Grappling Redux

OK, I’ve been called out on my crappy updating ways, so here’s my attempt to make amends.  I’ve just had such a boring life lately!

After about a six-month hiatus, I went back to grappling today!  Yay!  This was inspired by many things, but largely by my brother challenging me to a grappling match, so I need to get back in form for the Very Exclusive Mason Family Tournament, scheduled for Whenever We’re In The Same Room Next.  We can make t-shirts!

After six months, I have forgotten so much!  But not everything, so that’s good.  I even totally won two rounds of rolling.  One was the rear naked choke, my eternal favourite choke.  The other win may not count completely, because I had to get my rolling partner to talk me through the last half of the choke.  I was almost there, I had her pinned, and then I made her tell me how to finish because I suck and Angela is so nice.  Other fun thing: while practicing chokes I was trying to remind Angela to grab my head, but I was already kind of choking, so I couldn’t say anything, so I just kept hitting myself in the head, and she was like, “Are you tapping?  Did you forget how to tap?”

I continue to kickbox, of course.  I’m sort of getting to the point that I’m getting way fewer bruises, and the bruises I get are way lighter, which I know means I’m getting more hardcore and conditioned but also kind of sucks because I want my damn trophies.  I am in pain, why can’t I get my props?

In other, desperately important, news I have started putting blueberry liqueur on vanilla ice cream, and it is pretty much heaven.  The moral is, always do everything a booze salesman suggests.  I have never been lead wrong, in all the one time I’ve done this.

Jane’s Fighting Ships

This is my favourite new title for a book.  And there are several dozen books called Jane’s Fighting Ships, so I’m a pretty happy person right now.  It really just has pictures of military ships, but the title is great.  I’ve started work at the MMA Library!  I like to imagine it’s actually a mixed martial arts library.  Really, it’s the Maritime Museum on the Atlantic Library, where I am spending a few weeks hauling and unpacking boxes after their renovations.  The boxes are all labelled MMA Library, and that excites me terribly.  Now I really want to start a library dedicated to cataloguing sweet, badass moves.  I think I would be uniquely qualified!

The job is fun!  I get to tour the museum for free, which proves that I will take the least logical route to touring a museum (I toured the Art Gallery for free when I did library work for them, too).  I also get the inside scoop on ghost stories!  I learned that I know, like, way more about maritime issues than I thought I did.  And now I know more!  Sweet~

Moving boxes and hunching over books is invigorating, but hard on the back.  I’ve been taking a few breaths to do Wheel Pose in the stacks when I start feeling too caved in.  A quick stretch during physical work it totally legit, but it occurred to me that Wheel is probably one of the stranger looking poses to be potentially caught in at work.

Kickboxing update!  I learned a sweet new kick on Tuesday.  It’s a jump-back kick, or something, I didn’t catch the name.  Basically you stand right in front of your opponent, touching him, then you leap back on your front leg and use that force to propel your back leg forward into a really hard kick.  It feels great to do, it’s fast, and it works from punching range.  It’s a little hard to control and definitely needs more practice, but I love it to bits.  I was doing a snap kick, which was easiest, but Ray was demonstrating that you can do it with anything up to and including spinning back kick.  I think I need to practice just leaping up and spinning all the way around with one leg before I try to add a kick on there.

Because of the ways we were kicking each other, I now have a perfect, round bruise on the top of my wrist, right where my watch sits.  Just thought you should know, because my bruises are my precious children.

After about a month of rain, I finally bought rain boots.  It has now stopped raining.  Ya’ll can send me whatever cookies you like.

I had a conversation a few days ago that made me laugh.  Jill and I were complaining about how, in Nova Scotia, it’s impossible to find a bottle of wine for under $9, even the stuff that’s on sale, and doesn’t that suck?  After a pause, Jill was, like, “This is a real ‘developed world’ problem, isn’t is?”  Anyway, that cracked me up, and I wanted to share it with all of you.  And now I have.  Bam!

Stick a fork in me, I’m done!

