Hey, Jealousy

Someone I met through my little LiveJournal spy camera got to see Bill Champlin, Steve Lukather, and a whole host of other musicians including Dennis Matkosky, Michael Sembello, Jason Scheff and Bobby Caldwell in a show in Nashville -- probably the closest those cats will ever come to me. Apparently, a large chunk of the songs they played were songs I have plus a tune from the upcoming Chicago XXX.

This drives home the fact that while the town I live in has, in the strictest terms, a thriving music scene (for Southeast Ohio), this town has no soul whatsoever. Basically, the music is easily pigeonholed...

• People who feel they should've been called to play on the O Brother, Where Art Thou soundtrack
  
• People who want to be Fur Peace Ranch refugees (at least these people have a sense of really good music - who couldn't when you're basking in the skills of Jorma Kaukonen and G.E. Smith)
  
• People who play at frat parties

The last infusion of soul in this town was B.B. King and his daughter Shirley late last year.

Truth is, I respect people from all these groups who actually have some skills. What I hate hate HATE are the people who pick up their chords from the latest Mel Bay Teaches You How to Fake Your Way Through a Genre guitar book, and then proceed to go out and expect me to treat them like a serious musician.

Of course, all this bile comes from my college days playing jazz when all these little venues would feel forced to choose between booking jazz gigs and folk gigs. They always booked the folk gigs. Ok I have to stop before I go any further -- happy place... happy place...

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Fight Club Tuesday

Ultimate sparring day! Man, I have to give props to Coach Jones -- all that conditioning paid off. Now that my lungs are better, it would've been nice if my muscles have followed suit.

I had to try ultimate sparring someone other than DATU_B, basically because I didn't want to be bathing in balur at the end of the night. Plus, his highline kicks are getting a little too high for my taste lately. Basically, he high-kicks with all the finesse of a Thai boxer, and who wants any part of that, especially when you're 5"-6" shorter than he is? ;)

I wanted to free-roll with STRETCH_ARMSTRONG, which I got to, but not before he wanted to ultimate spar someone. I was guilty of two things in that match. One was being completely on the defensive once I was taken to the ground. The fight could have ended there if STRETCH would have been allowed to knee me. The second thing was continuing to play his game on the ground. I kept hearing B yell, "Disengage and get up!" We did and I managed to keep STRETCH at a distance with (missed) right jabs for bit - yeah, I decided to try and use all that boxing stuff I learned :)! And then, he went in for another takedown. This time, I managed to base out, and while his arms were tied up trying to take me down, I managed a solid right cross which was actually intended to be what I believe in JKD is called the "corkscrew hook." Either way it worked, and according to the rules, ended the fight.

After that, I got to play with sticks - dead patterns and some ultra-light sparring. Ah, swollen knuckles: the telltale sign of Filipino training. DATU_B was right about one thing - work in a strike to the centerline, and you're bound to hit SOMEthing.

The night ended with STRETCH_ARMSTRONG and I free rolling BJJ. It's always a chess match with him. The key, as I've always said, is just waiting him out to the point where he's unsucessfully tried a bunch of things and he stops to contemplate his next move. Of course, it doesn't help to blow the armbar you tried to sink in. He kept it off for a good long while before tapping from exhaustion. We both looked like a pair of Parkinson's sufferers by the end of it.

Call me a geek, but my strategy came from a Star Trek: TNG episode "Peak Performance" where Data played his second match of Stretegema with Sirna Kolrami (who soundly kicked Data's @$$ the first time out) and forced a draw, by focusing his strategy on immediately countering Kolrami's moves. Hehe, and who said being a sci-fi nerd wasn't good for anything?

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Stand Yo' Ground?

Ok, time to get back to what this blog has become famous for - my thoughts on the various aspects and implications of martial arts, self defense, and other gruesome violence-related stuff. It has been awhile, hasn't it?

A friend of mine emailed me another article in reference to Florida's "Stand Your Ground" law. Here it is (but I'm not sure for how much longer - you know how Yahoo! is with their news stuff).

I've writen that I'm basically down with the law. I'm glad one provision was scrapped, though...

Also gone from the version that passed 39-0 in the Senate and 94-20 in the House was a provision that prosecutors have said would have allowed people to shoot in defense of a neighbor's property.

It would have been different if the proposal was "in defense of a neighbor." To me, the fact that this was even proposed in the first place causes me to question the motives of the people supporting this law (*cough*NRA*cough*) and gives the law's opponents justifiable ammunition to do the same. I wondered where all this "Florida's going to become the Wild West" talk could reasonably come from.

