I'm glad I decided to go to karate tonight, though I feel sorry for spudtater who also showed up at the usual time when I did, only to find the seminar (as opposed to the usual class) had started at 6. Neither of us are on the mailing list, you see. He had to go home, since the beginner's section had ended, while I got to stay and play. And play it was since there was no warm up (thank god!) and we just go right in to technique after technique. The guy wasn't the best teacher (half the time he only demonstrated something once) and half the time I discovered that the way other people were doing things wasn't the way the sensei had done it, or vice versa. The amusing thing was that my own skills were much more obvious since I'm used to learning new things like that one after another, and what the guy was doing, while not exactly taijitsu definately came close at points. We even did a bit of weapons at the end (escrima sticks) which was easy, and rather relaxing imo.

I was supposed to go to a party tonight, but considering it was 11:30pm by the time I had eaten dinner and showered, I'm giving it a miss.

Now my knee is hurting and I'm going to go sit with heat on it and watch Star Trek IV in a fit of nostalgia. Ja ne!

I started reading Bridget Jone's Diary this morning since I picked it up cheap in a charity shop. It's a really fast read since I'm only half way through and I only read for about two hours. I'm not all that impressed with it actually, though I think it's a lot less like Pride and Prejudice in book form.

This afternoon I felt headache-less enough to go to karate, which was mostly a good thing. The first orange belt I trained with was annoying. He didn't know how to punch, and then claimed I wasn't throwing him properly when we were doing hip throws, when in truth, I was throwing him perfectly, he was simply really worried about being thrown and doing stupid things like sticking the wrong hand out and catching himself (a very good way to break your wrist in a real fight). If you're not comfortable with being thrown, you ask your partner not to throw you, not accuse them of doing it completely wrong. Other than that it was fine and a good work out, though I'll be happy if we continue to spend less and less time on katas as things go on since I consider them relatively useless.

Of course, the price I paid was that my knee was back to twinging again. trip up Arthur's Seat seems to have given it a few large and painful bruises I hadn't noticed before, but as on Sunday, soaking the knee (and the other one since that one's twinging from karate) has caused it to mostly stop, which is good since I'm going bowling with AASOC in a few hours.

I'm a bit beat up from karate atm, though I'm not sure why since I can't remember doing anything in particular to agravate the places where I'm hurting (with the exception of the muscles in my left foot which definately from doing katas). Speaking of katas, I'm amusing myself by joining the upper belts while they're learning new katas, despite my not knowing how to do the first kata (I learnt the first part of it Sunday, but that was my first kata ever), and while I'm certainly not up to their black belt kata standard, I can hold my own against, say, an orange belt. Thankfully, a major part of the class was still hand to hand, since katas are nice for a breather, but rather useless in real life unless you're trying to impress someone. Afterwards, I skipped the pub and spent a cozy evening at home watching the final Scarlet Pimpernel movie and doping up on painkillers *snuggles heating pad*

The odd thing about being in my 4th year is that the opposite of my first year is happening. My first year, everyone assumed I was older because Americans usually come over for a semester in their 2nd or 3rd years. Now, since I certainly don't look my age, the assumption is that I'm a first or second year, which may or may not explain why I've been hit on by so many freshers recently.

I have a short list of things to do this weekend since on Monday I have to dive back into another essay that's due. My biggest goal is to finish the next chapter of Uric, with the potential of finishing Blackadder the Pure-blood Years too. Anybody who can summarize for me what we know about how everyone broke out of Azkaban in book 5 would greatly speed up that ending since it's really all I need to know before I can write, and lack of time or motivation to reread OotP has been holding that back.

Another goal is to finish, or get close to finishing my costume for Hallowe'en, since I have a party to go to. I'm not one for making costumes. In fact, this is the second thing I've ever made (a black wool cloak which I had help on, being the first), but it's not that hard. I cut out the pieces last night and dyed them this morning, so hopefully they'll be dry enough tomorrow for me to start sewing.

And since I'm bored - first person to guess what I'm going as (if I haven't told you already (this should be only havenward)) gets a drabble from a series of their choice (keeping in mind I really don't do ships).

I'd also like to read The Da Vinci Code (only cause my mum keeps insisting I read it, and if I do, then I can get her to stop bugging me about it and then rant about how inaccurate the book is, in peace). I'd also like to read some of The Scarlet Pimpernel if I can get past Orczy's prose, and then there's that niggling urge to work on my dissertation a little. A busy, if entertaining weekend.

I actually met another black belt in taijitsu today at karate, who'se been training in Japan with the Grand Master. He was fun to talk to and he says he might be starting up a class in a few months, so I volunteered to be his uke (hoping desperately he was understanding it only in the martial arts sense...). Hopefully he will since it'd be lovely to train with someone doing taijitsu while here again.