Oh man, oh man, the homework is finished, the classes are done, the exams don’t exist, my degree is finished!  All I need is to actually get handed the piece of paper in May, and I’ll be a big-person librarian.  I finished up my work on Wednesday.  Cut to me, on Thursday, completely lost and confused.  Seriously, it’s been so long since I didn’t have anything to do, I’m pretty sure I can’t function like that.  Apparently I need a job and nine million hobbies and parties to go to or I go batty, wandering around downtown, caressing bowls and produce.  Luckily, Friday had plenty of activities lined up!  I think two days of nothing to do would be the end of me.

Friday kickboxing was good times.  We worked on chest and abs, whoo!  I’m looking forward to being in some pain tomorrow.  For one exercise, you laid on your back with your legs straight up above you, and reached up to touch your toes.  Then you did a sit-up.  Then you touched your toes twice, and two sit-ups.  Then three times.  All the way up to fifteen.  I just did the math, and that’s 120 all together.  Urg.  But I did it!  We also did pushups, where your partner does a plank, and you do a pushup on one side of her (facing her), then walk your hands over her shoulders, two pushups on the other side, walk over her shoulders again, three pushups, up to ten.  I remember doing this at the bootcamp last summer and sucking at it so hard, so I was really pleased that I did it, if not elegantly (never elegantly), at least properly and finishing.

Then, kicking things!  We practiced countering a Thai kick with a kick to the inner thigh, which was fun even if I apparently missed that I was supposed to the throwing Thai kicks.  We had to keep our hands down to counter the kicks, which was OK because we were out of range of any punches, but it still felt counter-intuitive to have both hands down.  I now have a pretty nasty bruise inside my knee.  Bruise watch alert!  It’s been so long since I had a really satisfying bruise, I am excited.  I also got punched in the nose because I wasn’t paying attention while I was supposed to be picking jabs to the face.  This happens sometimes, but what was weirdly embarrassing about this time was that my nose started running like crazy!  I was actually worried it might be bleeding or something, even though I knew I hadn’t been hit very hard, it was just so runny!  And gross!  Anyway, that’s my completely necessary story about things that might happen if you get hit in the face.  The more you learn~

I went straight from kickboxing to the MLIS year-end party.  (I’m always entertained by getting dressed up fancy at the club, because usually I dash out in my sweaty clothes without even redoing my ponytail.)  Very nice event, but I would’ve killed for some munchies.  I tried to start a ridiculous dance party with Leah, Naomi and Monica, but by the time the real dance party started I’d apparently lost interest.  I have a very small window of dance-party, it would seem.  Anatoliy gave me very good job search advice, because he is the sweetest.  And generally I caroused and chatted with people.  No drinking, though, because I am poor and sometimes I just don’t feel like drinking.  (Often when I’m poor.)

Having a car is going well.  I am offering rides all over the place, because I feel I have been given a lot of rides and I’ve built up ride-karma or something like that.  And in three days I’ll be back to being carless, so there’s that.  But I’ve come up with a new slogan for myself, based on my driving abilities in a new city, being inexperienced.  You see, I’m not a jerk.  I signal when I switch lanes, I shoulder-check, I don’t tailgate.  My problem, you see, is that I’m profoundly stupid.  I just wind up in the wrong lane sometimes, or I don’t know the rules of turning in this intersection.  So I feel I need a bumper sticker that sums me up: “Rarely an asshole, but often an idiot”  And really, couldn’t this apply to so many of us?  It’s the human condition.  Sometimes, yes, we are assholes, but mostly we’re just rock-stupid.  I am onto something here.

Bruises for Christmas!

With my lax December training, all my bruises have been fading.  But I got some good ones today in grappling!  Oh man, was grappling sweet.  We did The Thirties, which, if you don’t memorize every word of this blog (WHY DON’T YOU?), is, all totaled, ninety burpees, ninety sit-ups, ninety squats, and ninety push-ups.  Oh man, it’s been so long since I did that.  Now I will feel justified in everything I eat for the next two weeks.

