thought it was under control, but a week ago, I realized that I was wrong. I found myself thinking of her quite a lot, such that it had gotten to the point where, for the first time in my martial arts career, I said to hell with my rule! Unfortunately, she wasnt interested in me the same way. Needless to say, it was a blow to my self-confidence, and I think a low-level depression set in.
Then last week, I had no tango classes. My teachers took off to Argentina on a tango trip and took a bunch of students with them. They cancelled their tango classes, which left the poor bastards like me who were left behind to come up with other things to do on class days. Rather than train in martial arts, I chose to wallow in my depression.
Then, on Thursday, I went to Sacramento to visit an aunt and uncle who were in the hospital for strokes. My aunt had a massive stroke on Sunday morning. My cousin Edwin took her to the hospital. The next day, while Edwin was taking his dad to visit his mom, his dad had a minor stroke, too. Poor Edwin. As of this writing, my aunt is still in the hospital, but my uncle has been discharged.
But I think that's when things started to change. While we were in Sacramento, we visited our other relatives. They put on a video of the Pacquiao-Morales boxing match. There's nothing like a good boxing match to get you pumped. And this match was damn good. Both Pacquiao and Morales were true warriors out there. Incredible and inspirational.
Anyway, I think it was the combination of the boxing match as well as the knowledge that I traditionally ride out my depressions by training, that got me to pick up the skipping rope and weights on Saturday night. Between rope skipping, weight lifting, shadow boxing, an kata, I got a pretty good 1.5-hour workout. And at the end of the session, I wanted more...but decided not to push it too far too early. i retired for the night.
The next day, on Sunday, I marched with the naginata group in the San Francisco Cherry Blossom parade. It was kind of fun to be marching and showing off to crowds of non-martial artists. When I was fighting Curt in the streets, I heard kids saying: "Oh! look at him! He's just like Musashi!" And at another point, after Curt and I stopped fighting for a while, a group of people in the crowd started chanting: "fight! fight! fight!" of course, Curt and i did!
It was all in good fun. And I swear, it felt good. Curt and I started making arrangements to become training partners again in preparation for the naginata world championship qualifiers.
When I got home, I rested for a few hours, then did another 1.5-hour workout before I popped online to chat with Stuart. Stuart is an old karate buddy of mine, and a longtime training partner when we were kids up until we went our separate ways in college. He hadnt been training for maybe 6 or 7 years now, but said he'll start again in a couple of weeks. I hope he does. It would be good to train with him again. I feel the old me coming back.
Would be good to have the old him right there by my side again.
Looking forward to hard training, hard hits, and hard drinking.
Life's good.
I don't think there was one single reason for this re-awakening, but rather a confluence of events ... the first of which happened last week. And that had a little to do with a woman.
For the 26 years that I've been training in the martial arts, I've had a personal rule not to get involved with anyone I trained with ... especially someone I teach. Despite all the women that I've come across in these past two and a half decades -- many of whom were attractive and some of whom were interested in me -- I pretty much stuck with this rule. There is, however, one woman who trains with me now who has been growing on me for the last few months. I thought it was under control, but a week ago, I realized that I was wrong. I found myself thinking of her quite a lot, such that it had gotten to the point where, for the first time in my martial arts career, I said to hell with my rule! Unfortunately, she wasnt interested in me the same way. Needless to say, it was a blow to my self-confidence, and I think a low-level depression set in.
Then last week, I had no tango classes. My teachers took off to Argentina on a tango trip and took a bunch of students with them. They cancelled their tango classes, which left the poor bastards like me who were left behind to come up with other things to do on class days. Rather than train in martial arts, I chose to wallow in my depression.
Then, on Thursday, I went to Sacramento to visit an aunt and uncle who were in the hospital for strokes. My aunt had a massive stroke on Sunday morning. My cousin Edwin took her to the hospital. The next day, while Edwin was taking his dad to visit his mom, his dad had a minor stroke, too. Poor Edwin. As of this writing, my aunt is still in the hospital, but my uncle has been discharged.
But I think that's when things started to change. While we were in Sacramento, we visited our other relatives. They put on a video of the Pacquiao-Morales boxing match. There's nothing like a good boxing match to get you pumped. And this match was damn good. Both Pacquiao and Morales were true warriors out there. Incredible and inspirational.
Anyway, I think it was the combination of the boxing match as well as the knowledge that I traditionally ride out my depressions by training, that got me to pick up the skipping rope and weights on Saturday night. Between rope skipping, weight lifting, shadow boxing, an kata, I got a pretty good 1.5-hour workout. And at the end of the session, I wanted more...but decided not to push it too far too early. i retired for the night.
The next day, on Sunday, I marched with the naginata group in the San Francisco Cherry Blossom parade. It was kind of fun to be marching and showing off to crowds of non-martial artists. When I was fighting Curt in the streets, I heard kids saying: "Oh! look at him! He's just like Musashi!" And at another point, after Curt and I stopped fighting for a while, a group of people in the crowd started chanting: "fight! fight! fight!" of course, Curt and i did!
It was all in good fun. And I swear, it felt good. Curt and I started making arrangements to become training partners again in preparation for the naginata world championship qualifiers.
When I got home, I rested for a few hours, then did another 1.5-hour workout before I popped online to chat with Stuart. Stuart is an old karate buddy of mine, and a longtime training partner when we were kids up until we went our separate ways in college. He hadnt been training for maybe 6 or 7 years now, but said he'll start again in a couple of weeks. I hope he does. It would be good to train with him again. I feel the old me coming back.
