Sunday/Monday

Sunday:

The FOD is Kiu Two.

A few reps of Kiu Two, a few reps of Angry Snake (again, with a pen instead of a dao), all the mirror forms in a string. Touch Bridge seems as good as the others now. I was able to do that tricky arm spin in Five Points, by cueing myself to remember the start position a couple of moves beforehand.

Many reps of the Mirror forms in progress, Tiger Versus Crane and Black Crane 1. TvC: That spinning flying kick, starting to come along a bit. I added a couple of the next techniques…. If I wait till I can do the kick to move on, I'll never get this one done. Black Crane: I went ahead and worked my way all the way through it, since it is a very short form. The hairy part is the reap at the end- another spot where all four limbs are doing different things at once. It's coming, though.


Monday:

The FOD is Little Red Dragon.

Once again I am drafted to work a stretch of midnight shifts to cover for so-and-so who continually calls in sick. The boss has confirmed (confidentially to me) today that she is fixin' to let this person go. If I took this position, it would mean mostly midnight shifts (my favored shift) from now on, much less bouncing from shift to shift at all hours, a more regular/predictable/plannable schedule, and- whoee- health insurance. It also starts at 9:30pm. If I return to SK's class, I can't possibly get to work on Thursdays and Sundays till 11pm. I told the boss that I would only apply for the position if there was a way that I could get cleared to come in late on those two days. The logical part of my brain is asking me, "What are you smoking, woman???!?? You're a shoo-in for this job, but you could get passed over because of this clause. And you don't know if you will ever be able to return to that class anyway." Yet I just can't seem to burn that bridge. (If SK ever speaks to me again, maybe he'll be reassured to hear that I'm compromising my career on the hope/assumption that I'm going to be back in class at some point.)

Stretches of midnight shifts do make it very challenging to get to any BJJ. Yet on my days off, I ought to be able to do two classes per day- as long as I'm not too wiped out. Things are going to be hard for a few months- till someone gets hired and trained to fill whichever schedule hole remains. In the meantime, I will be doing the lion's share of both jobs. It looks like this entire year (beginning with my busted finger, and finishing with burning the work candle at both ends)is just panning out to be a poor year for training, on all fronts.

Today I worked on Little Red Dragon, all the Mirror forms in a string again (including Touch Bridge, which is as good as any of the others, and Black Crane 1, which just needs a few more reps to be equally as good. Several reps of the tricky reap at the end of BC1, which is really the only challenging part. More Tiger Versus Crane: mostly the spinning flying kick, and starting to work into the two final kick sequences after that. The Tiger sequence- on the mirror side- goes Left kick first, then right, and left back kick at the end. The footwork is a little tricky- if you don't have correct foot in front, your legs are essentially braiding when you try to do the kicks. The other kick sequence is going to be fairly easy to memorize, I just need a little practice doing the flying kicks on the less familiar side.

Played with the opening to Hurricane Hands In the Mirror. It was either going to be that one or Frolic Of the Five Animals.