kickin back for the summer (you think that's too pretentious?)
ok.
this is the aberkarate reunion weekend debriefing that occurred last weekend in aber. i know i didn't get around to writing this last week but i was very busy with work and seeing other people (friends of the family) and more work on odd shifts and after 8-9 hours of slog i don't really have the creative juice to sit at a screen and compose something witty.
until now.
or maybe this won't be witty. either way click behind the link to read:
the plan was to drive to aber on the Friday, see friends and drive back on the Sunday squeezing in 2 nights out and a single training session in between.
like 2 years ago i am going to have spread this trip over 3 entries. they may not be sequential so if you get lost i'm gonna use Lord of the Rings piss-take quotes as titles (see above) to my links. clever eh? ;-)
Driving to aber, which is 120 miles one-way, is a herculean task in itself and wasn't helped by a gargantuan traffic jam at abergavenny. but i eventually made it to aber in about 4 hours and found my room above a pub. a room, unfortunately, that was not en suite. still it had a basin and the toilet/shower room was only across the hall and seemed fairly humane, just remember to take the room key if you want to pee in the middle of the night ;-)
we were briefed by Sensai that we were gonna meet at 7pm. and after going for a walk and bumping into an old friend that i haven't seen since 2002 (Mr. Booth) i went back to the hotel, got ready, and wandered up to see who's who.
now. this is important. some of these ex-karate members haven't seen me in anything from 2 to 4 years. some haven't kept in touch (intentionally) where as others have just been hamstrung by life getting in the way.
and i know that not all of them agree with my choice of lifestyle. for a variety of reasons.
i had already pre-empted both Sensai and another friend (Al) about my situ and they both made pre-alcohol apologies regarding their conduct over the weekend. i wish i could say that was the only uncomfortable event that happened :-(
walking into the Academy (pub meet-point) i have the urge to bolt (usual reaction) but i meet a friend at the bar i haven't seen in yonks (TallP) and he's easygoing with me and tells me just to get up to the balcony and mingle.
i do and see a lot of good people i haven't seen in 2 years (K, A, P, G) as well as some i haven't seen in 3-4 years(Al, Sensai, Helena).
it's going ok. Sensai, during introductions admits he hasn't a clue at how to actually pronounce my name ("Just call me Dee") and i am mocked fierce by Al for my drinkage of coca-cola when everyone else is necking Guiness.
i have a suspicion i'll be on the soft-drinks all night on account of the strain my liver's under regarding my pill intake.
then 2 people walk in who i really don't like. i'm not gonna name names but they're related and anyone who knows this circle of friends will know who i'm talking about.
one says hi to me as she's walking down the stairs, the other never looks or talks to me at all for the entire weekend. that is the limit of my interaction with them.
and yes, it is an ominous omen of things to come.
but i'm chatty with others and some of my friends (K, Helena) even comment on how pretty i look. even my headscarf is complimented. I have one of the worst pub food imaginable (pasta? how can you wreak pasta???) and we then decide to de-camp to the next pub on the night's itinerary. all in all it hasn't been so bad and i've only felt isolated and freakish on one occasion.
in the next pub.
Inn on Pier.
we drink more but i keep with my friends and the people who accept me. Al voices the line of the evening when he asks frankly:
"So, you've decided to play for the girls team?"
a bit taken aback with his forthrightness i recover and ask about his love-life and the absence of his longterm girlfriend at our shindig.
he grins. later on i got a facebook email saying how he did suffer a bit of minor freaky-ness but nothing severe and nothing that should imped our friendship. yay! :-)
unlike when i met a junior member of the club from a few years ago, Adrian who, upon seeing me in a purple tank top (don't ask about my fashion that night) and my chest (small though it may be it is perfectly formed) asked blatantly:
"You've got boobs. Can I touch them?"
I was talking to Paula and Katie (more on her in a sec) at the time and our conversation just stopped. In shock and a bit embarrassed i replied:
"Er, no you can't. And please don't ask me again" in a very calm and regal manner.
what i should have done is poured my drink over his head and kneed him in the groin but i thought better of it.
although both Paula and Katie (she's almost ready) later said separately how they couldn't believe he'd said that. I just smiled and uttered some throwaway line like: "It comes with the territory". and at the very least i can be seen as a form of flattery and interest.
