Knight of Pentacles

 I really like the thing the instructors are doing right now where they give each of us personal notes on things we need to work on.  I feel like each person benefits from the personal notes, and to hear the notes that everyone else gets.  You never know what nuggets of wisdom are going to resonate with you. So here are some notes I've received lately and need to remember: -Intensity is key.  Intensity does not equal speed, but speed can enhance it.  Work on my intensity for the movements and then let the words sit on top. -Intent and Intensity.  Intent does not always have to be "smash badguys".  It can be chopping wood, swirling leaves in the wind, moving branches out of the way.  The main thing is the your visualization must be well established in order to transfer the intensity to the viewer. -After kicking in a form, consolidate your body before transitioning to the next move. -Panther hands are a strike, not pawing at someone -Make sure I'm ...

  I've been having a sad the last little while.  Like, everyone has ups and downs and sometimes the changes in latitude are small and sometimes they are big.  This downward spiral was a big one for me and to be honest I didn't handle it very well.  There wasn't even any one thing that made it so bad, but everything adds up eventually.  I realized that a big part was not making it to Kung Fu for a loooong time, and I tried to train on my own, but the effort was sporadic. I remember seeing an interview with Ann Hathaway once where they asked her how she got so slim and fit to play Catwoman (#askhermore!).  She responded that there was no magic bullet, she just did the normal things that no-one wanted to do: eat well and exercise more. So, I started doing the boring things that I had been avoiding: eating better, drinking less alcohol, exercising when I could, talking to my friends, going to a therapist.  It's been slowly getting better. And then I went t...

I've been trying to write what I thought was going to be a great post about how I keep my goals in the crosshairs, but the words aren't coming together properly, so I'll just do a quick update. Work has been a priority for the last little while, and my attendance in class is taking a serious hit.  So, I've been trying to work some Kung Fu into my evenings.  It's a work in progress.  We're supposed to be starting up a job on the West end of Edmonton ~sometime~ soon, where I'm (95% likely) to be stationed for the foreseeable future, which would be fantastic.   I have de-coupled my push ups and sit ups.  Trying to keep them matched was making it hard.  De-coupling has proved useful, I just need to ensure I track them properly. I'm at a wedding in BC next week, so I'll miss Wednesday's class, and IHC on Thursday. Originally, I was going to drive out, and fulfill one of my personal requirements along the way: Climb to the top of a Mountain.  But the d...

 In Construction, summertime is a race.  There are a lot of things that either can't be done, or would be prohibitively expensive to do in winter.  So, as soon as the weather gets above 0 things need to move FAST to finish up outside, or be able to close up a building before winter hits.  Things like rain, tremendous heat, or administrative/supply delays can impact a schedule quickly, so the easiest thing a company can do is increase the man-hours to try and claw back time lost. We're currently 6 weeks behind schedule on our Sherwood Park site.  The Superintendent is authorizing unlimited overtime, and has been trying to get us to work 6am to 4:30pm every day.  This means that I leave my house at 5:10am, and get home around 5:10pm.  And when I do get home, I'm sore, sticky, dirty, and sour. Now, don't get me wrong, I still love my job, and the overtime is great.  But I've been finding it harder and harder to get the energy to get to Kung Fu w...

 These last couple of weeks, as EVERYONE is aware, have been hot.  Last week was our first really hot week of the summer, and it was brutal.  My crew was working outside, the whole time, and it was miserable.  Headaches and nausea and fatigue.  By the end of last week we were all completely worn out.   This week is not ~quite~ as hot, but close, and we were doing better.  And it made me think of something from last year.  There was a job my previous company was doing in the attic of a 4 storey apartment building.  The attic spanned the entire structure with a gable roof and when the sun hit it the space got HOT.  I didn't work on the project, but I was friends with the superintendent and he told me many tales of the woes of trying to cool the space down so our people could work.  They tried fans, air conditioners, personal fans around necks, cooling towels, everything.  At first we were cycling workers through bi-weekly....