But the best part was the rolling!  I rolled with Angela, and I got two, two, legitimate tap-outs, and our third fight timed out.  I didn’t get to start in the easy position, I didn’t get any special advantages, nothing!  My first win was with an Americana arm bar, which means, like, breaking-your-elbow move, and my second with a Rear Naked Choke, which is, well, a choking move, from behind, I have no idea why the ‘naked’ is in there, I’ve asked.  Anyway, I’m just giddy.  Grappling is harder in some ways than kickboxing, because the moves are so intricate.  Kickboxing is, like, Hit him in the face, kick him in the stomach, repeat as necessary.  Grappling is, Get your legs around her right shoulder and neck, hold her head down, hook your left foot under your right knee, point your toes up, pop your hips up, and squeeze your thighs.  And I have simplified this.  Incidentally, I just described the Triangle, one of my all-time favourite moves.  It is a choke, and God help you if you forget to point your toes up.

Another fun thing from rolling, Angela complimented my heaviness.  We spend a lot of time practicing being a heavy as possible on top of each other, which is so counter-intuitive for women, but important in rolling.  Anyway, I like it as a compliment, “You were so heavy!  Good job!”  Last week, Natasha and I were practicing heaviness, and from the bottom being, like, “Heavier, heavier, I know you can do it!”

Do I have anything to talk about that isn’t grappling-related?  I went shopping for my very few non-baked goods gifts.  I had a committee meeting in the Superstore, because Dana and I are the whole of a committee and we can have meetings wherever we freaking well meet.  Uh, the juxtaposition of those sentences makes it sound like I got my gifts at the Superstore.  I did not.  I got my soy sauce at the Superstore.

So… much… pain…

OK, so I learnt what conditioning is, and I learnt that it sucks.  It’s a kickboxing thing.  Basically, you get your body accustomed to being in pain by putting it in terrible, terrible pain.  We basically spent an hour on Saturday smacking each others’ forearms as hard as possible, all in the name of pain acclimation.  I don’t even have awesome bruises to show for it!  They are teeny, pale bruises.  I have a feeling they may be the deep, slow-forming sort of bruises that will bloom, glorious yellow, in two days time (I have become a bruise connoisseur).

I skipped grappling today, because at 1am last night I suddenly realized I have two assignments due this week, not just one.  Whoops!  I’m currently theoretically working on cataloguing, because it’s time to figure what a main heading is do some good work really well!

I bought new workout pants yesterday.  They are not from Zellers, so hopefully will not completely suck.  Burpees are miserable enough without my pants constantly threatening to slide down my ass.  To test their stay-on-my-ass-ability, I was totally doing jumping jacks in the changing rooms, desperately praying that the saleslady wouldn’t hear and be all, like, “Ma’am, are you stroking out in there?”  My point is: SportsChek should make changing rooms big enough for burpees.

I thought of a really good public service announcement, which I feel should be shared with the world.  OK, so there’s a princess in a tower, all Rapunzel-like.  Then she comes out of the tower, and immediately falls on a penis.  Then the PSA says, “If you’ve had sex, get a Pap!”  Brilliant, right?

An important offer

I am offering piggyback rides to people what wants ’em.  Think of me as a short-range rickshaw, but a rickshaw you’re not paying, and it gets bored eventually and just puts you down wherever.  This offer is not valid to creepy, creepy freaks.

I always get the best bruises from grappling!  Today I got a bunch of new weird bruises that seriously make me look like some kind of poxied freak, not even kidding.  All sorts of spots on my right bicep, some light brown, some bright blue, a few dark.  I may have picked up the Plague, is what I’m saying.  We also took a group photo at the end of class, and I debated brushing my hair, because should I be “coifed” or “authentic”?  I went with “authentic”, because I am also “lazy”.  Some guy was taking a bunch of pictures during rolling, so if photos arise of me choking a lady or getting choked, this is why.

Went to Tribeca with kickboxers last night.  Clubbing with kickboxers is ridiculously fun, because there is no fear of any trashy club people.  This drunk on the dance floor tried to get a bit handsy with me, and I totally wasn’t worried because I’m pretty badass on my own, but I knew if he got unfortunate I had a bunch of even more badass backup within about four feet.

