The trip to Ft. Worth and Plano last weekend (July 20-22) was really great! I got to visit with the one and only Brian Briscoe (seldom known as Alice these days due to an increase in butt-kicking ability), I enjoyed a workout at his Krav Maga school, we had a blast at the Taiji Legacy tourney in Plano...fun, fun, fun!
I've noticed that I tend to put off blogging because I want to write a really great entry each time. However, that usually means that weeks go by without an update, and they're really not that great anyway. So I'll be brief.
Amy won 2 gold medals, Renee won 3 gold as well. We had a bit of a moment before Amy's staff competition when her staff was judged 'too thin', even though the woman next to her had a slender staff as well, and wasn't told this. I ran out to see Nelson of Beijing Imports, and he only had a handful of sticks available, none suitable. "Oh, wait, maybe this one..." he walked over to a corner and took his coat off of a stick that ended up being perfect, if a bit thick. He saved the day! The new staff was so huge that we immediately dubbed it "The Log", and Amy won her second gold medal with it. Yay!
I watched some of the Shuai-Jiao events while I was there, and with all due respect, I just wasn't all that impressed. I've had training in Judo and BJJ, and I've been thrown by Theo (Godzilla in human form), and watching these guys just wasn't what I had hoped it would be. I thought about entering this competition at the upcoming tourney, but I have several students competing, and I don't want to miss any of their events...my responsibility is to them, not to seeing if I can beat the Shuai-Jiao guys at their own game. However, I might hang around and see if I can have a friendly bout or two. ;-)
The san shou fights were lots of fun to watch, and Westside's guys all took gold. The importance of conditioning was highlighted in almost every match, and there was one guy who apparently thought he was Jet Li, based on the stances he was using. He lost the fight...go figure.
The Houston tourney is fast approaching, and I'm looking forward to visits from Sifu Israel Flores from Pharr, Tx and the incomparable Larry Escher from Corpus Christi, and man, we're going to have a grand old time!!
There's other stuff, but I'll post more tomorrow. Have a good night.
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Sunday, July 15, 2007
Flip that House, Plano, and Fun with Burpees
It's Sunday night, and my darling wife is on an overnight babysitting gig for a friend. She just returned a week ago from her 'Project Boot Camp', and just as I'd gotten used to having her around again, she's gone. (SIGH) Ah, well. Her absence has left me with some time on my hands tonight...what to do, what to do?
Our home has basically been somewhat shabby ever since we moved in. It was simple to start with, and we kept it that way, except that we managed to fill every nook and cranny with STUFF. Some of it is important stuff, and lots of it is actually junk. The problem is that it takes a moment or two of examination of each item to determine which is which, and we just haven't made the time to do that.
Since my darling wife has been away, she's been watching Flip That House, a show that depicts folks who buy a run-down home, then rapidly fix it up, and sell it for a profit. I know...it sounds way easier than it actually is. She's not interested in flipping houses, but she IS interested in watching all the renovations that turn formerly shabby houses into fabulous little homes. And so our home's shabby days appear to be numbered. She's fired up, and ready to get started with some big changes just as soon as her paycheck starts coming in.
Since she's gone for tonight, I decided to start straightening up the garage. The garage used to be kept extremely clean, because I taught all of my students in there. No laundry all over the floor, no junk, no boxes, no (exactly what is that thing?) in the corner. However, the day I opened my school, I recall chucking my first piece of junk into the garage with the intention of 'taking care of it later'. My friends, later is here!
I figure I'll get the whole thing cleaned out and ready for whatever my wife has planned by around...say...November. Rome wasn't built in a day, and it'll take far longer than that to tame the whole house. I'll keep you posted.
In other news, a couple of my students are competing this weekend at the Taiji Legacy tournament in Plano. I'm really looking forward to it for many reasons, one of which is that I get to spend the weekend with my dear friend Brian. There will probably be pho and Tex-Mex somewhere along the way, so I'm thrilled.
