[ Posted by Janka
Fri, 29 Aug 2008 11:08:43 GMT ]
Bussilehdissä uutisoitiin, että jonkun intternetissä tehdyn kyselyn mukaan 12-19-vuotiaista tytöistä suunnilleen kaikki haluaisivat muuttaa jotain kohtaa ruumiissaan ja että he kokevat ulkonäköpaineita. (Käsi ylös, joka yllättyi. Ja ne kanssa, jotka eivät, jos ilmaiseksi ja turvallisesti pystyisivät, muuttaisi jotakuta kohtaa itsessään.)
Tällaisia kyselyjä tehdään muuten ihan yhtä mittaa. Ja niissä todetaan aina sama asia: joo-o, ihmiset on tyytymättömiä ulkonäköönsä ja kokee siitä paineita. Ja sitten toiset ihmiset lukee tästä lehdestä ja nyökyttelee, että sellaista se on, kyllä on paineita, meillä kaikilla.
Miksei näissä kyselyissä koskaan kysytä, että oletko tyytyväinen luonteeseesi, ja koetko paineita olla hyvä ihminen, ja jos saisit muuttaa jotain olisitko mieluiten ahkerampi, hyväntahtoisempi, itsenäisempi, rohkeampi, avoimempi, parempi kuuntelija, vai ehkä kenties joisit vähemmän tai et kuuntelisi niin herkästi juoruja, vaiko jotain muuta, mitä?
Sen minä vaan haluaisin tietää.
Posted in Sama suomeksi | Tags self, uutiset | no comments
[ Posted by Janka
Thu, 28 Aug 2008 19:17:56 GMT ]
I had real, real trouble getting myself into class today. Real glad I went though. We were just three in the rapier section, and it was really a good and fun doing things that way; when we were changing often there was the option to observe a couple of goes of a drill and then have a go yourself, which was really, really helpful for me.
For laughs, I wish someone could really see all the visualizations I use. At some point today, I think I had water sprouting from my wrists, a stick pointing to my hip, a random guy balancing on my shoulders, and Ilkka standing on my left foot. (He does that when I lunge occasionally; I found out that an imaginary version of him does quite as well to keep the foot from sliding as the real one.)
I can do one thing well with rapier and that is counter-attack in seconda. Preferably coming from cavazione, but I can live with just a change of line. My parries were terrible, again, but at least they are now parries. Go me. Other than, we did some very nice work on stepping without rocking back and forth, and some very clear and basic stuff with attacks and cavaziones and counter-attacks and parries. Nothing fancy, nothing complicated, just simple, brilliant rapier basics. I really do love the style.
I claimed before class that I am still in total crap condition, but I noticed in the warm-up that I had actually zero trouble maintaining the push-up position, changing hands, etc, so at least doing those planks seems to have paid off.
In other news, I hereby sulk about the new class schedule for fall not having a rapier class on Thursday. Yes, I know I have not joined any of the mailing lists where I might have actually discussed it beforehand and stated my opinion, but I still reserve the right to sulk in my own blog.
Edited to add: the way the counter-attack in seconda feels is probably how all swordsmanship should feel. It feels like I do not really actually do anything. The sword goes where it belongs and I simply mostly just stand there. There’s no real “movement” or “action”, just a quick change in the “being” of the current… flow or stance or the Thing, you know what I am talking about, right? (I seriously lack words.)
Posted in Plain English | Tags training | 1 comment
[ Posted by Janka
Mon, 18 Aug 2008 22:02:37 GMT ]
Vuosittainen off-the-grid-aika jää lyhyeksi, mutta mainittakoon nyt kuitenkin, että ennen sunnuntaita on turha yrittää soittaa, mailata, pingata ircissä, jättää ravelrymessuja tai muuten kommunikoida muuten kuin kasvokkain.
Oon Pariisissa viettämässä hääpäivää. Eiks oo romanttista?
Posted in Sama suomeksi | Tags elämä, internet | no comments
[ Posted by Janka
Wed, 13 Aug 2008 08:17:24 GMT ]
Noin, Ropecon suoritettu. Logistiikan kantoapuna homma oli jokseenkin aivottoman vaivatonta. Jostain syystä on huomattavasti pienempi homma kantaa laatikko paikasta toiseen tai keksiä lennosta limsansäännöstelyprotokolla, jos joku muu ensin sanoo, että vie nää tonne ja tee hei tälle jotain.
