In JKD...

I'd have written about this much sooner but the tournament happened...then I got caught up in writing a poem about the crush, even though the event I wanted to relay is about her. What can I say? My need to express myself through the poem took over.

I was paired with her in JKD 1. We were practicing responses to the lead Now-Tek (hooking kick). Our legs touched. She scratched me with her big toe. It may have drawn blood. She didn't know it happened. I told her. She apologized. I didn't want her apology, I just wanted her acknowledgment that this moment happened, even if her understanding of it was drastically different than mine. I kept thinking this is the most physical contact we would ever have, and I savored it quietly. She's amiable and likes to laugh. I did not have to hide my smiles, just that goofy glazed over twinkle that effects both drunks and the lovestruck.

The sexual symbolism of her drawing my blood was immediate (to me). Here she is with a chastity ring (I still haven't pressed her if this is a promise ring or a purity right for the wedding) and I'm the one cut open. If I was the virgin in this situation, what was lost/gained? Certainly nothing so practical as my first time working with a girl in a martial context. I didn't reveal anything of import, nor did she. It is more primal than that; she pierced me, and I delight in the wound. I'm supposed to be bound to another and she cut through that carelessly, unknowingly. She barely broke skin, but the force caries on to the center. Hmph, none of that translates into a smooth lost/gained binary opposition. I've certainly lost, but what have I gained here? I do not know.

I'm reaching that point where sincerity turns saccharine. Sincerity, the genuine, is the hardest thing in the world to express, especially when it's connected to love and suffering.

And all the while I am a failure and traitor, try as I may, I have not served G well.

Cough/Hack

Lord God, the last week was awful, just awful. If it wasn't all the damn fighting, it was the bacteria; largely due to the blinding sunshine and humidity of psychic distress, I was a pitree (sp???) dish of coughing, pink eye, insomnia, and laryngitis. Oh what fun the last week was, I meant to examine the relationship between me and G, but reality forced my gaze elsewhere.


So what now? I don't have a lot of time tonight for writing, so just gonna throw a few things out there:

1. Am having a lot second thoughts about a job in the insurance industry
but without the money, I may never get out of here.
2. Having second thoughts about the U of Phoenix position,
but without the money, I may never get out of here.
3. My sister scares me, don't think I've ever made that clear;
something is wrong with her be it psychopathy or some other related disorder
4. G and I had a fight over my friggin sister?? I would rather G say to me
"I just can't forgive you for leaving/the rape/whatever, goodbye" than to end it
because of the goddamn baby-kicker.
5. Tournament in 2 weeks, under 140 beginner divisions. I am gonna crush the
competition. I have A LOT of stuff to work out.
6. The one benefit to everything, is it's left too emotionally exhausted to
obsess over my JKD crush, I have just enough emotional energy for one
fantasy a day.

Radiation Therapy

So my crush is engaged, due to be married in a few months. I found this out last night during JKD. In about ten seconds, I knew what my next blog post would be be about, title included. I was given a huge dose of radiation therapy.

Knowing she will be married soon places another ethical roadblock in my way; it prevents me from cultivating any sort of relationship with her, which in turns prevents me from destroying my relationship with G. Stupidity is radioactive. One blunder becomes two, two becomes three, and then those around you begin to blunder and stumble. Stupidity spreads like the halo at the base of a mushroom cloud.

In this case though the treatment is radioactive too. It burns, god, does it burn. The school girl crazies giggling through my marrow are ground into Saharan dust. I'm sweating the butterfly fever through my hair; she is my first gray hair, my second, and my third. The bush and tangles clumped in my hand, as I stand in a hot shower. Old guilt, a stirring for someone not named G, is replaced by new guilt, fatigue from the crush itself, because I am still left to wonder: Can it still work between us? Is it too late? Am I still losing her? And the sad answer is an emaciated, forlorn yes.

In retrospect, the high school aspect to the experience is complete. Too often I fell for girls because of some intangible thing I saw, a talent, a dreamy kaleidoscope in the center of their chi. My first crush, my VERY first crush--I was 12 or 13 at the time--was a talented actress and an amazing singer. Forgive me for reducing her to a scale, but I honestly couldn't tell you if she were a 7 an 8 a 9 or a 10. I fell for her because of the way she sang: that dizzying, whirling, out of control barf ride at the State Fair, love, was not returned. She just didn't see me that way. It happened again in high school. In my senior year there was this one girl, smart, outgoing, ambitious, confident, brilliant blonde hair. One day, we were talking. It was inside a McDonalds; I was minding my own business, listening to her, impressed, by her focus, everything she wanted to do and be, and my heart started doing backflips and moonsaults, pirouttes and handstands. It was the Olympics, and my ventricles were doing the floor routine. I was surprised by the suddenness of the thing, its divine irrationality, and as before she was not interested.

