Post Pandamonium

After a 7 hour shift at the Panadamonium yesterday my body is sore just about everywhere. I had a great time and its always a pleasure to be part of such an amazing group of people. I was glad to be there at the end, it was fantastic to see everyone bring up their energy levels to cross the finish line sprinting. I think its safe to say it was a great success.

Since my muscles were yelling at me all day I decided to take in a flick. I went and saw the Avengers and then hung out with some friends, chilled and played some board games. Overall the weekend was  great success.

I've got blisters on me fingers

It felt good to be swinging the old Kwan Dao around on Friday. An hour is a long time to be swinging it around, I've got some wicked blisters on my thumbs. I felt like I made a lot of progress in the last I Ho Chuan class. Unfortunately I've forgotten a fair bit of my old form. I've been trying to piece it together with mixed results. I think I've got about 65 percent of it back but there's still a lot of gaps.

So far my approach has been to just try and remember moves but now I think I'm just going to remodel the form. Instead of worrying about remembering every detail I can take this opportunity to recreate it. The positive side of this is I can cut out some of the stuff I didn't like as much and make the form shorter. It was a bit too long before. The forgotten parts are mostly the in between moves. I remember most of the highlights.

I've definitely lost a lot of finesse with the weapon. It will take me a lot more practice to get my strength and control back to where it used to be. The expansion is going to be a lifesaver for me to get more practice time in.

My week

Last week was a good week. I played a few games of squash and it felt fantastic. After an hour and a half of squash on Wednesday I had pretty much worked the stiffness out of my knee. Then my whole body was super sore for the next couple of days, a feeling its missed.

I also found out that we were accepted for a grant I applied for to sponsor the Pandamonium. It should take week or two for the check to make it through accounting and into my hands. I was hoping to have it in time for the Pandamonium but it might be just a little late. Either way we have $500 to put towards the event and the charities.

I was down in Conklin for a day of work and it got in a fair bit of overtime. It was the first time I've been down there. There are some huge plants out in the middle of nowhere, it was strange to see. I slept until one pm yesterday and it felt great.

Results

I got my MRI results back this weekend and its good news. Turns out the cartilage in my knee isn't damaged. I just had a bad sprain to a ligament. Since the ligament was stretched, the fix is to start exercising it so it can tighten up again. I'm happy to hear that exercising it is safe. I've been experimenting with it the past week or so and the aches and pains I was getting made me decide to lay off it until I knew what was up. I was really worried about making it worse.

In celebration I tried playing an easy game of squash with a friend today. The leg was pretty stiff and I didn't run very hard but by the end of the match it felt pretty good. I'll be sore tomorrow but in a good way. Now its time to get back into the swing of things!

Hotel Room and a Laptop

I'm writing this from a hotel room in Red Deer. I'm out of town for the week in training seminars for work. With work on the brain I realized I've never posted about my new job. Since coming back to Kung Fu I've been asked, "where have you been?" a lot so I thought I should maybe explain a bit. This may prove yawn worthy.

I graduated from N.A.I.T last May with a diploma in electrical engineering technologies. The engineering is thrown into the official name to make it sound fancier. It means I am an electrical technologist. It was a two year program and I disappeared from kung fu sometime in my second year so I could focus on school. After I graduated I got a job as a designer for FortisAlberta.

For anyone unfamiliar with the company, they are a large electrical utility. They own approximately 60% of the distribution power lines in the province. My job entails designing and managing the construction of power lines all over the province. It's kind of a mash up of civil/electrical engineering, surveying, land, material ordering and project management.

So far it's proven to be interesting and very challenging. There is so much for me to learn and I like that. I think its important for me to be challenged, to always be thinking. I dread the day I start going through the motions. Its both comforting and depressing to see so many people I work with having 20-30 years in with the company. I am still in a bewildered state. Adjusting to the change from dead end job to actual career. So for the past 10 months work has been a dominant force in my life. Therefore I'm sure I've been talking about it more than people would like and glazed eyes are all to familiar.

I'd be lying if I said that this hasn't interfered with my kung fu. As I'm adjusting to my new found state I'm remembering the other more important parts of my life, parts like Silent River. These other parts are starting to get the attention they deserve and it will only get better.

Inspiration

The I Ho Chuan class Friday and the meeting on Saturday gave me a motivational boost. It reminded me of what I can do instead of what I can't. I tested the knee out today doing some forms to see how it does. It seems to hold up alright so long as I take it slow and avoid putting too much weight or strain on it. I'd like to say thank you to all my wonderful teammates for reminding what this is all about.

Update

My knee seems to be getting better. Walking and moving around normally only causes mild discomfort now. Although It still hurts pretty good moving it around sideways or twisting. At least it seems to be healing and I have an MRI on the 29th if it is still giving me trouble by then.

Earlier in the week I watched a video about bill C-10 and how the conservative government is trying to push it through. Thats the big "hard on crime", create mandatory minimum sentences, invest 15 billion dollars into convicts bill. I did some research on the matter, decided its idiotic and in a moment of inspiration sent a mass email to all the Canadian senators. I wasn't expecting anyone to read it but to my surprise I've had seven or eight of them write back to me.

The ones who responded all agreed with my perspective of course. I don't think they would write back otherwise. I thought it was rather neat to be getting emails from senators.