Ropeconissa on samanlainen feature kuin Burning Manissa, että teki mitä hyvänsä niin koskaan ei oo ihan tyytyväinen. Jos ramppaa katsomassa kaikenmaailman esitelmää ja paneelia, harmittaa myöhemmin kun ei jäänyt aikaa tavata tuttuja. Ja jos istuu Keltsussa ja tapaa niitä tuttuja, tuntuu, että hukkaan meni koko con kun ei siellä ees tehny mitään. Valitsin tänä vuonna jälkimmäisen, ja tuntuu, että meni vielä enemmän hukkaan, kun huolimatta siitä, että olevinaan koko ajan oli puhumassa jonkun kanssa joko aiheesta “viime vuoden kuulumiset kolmessa minuutissa” tai “roolipelaamisen syvällisemmät ulottuvuudet”, ei oikeastaan kerennyt tavata puoliakaan ihmisistä jotka olisi halunnut. Olisi varmaan pitänyt jättää nukkuminen väliin.
Muuten olen tässä vähän suunnitellut, että vapaaehtoistuisin ensi vuonna narikkavastaavaksi tai jotain, ja suoritettaisiin jääränarikan pojan paluun kosto. Kuka lähtee mukaan?
Posted in Sama suomeksi | Tags roolipelit, ropecon | 5 comments
[ Posted by Janka
Fri, 01 Aug 2008 10:31:05 GMT ]
(Training ramblings follow, first an upkeep notification:)
Toimitus pahoittelee edelleen esiintyvää kummallisuutta CSS:n kanssa sekä RSS-feedin toimimattomuutta, joista jälkimmäinen johtaa myös siihen, että spammikomentit haamupäivittävät Blogilistaa. Ylläpitomme työskentelee päivin ja öin asian korjaamiseksi. (Joojoo, ihan totta, joskin ei ehkä yhtämittaa.)
Seems under current schedules I can make it to the salle about once a week. It will have to do, and so my first goal for my return to the fold will have to be to teach myself that training needs not to be all or nothing, and to learn what I can with the time I have, and not be constantly frustrated by comparing it all the time it to what I could have learned with more time. This is a thing that creeps up to me again and again. My first teacher of clinical medicine said that the one lesson you need to learn to become a successful doctor is how to cope with your own feelings of inadequacy (“pitää oppia tulemaan toimeen oman riittämättömyyden tunteensa kanssa”), and frankly that’s a lesson I’ve always sucked at. Not learning it almost stopped me from becoming a practicing physician. Maybe it is not a coincidence that I am willing to try and deal with it in swords class at the same time that I am beginning to find the ability to deal with it professionally.
Growing up is a damned hard thing to do. You’d think you’d be through it at the age of 30-plus, but it seems to me I am somehow late and am only beginning.
I have managed to take up the habit to do some conditioning pretty much daily, which while I am not really sure for how long I’ll feel like keeping the habit up, has helped a lot. I also have an access to a gym located on my commute, so I should really remember to grab someone while at the salle and have them re-teach me the weight exercises. If I start doing them without getting a crash course and someone spotting me, all that it will do is totally bust my right elbow which is already in need of heavy maintenance and occasional heavy dosages of ibuprofein to barely cope with the rapier. It always was my problem spot and I am afraid it is suffering terribly from my current total crap muscle strength.
Ilkka taught the class yesterday. I like his current way to teach a class a lot. He’s comfortable with himself (or in any case fakes it well), knows what he can do and cannot do, and his way to explain stuff, especially one-on-one when we practice when he can show and guide, works for me very well. I am certain he has secretly taken acrobatics classes, some irregular stuff in the warm-up was so very familiar, though luckily he was not far gone enough to make us play weirdo tag games (the one thing from acrobatics I seriously dislike).
Lots of balance games in the basic technique section, which I totally sucked in; I seem to have a tendency to “tell” my partner where my weak direction is so clearly that I might as well tell them out loud, except I don’t myself know before I get thrown. No frigging idea what to do about that, other than keep up building basic deep core strength.
Rapier and dagger basics in the weapons section. Never was my favorite and still isn’t. I have a wire from my left hand to my brain which totally shuts down everything I know of rapier if I hold an item (any item, yes, including a rubber duck like was suggested) in my left hand. I had completely forgotten the basic defense lines of the dagger and even though Ilkka went through it really slowly and thoroughly I spent most of the class being totally and utterly confused. Something started to come back during the pair exercises, and it was ok, but I still don’t think I like the dagger there. Feels like cheating.