Tammy and Laura were describing Friday nights at the martial arts club, which are basically bootcamp with kickboxing at the end, and sometimes even some grappling.  Everything I like!  I always hear about Friday because various kickboxers are always in pain on Saturday.  Anyway, Tammy asked why I don’t come to Friday nights, and I couldn’t think of any reason that I don’t, so I think we can all see where this ends!

Now I’m on the reference desk, and totally intending to do some homework, but also totally updating my blog so we can see how well that’s going.  I’m very sleepy, and my thighs are in fantastic pain from dancing in heels last night.  (Or from doing kicking drills yesterday afternoon, whatevs.)  I danced for like, two hours, then I stopped and was like, “That was gre-DEAR GOD MY LEGS!!”

Oh, I apparently have weirdly thin thighs.  I kept getting comments from people about my thin legs, and it turns out it’s my thighs, specifically, that are oddly thin.  I don’t know what to do with this information, but rock on, awesome thighs.  You are hard to show off in a skirt without me coming off like a whore, but I love you anyway.

Go Shannon, it’s your Halloween-party-day

Kickboxing yesterday!  You know, I had just been thinking to myself, “Self, it’s been, like, two months since you gave a person a piggyback ride.  What is even up with that?”  The Halloween-Party-Day gods were listening, and they answered.  In piggyback form.  My piggybackee, Sam, cheered me on with the whole, Go Shannon, It’s your birthday chant, until I corrected her with the Halloween-Party-Day chant.  Because yesterday, being the Saturday immediately before Halloween, was Halloween-Party-Day.  After that, she just concentrated on racing me against fellow bootcamper Laura.  Quoth Sam, “I’m always competitive when I’m the rider.”

Other kickboxing adventures: I got knocked over!  Right onto my butt.  That’s what happens when you get chatty and inattentive during a kicking drill.  Also, I have paid for my boxing gloves, and will receive them sometime next week.  New bruise: Left hip, lovely shade of dark purple.

Halloween party at the Library House!  Apparently, drinking wine straight from the bottle has become my signature, and I am deeply, deeply pleased with this.  I figure if I use a glass, I am just making more work for Library House People the next day, and also buying into the Dawn Liquid Soap advertising conspiracy and we’re all just puppets of the wine glass industry… or… something.  I don’t know, it all starts to fall apart once I start “thinking” about it.

Anyway, hungover until noon, so I skipped grappling, like a loser.  I have done precisely dick in terms of fitness today.   Have done precisely dick in terms of a lot of things, really.  No closer to attaining Nirvana, curing cancer, or finding true love.  But I did some homework and came to work, also I got to sleep in and watch sitcoms.  My life rules!  What were we talking about?

The nose is worrisome

SQL is freaking me out less, seeming downright do-able, which means I’m probably doing it wrong.  Oh well!

In bruise news, my awesome arm bruise is even awesomer, today.  And, and, on the other side of my bicep, there’s this weird little, like, archipelago of bruises, and I’m not sure if they came from kickboxing yesterday or grappling today (rolling got downright fierce, today, you know, for me).

I learnt in grappling that I have to stop crossing my ankles, which I do, like, freaking constantly.  Tammy, the kickboxing second-in-command, was at grappling, and she took to physically uncrossing my ankles while I was lounging around.  When I protested that I am a lady, god damn you (currently straddling and choking another lady notwithstanding), Jody said, “None of us are ladies, here.  We leave our vaginas in a box by the door.  It’s the box of boxes.”  Jody is now Officially Aces in my book.

(I need, like, a stamp, or a set of stickers, that say “Shannon Certified: Officially Aces”.  My cool grandmother and Jody would both have one.)

Then I rolled again, and I pretty much completely forgot everything, so I was just dodging around, and getting into good positions, then being, like, FuckWhatNow?  It’s been two weeks since I went to class (Thanksgiving in Truro and last week’s class was cancelled), so I’ve forgotten most of the moves except Arm Bar.  But I’m super-wiggly and surprisingly strong, so I still gave Tammy a run for her money.  Everyone else has mouth-guards, which I need, but the nose is what freaks me out.  It’s just out there, and when your face is getting squished into the floor (tactically squished into the floor, tactically), man, the nose is just waiting to get smooshed.  And my pretty face is basically my meal ticket.

