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Last night’s training was a blast. After about twenty minutes of the first class, I was seriously fearing a slow burn workout. I usually end up feeling those for about three days afterwards, so I tend to see the warning signs early. Luckily, though, we moved into some stationary tension exercises which I felt helped me quite a bit.

I got to take the white and yellow belts, and trying to get them all to do their kata at the same time isn’t that easy. Thankfully, McCabe-san was floating, so I had him take the white belts so I could focus on the yellow belts. Most all of the yellow belts are doing great, they just need to dial up the power and spirit.

Second class we got to do some sparring drills. I don’t know if I’ve just been starved for this kind of treatment, but I LOVE doing stuff like this. I got as a partner, and trying to spar with him is like trying to wrestle four angry living logs into a bag. His punches can hit you from as far out as his legs can.

I was concerned with the amount of power I was getting out of my reverse punches, and Sensei Hartman told me that it was probably a good thing that I felt that way because that meant I was relaxing. This makes me happy, because I thought I was doing something retarded. I probably AM, but at least it’s not that one thing.

There is a green belt woman in class that I got to spar with after Matt, and she is just SO timid. I want her to hit me, and yell and scream but she won’t, no matter what I told her to picture. I was utterly surprised when I got to spar against , for a yellow belt she’s seriously not afraid of anything. She’s taking the whole “moving in as a defensive matter” thing to a new level.

At the end of class, I was told that Sensei Hassall sent word to everyone not be conflicted about coming down to St. Louis as opposed to attending our wedding on April 17, which I was amazed and humbled by. I don’t want my friends to miss Sensei Otis because of us, but at the same time I view most everyone at Karate as family so it would be nice to have everyone there.

Someone asked me if I was getting nervous about the wedding yesterday, and I told them absolutely not. They seemed surprised at this. Surviving a Shodan test is nervewracking. Getting married is easy. I mean, I know what she’s going to say. 🙂