In the technology adoption lifecycle, I am not an early adopter. I used to be back in my younger days: early adopter, innovator, being on beta lists and other things to get in before the rest of the crowd. But the trouble with being an early adopter is you get to work out the bugs. I write/create enough of my own bugs in a day; why should I burden my life with someone else’s too? 🙂 Yeah, I finally see reason to get an iPhone, but the 3GS models overheating and turning pink? Yikes. No thank you, I’ll wait.
Me
Lack of posting
Not sure what gives, but something’s hoarked with t3h int3rw3bz for me today. Looks like something in one of Time Warner Cable’s backbones or maybe GBLX is failing. Something up in the DFW area, from what diagnostics I can run.
Of course, trying to get a hold of someone with a clue at TWC is impossible. Stupid voice response menus that navigate you to nowhere useful. The constant drone of “sorry, this department doesn’t handle that; let me transfer you to the department that does” and repeat that about 5 times and 20 minutes before I decide to just hang up. Be a sucker for punishment and try again (thank God for my office phone headset), and get the same clueless runaround.
Even getting to Google is a challenge.
It’s been too damn painful to be online all day. Not going to keep hurting myself with it tonight.
Going to go do something novel, like read a book. 🙂
Next Class – Wow!
I just got back from my first “stand up” session from Warrior’s Edge Martial Arts. On Monday night’s it’s 2 things: first class is “stand up” MMA with Jeet Kune Do, Muay Thai, Kali, Silat sorts of empty hand skills and drills; second class is western boxing.
In a word: awesome.
So far, this feels like what I’ve been looking for.
The first class was taught by Guro Ray. We worked on various drills, working on getting inside and what we can do from there. For instance, right haymaker comes at you, shoot in and block, and from there various things could happen: a chicken-wing arm-bar, a bent-elbow shoulder lock, or other sorts of arm bars and locks. And as I’m doing this all I can think to myself is: ah, that’s Ki Bohn Soo #3, oh, that’s this other Kuk Sool thing. The key is that the body moves in only so many ways, so there’s only so many things you can really do. My Kuk Sool knowledge isn’t discarded; in fact, it came in quite handy in performing the locks, sweeps, and takedowns. Didn’t hurt my kicking skills either. Â But the key difference? Learning how to apply things.
I’ve always felt that the library of “techniques” you learn in Kuk Sool isn’t necessarily meant to be a literal library of movements. Sure the constant execution of them does teach you things, does teach you how to move, but it’s static and not very alive. I’ve always felt that what the “techniques” are more doing is teaching you a concept, teaching you about some way to move the body be it your body or more importantly your opponent’s body. So you’re being given an abstract notion. Trouble is, in most all of my 6 year Kuk Sool history, it never really went beyond that. There was never really any application, any “let’s get in there and work it”. Sure I attempted to do it now and again on my own, but in terms of it being a good part of how things were taught, it just wasn’t there. That was one reason I left. I’d say that tonight I got a good dose of how to actually apply and get in there and take the abstract knowledge of the body and work it from there.
Then the western boxing class.
Ouch. 🙂
It was drills. The teacher was a gentleman name Abel, and he took as a beginner and taught me accordingly. The drills? Good grief. I am in good condition and physical shape, but I am not in good condition for that particular activity. 🙂 My triceps, shoulders… they were  truly exhausted by the end of the class. But I got a good intro to western boxing, now I just need to practice and continue to apply. This was a nice start.
In the end, I walked out of there after 2 hours just drenched in sweat and thoroughly exhausted. It was awesome. 🙂  This is exactly the sort of thing that I’m looking for. I feel safe in saying that Warrior’s Edge Martial Arts will be my new home for the next however long.
Good stuff. Good stuff. Happy me.
Another hog hunt
Man, it’s been hot the past some days… 100+ degree temperatures. But that didn’t stop me from wanting to go hunting and put some more piggy parts in the freezer.
Earlier this week I called DB Hunting Ranch again, just on a whim, to see if I could do another walk/stalk hunt. They called me back and I was able to go almost immediately, so I booked something and was ready to go. A few hours later I got a callback saying that a friend of mine, Charles, called and wanted to book a walk/stalk hunt too. In the call my name was mentioned, and so they called me back mentioning this and asking if I wanted to change my date so we could hunt together. Sure! This was a complete coincidence because while Charles and I had been exchanging some emails talking about hunting, neither of us knew the other was calling DB. We both just got an itch and decided to individually scratch it, and it came together like it did. Glad it did too, because it was most fun.