And now I’m on the reference desk!  It’s good to Barbarian before you Librarian.

SQL is the sound a piggy makes!

I’m working on my SQL assignment (Teradata is open, god damn you, it is like work), which seems as good a time as any for a blog update.

Awesome kickboxing day, today.  We did some bizarre series of exercises I won’t even try to recount, and Gerald revealed that if anyone ever throws up in class, he’ll treat that person to a meal, sort of to replace the nutrients.  Sounds fair!  I’ve only ever gotten as far as crying, which merely got me mad props.  He was also filming us, so I was hopefully pretty rad-to-the-extreme.

I totally got roundhouse kicked in the arm, like, 150 times.  That number is not a hyperbole.  My left arm already has a completely wicked bruise, and I’m sure by tomorrow it’ll be even more awesome.  We were learning what to do when someone roundhouse kicks you in the arm, natch.  Yeah, you just get in tight and punch.  Turns out, roundhouse kicks sort of suck because they don’t really stop your opponent, so it’s best to go with a front kick or a side kick, again, for those backalley knife fights I know you all go to without inviting me.  In other kicking news, I got to freestyle kick with my opponent all over the place, which was super fun, and I’m getting pretty adept at kicking dudes in the face.

Then the ballet class after us came and kicked us out.  I thought we should have a dance/fight off, because the camera was right there and everything, and there’s even a guy in both classes, so there’s your plot!

After class, I took a nap, and now my hair looks like an anime character’s.  Seriously, why do I even have bangs?  Fuck bangs, just fuck those guys, hanging aroung my face, not even pulling their own weight or anything, then suddenly actively trying to escape my head like my forehead is coated in napalm.

It’s almost 9, why hasn’t my piggy-SQL homework magically finished itself?

Battered and Bruised!

You guys, I have so many bruises, it’s great!  One on my arm from grappling last week, and two new ones on my stomach from some shin last night in kickboxing, I don’t know.  Also, my right shin is all bruised, because I was Thai kicking the crap out of that joint, you don’t even know it (fine, my Thai kicks were middling at best, but I was doing them a lot, is my point).  Also, my feet are all sore from doing kicks in bare feet, which is what you have to do when you become, as Gerald put it, “One of us.”

We also practiced kicking people in the face, which is a very Zen experience.  Gerald kept telling us, “Don’t focus on the kick, focus on the leg.”  Eventually we figured that meant, “It’s not the journey, it’s the destination.”  Basically, it doesn’t matter if it’s a good kick, just get the motherfucker in the face.  It will surprise them!

Also, I showed off my biceps to Gerald, and I was like, “I guess I have some baby muscles now.”  And Gerald told me my biceps are definitely bigger than baby muscles.  He dubbed them Intermediate.  Badass!  You know… intermediate badass!

In other news, I went to those bra-fitting people on Spring Garden for help with my bra issues, and left with an atrociously expensive bra.  Turns out I’m an F-cup, which explains why an earlier trip to Lululemon was such an unmitigated disaster.  Oh well, now I have a totally cute proper bra that isn’t even a sports bra or anything, and all it cost was my first-born.  Anyway, I highly suggest that store (Lily’s), because they’re super-nice and will find proper bras for your boobs that actually make you not want to die inside.

I haven’t updated ya’ll on my reference desking, but I’m rocking the crap out of it.  Just keeping you posted.

Going to a TV Character Party as Pam from True Blood.  I was all het up to be Jayne from Firefly, but then I remembered my Jayne hat is back in Truro because Matt likes to borrow it, so I figured I could do I pretty good Pam.  I have the clothes, found some fangs, just need to roll my eyes a lot and I’ll have it down.  I think a bottle of cheap red wine upon which I’ve scrawled TruBlood in permanent marker might have to feature prominently as well.  I know I can get actually bottles of the stuff in Dartmouth, but those won’t get me drunk, now will they, Internet?