If you're desperate enough.
and i'm not.
Anymore (more on that later too)
Katie arrived a few minutes prior. after not seeing her for 2 years and getting all frantic when she went off the radar prior to the winter of last year i am now hugging one of my best friends on the planet.
[words cannot describe this feeling]
she says i look gorgeous and i finally agree.
it's weird. we mingle tons and talk to other people but if we ever have to move anywhere as a group it always comes back to me and her. i guess she doesn't know as many people in the group as i did when we trained here back in 2001/2 and as we are the only medical people in the group (she's in med school and i'm a scrub nurse) we do get to talk a lot more about stuff that the others are too screamish to talk about.
or maybe are simply not interested? who knows.
we talked, drank, talked, drank and took pictures of everyone from every possible angle. I got tattooed with a permanent marker pen on my belly as our sensai was going around giving everyone pirate tattoos (you have to be there)
then we have to go to Pier.
this is the straightest club in aber. i've never been in there for the past 2-3 years purely for that reason.
i'm with a lot of friends who's common denominator is karate and who all support me (even if they don't say it - i hope!).
i pay for Katie's entrance fee (bye-bye £10) and we walk up the carpet steps to my history.
now. the Pier (Pier Pressure is its full title) is half crowded and now stays open until at least 3-4am.
i can't last until then but i don't care. we sit, chat, take pictures of each other, dance and drink like we've always done in this club since there's been a karate club in this place.
I have to use the loo at one point but, after telling Katie that if she hears violence in the girl's loos and running bouncers that she must follow them to stop me being lynched, i go and pee with the minute amount of difficulty.
around 1.30am me and Katie leave the club (little did we know the party would continue til 3am!) and go for Hollywood Pizza as Katie's whacked and she knows the guys who run it and we are able to get a discount on the best pizza in the UK (I am serious).
we chat about personal stuff and walk home in the rain (the weather for the entirety of the weekend was abysmal) before crashing out on her bed (she was in the same hotel as me and she had en suite - boo!) and eating the rest of the pizza.
i eventually wandered home to my room at 2.30-ish and got a few hours sleep before sat officially began
this is the aberkarate reunion weekend debriefing that occurred last weekend in aber. i know i didn't get around to writing this last week but i was very busy with work and seeing other people (friends of the family) and more work on odd shifts and after 8-9 hours of slog i don't really have the creative juice to sit at a screen and compose something witty.
until now.
or maybe this won't be witty. either way click behind the link to read:
the plan was to drive to aber on the Friday, see friends and drive back on the Sunday squeezing in 2 nights out and a single training session in between.
like 2 years ago i am going to have spread this trip over 3 entries. they may not be sequential so if you get lost i'm gonna use Lord of the Rings piss-take quotes as titles (see above) to my links. clever eh? ;-)
Driving to aber, which is 120 miles one-way, is a herculean task in itself and wasn't helped by a gargantuan traffic jam at abergavenny. but i eventually made it to aber in about 4 hours and found my room above a pub. a room, unfortunately, that was not en suite. still it had a basin and the toilet/shower room was only across the hall and seemed fairly humane, just remember to take the room key if you want to pee in the middle of the night ;-)
we were briefed by Sensai that we were gonna meet at 7pm. and after going for a walk and bumping into an old friend that i haven't seen since 2002 (Mr. Booth) i went back to the hotel, got ready, and wandered up to see who's who.
now. this is important. some of these ex-karate members haven't seen me in anything from 2 to 4 years. some haven't kept in touch (intentionally) where as others have just been hamstrung by life getting in the way.
and i know that not all of them agree with my choice of lifestyle. for a variety of reasons.
i had already pre-empted both Sensai and another friend (Al) about my situ and they both made pre-alcohol apologies regarding their conduct over the weekend. i wish i could say that was the only uncomfortable event that happened :-(
walking into the Academy (pub meet-point) i have the urge to bolt (usual reaction) but i meet a friend at the bar i haven't seen in yonks (TallP) and he's easygoing with me and tells me just to get up to the balcony and mingle.
i do and see a lot of good people i haven't seen in 2 years (K, A, P, G) as well as some i haven't seen in 3-4 years(Al, Sensai, Helena).