There are two things she said to me I will never forget: "you treat me like a queen" (intoxicating even as it followed rejection), and "Tigr, honestly, sometimes talking to you is like talking to a brick wall."

I have been kicked in the nuts, I've been pegged in the nuts by a soccer ball, I've been tackled so hard it tingled from my chest through to my extremities. There's been the referred pain of the hips, and the searing, buckling numbness, of being wacked in a large nerve. What she said hurt more, it shamed me; but I couldn't tell her that, I was a wall, she was right.

And college? College. College. College. At this point a descriptive history of my un-love life becomes tedious, redundant, filled with excuses and cynicism. (In other words I don't feel like writing about it). For this crush, it was her boxing. I was impressed by how quickly she absorbed the boxing, she learned to turn with her hook, in comparison to me, a fraction of the time. (the porcelain, Victorian skin of her thighs didn't hurt either) It was off to the races.

To compare G to all of this???? I am stupefied; forget about doing anything, I don't even know what to make of it. I think this is enough for now. I'm sure I'll be revisiting this in the coming weeks.

I miss the drive-in 2

So I've been thinking. You know, I was a bit scared to ask that guy to stop texting, and I was definitely scared when I was stuck with him for the rest of the movie. I felt guilty, not just because I hadn't meant for it to become a production. I felt guilty because I didn't ask him in the first place, even though I knew my past history in movie theaters made it a dangerous proposition. I feared losing control of both myself and the situation. And to a degree I DID lose control of the situation. I was stuck! I couldn't leave the theater, or at least I didn't feel as if I could leave the theater upon a perceived threat of violence. You'd think my training would instill confidence. It didn't, perhaps if the situation had turned violent I would have remained calm, but that is speculation. What my training did was make me aware of the potential for violence and the consequences of violence. So it's not as if my training failed, I kept myself out of a compromising position and yet I still felt COMPROMISED. I'm not sure what all this means. Sifu would say my avoidance of conflict was a victory in itself: I didn't get hit; I didn't get hurt; therefore, I didn't lose a fight. And I agree. It's just...I don't know. This incident pushed my buttons. Is it a gender thing? As a male there is pressure for me to solve conflicts aggressively? Maybe the trauma has created an extra incentive to solve my conflicts with the grace and skill of a caveman, but my movie theater blow ups happened before I was tortured and I've ALWAYS been a bit shy. Ugh!

I miss the drive-in

Had a sour movie going experience Friday. I went to see The Hangover with a friend....No, that's not why it sucked. THe movie itself was alright. I was caugt off guard by the Danzig song in the opening credits but that is neither here nor there.

The black guy to my left started texting during the trailers, that was annoying but I let it slide. Then the fucker kept doing it for a good 20 min straight into the movie. I'm not good with confrontation; I consider myself to be shy, but when it comes to movie theaters---how do I put this?--there were two occasions were I lost it. I mean I just flipped out and did some serious screaming. That's not how I want to conduct myself, I don't even want to risk it, so I left the theater and complained to a manager, who was SUPPOSED to wait and not follow me in immediately. He waited all of 5 seconds. Sigh. The texting stopped. Then the guy next to me said "You could have just asked me blah blah blah" to which I replied "I find there is no polite way to do it," which in my case has served as a true statement.

Then the usher asked the dude to leave. I hadn't anticipated that. He was gone for about 5 min, then he returned. During the interval, I was unsure if HIS friend had made a threat to me or was just talking at the screen.

I felt bad about the guy leaving. I wasn't trying to get him kicked out, but when he returned? Dude! Why even bother?? That just makes it really uncomfortable and awkward, and I was getting a little scared and started wargaming my best defense to a two on one assault. Grapple? Or go for the eyes. Best to keep it standing, avoid th throat if possible, cross fingers hope they didn't have weapons. Their being 2 black males in a dark room reminded me of the rape. I wasn't going PTSD, but this must have been one of the hundreds of hell dimensions from the Buffyverse.

