As I sat on the floor of the dojo, feeling a little confused as to why I was down there, I did wonder if this would have any negative impact on my ‘hard man’ image. Of course the ‘hard man’ image is just a delusion I have unto myself, but still… sticking your feet in the air, however good a suggestion under the circumstances, seemed faintly embarrassing.
Although, if objectively looked at, actually being sprawled out *on* the dojo floor in the first place could also be considered slightly embarrassing too. Being too stupid to admit that a stomach injury and karate training never make good bedfellows, and then seeing stars and fainting when knocking your own arm against aforementioned stomach, could also be categorised as embarrassing.
It would seem that Sensei’s lesson that personal pride doesn’t have a place in Karate may actually be true… who knew?!
Ah well, thankfully my little swooning episode wasn’t witnessed by many of my colleagues and I still get the giggles when remembering the slightly surreal “Do you like nuts?” question that floated from nowhere in a dark car park.
Mitigation: That particular question was asked by a female colleague, and she just wanted to make sure I had some food in my stomach before I started the drive home. Emminently sensible, but it did make me and the other Sensei I was with laugh at the unexpectedness of it.
I managed to win a new iPod Shuffle! The thing is truly tiny and now takes pride of place as I pursue my increasingly fruitless task of developing a physique….
…although pear-shaped is a physique, it’s not the one I’m really striving for, rather get away from!
So I can now be found bouncing around the gym, with diddy wee iPod attached to jogging trousers, desperately trying to pump iron to the tunes of Marilyn Mansun, Iron Maiden, Hoobastank, Guns n’ Roses, Nickelback, Rammstein, and many other devils music practitioners.
Now if I could just get rid of this damn cold! Although on the positive side, going around the gym equipment sneezing, coughing and sniffing and telling the other gym users “I haven’t felt right since Mexico” is getting me on the equipment far quicker than previous outings.
Karate tonight, although I’m sure the same ‘Mexico’ reference will not work quite as well on Sensei!
If the week was on a sliding scale, measuring how well it had gone, it would definitely be pointing to the middle ‘neutral’ ground.
From swings deep into the negative at the beginning of the week with the loss of a friend, not in the bereaved sense of the word, to swings in the other direction with the re-discovery of old friends.
From work and injury managing to stop me attending senior karate classes this week, although the positive is that work is finally starting to get interesting, to finally getting the spark back when presented with a pencil and a blank canvas; Although for some reason when presented with a blank photoshop canvas and a mouse I only seem able to doodle little cartoons… What’s going on there?
I have even started baking thanks to the ever helpful Mr Evans (@phevans).
However, I still can’t shake the feeling that the negatives will be deeper felt than the positives. Methinks it’s time to go-a-visiting next week, and finally fulfill some long outstanding beer promises, to play catch up and revisit simpler times.
…of course the scales can also extend to the “Oh shit, noooooo!” end of the spectrum, especially when you learn of ’Jade Goody the musical‘!
Its either time to emigrate or await the four horses of the apathetic apocalypse with open arms.
I am sat in front of the PC and desperately thinking of what I want to do.
I want to draw, but can only doodle a couple of silly cartoons and I can do so much more than that.. if only I could figure out what it was I wanted to draw or what medium to use; pen, pencil, pastels or photoshop with the wacom tablet?
I want to do some more PHP web development, but have so far only developed the equivalent of a “hello world” application and I have certainly done much more that that.. I can’t even figure out what Object Classes or Libraries I would want to use.
So I am sitting looking out of the metaphorical window, as I don’t have a real one in my roof space office, and thinking; “dammit since when did life start impeding on my playtime?”
So it would seem that there’s no hiding up here either… Which is damn rude of the real world!
Well, I didn’t think it possible, but the week has ended more shittily than it started! So on top of the heightened levels of fucked off, confused and unhappy we can now add being made to feel like a fool..
..I just can’t wait until next week to see what that brings!
Apparently the short one-liner of a post yesterday is better suited to twitter and not a blog post, I wasn’t aware that netiquette had developed to such a degree.
As to an explanation….
..Somewhat more difficult. I am sat here, in front of the keyboard, with a thousand words, phrases, sentences and paragraphs running around my head refusing to attach themselves in any permanent form to the screen. The backspace key is getting worn out and I’m afraid that the artificial intelligence within WordPress will just get tired of the relentless type-delete-retype-delete cycle and just publish anyways.
Where to begin and how to word this post without the spitted teeth embedding themselves into the paragraphs?
I dunno.
I value honesty above all else, and always ask friends to be frank and honest with me. I have a particularly thick skin and most things will be taken as they are meant – I always thought it particularly stupid to seek someones honesty and then repay that with hurt pride after they have taken a difficult leap to provide you with that feedback. Take it, deal with it, move on.
However the stream of ‘truth’ that came through over the Bank Holiday was a little too much, even for one as thick skinned and dense as myself. Whilst I recognised some of what was said, and sheepishly say “guilty as charged” to others, the rest just seemed pure anger and nothing that I recognised. The shutting of virtual doors afterwards leaves no room for response, and to be frank I don’t think I want to rattle those ‘doors’ to see if that’s even a possibility.
There comes a point in time when you think this is happening too often and I just don’t have the energy to weather this anymore.
I took it, the “dealing with” is being exorcised here, and now it’s time to move on, however sadly…
Somewhat in the same vein as my ‘8 beginner tips for Yoga‘, I bring you 10 gym warnings for the unwary. These have been gathered from my daily visits to the gymnasium in a desperate bid to develop a muscle.
There will always be somebody there bigger than you, trying to keep up with their regime will only result in arms that ache so much that you can’t lift your cup of tea at work an hour later.
There will always be somebody smaller than you, and perversely they too are able to lift more than you. Stick with your exercise regime and do *NOT* attempt what they just did… Nothing hits your self respect quite like whimpering for help as you try not to strangle yourself under a heavy bar.
There will always be a ‘fat-sweaty-bloke’ present whilst you exercise, whose sole job is to precede you on all equipment to cover it in a fine fragrant musk.
Laughing at the guys gurning as they lift heavy weights is NOT acceptable behaviour and can be hazardous to your health. (In a related note: do not attempt to look at your own face as you lift your more modest weights… it’s doing the same THING!!)
Parading or posing in front of the mirrors flexing your ‘muscles’ is acceptable practise, up until the point when somebody who actually does have muscles notices you.
No matter how big you are; strutting your stuff around the ladies section of the gym, in a faux attempt at getting water, makes you a cock…. in every sense of the word.
The amount of attention you attract is in direct correlation to the amount of wind you break and the attempts you make to try and maneuver said weights onto your chest and into your lap, after a major “uh-oh” failure in anticipating how heavy the actual weights are. (See #1 and #2 for more understanding of this point).
No matter which shower cubicle you walk into, and regardless of the colour of the shower gel provided, it will always be ‘essence of coconut’ and make you come out smelling like a macaroon.
Using the hairdryer to dry your hair is fine, using it under your armpits is a little weird, using it to blow dry your pubic hair down below is downright freaky!
Finally… Walking into the changing rooms to be confronted by the rear-end of fat-sweaty-bloke in all his naked glory, one leg up on a changing bench, throwing liberal amounts of talcum powder between the cheeks of his but-tocks does give you pause to wonder why you got up at this obscene hour and punish yourself in this way.
...to this!
All of the above has either been noticed, witnessed or done by myself – i’ll leave it to your overactive imaginations as to which ones which.Â
Further rules can be found here, please add your own comments as to any other warnings/rules/observations I may have missed.
