Congratulations to Carrollton Community Martial Arts Students!!

Carrollton Community Martial Arts held its first Moo Do Won Tae Kwon Do belt test last night, and all six students who were testing passed! Many thanks to Charles Theiss and Thomas Johnson for judging, and to Marsha Prokopakis for judging and teaching this year. Thanks also go to all the parents, grandparents and Thomas Maffett for coming to observe and support the class. Everyone did a great job, and I hope to get more pictures and videos uploaded to the website (http://carrolltonmartialarts.wordpress.com) soon.

I’m a black belt!!

Well, I did it! I passed my black belt test today… its pretty incredible. Charlie went back in his records and figured out that I started on September 24, 1989!! So, it took over 18 years, probably longer than just about anyone else… but I did it. I got through all the board breaks, though the only one that I got on the first try was the back fist (2 boards)… I broke 2/3 of the knife hands, but it was wierd cause’ the didn’t come apart at first… And then the ridge hand one of the boards just feel/slid… and then I jumped off of the wrong bloody foot for my flying side kick an so missed it the first try :boggle: And then I felt like an idiot when I put the black belt on backwards… and couldn’t remember how to bloody hold the stupid belt or certificate!! But… somehow or other, I got through everything, and in anycase I passed 😀

The bong sool test was also quite cool, although also very different. Basicly it was all fighting, which was pretty interesting and fun to watch. If my hand hadn’t been soo bloody sore I’d probably have sparred at least too. It was very cool though to watch Jarrod cut the apple with the sword. Mr Braumberger showed them ‘how to do it’ first – which was pretty lame – just tap, tap on either side and then tap it and cut it in two… Jarrod however didn’t ‘follow directions’ 😉 He pulled it out swung it around and then cut it and put it back, just like Charlie had told him he had to. I hope that we really do start doing bong sool though, that would be very cool and fun to do tournaments.

Overall, the differences in the schools was kind of obvious and bit wierd – Brock for his second just did one two-board break (palm attack), while Jarrod did six different single-board breaks (front snap kick, roundhouse, sliding side kick, backfist, knife hand and ridge), and then of course my 4 for first degree, which even though I semi-botched I still got through…

Anyhow, I’m excited and elated as can be. I kind of never thought it’d actually happen… Now I just have to keep going, and start teaching and helping out. Overall, its really quite cool.

It’s Super Tuesday!

So, I’m feeling pretty good about my black belt test, which is good cause its coming up in just 4 days!! I’ve got all of my stuff down pretty good, mostly concentrating on getting all the old stuff down again. Especially all the old fighting steps. Tommorrow I think I’m going to teach Kevin 1-10 so that I can practice 31-40 (counter attacks). Other than those, and the take downs I’m pretty confidant about most of them. So, mostly its remembering them, going over the take downs… and memorizing/learning all the Korean terminology. So, yeah. I guess its actually a good bit… but not too bad!

I’m sitting here at the moment watching CNN as the polls close around the country and they try to “predict” who’s going to win where. I really hope Obama does well – its looking like hes doing OK, not wonderful, but OK anyways. I’m honestly very surprised at how well Huckabee’s doing on the GOP side. Really, I didn’t think he had much of a chance at all, so its pretty surprising that hes actually winning a couple states. As much as I really, really hope that we have a democractic president (and I hope thats Obama;) if I had to pick a republican I like McCain the best by far. So, good to see he’s still doing super well.

In any case, here’s hoping for good results for Obama & McCain both.

Super what?

Well, today I went in and went through my fighting steps and forms with Jarrod and some other folks, trying to get ready for my black belt test. I’m feeling pretty confidant about them. I just need to start going through all the *old* fighting steps and remembering them.

I’ve also been playing around with blogger, and have added Google AdSense, so who knows maybe I’ll be able to make a little money off this. (OK, so thats not likely in the least, but hey, its worth a try, right??)

DH has been sitting in the other room watching the Super Bowl except now, since my Dad’s gone to bed, he’s moved in here… so I’m watching football for the first time in… years. Personally, I’m rooting for the Giants. The Patriots don’t deserve an undefeated season. I don’t know why not, but it just doesn’t seem right. Specially since they cheat. Not that I really care either way…

It occurs to me of course that I’m like one of the only people in the US that just couldn’t care less about the super bowl. I mean, the commercials tend to be really good, but other than that its just another football game… and, yeah. Whatever floats your boat, I spose…

Fun Stuff

Well, its been a kinda crazy past couple of weeks… I´m now (after some class and level changes/additions) taking 5 hours of school a day (25 a week)… including taking both Art History and Spanish Culture. They´re both great, and espcially nice after so much pure spanish communications/grammar for the past month (and don´t wory, I still have 3 hours of that every day too=). I´ve also managed to move up to C2 (the next to highest level of intermediate)… so I´m really learning a lot now. Next week we start on past imperfect and futuro and conditional tenses/conjugations. I´m really excited… and I absolutely love art and culture both… they´re both taught exclusively (or nearly exclusively, as occasional the teacher will use english so that you know what a new word is…) in spanish, and are very cool.

Whats honestly most exciting though (and a bit scary as well), is that tommorrow, I am leaving Salamanca for 5 days to travel – by foot, train and aeroplane to Venice, Italy. All by myself. I´m really excited about going. I´ll miss a day of school (and most upsettingly a two days of Tae Kwon Do.=(, but by doing so I save nearly 200 dollars. So I figure its probably worth it. So yeah. If anyone has any suggestions as were I should go in Venice, feel free to suggest away for the next couple of days (I come back on Monday).

And yeah, thats about it. Still taking Tae Kwon Do here, and I absolutely love it… take a total of 6 hours a week (2 hours monday, wednesday and thursday each). Helps me to practice my spanish, and also gives me something else to do in the evenings. Anyhow though, I´ll post again when I get back from Venice…

Tae Kwon Do

Well, the past week sure has been pretty cool and exciting.

I started taking Tae Kwon Do classes on Wednsday and Thursday of last week, and they went very well… Everyone is both very nice and understanding.

On Friday night we all (everyone from Tae Kwon Do), went out together, first to dinner (we went to some nice place down the street where we ate tapas and drank wine for 3 hours… was very very good. Tapas are awesome!!), and then out to a couple different discotecas. The first place we went to I´d never been before, but it turned out to be very very nice. It was really cool too, cause everyone, including the instructor went out with us… I ended up going home around 4:30 or so, mostly cause´ I had to get up at 8:00 to go to Santander the next morning=)

On the way up to Santander the next morning, we stopped by the Museo de Altamira where we saw replicas of 15-18,000 year old cave paintings as well as some of the other stuff that they´ve since found in the cave (flint knives, bone tools, jewlery, etc). It was kinda cool… they also have a complete full-scale model of the cave that we got a tour through, so that was neat as well, though I wish that we could have seen the actual cave and cave paintings, but oh well. In anycase though, it was pretty cool…

=)

Well the past few days have been quite good… Had exams on Monday and today (tuesday), and they all went fairly well… haven´t really gotten results back, but I feel pretty good about most of them (one not so sure about… but we´ll see).

I also am now planning on taking Tae Kwon Do here in Salamanca. There´s a really good looking class just 10-15 minutes from my house, and its not too expensive… Went and watched a class on Monday and it looked pretty good, so I think I´m planning on going back and starting to take classes on Wed (three times a week, Monday, Wednesday and Thursday).

Also, Kevin finally found a job, so thats super exciting… a YMCA Camp in the blueridge mountains of South Carolina. It sounds beautiful!! I´m actually kind of jealous=) Hope that works out, I´m sure it will… he´s just happy right now though, just to have a job=)