One last comment...it rained again today, so I decided not to do my interval sprints outdoors, and opted for the 100 Burpee Challenge as a replacement. My first go at the 100 B's took me 7 minutes 20 seconds a couple of weeks ago. The next time, I must have been inspired, 'cause it only took me 6 minutes and 20 seconds. Today, I just didn't bring my A-game...7 minutes and 9 seconds. Dang. That's OK, I'll do it again soon.
Oh, did I mention that we now have tires and a sledgehammer at my school? Great for stress relief, I tell you!
Our home has basically been somewhat shabby ever since we moved in. It was simple to start with, and we kept it that way, except that we managed to fill every nook and cranny with STUFF. Some of it is important stuff, and lots of it is actually junk. The problem is that it takes a moment or two of examination of each item to determine which is which, and we just haven't made the time to do that.
Since my darling wife has been away, she's been watching Flip That House, a show that depicts folks who buy a run-down home, then rapidly fix it up, and sell it for a profit. I know...it sounds way easier than it actually is. She's not interested in flipping houses, but she IS interested in watching all the renovations that turn formerly shabby houses into fabulous little homes. And so our home's shabby days appear to be numbered. She's fired up, and ready to get started with some big changes just as soon as her paycheck starts coming in.
Since she's gone for tonight, I decided to start straightening up the garage. The garage used to be kept extremely clean, because I taught all of my students in there. No laundry all over the floor, no junk, no boxes, no (exactly what is that thing?) in the corner. However, the day I opened my school, I recall chucking my first piece of junk into the garage with the intention of 'taking care of it later'. My friends, later is here!
I figure I'll get the whole thing cleaned out and ready for whatever my wife has planned by around...say...November. Rome wasn't built in a day, and it'll take far longer than that to tame the whole house. I'll keep you posted.
In other news, a couple of my students are competing this weekend at the Taiji Legacy tournament in Plano. I'm really looking forward to it for many reasons, one of which is that I get to spend the weekend with my dear friend Brian. There will probably be pho and Tex-Mex somewhere along the way, so I'm thrilled.
One last comment...it rained again today, so I decided not to do my interval sprints outdoors, and opted for the 100 Burpee Challenge as a replacement. My first go at the 100 B's took me 7 minutes 20 seconds a couple of weeks ago. The next time, I must have been inspired, 'cause it only took me 6 minutes and 20 seconds. Today, I just didn't bring my A-game...7 minutes and 9 seconds. Dang. That's OK, I'll do it again soon.
Oh, did I mention that we now have tires and a sledgehammer at my school? Great for stress relief, I tell you!
Thursday, July 05, 2007
Sean Sherk is one tough dude...
I caught the show on Sean Sherk a few days back, and was duly impressed. That is one tough little man! Here's a vid of his 'Caveman Training'. Enjoy!
Sean Sherk Vid
Sean Sherk Vid
Wednesday, July 04, 2007
The cards were evil, I tell you!!!
Happy 4th of July, everyone! I'm proud to be an American...just love it here. It's not perfect, but I feel extremely fortunate to be here, and I'm grateful to live in such a free society. Ok, that's what I have to say about that. :-)
It seems that I'm always working out while doing laundry. It takes our ancient dryer quite awhile to finish a load, so I generally have to wait around before I can switch things around. Apparently, this is prime workout time for me.
My agenda originally included a bunch of intervals on the track, but it's been raining for days, and I don't enjoy doing battle with mosquitos the size of rats, so I stayed indoors. Instead, I decided to try the Deck of Cards workout. Here's how it goes...
Each card requires a set of burpees (red cards) or a set of pushups (black cards), face cards count as 10, and aces count as 11. If you pull a 9 of hearts, then you're doing 9 burpees. Ace of spades, and it's 11 pushups. The goal is to get through the deck as fast as possible. My goal for today was to survive the entire deck without killing myself. I cleared a space among the piles of laundry, placed the cards close by and got to work.