Like Ilkka said, the dagger, if you know how to use it, makes a lot of things easier and safer, like making sure your opponent stays out of their line when you counter-attack or approach to stringere or whatever. But what the hell, it’s not about “safe” and “easy”. If I wanted to be safe in a rapier fight, I’d not bring a rapier and a dagger, I’d bring a handgun. (Or not go at all.) The added safety of the dagger takes away from the pure elegance of a rapier duel and transforms it more into combat. I might, of course, feel different if we really fought with sharps these days, but since we don’t, as far as swords go, I prefer the elegance of the duel over the excitement of combat - always did.
Posted in Plain English, Sama suomeksi | Tags meta, training | no comments
[ Posted by Janka
Fri, 25 Jul 2008 12:15:35 GMT ]
“Kiireellisesti huostaanotettu väkivaltatilanteen yhteydessä”
“Äiti ilmoittaa, ettei halua tyttöä tavata.”
“Opettajan mukaan ilkeä poika.”
“Osastolla ei nyt tilaa.”
“Lopullinen sijoituspaikka edelleen epäselvä.”
“Terapiajonossa.”
Posted in Sama suomeksi | no comments
[ Posted by Janka
Mon, 21 Jul 2008 19:37:02 GMT ]
Today, I learned to do a parry-riposte with a rapier.
That might sound like something not too convincingly brilliant, considering it is one of the first things most people seem to learn once picking up the weapon for the first time. However, I have spent years trying to, and I do not think I have ever before in my life done a tolerable one. Ever. The closest I can get is to fake it by doing a slow-ish counter-attack, but I have never been able to do something that actually differentiates between the single tempo and the double.
Today, I did half-a-dozen or so in a row today, certainly not good ones, but things that really actually were recognizable, and worked. And I think I finally, finally got the idea of how it is supposed to feel.
The key was Guy (who I think was about as excited as I was and certainly must have been quite relieved at finally getting through to me) saying “think of it as three actions, not two”. And suddenly it clicked. A parry-riposte is not a “parry” and a “riposte”, it is “close, extend, lunge”. Same as a counter-attack is not really a one movement, it is “close-and-extend, GO”. The tempo is double or single, but there are more notes to a beat there than just the one, if you excuse my horrible mangling of musical metaphors. (And of course, the movements combine to one fluid motion in both cases, like a melody… err, sorry.)
In celebration here’s a new tag for this blog and the first English entry in a loooong time.
Muissa uutisissa, toimitus pahoittelee spammikommenttien määrää. Filtterin opetus on jäänyt vähiin viime aikoina.
Posted in Plain English, Sama suomeksi | Tags training | no comments
[ Posted by Janka
Sun, 20 Jul 2008 08:25:42 GMT ]
Perusongelma vaikuttaisi olevan, että Typo etsii stylesheeteja ja kuvia eri paikasta kuin mihin haluaa ne laittaa. Tämä tuskin selviää ilman ylläpitoa; workaroundina laitoin nyt stylesheetin manuaalisesti sinne mistä sitä etsitään. Tämä ei ole kovin kätevä ratkaisu, koska Typo ystävällisesti siivoaa sen turhana pois joka kerta kun päivitän jotain. Kuvia en jaksa alkaa etsiä enkä manuaalisesti siirrellä, tullaan nyt toistaiseksi toimeen ilman.
Posted in Sama suomeksi | Tags meta, typo | no comments
[ Posted by Janka
Sat, 19 Jul 2008 17:54:47 GMT ]
Jaha, heti kun kirjoitin tänne jotain, blogilista päätti, ettei huomaa päivityksiä RSS-feedista, ja blogi itse päätti, että CSS on tyhmä juttu.
Ylläpito on Turussa leikkimässä teräaseilla, niin ettei voi siltäkään kysyä.
Posted in Sama suomeksi | Tags meta, typo | no comments
[ Posted by Janka
Sat, 19 Jul 2008 11:27:00 GMT ]
Haloo, onko sairaala, tässä Jessi
Onks Krista siellä, se on mun isosisko
Voiks se tulla puhelimeen?
Kuoleeko se?
Mä olen yhdeksän
Mulla on pikkuveli kanssa
Se on kuusi ja Krista on kohta neljätoista
Voiks Krista tulla kotiin?
Onks sen pakko jäädä?
Kun mäkin oon surullinen
enkä mä yhtään tiedä
kuka meistä nyt pitää huolta.
Posted in Sama suomeksi | Tags runot | no comments