If I had been sitting on the end I would have left. I was miserable, but actually leaving meant crossing between two men I didn't know or trust so I stayed put and hoped that when the lights went up they would just leave. Luckily, they did. My friend downplayed the incident, but said something to the manager about his lack of timing. I just wanted to go home and hug Radar and bask in his grunts and shovel-heads.

God damn, I miss that drive-in.

p.s--Could have asked him?? There was a sign outside saying texting was a no-no.

JKD curriculum

Had a discussion with Sifu about the path beyond yellow belt. Didn't say much I didn't expect. From a pedagogical stand point, JKD is a bitch to teach because it favors breadth of knowledge over specialization. This includes street and weapons applications; moreover, it is concerned about the interactions amongst various strategies grappling, sparring, striking, and the previously mentioned. For green this can be broken down into ratios, but the higher you go, supposedly, the trickier it gets. Personally, I think the system should have majors and minors ala academia. Sifu fears this will lead to over-specialization. I don't because the JKD base skill set is striking, as long as attendance in phase 1 is compounded by regular/semi regular attendance in phase 2, as well as the study of a third strategy there is little fear of over-specialization. Not to mention, anyone willing to do all of this in the first place is committed to the long haul.

What is problematic for me currently is juggling all the damn classes. Grappling is now 7:30 on tues/thurs This is the same time JKD 2 meets. Jumping between the 2 classes is wacky enough, but what happens come Dec and I decide to pull the trigger on MMA? --The MMA classes btw, are also tues/thurs at 7:30. Argh! And I don't even wanna think about Wing Chung. IF that stands as a JKD req I am gonna be pretty fucked. Grrr.

As an addendum to our discussion I'm gonna ask him about making the triple punch part of the 1 curriculum.

Side note: Last night we ran the gauntlet in grappling. It was strange none of the pros or more experienced guys were there, except Sihing. I was the smallest, followed by that promising wrestler in the 140s, another guy was in the 150s, Sihing is 170, and then a 282 lbs-er built like a squat version of the Stay-pufft Marshmallow Man. I went first and thought those 2 min rounds were gonna kill me (Taking the now ultra hard fitness kb class probably didn't help. It's funny, the rounds are shorter in a gauntlet, and the over all time isn't significantly different from standard rolls, but there's just something about taking on a fresh person coupled with the fact you are being watched. Yes, I think there is a strong psychological motivator involved.

Brain Mush

Was studying for an insurance licensure exam. My brain is mush. It's frustrating, sometimes a meer two hours of this stuff does me in.

Officially passed JKD test. I'm a 2 stripe yellow belt. Sifu indicated 2 stripe yellow belts have seen the breadth of the level 1 course. I thought it was supposed to take us to green (?) Have to ask him about what the deal is with the curriculum.

Bad news, Good news

I'm not pleased with the spotty posting. Seems every proclamation to regularly scheduled program guarantees 5 to 7 days of silence. So no more proclamations, just determination.

Sigh, so where to begin. Bad News first of course. My father has--
I don't even know what to write. No, I know what to write, but I am enervated. Drained of the energy to write about his whiz bang cherry-banana split of hubris, stupidity, and what is either stubbornness or senility.

He had to send a letter to Federal Court in Texas. He doesn't mention this to anyone, doesn't write the letter, until he's eating dinner with mom the night before it's due. There's more to arc of the story. It isn't worth reciting. The letter didn't make it. Not even close.

More bad news: still seem to be nursing a crush. This has exacerbated a sense of impending doom. That my relationship with G is in waning moments. When I'm with my girlfriend I feel more sad than happy, more agitated and angry than excited. We spent memorial day weekend at the beach house. We had fun. Visited a few of her friends. Spent time on the beach, even went to a drive-in (holy ground as far as I'm concerned). But I snapped at her a few times. Once I even felt the need lash out at her physically. I cannot endure our relationship this way, regardless of whether we're living together or long distance. The only thing worse than the fear of hitting her, is actually hitting her. What would I do then? That rabbit hole is not worth the tumble.

There's been talk of her getting a promotion again. One she richly deserves, but I'm afraid it will be our death knell. She will have no incentive to move, regardless of when she finishes her M.A. I can't go back there, I can't live in Florida, the town of our prime years is tinted by rape and anger and stasis.
As I say this I want to make it clear I have no indication that Chastity likes me; in fact I highly doubt it, even if she did I balk at the potential incompatibilities. She's probably evangelical, I'm coo-coo bananas, and a horny, low tolerance for organized religion coo-coo bananas.