I now hate the cards. All of them. They all suck, and I should just set them all on fire. But I won't...I don't want them to think that they've beaten me.
I completed the entire workout, yes I did. And now, I'm slack-jawed with exhaustion. See, when I started, I didn't realize that I was about to do 190 burpees and 190 pushups in all.
In other news, my darling wife will be moving home soon! She's nearing the end of her Project Boot Camp (and she misses us greatly), and should be returning home by the end of the week. This is good news, because I've been missing her as well, and so has the Monkey. She's made great progress in her quest to improve her health and fitness, and we plan to continue supporting her training once she returns home.
And that's about all I have the strength to type for now. Enjoy the holiday!
It seems that I'm always working out while doing laundry. It takes our ancient dryer quite awhile to finish a load, so I generally have to wait around before I can switch things around. Apparently, this is prime workout time for me.
My agenda originally included a bunch of intervals on the track, but it's been raining for days, and I don't enjoy doing battle with mosquitos the size of rats, so I stayed indoors. Instead, I decided to try the Deck of Cards workout. Here's how it goes...
Each card requires a set of burpees (red cards) or a set of pushups (black cards), face cards count as 10, and aces count as 11. If you pull a 9 of hearts, then you're doing 9 burpees. Ace of spades, and it's 11 pushups. The goal is to get through the deck as fast as possible. My goal for today was to survive the entire deck without killing myself. I cleared a space among the piles of laundry, placed the cards close by and got to work.
I now hate the cards. All of them. They all suck, and I should just set them all on fire. But I won't...I don't want them to think that they've beaten me.
I completed the entire workout, yes I did. And now, I'm slack-jawed with exhaustion. See, when I started, I didn't realize that I was about to do 190 burpees and 190 pushups in all.
In other news, my darling wife will be moving home soon! She's nearing the end of her Project Boot Camp (and she misses us greatly), and should be returning home by the end of the week. This is good news, because I've been missing her as well, and so has the Monkey. She's made great progress in her quest to improve her health and fitness, and we plan to continue supporting her training once she returns home.
And that's about all I have the strength to type for now. Enjoy the holiday!
Tuesday, July 03, 2007
Trip, lots o' burpees
Just got back from a pretty fabulous weekend up near Greenville, TX. I haven't seen Dad's side of the family for nearly 10 years, and it was absolutely wonderful to see them again. It was an easy trip up there, except that our little Monkey had to pee just about every mile or so, and we wanted to encourage him to 'listen to his body', so we took waaaaaay longer to get there than is usually required. Even so, it was a pleasant trip up, an easy ride back, and lots of laughter and family fun in between.
Ever thrown a cast net? I have, but it was many, many years ago. One of the family projects during our trip involved heading out to Uncle John's pond to catch some catfish. These were to be relocated into Aunt Sissy's pond. Seems like everyone has a pond out there. After a mud-drenched hike to get to the first pond (and taking time to push Uncle John's golf cart through the mud near the river) we threw food on the water in the hopes of attracting the huge fish. They handed me a cast net and told me to get to work.
Apparently, these fish are fairly smart. The silhouette of a dude on shore with a cast net in hand did nothing to reassure them, and they studiously ignored us for the rest of the day. I managed a few decent casts, but came up with nothing but some small fish that we threw back. Next time, I'm going in with a wetsuit, snorkel, and a ballpeen hammer, and I'm coming out with some danged fish.
Family time always means funny stories, and I've heard most of my Dad's tales many times. I usually know the end of them before he gets ten words into the story. But I still find them hilarious, and occasionally have to translate them for my wife, who can't understand him once he starts laughing at his own humor. The old man has a great sense of comedic timing, even if he doesn't know it.
He mentioned the last trip to Texas in which he drove my late Granny to see her family. Apparently, there was an issue with the opening of a package of brownies during the drive, and PING! one of his eyeteeth popped out of his dentures. He said he looked for it in the floorboards, but never found it. He went to the dentist in Angleton soon after, and the dentist asked Dad about the missing tooth.