it's going ok. Sensai, during introductions admits he hasn't a clue at how to actually pronounce my name ("Just call me Dee") and i am mocked fierce by Al for my drinkage of coca-cola when everyone else is necking Guiness.
i have a suspicion i'll be on the soft-drinks all night on account of the strain my liver's under regarding my pill intake.
then 2 people walk in who i really don't like. i'm not gonna name names but they're related and anyone who knows this circle of friends will know who i'm talking about.
one says hi to me as she's walking down the stairs, the other never looks or talks to me at all for the entire weekend. that is the limit of my interaction with them.
and yes, it is an ominous omen of things to come.
but i'm chatty with others and some of my friends (K, Helena) even comment on how pretty i look. even my headscarf is complimented. I have one of the worst pub food imaginable (pasta? how can you wreak pasta???) and we then decide to de-camp to the next pub on the night's itinerary. all in all it hasn't been so bad and i've only felt isolated and freakish on one occasion.
in the next pub.
Inn on Pier.
we drink more but i keep with my friends and the people who accept me. Al voices the line of the evening when he asks frankly:
"So, you've decided to play for the girls team?"
a bit taken aback with his forthrightness i recover and ask about his love-life and the absence of his longterm girlfriend at our shindig.
he grins. later on i got a facebook email saying how he did suffer a bit of minor freaky-ness but nothing severe and nothing that should imped our friendship. yay! :-)
unlike when i met a junior member of the club from a few years ago, Adrian who, upon seeing me in a purple tank top (don't ask about my fashion that night) and my chest (small though it may be it is perfectly formed) asked blatantly:
"You've got boobs. Can I touch them?"
I was talking to Paula and Katie (more on her in a sec) at the time and our conversation just stopped. In shock and a bit embarrassed i replied:
"Er, no you can't. And please don't ask me again" in a very calm and regal manner.
what i should have done is poured my drink over his head and kneed him in the groin but i thought better of it.
although both Paula and Katie (she's almost ready) later said separately how they couldn't believe he'd said that. I just smiled and uttered some throwaway line like: "It comes with the territory". and at the very least i can be seen as a form of flattery and interest.
If you're desperate enough.
and i'm not.
Anymore (more on that later too)
Katie arrived a few minutes prior. after not seeing her for 2 years and getting all frantic when she went off the radar prior to the winter of last year i am now hugging one of my best friends on the planet.
[words cannot describe this feeling]
she says i look gorgeous and i finally agree.
it's weird. we mingle tons and talk to other people but if we ever have to move anywhere as a group it always comes back to me and her. i guess she doesn't know as many people in the group as i did when we trained here back in 2001/2 and as we are the only medical people in the group (she's in med school and i'm a scrub nurse) we do get to talk a lot more about stuff that the others are too screamish to talk about.
or maybe are simply not interested? who knows.
we talked, drank, talked, drank and took pictures of everyone from every possible angle. I got tattooed with a permanent marker pen on my belly as our sensai was going around giving everyone pirate tattoos (you have to be there)
then we have to go to Pier.
this is the straightest club in aber. i've never been in there for the past 2-3 years purely for that reason.
i'm with a lot of friends who's common denominator is karate and who all support me (even if they don't say it - i hope!).
i pay for Katie's entrance fee (bye-bye £10) and we walk up the carpet steps to my history.
now. the Pier (Pier Pressure is its full title) is half crowded and now stays open until at least 3-4am.
i can't last until then but i don't care. we sit, chat, take pictures of each other, dance and drink like we've always done in this club since there's been a karate club in this place.
I have to use the loo at one point but, after telling Katie that if she hears violence in the girl's loos and running bouncers that she must follow them to stop me being lynched, i go and pee with the minute amount of difficulty.
around 1.30am me and Katie leave the club (little did we know the party would continue til 3am!) and go for Hollywood Pizza as Katie's whacked and she knows the guys who run it and we are able to get a discount on the best pizza in the UK (I am serious).
we chat about personal stuff and walk home in the rain (the weather for the entirety of the weekend was abysmal) before crashing out on her bed (she was in the same hotel as me and she had en suite - boo!) and eating the rest of the pizza.
i eventually wandered home to my room at 2.30-ish and got a few hours sleep before sat officially began