Regardless, despite all the arguments I've heard against the law, no one has been able to answer an important question for me: Why shouldn't I be allowed to stand my ground when faced with potentially lethal force?

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Go On, Say It!

I decided to finally switch to Blogger comments. I've been meaning to do this after they fixed it so that no one has to have a Blogger account to post. Plus, it's easier for me to check, monitor, and edit. Don't worry -- all of your cool enetation posts will be around for the time being (if inaccessible). But, I'm sure as it quits being used, they'll disappear soon.

Let me know if there are any bugs.

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Manic (Depressive) Monday

Well, I've got some time before the Diamond Mines, so I'm at "That Place" and finally getting a good download speed for the latest Who episode, "Father's Day."

If you need to kill time as I did last night, here's something: An interview with Bill Champlin on Mick Martin's Blues Party, heard on Sacramento's KXJZ.

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Amazed

I'm sitting here at the coffee shop a.k.a. "That Place" as E calls it, listening to a local band getting interviewed. Now, I know very little about this band, what their goals are, or if they even care about establishing any sort of musical career. But, if this interview is any indication, these are just the most ridiculous and clueless bunch of kids I've ever seen. I honestly don't even know why they're wasting their own time and that of the interviewer. Each one of their facetious answers, which were audiotaped, were followed with "ha ha ha." "What are your influences?" "Soft core porn ha ha ha."

Hey, call me cynical because I've spent the better part of the evening here downloading Doctor Who episode 1x08, Father's Day. The net.connection here is like molasses. I should be done and watching it by now. Don't know if that's the only reason I'm in a b!+chy mood right now.

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Quiet Saturday

Yesterday was the Wife's Proseminar presentation for completion of her Masters degree in Linguistics. She's just steps away, now. I'll (or she'll) put pictures of that up later.

But because of Friday's antics and an infamous local annual drunkfest, we mostly stayed in last night and I got to enjoy a harrowing victory at computer Scrabble. It was the only thing my left arm was good for at that point anyway.


Today, I throw away my usual net.restraint. Just deal ;). 

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Bad Thing

Cimande djurus + the Silver Bullet ™ = Need for balur. 

This is what happens when you mix martial artists with Coors Light, which I haven't touched in damn near a decade before last Friday night.

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My Weekly Personality Analysis

You scored as The Artiste. You like cafes you can't afford and clothes you don't wash. You love to "epater la bourgouisie" You'll show everyone someday- your parents, the academy, that whore who turned you down on the street... Now, if only you could afford socks.

Test by www.MollyCrabapple.com The Artiste 88% The Cad 83% A Tramp 67% The Lady 38% Which Victorian Stereotype are you? created with QuizFarm.com

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Fight Club Tuesday

I'm still not feeling 100%, so I shirked again. I showed up for the second hour of weapons (which really didn't get going until :35 after) with my still nameless shilelagh. I've decided that "Fratboy Buster" is out. The context will be gone once E and I move out of here.

Last night was my first mini-introduction to Bowie knife work and the art of the back cut. I pulled someone aside and had him show me the basic shilelagh striking angles. Two or three people really got a kick out of seeing a Filipino with anything other than bamboo or rattan.

No, wait... I have it. The perfect name!



Meet Glengarry. Yes, I know it's not Irish, but it's in reference to my favorite movie. Whenever I use it in a fight, I'm going to throw out quotes from the movie with each strike. "I don't think so, Shelley! *whack*" "You are going out! *bam*" "Will you go to lunch?"

Or, I can improvise:
Jerk What's your shilelagh's name?
Me Fcuk you, That's it's name *thud*

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Here's a Legal Tip

As long as I don't touch anyone (except in self-defense, of course), this is now a legal orthopedic device. 

My next research question: Is there, in fact, any law in any place that says one needs a legal orthopedic device in order to carry one?

Not that the precedent hasn't already been set in this county of Ohio ;).

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Forgot About Dinner

I did say I'd talk about dinner, didn't I? Barbecued meat! 'Nuff said!

No, not really 'nuff said. Besides the good, red chicken, there were lots of fixin's. "Sorry the potato salad's store bought," they said, but like we'd even say anything between the chicken, these awesome deviled eggs Mrs. DATU_B made, as well as this awesome chip dip.

I almost didn't go because I wasn't sure I was up to it. I even forgot I had a new toy waiting for me, so I'm glad I went. I was a winner all the way around: time with the wife, time with friends, good food, and a nice new legal weapon walking stick!