Good news:
I've unlocked the secret of the upper-cut. I won't go so far as to say I've MASTERED the damn thing, but I'm finally punching with my whole body. Not just my arms, not just my legs, not my arms and legs, but my arms legs and CORE.
Drop with the legs, twist the core on a descending diagonal, rise up with legs and core,let the arm poke up just a bit past nose level. Also I took my 2-stripe yellow belt test Thursday, unless I really botched the vocab section, I should have passed.

Random Stuff

So this girl, the one with the chastity ring, the one that gives me the school girl crazies, the big bad butterfly fever, the puppy dog mumbles--all of which are symptoms of the hyperbolic verbosity disorder--I noticed she wears stud earrings (I think that's what they are called: simple metal rods with a silver bead at each end. This strikes me as funny, subversive, and possibly grounds for a paradox in the time space continuum. I associate such baubles with pierced lips, prince alberts, and other kinds of genital, heavy metal accessories. In short, they're tools of the bad girl trade, not a demarcation of the Fine Upstanding Evangelical (I have no idea what moral/ethical code she follows, but a chastity or promise ring usually indicates evangelical christian). I don't have much else to say about the issue, other than I hope my girlfriend NEVER EVER reads these entries. And if she does, I hope she remembers the patience and understanding I showed her when the tables were reversed 0:)
(Is that first sentence even close to being grammatically correct??)

Speaking of JKD, Tuesday, Sifu informed the class of my grappling success, praised my development, and stated that if they need help with the grappling portion of the level 2 test I was the one to ask for help. Oh, he also said my grappling was "good" I appreciated the praise and recognition, but I wouldn't call my grappling good...not yet.

Yellow Belt, 1 stripe

I officially passed the test or "progress check" as Sifu ruefully calls them. I noted it was ironic that our belts were imports, straight off the back of a boat from china, and our stripes were just generic black tape. Then again, generic black tape probably comes from China anyway.


Sifu stated would become more comprehensive in nature, which I take to mean longer and more involved. Since we will be learning more Thai concepts--basic thai kick, knees, clinch--this is unsurprising. We can also expect thai-like test components, 60kicks/45knees in a given time frame kinda thing.

I'm a fickle 12 year old girl

I've spent the last few weeks having doubts about my relationship with G. It never seems like I give enough, sometimes I feel like I'm stuck in a love triangle; she sees the martial arts as competition. This isn't counting all the ways I feel guilty, all the ways I think I'm failing at the relationship. How can she feel needed/loved when we spend most of the time apart? It's a fair complaint.

So with all this going on I've found myself, er, infatuated by a couple of girls in the dojo. I haven't flirted; I haven't done anything out of the ordinary (that I know of). Thinking about them makes me a little goo goo ga ga. But I experience the attraction differently for both. For one, the attraction feels intellectual, the ole "Ah, this person could understand me" She has traveled further down the martial path than I have, and has born the sacrifices of that decision.

The other is a neophyte, but impressed me with the alacrity she picked up the basic boxing techniques. She is a music teacher, classical guitar.

Sound like a 12 year old girl yet? If I don't I'd love to hear your definition of a fickle teenager.

After JKD, I asked her about a ring she was wearing. I felt foolish enough having a crush on this girl, so much so the idea of having the puppy dog syndrome over a married woman a bit embarrassing. Simultaneously, I HOPED it was a wedding band, that a cold hard smack of reality would whiplash me of the daze.
She showed me the ring. It had engravings.
"It's a chastity ring"
The cold hard smack of reality by way of a wet towel across my bare ass.
My infatuation was muted, but still there.

Anti-Climax

So the long winding path to this spring's submission grappling tournament seem to be lacking in momentum: no drama or melodrama because I've been busy trying to secure work, coupled with the banality of training, no that it hasn't had its moments (this is also why my return to blogging was short lived.) How anticlimactic is it? The tournament is this Saturday, and I haven't said one thing about it in weeks. I've been much more concerned with

a) Getting the aforementioned job
b) Making actual progress in JKD--we had a yellow sash (1 stripe) "progress check"
c) the judo tournament yesterday (Sunday)
d) behaving like a fickle 12 year old girl (getting its own post)

BJJ itself is going fine, I suppose. We've started implementing the Carlos Machado curriculum, and I know 3 ways to do a basic sweep, and quite frankly, I wouldn't mind knowing two more.

