I am woman, hear me roar

Last night's class was pretty uneventful, so it's not really worth talking about. I have my form down SO much better, front board break a cinch, sparring, the usual, weapons still working on.

However, I got something that I've been waiting a month for, because I had earned it:

This is a very bad fuzzy photo of the trophy I earned for my 3rd place finish in Weapons from the last regional tournament that I participated in, that helped me get my 3rd place Weapons position for my age and rank in the state. Hooray! I would've loved to have gone home with it the day of the competition, like most everyone else that day, but better late than never! Both JC and Drew were impressed. Drew is looking forward to getting his little trophy at the next regional tournament this summer. :-)

Lazy Night

A few things going on.

First, it looks like it's official now. I'm officially ranked #3 in NJ in weapons for women's color belts aged 30-39. Go me.

Second, I think Drew's only going to have one more class before taking his summer break. Graduation is the first full week of June, and since he's not graduating to the next half rank (or full rank for that matter) anyway, it doesn't seem worth paying for the month of June when he'll miss most of it. So next Wednesday is his last class until September. He did better today. Still a bit of a clown, but no "timeouts" today. He did much better. Although he did try to bop a kid in the face during sparring, and Mr. A caught it and said, "BREAK!" to prevent everyone from going too far. I think it's a good thing that I'm putting off the kicks and other sparring gear and weapons until September. He'll just start everything up again when he starts Kindergarten. He still gets to go to the ATA picnic and Movie Night, and he still will be allowed to be in the Tournament in July, so that helps.

Third, I had something related yet unrelated happen. I lost my change purse/wallet after Drew's class, which I wasn't happy about. You can read about it on my other journal-- http://windsornot.livejournal.com. Not happy about that.

But finally class-- it was small since it's getting towards the end of the year with exams and such, and Memorial Day weekend approaching fast. I got to class a little early due to looking for the wallet, and spent a while out back behind the school trying to contact the credit/debit card companies to issue new cards immediately. I think some in the class, particularly the teenagers, where wondering why I wasn't in class with them, but I had a more important thing to deal with. And besides, I wasn't intending to be in that class anyway. I was going to go home and change and be at Leadership class anyway. Good thing I had my leadership uniform in my bag already, so I just had to change.

Class was rather uneventful, since Ma'am wasn't there. But that's okay. We got to practice our forms some more, and I got my square block directional problem fixed once and for all. Mr. A is the tops quite often. Alex V. helped too, as he's got it down pat, and he was very kind and complimentary (for a kid) to say he's seen improvement in how I'm doing it, so that was nice of him. Good kid. Did a warm up exercise with Mr. Dr. Phillips, and that went okay. He's a lot older than I am, but patient. Sparred his son Ben, one of the few 3rd degrees at our school, who also took it easy on me. Nina is funny, as she and I sparred first. She's a petite little teenager, but she knows that if she's feeling tired, I'm not going to make her work, so she said, "I'll go with you, Mrs. Villegas." Hahahaha. No problem. The kids are getting to know me well! :-P Board breaking was a cinch. It was review week, and I don't have to break for rank yet, so it was optional. Since I have the front kick down without thinking, I just did that so I could say that I did it. I also worked on my ssang-jeh-bang, and Mr. A helped me get a kink out of that horizontal 360 move. He said that it's actually a black belt required move, so that's fine, and since the vertical wasn't required until black belt level as well, he said not to worry about learning it now. OK, no argument from me!

So, it was a bit of a lazy night. It's not that I didn't work during class, just not as much. I just want to get through this week and next week, and get through graduation, and earn that purple belt! After being the green color family for 2 cycles now (camo and green), I need a color change! So many people are brown belts right now, and I want to catch up. I will, in time, I'm not in that much of a rush. At least I'm doing things as well as I can, and learning to do them correctly, which has to account for something. I think by graduation, I'll be able to get that form down perfectly, and it will be so much easier when I have to do it later.

I must be out of favor right now.

