Raising Cane
It's been too long since I wrote in my journal again. Last monday all I remember was playing rough with Nate and a training knife. Every time he tried doing a center lock on me I was able to rib out of his grib, "slicing" him pretty badly in the process. It made me look at the techniques I know again in a new light. I'm not sure most of them would work. I don't really know what I should do, but what I'm doing right now doesn't seem to be working very well.
I didn't make it to wednesday night kick-butt because my car was PMSing. Her alternator fried, she needed a new battery, and a couple of other relatively minor issues needed to be fixed. I didn't make it to Thursday night either because I was spending time with my family and that doesn't really happen too often. So I didn't leave early enough to make it to kick-butt.
Yesterday (monday) Sensei Ross put on a seminar on using a cane for self defense. He's certified by Cane Masters as an instructor. That's pretty cool because Cane Masters is the worlds foremost authority on the cane as a self defense tool. You can bring a cane anywhere with you legally. Even on airplanes. You might even be able to board the plane before everybody else because you've got a cane. Then, should the person next to you be in sore need of shutting up, you can beat them over the head with it until they are unconscious, or they get the hint, whichever happens first. I'm reminded of how much I want one of Newt Livsay's combat canes. They are SWEET!! http://www.newtlivesay.com/NL_fighting_canes.htm check 'em out!!
The coolest part was, my dad got to come and participate. He was the only guest that came. He had a really fun time, and now he has a better idea of the kind of classes I have. He needed to be reminded to move more to avoid being off-balanced by his own technique. Chalk it up to the fact that he hasn't been active in martial arts training for "half a lifetime" (his words), so it's only natural to have to knock the rust off first. Overall, I'm glad that both he and I had fun.
We started by getting aquainted with the different parts of a cane, then went over how to use those parts to strike. We swung our canes around with a training partner in front of us for visualization of the different areas we would be theoretically striking at. It helped familiarize us with what it feels like to swing a cane around. Then we did a couple of defenses against a cane-side punch, open hand-side punch (don't know what else to call it) that led to leveraging them to the ground. That led to a few variations of plan B's in case the cane slipped over their head. It just gets nastier **evil grinning** when that happens.
I liked the defenses that start with a two handed strike with the tip of the cane into the mid section. You can deliver one powerful strike, or turn into a sewing maching and deliver a few to soften them up before applying a super nasty neck-crank/throw that made Stew make gurggling noises when Sensei Ross demonstrated on him, and made me gag when Stew did it on me. Let me tell ya folks, this one is NASTY!!
It felt natural to me to want to hook the ankle after delivering a few blows with the tip of the cane. So I brought that up to Sensei Ross. So he went over a couple of variations of how to do it correctly. I liked the second variation better, where you strike with the top part of the cane, then hook the ankle (much faster since the hook is already half way there) and kick (kind of kick) the knee/thigh area and pull their foot out from under them.
After that, we had to go because Austin's father was there to pick him up, and because Nate "had to get up for work in the morning." I got the feeling Sensei Ross didn't want to stop. He was in a groove and wanted to get a few more ideas across. That's all he was really trying to give us was ideas and familiarity with the cane. He's smart in that he doesn't try to make us Masters overnight.
I found out today that Nate works with my mother. She can't stand him, and every day at home she vents about how much he pisses her off. I guess he is extremely unproffesional at work, and so cynical that it's nearly impossible to deal with him. Besides that, he's just annoying and very few people like him. So she told me to go a little harder on him in class. We'll see about that because so far, I like him. In class he's quite nice, and an excellent asset.
I didn't make it to wednesday night kick-butt because my car was PMSing. Her alternator fried, she needed a new battery, and a couple of other relatively minor issues needed to be fixed. I didn't make it to Thursday night either because I was spending time with my family and that doesn't really happen too often. So I didn't leave early enough to make it to kick-butt.
Yesterday (monday) Sensei Ross put on a seminar on using a cane for self defense. He's certified by Cane Masters as an instructor. That's pretty cool because Cane Masters is the worlds foremost authority on the cane as a self defense tool. You can bring a cane anywhere with you legally. Even on airplanes. You might even be able to board the plane before everybody else because you've got a cane. Then, should the person next to you be in sore need of shutting up, you can beat them over the head with it until they are unconscious, or they get the hint, whichever happens first. I'm reminded of how much I want one of Newt Livsay's combat canes. They are SWEET!! http://www.newtlivesay.com/NL_fighting_canes.htm check 'em out!!
The coolest part was, my dad got to come and participate. He was the only guest that came. He had a really fun time, and now he has a better idea of the kind of classes I have. He needed to be reminded to move more to avoid being off-balanced by his own technique. Chalk it up to the fact that he hasn't been active in martial arts training for "half a lifetime" (his words), so it's only natural to have to knock the rust off first. Overall, I'm glad that both he and I had fun.
We started by getting aquainted with the different parts of a cane, then went over how to use those parts to strike. We swung our canes around with a training partner in front of us for visualization of the different areas we would be theoretically striking at. It helped familiarize us with what it feels like to swing a cane around. Then we did a couple of defenses against a cane-side punch, open hand-side punch (don't know what else to call it) that led to leveraging them to the ground. That led to a few variations of plan B's in case the cane slipped over their head. It just gets nastier **evil grinning** when that happens.
I liked the defenses that start with a two handed strike with the tip of the cane into the mid section. You can deliver one powerful strike, or turn into a sewing maching and deliver a few to soften them up before applying a super nasty neck-crank/throw that made Stew make gurggling noises when Sensei Ross demonstrated on him, and made me gag when Stew did it on me. Let me tell ya folks, this one is NASTY!!
It felt natural to me to want to hook the ankle after delivering a few blows with the tip of the cane. So I brought that up to Sensei Ross. So he went over a couple of variations of how to do it correctly. I liked the second variation better, where you strike with the top part of the cane, then hook the ankle (much faster since the hook is already half way there) and kick (kind of kick) the knee/thigh area and pull their foot out from under them.
After that, we had to go because Austin's father was there to pick him up, and because Nate "had to get up for work in the morning." I got the feeling Sensei Ross didn't want to stop. He was in a groove and wanted to get a few more ideas across. That's all he was really trying to give us was ideas and familiarity with the cane. He's smart in that he doesn't try to make us Masters overnight.
I found out today that Nate works with my mother. She can't stand him, and every day at home she vents about how much he pisses her off. I guess he is extremely unproffesional at work, and so cynical that it's nearly impossible to deal with him. Besides that, he's just annoying and very few people like him. So she told me to go a little harder on him in class. We'll see about that because so far, I like him. In class he's quite nice, and an excellent asset.