JKD Make up Test

Was baffling in it's laid back easy going tone, such is the way of Saturday mornings I suppose. I'm not complaining. (I see the fitness requirements as nuisances, not goals.) Sifu even said we passed the test, which he would never do during the week. He'd make us wait. I'm officially a yellow belt now.

Afterwords I had the opportunity to jaw bone with the Thai black belt. She's an administrator for a children's home. I asked her about her job and its unique hardships. Once, she held a meeting where a mother told the child that she couldn't be her mother anymore and was signing the child over to the state. Thai had to restrain the child.

Another story: As Thai was heading to her car one day she saw a teen who appeared to be making a break for it. Thai chased her down. There was a struggle, and Thai believed the teen was trying to throw herself in traffic. Help arrived. Later, when asked why she was trying to kill herself the teen replied "But I wasn't, I was trying to kill you, Thai." "Why?" "To see how much you loved me.".........................................................................................................................
.............Now that is some serious bat-shit crazy. My head blew a fuse when she said that.

Performing the job she has takes both tremendous empathy and ..a..a..a kind of discipline I don't have a word for, "resolve" perhaps?
And she's divorced. And she has twins. Me? Ask me where my car keys are? If I get that on a first try then I am having one tremendously yellow brick road musical of a day.

Note: Thai has to depend on orderlies in many confrontational situations. Ethical codes of her profession prevent her from using most of her techniques or she'll risk losing her license.

Fitness Kickboxing...to the death!

Most of the time in Fitness Kickboxing and JKD 1, I'm one of the more advanced students when it comes to basic boxing. I spend a lot of time working on THEIR form and their feeding technique. But not last night.

There is a girl--she has twins, is "girl" a wee bit condescending??--who comes to the dojo in spurts. She happens to have great legs, a friendly disposition, and a black belt in Muy Thai. Her smile is arresting. Big and honest, she has one tooth in the front row that juts at a precarious angle. Is it a simple renegade tooth making trouble for her brothers and sisters or the result of something vicious, a punch she had for breakfast early in her training or an oopsie, a clutsy mistake we all make, like walking into a pole or it could be the scar of her own personal trauma. The smart money is on the knuckle sandwich.
She-- Oh that's right, she's not JUST a black belt, she passed an instructor level examination. Regardless, I haven't worked with her in at least nine months. When it comes to feeding, it's pretty easy to sit on your heels, get a little too comfortable with beginners. Not with her, I was fighting for my life. She wasn't out to kill me, she's just that good. She has speed, she has intent, and she seemed to lean forward a little.
I couldn't tell if that's what she was doing or the way she carried her head, I was too preoccupied with not getting hit! In fact, during one of the two other times I've fed for her she whacked me twice, once in the eye, once in the mouth. This made me feel tentative. I grabbed my mouth guard at the first opportunity.
"Mouth-guard? You don't trust me?"
"No." And no disrespect was intended, just the opposite. Her punches are straight, and if you ain't ready you will get popped. Despite being a little scared--scared of a girl yes, I admit it--I want to work with her again. She pushed me from both directions, and offered the occasional constructive criticism.
"When you bob and weave, look at my chest." Now there's something you won't hear a woman say very often. I kept this observation to myself.

Not pleased

Tentative Summer teaching schedule is one ten week course that meets in the evening, finishing just late enough to completely wreck two nights of dojo training. Grrrr. Turning my request form in early apparently counted for sweet fuck all. Better start looking for an employment plan B. Excuse me while I go brood in a corner.

Practice

Lately, I've felt impervious, I mean my ego has been impervious, to the tap-outs and the fuck ups and the overwhelming weight and strength and speed of my contemporaries, just another day at the office. This isn't to say I've burned out or don't care anymore, far from it, I'm handling defeat better. I haven't needed to feed off little victories the way I used to. They are still there, a slow improvement in movement,near competency with a couple of sweeps (basic, kimora), and a sense of...flow is beginning to emerge. Now if we had a true technique class I think it would emerge faster, but hey, I'm making the best of what I've got.

Off to JKD soon.