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New Toy

While I spend the next half hour downloading Doctor Who 1x07, The Long Game, let me tell you about the dinner the Wife and I had at Mr. and Mrs. DATU_B's where I got my new toy, a nice shellacked Irish shilelagh, made from an ash sapling. This isn't a mere walking stick. It's a Gangs of New York special. I'm still pondering exactly what to name it. But, I'm determined to carry this around with me everywhere. It's legal, so ha ha, fcukers! Then again, I don't want to seen to be imitating a rather famous local Asian who walks about town with a "walking stick." (Walking stick, my behind -- everyone knows he doesn't use it as another leg. Just something to take out whoever tries to screw with him.)



An old Fight Clubber made a bunch, having little else to do with his summer, two were custom made for DATU_B and myself. Now, I have only the barest familiarity with shilelagh fighting. Just how to hold it and some of the basic principles. I'm more familiar with Bando boar techniques, and with the minor adjustment to box footwork as opposed to my poor imitation of triangle stepping, the media/corto range FMA stuff I know is easily translated into larga.

Lucky for me there'll be a small shilelagh seminar in next Thursday's Fight Club. Guess I won't need a padded PVC one, huh?

Speaking of which, here are some name potentials.

• "Shaft" - Besides the phallic reference, keep in mind that I actually own Shaft in Africa on DVD. "Cat named Shaft is gonna be good with a stick." Damn right.
  
• "Leovigildo" - as in Leovigildo Giron, Bahala Na grandmaster, a larga expert.
  
• "Fratboy Buster" - Because what's the worst thing about living in a college town?
  
• "Paddy o'Shannahan" - Purely as bait
  
• "Woody" - "Hey, E, I'm going out. Hand me my Woody."
  
• None of the above...
  
• Suggest your own

I've got it with me in the coffee shop right now. You can bet I'll be looking out for the two people who walk around carrying a bamboo pole and a bo staff. "Welcome to Dublin, muthafcuka!" Or, Manila. Djakarta? Whatever.

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Don't Panic Get Too Excited

E liked Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy more than I did. Call me a Douglass Adams purist, I don't care. But, the movie worked best for me the closer it stuck to the basics of the mythos. I can forgive the plot point differences. I can't forgive changing the entire point of the book. Just like you wouldn't rework "Goldilocks and the Three Bears" into some sort of spy thriller, you shouldn't take a story that's basically about a man's reaction to the discovery that Life, the Universe, and Everything is utterly absurd and make it into a love story. And, you damn sure don't do it by mischaracterizing almost all the characters. Except for Marvin. I can't decide if I'm entirely in favor of what they did. On the one hand, the look was awesome. I enjoyed the character... but why? Because aside from the new look and the new (Alan Rickman's) voice, his character was exactly the same as the one in the old radio/TV mini, even down to the pacing. So, why not change him like they changed the rest of it? Even the starship Heart of Gold acted the same. Were they respecting the mythos or giving us the finger. Like, "We'll leave the unimportant stuff alone, but screw with all the other things you, as a Douglas Adams purist, were intentionally looking out for."

The little video ditties of the Guide entries were funny, too. Again, 100% first class updating. The ships and the CGI were great. I was expecting one of the spherical vessels to suddenly sprout arms and a tongue, but I bet you they're saving that money shot for the sequel that they hinted on.

See it, and see if you can pinpoint the exact moment where the movie goes south.

Maybe I'm just old and jaded and just don't get it. Maybe I don't understand this current mindset of remaking, reimagining and revamping of, well, just about every God damn movie and TV series that existed between 1960 and 1989.

Then again, maybe it's the same thing that enabled me to recognize the greatest cameo in the film aside from the planet shaped like Douglas Adams' head - a cameo that, like the Kubrick reference in Kung Fu Hustle, vitually no one outside me and my wife recognized, let alone appreciated.

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The Joys of Being Ill

Because of my illness and the ungodly amount of time spent at the Diamond Mines despite said illness, I've missed...

• All training this week
  
• A late night screening of Ong Bak at the house of GURU_ANGRY
  
• Catching so much as a single frame of the local annual film festival
  
• Seeing Steve Buschemi who was showing a film at said festival. I wanted to see if any idiots would scream out things like "Hey, Mr. Pink!" or "Shut the fcuk up, Donnie!" Who am I kidding, I wanted to be that idiot.

Eh, what are you gonna do?