"So, do you have the tooth, Mr. McClendon?"
"Naw."
"Any idea where it might be?"
"I think it's in the defroster somewhere."
And for some reason, that was the funniest thing I'd heard in quite awhile. I'm still chuckling about it.
Hats off to Mom for driving them all the way down from Indiana. After a 4 hour delay due to some car trouble, and another 1.5 hour delay because of construction, Mom and Dad came easing down the road to Aunt Sissy's at about 12:30am Saturday night. They'd been on the road for over 24 hours, and poor Mom had been pouring water on her head to stay awake for the last few hundred miles. They were asleep almost before they made it down the hall to their room, but they were safe and sound.
Anyway, it was a great visit, and I'll probably write more about it later. I was really wonderful to see my aunts, uncles, and cousins after being away so long.
And now, one last little pat on the back for me...
It was late Friday night, and I knew I wasn't getting another workout in until today because of the trip. I was waiting for the laundry to finish drying so I could switch loads, and I decided to do a quick 100 burpees to pass the time. My best time so far had been 7:20.
Amazingly, I did them in 6:20, and yes, I did count them correctly. I sounded very much like a wheezing hippo that needed to be put out of its misery, but other than that, I was quite pleased with my performance. Next time, I'm shooting for 6 minutes.
Ever thrown a cast net? I have, but it was many, many years ago. One of the family projects during our trip involved heading out to Uncle John's pond to catch some catfish. These were to be relocated into Aunt Sissy's pond. Seems like everyone has a pond out there. After a mud-drenched hike to get to the first pond (and taking time to push Uncle John's golf cart through the mud near the river) we threw food on the water in the hopes of attracting the huge fish. They handed me a cast net and told me to get to work.
Apparently, these fish are fairly smart. The silhouette of a dude on shore with a cast net in hand did nothing to reassure them, and they studiously ignored us for the rest of the day. I managed a few decent casts, but came up with nothing but some small fish that we threw back. Next time, I'm going in with a wetsuit, snorkel, and a ballpeen hammer, and I'm coming out with some danged fish.
Family time always means funny stories, and I've heard most of my Dad's tales many times. I usually know the end of them before he gets ten words into the story. But I still find them hilarious, and occasionally have to translate them for my wife, who can't understand him once he starts laughing at his own humor. The old man has a great sense of comedic timing, even if he doesn't know it.
He mentioned the last trip to Texas in which he drove my late Granny to see her family. Apparently, there was an issue with the opening of a package of brownies during the drive, and PING! one of his eyeteeth popped out of his dentures. He said he looked for it in the floorboards, but never found it. He went to the dentist in Angleton soon after, and the dentist asked Dad about the missing tooth.
"So, do you have the tooth, Mr. McClendon?"
"Naw."
"Any idea where it might be?"
"I think it's in the defroster somewhere."
And for some reason, that was the funniest thing I'd heard in quite awhile. I'm still chuckling about it.
Hats off to Mom for driving them all the way down from Indiana. After a 4 hour delay due to some car trouble, and another 1.5 hour delay because of construction, Mom and Dad came easing down the road to Aunt Sissy's at about 12:30am Saturday night. They'd been on the road for over 24 hours, and poor Mom had been pouring water on her head to stay awake for the last few hundred miles. They were asleep almost before they made it down the hall to their room, but they were safe and sound.
Anyway, it was a great visit, and I'll probably write more about it later. I was really wonderful to see my aunts, uncles, and cousins after being away so long.
And now, one last little pat on the back for me...
It was late Friday night, and I knew I wasn't getting another workout in until today because of the trip. I was waiting for the laundry to finish drying so I could switch loads, and I decided to do a quick 100 burpees to pass the time. My best time so far had been 7:20.
Amazingly, I did them in 6:20, and yes, I did count them correctly. I sounded very much like a wheezing hippo that needed to be put out of its misery, but other than that, I was quite pleased with my performance. Next time, I'm shooting for 6 minutes.
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