Ma'am often says if she's not joking with you or making fun of you at some point, that you are probably on her hit list. I think I am, but I don't know why. I don't think I've been TOO annoying or anything. If anything, I've backed off. I'm kinda keeping to myself with her. I dunno. I sent an email asking about how the point system worked, as I didn't understand why both the points from the regional AND the interschool counted, but the points from the interschool alone didn't count in the ranking. I got a short email answer, but it didn't make sense. She said she'd explain it more in detail to me when I came in, and she saw me there tonight, but never beckoned me over to her office or anything. Then again, I didn't go over to her office either. I'm feeling a little intimidated these days, since I feel like she really doesn't like me right now, and I don't know why.

Anyway, so tonight we had class with Michelle Zimmerman. I'd say "Miss Zimmerman", but her little sister Jodi also is an instructor, so I'll just call her by her first name here. It was a fairly easy going class, and nice and SMALL. It was the two boys with Downs, Matthew and Mike, who both always want to partner up with me on exercises and sparring, and they did. After doing some floor stuff and group stuff, we actually got to do sparring first. Matthew and Mike each had a turn with me, and then Michelle took a turn with me too, which was fine. I couldn't go too crazy as she didn't have gear on, and she was tired, and so was I. Next, we worked on forms. I think I have the problem with the square block direction figured out now, but I still have to work on it some more. With board breaking, I did my side kick one with my right foot, after the success with my left last night, and it was the least amount of tries until the break with my right foot yet. So I was happy about that. We bowed out, but them worked on weapons a bit, and Em was helping me with some pointers about hand placement on the ssang-je-bang. We have freestyle for now, but I want to come up with something if I can that looks pretty good. I'm getting better at that horizontal 360 move, but still have to work on the vertical some more.

So, a somewhat uneventful class other than doing sparring first, which I liked. I think for a while, I'm just going to keep a low profile.

Brain dead, or maybe I'm not cut out for this.

Today was another triple threat TKD day, like last week. Drew's class, quick break, and then 2 classes in a row for me.

First for Drew. He was doing better today. He only had to sit out once, and I saw that Mr. A and Miss Chunko worked with him individually instead of pairing him up with other kids, and I think he did better with that. Overall, it was a better time for him, and he did earn his star patch from last week, so he was happy about that. So I was happy with him today. He had an overall good day before class, so that contributed to that, I'm sure. It was a good day for Drew. He's slowly, but surely improving.

I dunno. Sometimes I think I made a big mistake going into Leadership. I am not a kid, and I think that mentally I'm not cut out for this. Maybe it's because I was tired and I've had an abnormally busy and long day. The drills we had to do were hard, and just physically difficult for me. If I was a kid, maybe I could do them, but I'm just not in that kind of shape. When working on forms, as usual, Malachi rushed through stuff, and he doesn't pay attention to the details. I did get a better sense of direction, but I have to get the ki-haps and the foot positioning better. I'm getting it. Next week is when they decide who's actually graduating and who's not. Weapons, I'm getting a little more. Alex V. was impressed that I was starting to get the horizontal 360s, but I do have to work on the vertical one and come up with something for graduation. Gotta start thinking about that. Board breaking-- it was a foot week. Instead of doing the front kick, which I can get right off the bat, I decided to reapproach the side kick, but from the reverse side. It took 3 tries once it was locked in, but I got it, much faster than the other foot. I think I have a better idea of what to do with it now. Sparring was okay. Nothing special there.

Leadership class was a challenge. And I was paired up with Ma'am. She was patient, but at the same time I think she gets a little frustrated with me. I am just brain dead, but I was getting the hang of it after a while. I just look and listen to some of this, and wonder if I'll ever catch up.

There is a slight silver lining tonight that I discovered late tonight. As of tonight, probably for the tournament year of 2005-2006, I am ranked third for my age and rank for the state of New Jersey in weapons. Yay me! I heard everyone congratulating Alex V. for getting first in all formats for his age and rank (age 14-16 color belt). While that's great, and he's even helped me and I would consider him a young friend, I wish they could've fussed about me a little. I mean, I haven't even been doing this a year, and I'm 3rd in the state for weapons. That's not too shabby, c'mon! My husband told me, at least that in this house, I was #1 all the way around, and that meant a lot to me.