So we headed back out and once again Jake was our guide. He’s got an eye and did a great job at spotting. On this hunt I saw a lot more variety than I did on the prior hunt to DB. Saw a lot of whitetail, a couple axis does, black buck, aoudad, rams. Jake kept trying to offer us some of the rams at a reasonable price, but while it would have been a quick and simple kill I didn’t see the point. I’m not going to eat the rams. I’m here for meat, not trophies. Still, it did sow a seed for the future. In fact, during the hunt we were talking about future plans for DB, things that were coming in, and it sure gets me itching for future hunts. Jake knows how to keep business rolling, which is good for him. 🙂
We did see a couple trophy hogs on the hunt. One was sleeping under a pile of brush and Charles was able to get maybe 10 feet from him before the hog took off. At that time we weren’t going to shoot the trophy hogs because of the cost. But later on as I was looking for my second pig, I was riding in the bed of Jake’s pickup leaning on the roof and Charles riding in the passenger seat (he had gotten 2 already). Jake stopped the truck and down a road were 3 pigs: 2 small ones and 1 trophy. I shouldered my new hunting rifle and tried to get a bead on the pigs but because I was so high up in the air a tree branch was obscuring any sort of shot. Damn it. Charles had leaned out the truck window and said he had a perfect bead on them but was giving me the shot. Unfortunately the pigs moved and that was that. Thing was by that point, we had decided that we’d go ahead and take a trophy pig if the opportunity gave itself again (it didn’t) and just split the cost and the meat.
In the end, we each got 2 pigs. The new Savage hunting rifle performed great and I’m pleased with it. The Federal Premium Vital-Shok .308 Winchester 165 grain Barnes Triple-Shock X-Bullet (load P308H) bullet is simply devastating. Charles was shooting a similar Federal load but in .223 55 grain Barnes bullet and had similar results. I put the crosshairs on the shoulders, hit ’em where I was aiming. So the hardware portion of the hunt was better than last time. Since I have more confidence in both my hunting skills and the hardware, I’ll go for the “behind the ear” shots in the future to help preserve the shoulder meat better.
One thing I learned from this hunt is that I need to spend more time on my rifle skills. I spend most of my time focused on handguns, and when I do spend time on rifle it tends to be more slow paced stuff often because that’s all the gun ranges will allow (e.g. shooting rifles from the bench). With these hogs, you do have to be able to move quickly. They are always on the move and you may only have a window of a couple seconds to take the shot. I need to work on that, being able to shoulder the rifle and peel off a “bullseye shot” within 2-3 seconds. I obviously shot fine, but finding ways to practice with a little more speed would be good.
Only real question this morning is what to do with all the meat. Smoke it as is, take it to Johnny G’s to make sausage. Throw a ham in the crock pot. So many choices. 🙂
Good time had. Got another hog hunt booked for next month. This one will be a night hunt.
Updated: Charles posted a write-up and a picture.
Flow with it
Yesterday was my first class and today I worked out at home trying to remember all that I could.
First, I spent some time on the heavy bag.
- 3 minute round, working on skills. 4x
- 30 second round, punch-out drills (fast as possible, hard as possible). 4x
- 3 minute round, working skills, 4x
Thank you rossboxing.com. Some jump rope too.
Then well… get this. Some long time ago my in-laws bought me some 8′ long bamboo sticks. They meant well, but the sticks are not something I could actually use because they are too brittle to take impact; I could tell from their dye job that they were made for home decor. Nevertheless, it was thoughtful of them, and I just kept them in a corner of the garage. Well, they came in handy today! I cut one down to 3′ lengths and viola… some makeshift baton to practice with. I will not actually use these since again they cannot take impact, but for now doing drills in the air to help me remember what I learned in class until I get proper sticks, they are just fine and will do the job. Plus they have a larger diameter and are a bit heavy, so that’s good for training.
So I worked on my drills, what I could remember from my first class. Just basic movements, trying to remember what I could, trying to not feel awkward, especially on transitions and not getting my arms all tangled up now that they’re 3′ longer. I even put the sticks down and used a dan bong as a makeshift knife, doing the same drills but now with a knife. Then put the knife down and try it empty handed, same drills.
I really like this. It flows. It’s simple. It works no matter what’s in your hand, including nothing. I’m doing my best to not think about what I’m doing, especially risking over-thinking it. Just relax and let it flow.
Gah, I’m excited and invigorated. 🙂  I think I’m going to like Kali.
Second impressions
Ended up taking my first class tonight at the new martial arts school. I haven’t signed up, but took this as a trial class.
First impressions
My actual first impressions came on a motorcycle ride.
A New Journey – Part 3: Moving Forward
This is part 3 of my story of my new martial arts journey. If you have not yet read “Part 1: Getting Started” or “Part 2: Things Fall Apart“, you should go back and read them before continuing. Once you’ve gotten caught up, please continue reading on how I’m now moving forward.
A New Journey – Part 2: Things Fall Apart
This is part 2 in the story of my new martial arts journey. If you have not yet “Part 1: Getting Started“, you should go back and read it before continuing. Once you’ve finished reading part 1, continue on to read how Things Fall Apart.
A New Journey – Part 1: Getting Started
There have been a lot of changes going on in the household. As Wife and I look at them, they’re all very good things towards taking us individually closer to where we want to be and also as a group/family taking us where we want to be. Here I want to talk about one big change that I’m making in my life:
My martial arts study.
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