Because the posting has been sparse this week, I leave you with this.

Alternate Parkay Commercial Tag Lines

It's not nice to bamboozle The Green Man.

It’s bad karma to hoodwink the Buddha.

Liars are a disease. Vishnu is the cure.

Screw with Zeus, and die.

Don't fcuk with the Great Spirit, bitch!

© MMV, Warm Fuzzy Freudian Slippers

Submitted and rejected a long while back.

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My Weekly Personality Analysis

So, who's the Star Wars equivalent of Sybil? 

Click to see my Star Wars Personality!!

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Time Out

That's what my body's put me on. I feel like crap - it's either a budding virus or fading allergies. I can't tell yet. I'm home three hours early from the Diamond Mines and will probably take the rest of the day to sleep. Maybe four hours a night of training won't be the best thing tonight.

First thing in the AM tomorrow, I'm gonna go and "turn State's," as E puts it (a la Glengarry). As we've all learned, nine AM is the worst time for me if anyone thinks I'm going to cover anything heh.

Gonna get some internet medicine and then go home.

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Stoolies

It's funny when a bunch of random things dovetail.

PART ONE
The Wife will probably mention this on her blog, so I'll summarize. Yesterday, she witnessed a car accident outside our house. Two guys in a truck sideswiped a car. Took the side view mirror right off. Apparently these guys parked their truck and buggered off into this house across the street and didn't reemerge. It was obvious something was fishy. I mean, even you hit your own car, wouldn't you be out there inspecting the damage? So E, who was with our landlady at the time, decided to call the cops. They showed and went into the house in question (apparently, not the first time they've visited) and took the driver out in handcuffs and double-checked with my wife to make sure he was the driver.

PART TWO
An important plot point of Glengarry Glen Ross (see previous entry) is the break-in of the salesmen's offices, about which each of them gets questioned by a cop.

PART THREE
I got an email this morning from a mucky-muck in the administration that oversees the Fight Club. I'm not sure if I should write about this, but they didn't explicitly say not to discuss this with anyone. Eh, screw it, I'm not in trouble (at least, according to the mucky-muck). Apparently, since I'm listed on paper as a "coach," they contacted me about setting up an appointment to come in and talk about "some issues" and my observations about "Club officers." They must've emailed DATU_B, too, but I'm not sure if he's read it or if he's going to anytime soon, as he's going to be out of town for the next couple of days on Glengarry type business. Anyway, I offered a time later this afternoon and am waiting to hear back.

PART FOUR
Actually, I don't want to go in. I'm not a stoolie by nature and normally, I'm all for sticking it to The Man. But, hey, I can't think of anything I might've done to be suspect about anything and I definitely don't have anything to gain by lying to The Man in this instance. If I did do anything, it was unintentional - so unintentional, I can't even think of what it might be. So, while it's an inconvenience, I suppose I'm better off keeping it as small an inconvenience for me as possible.

It reminds me of Al Pacino's line to Kevin Spacey just before he goes in to talk to the cop.

I'll tell you something else, I hope you ripped the joint off. I can tell our friend here something might help him to catch you.

Because I've always told people "If you ever do anything illegal with me or in front of me, and I get pulled in for questioning, you might as well meet us at the police station." Or perhaps in this case, some Director's office.

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Don't Call It a Comeback

REVIEW: 'Glengarry' Hasn't Lost Its Sting

By MICHAEL KUCHWARA
The Associated Press
Sunday, May 1, 2005; 10:47 PM

NEW YORK -- More than two decades after it first arrived on Broadway, "Glengarry Glen Ross," David Mamet's scabrous, yet often hilarious look at the underbelly of the American Dream, has lost none of its sting.

This powerhouse revival, which opened Sunday at Broadway's Royale Theatre, scorches, thanks to superb performances down the line. The seven actors _ Alan Alda, Liev Schreiber, Frederick Weller, Tom Wopat, Gordon Clapp, Jeffrey Tambor and Jordan Lage _ define what it means to be an ensemble.

I've written about this film over and over again. I'd pay just to see the play with just about anyone in the cast, nevermind a cast like this. To get any better, you'd have to dig Pacino, Spacey, Lemmon (from 6' under), Harris, Arkin, and Price up and have them work for scale.

You all should at least rent the movie, you fairies... you company men! You stupid fcuking cnuts ;).

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Aren't Torrent Sites Grand?

I knew this show would be good but I never thought the episode Dalek would be one of the better pieces of sci-fi drama I've seen in awhile.  

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