In other news, fieldwork portfolio is slowly progressing. It took me a whole night of writing things, and deleting them to finally decide on a style and design for the whole thing which I am now implementing, albiet slowly.

I took a break to watch Wilde last night. Orlando Bloom's cameo is actually perfect for him, and there was much mocking of Ioan Gruffud's character hat and hair. Also, lots of calling Bosey a whiney bitch. Not a bad movie, though I thought it could have been arranged a bit better.

As seems to be becoming a trend, I spent tonight in the pub with the karate people after training (in which I gained a lovely bruise, and a huge, red... it looks and feels like a nasty rug burn - on my neck from being strangled). I had a lovely time talking though, mostly to the two Japanese students, though I was a teetolar for the night because I felt like it. I didn't get home until 1:30am, and I'm surprised at how good a time I had. This might be because the night of good talking came on top of a surprisingly good training session which was basically full of technique after technique which is exactly how I like to learn, though I'm amazed at how ingrained some of my basic instincts are. Shutos to the neck, taking someone immediately off balance and down, and palming someone to the chin are all extremely well programmed into my instincts.

Oh, and I found a toad in the middle of the pavement on my way home, so I moved him over to the side so he wouldn't be stepped on, only he was so well behaved and solemn and he didn't want to get off my palm cause I was warm. So cute!

I made the mistake of reading a Battlestar Galactica (new series) fic this evening, and now I really, desperately want to see the series, even if it sucks since the story, while generic had some interesting ideas, and I'd really like to see backstory and how accurate it was to the series... and yeah. Intellectually, I know this is just my usual 'omg, you haven't been obsessed with a fandom for over a week. go find a new one' reaction, but that doesn't make it any harder to resist. I forsee a trip to the dvd store soon.

Karate was excellent this evening with minimal warmup and lots of focus on techniques. Pub afterwards was lovely as well, though I escaped around 11pm because I needed to work on my seminar due Monday, though somehow I ended up using up my sakura petal Lush bath bomb first. Bath's are such lovely things.

Did karate again today, and I have to say that painkillers are my friend. It's interesting to see the differences in the art compared to the taijutsu, which I was trained in. At karate they believe in building up a resistance by repetitive motions, ie getting a person used to being hit by letting them hit and get hit repeatedly over and over. This is very useful if you do sports karate since you are going to be hit repeatedly and in the same spot. But for self defense it's not useless, but it's not going to help you much either. If you get into a real fight, your addrenaline will be going, you might not even feel the hit, but if you do, you're supposed to just keep on fighting, so if you're tough or not doesn't really matter until you count the bruises at the end. So, since taijutsu is entirely defense oriented, we don't train for these things, but being a black belt, I am training with all their senior grades at karate, therefore since they're used to it and aren't pulling their moves (not that I am either...) - I have some fasinating bruises developing on my forearms. And since these bruises are developing on top of the less obvious bruises from friday, well, it's a good thing I don't actually bruise that easy. Now if only my blackbelt would actually arrive...

This song meme is fun. I've been enjoying recieving and sending songs all day:)

I tried out Kendo this evening and wasn't very impressed. The etitquette was very strict and I suspect I'll have the same problems with it that I had with fencing (namely, it's not realistic fighting). The sensei was a sadist at the beginning, making everyone sit in seisan (legs tucked under, arse on feet, hands on thighs, back straight) for well over four minutes on a hard wooden floor. I've been doing martial arts and sitting in that position for six or seven years now, but even I was having trouble near the end (it's the wooden floor that does it since your ankle bones grind into it... unless you're a guy and then you can sit with your ankles crossed...bastards...). He did it to point out how hard his class was going to be, and I must admit, this is the first martial arts class I've attended that drew blood on the first day (everyone is bare foot and learning a new way of walking so feet are bound to get hurt and slashed up), but I wasn't too impressed by how 'hard' everyone was. It was an interesting thing to try, but it's definately not for me.

I really enjoyed today's class of Shukokai karate, and I didn't expect to. I was impressed by how friendly they were, how they welcomed me not as a beginner but as someone with experience, and how they were willing to tailor the class to very different wants and needs. The class had a bit more exercise then I like in your average martial arts class but other than that, there was a lot of the training I want and need and lots of friendly people with no strict rules. I think I'm in love. Will definately going back, though I think I'll still check out Aikido and Kendo tomorrow on the off chance they'll be better (which hopefully they won't be since I'm quite content with what I've found). Only trouble is I need to go buy a blackbelt now. It's either that or have it shipped here from NJ, which seems kinda silly. Only don't know where the martial arts/sports stores are in Edinburgh:( Gotta find one soon though. Anybody have an idea?