King of the Whitebelts Forever

There was a test, an actual by god test, in JKD last week. New Year, new system, actual monthly tests. I didn't feel any real pressure for most of the test (except when Sifu did the feeding, mostly because it didn't even test up to the yellow belt level, so once again I am a two striped white belt in JKD, but I'm clearly the best boxer of all the white belts. Presumably, I'll be doing a yellow belt test at the end of this month. There is a good chance, I may make green belt by end of the year.

In Judo I'm moving towards my blue belt (white>>green>>blue). I'm in no rush right now to test; I think a lack of randori has hurt my development, and only having one guy who is over 6 ft has given me a few bad habits I have to correct. The good news here is we;re now trying to get in an hour of judo on Mondays and Fridays (I have this dream where one day practice will consists of more than me and the judo brown belt). I'm going to attend a judo camp in the summer, where I should get plenty of randori experience. After that, I'll test for the blue belt (am also hoping to do a judo tournament before that too)

BJJ? Who knows? I like the incorporation of wrestling, but we need more high rep drills, stuff like armbars from the bottom. I did a few in the beginners class and my legs felt like jelly after 10 reps, unacceptable. Are there any solitary drills for practicing those armbars? Would go a long way in developing the strength of my guard too (physically and tactically).

Oh while I'm thinking of it, Monday, the BJJ brown belt had us doing some scramble drills, and really opened up how to approach the mount. If no locks are available or if the person is about to escape, switch to knee to belly, side, back to mount, hell at one point he--how do I describe this?--it was a mount but he monetarily faced the other direction, weight near the chest (not the same as reverse mount in sambo, at least it didn't appear that way)

Reverse Lead

I arrived at the dojo feeling good. Even though I’d done Cindy that morning I had the energy for a three hour session at the dojo. I decided to to take the fitness kickboxing class. Over the past few weeks my boxing has broken through a learning plateau. My hook looks like a hook, my cross looks like a cross. My stance itself is better. I’m better at controlling weight distribution through my feet; the legs are turning with the punches. When I want to emphasize power I can do so (with the kickboxing not so much, although I’ve gotten better at using my hips and turning my head off the line). I asked Sifu if he thought I was ready to work in reverse lead, and how to go about doing so. He thought I was ready, suggesting I remind him from time to time on boxing days (work with leftys, work with experienced folks who themselves needed to work reverse leads)

He decided now was as good a time as any so he paired me up with H, who had just passed her first Thai test.

Working reverse lead is like hitting the reset button, as you simply don’t have the muscle memory. To have a solid right lead hook, you must practice the right lead hook, likewise for the left. Knowing one doesn’t mean you know the other, it’s not a transferable skill, but the JKD ethic (and our curriculum demands you learn both). Even though it might be a couple years before I actually have to test this stuff there’s no time like the present (and if it takes as long as my right side I may need these two years).

H didn’t share my enthusiasm for working the left side. As the class progressed she became progressively upset, she wasn’t getting the workout she wanted. We were both equally clumsy, but I was trying to be patient, to look at the big picture. She blamed me for ruining her hour, at least that’s how I was taking it, and I just about had enough. I was being blamed for learning and adaptation, for being challenged. Can’t have that in a dojo. She got cattier and cattier, had we not switched to kickboxing (and leads) there would have been a blow up. Luckily, I didn’t say what was on my mind

“Have you ever been raped? Ever had a gun to your head? How about tortured?

No? Then shut the fuck up and work the combination.” Yeah, sayin’ that would have been bad. I don’t know what the long term result would have been, but suffice to say I think the class might have come to a dead stop.

I stayed for grappling. H didn’t stay for the Thai class.

Busy Week

Had to lone mom 2,000.00. Never thought I'd be doing that. Practice is on the ropes.

Very busy week: writing/revising personal statements, helping at office, and all the other crazy ga ga I do...and I may get up tomorrow to do a Muy Thai seminar.

Oh, discovered there is a tourney in GA with an open weight white belt division, making it exactly the same as the average practice for yours truly. Will see if I can interest a few people in going.

Soreness

Yesterday I ran 3 miles before kickboxing, which wouldn't have been a problem if I had waited 3 hours between the two instead of a paltry 90 minutes. Ugh. I am sore, a fused hunk of metal sore...and i have this sneaking suspicion that there will be another gauntlet tonight (either consciously or otherwise they always tend to happen in pairs).

In my day life, it's safe to assume I'm not getting a 14 week section. Girlfriend suggested I apply as a sub. teacher. I'll look into it, but districts may not be hiring until summer if not at all.