Would be good to have the old him right there by my side again.
Looking forward to hard training, hard hits, and hard drinking.
Life's good.
Sunday, April 02, 2006
Diary of a sick, lazy bastard with dreams of world domination
It's Sunday afternoon and I'm lying down on my bed hammering out a blog entry.
I should be training now, but I'm sick. (Biologically, guys, not metnally.) I came down with a nasty bug earlier this week, one that seems to be hitting everyone from coworkers to roommates to coughing sons of bitches sitting next to me on Caltrain: running nose, sore throat, coughs, headaches ... the works. I had to leave work early on Friday and I skipped naginata class later that night so I can come home and sleep.
When I was much younger, I had the attitude that when sick, you have to train your way into health. On top of that, I had the attitude that given a strong enough will, nothing should be able to stop me from my appointed duties -- whether those duties be work, teaching class, or training in whatever the hell I was training in. For the last few years, however, I've kind of mellowed out. When sick, I'm much more prone to rest at home or look for a good bowl of Vietnamese pho, I forego all but the most critical of my duties, and I lay off on the training.
It's worked fine for me so far, but I kind of think I should adopt a younger frame of mind again.
You see, I've been kind of slacking off in training in the last two years, especially after I got into Argentine Tango (my newfound addiction). But in three months, I will be participating in the US Naginata Federation's 2006 National Championships. In the same week, I will try out for the US team to the International Naginata Federation World Championships to be held in Belgium in 2007. No trivial matters, even without adding the fact that I'll be defending a national champion title in individual yudansha men's fighting and a world championship title in mens team fighting. Sure would look bad if I dont place this year in the nationals or dont make the team for the worlds. Just like Dana Carvey's Saturday Night Live George Bush character of the 1990s: I don't want to be a one-termer.
Moreover, sometime real soon, though I don't know exactly when, I'm supposed to be trying out for the US team to the 9th Shotokan Karate International Federation World Championships in Tokyo this year. It would be the first time I'd be going to compete in the 3d SKIF Worlds since 1988, when I was only 19 years old. I want to fight there, too, but because of a bad ankle I am hesitant to do so. I believe I still have a world-class repertoire of Shotokan kata, though. So I'm looking forward to going against the best of the best once more.
Another thing I'm looking forward to ... I'll be very happy at these upcoming events. Not only will I get to experience the rush once more of competition amongst the best that the nation and the world have to offer, but I'lll also get an ample dose of Tango as well: The weeklong naginata events in wine country coincide with Nora Dinzelbacher's Tango Week in nearby San Fracisco. And I believe the 2nd the Tokyo World Tango Festival is being held around the same time or a week or two after the SKIF World Championships.
Totally lucky for me, but probably unlucky for anyone counting on me to be focused.
I've got to straighten this out.
I should be training now, but I'm sick. (Biologically, guys, not metnally.) I came down with a nasty bug earlier this week, one that seems to be hitting everyone from coworkers to roommates to coughing sons of bitches sitting next to me on Caltrain: running nose, sore throat, coughs, headaches ... the works. I had to leave work early on Friday and I skipped naginata class later that night so I can come home and sleep.
When I was much younger, I had the attitude that when sick, you have to train your way into health. On top of that, I had the attitude that given a strong enough will, nothing should be able to stop me from my appointed duties -- whether those duties be work, teaching class, or training in whatever the hell I was training in. For the last few years, however, I've kind of mellowed out. When sick, I'm much more prone to rest at home or look for a good bowl of Vietnamese pho, I forego all but the most critical of my duties, and I lay off on the training.
It's worked fine for me so far, but I kind of think I should adopt a younger frame of mind again.
You see, I've been kind of slacking off in training in the last two years, especially after I got into Argentine Tango (my newfound addiction). But in three months, I will be participating in the US Naginata Federation's 2006 National Championships. In the same week, I will try out for the US team to the International Naginata Federation World Championships to be held in Belgium in 2007. No trivial matters, even without adding the fact that I'll be defending a national champion title in individual yudansha men's fighting and a world championship title in mens team fighting. Sure would look bad if I dont place this year in the nationals or dont make the team for the worlds. Just like Dana Carvey's Saturday Night Live George Bush character of the 1990s: I don't want to be a one-termer.
Moreover, sometime real soon, though I don't know exactly when, I'm supposed to be trying out for the US team to the 9th Shotokan Karate International Federation World Championships in Tokyo this year. It would be the first time I'd be going to compete in the 3d SKIF Worlds since 1988, when I was only 19 years old. I want to fight there, too, but because of a bad ankle I am hesitant to do so. I believe I still have a world-class repertoire of Shotokan kata, though. So I'm looking forward to going against the best of the best once more.
Another thing I'm looking forward to ... I'll be very happy at these upcoming events. Not only will I get to experience the rush once more of competition amongst the best that the nation and the world have to offer, but I'lll also get an ample dose of Tango as well: The weeklong naginata events in wine country coincide with Nora Dinzelbacher's Tango Week in nearby San Fracisco. And I believe the 2nd the Tokyo World Tango Festival is being held around the same time or a week or two after the SKIF World Championships.
Totally lucky for me, but probably unlucky for anyone counting on me to be focused.
I've got to straighten this out.
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