Neti nonsense and Avatar and Fight Quest
I realized that, since I started doing Jala Neti the sense of smell I've acquired that I thought was just salty and dry is actually the musty smell of the house I'm in, and that now I actually smell things very well. Sometimes too well--and I don't mean that in that "It's quiet...too quiet" way. I mean that, from half a block away and on a second-story deck, somebody was smoking, and I could smell the cigarette smoke, and there was no wind blowing. It made me feel sick, as cigarette smoke does, and I was glad when I got past it. It's just funny because I assumed this Neti thing wasn't working and was probably just drying my nose out and damaging my sinus tissue (and who knows, maybe it is), but I can smell more, better than before. It makes food taste stronger, too, but that's besides the point.
With the free time I've got, as I've mentioned, I've been reading and occupying myself with various exercises and stuff. One of the things I've been doing is going through all the "watch instantly" things I'm interested in on Netflix. One of those things is Avatar: The Last Airbender. And holy shit: It's fucking great. I finished the first season, and the last episode in that season alone is heartcrushing and great, and not really good for kids who might be emotionally sensitive. And because I'm impatient, I watched the final battle in the series from Sozin's Comet and shit! It gives me goosebumps. That show is so retardedly well animated for an American cartoon, and done even better (stylistically and otherwise) than most anime series I can think of. Shit.
After I finished Avatar, I was at a loss. I watched all of season 1 of Man vs. Wild, all of Avatar season 1, and noticed that most of the stuff to watch instantly on Netflix is the kind of stuff I'd want to enjoy with [despondent loneliness] somebody else [/despondent loneliness]. So I started watching some episodes of Fight Quest, of which I'd only ever seen two episodes. And those guys are really, really bad.
I mean: Really horrible. They're really awful at the stuff they do.
I understand they're only training for a five days at a time, and it's really cool to see the martial arts and learn more about them, and to see how they train, but Doug and Jimmy are just terrible. It's a wonder that they ever win a single round of any fight. I imagine that their opponents go easy on them.
And it's not just that they're not skilled; it's that they don't use the styles they're taught; at least in the episodes I've seen so far (with one exception that I'll discuss in a second).
You're teaching us Kali? I'm gonna do MMA.
Shaolin kung fu? I'm gonna do boxing.
Kyakushin karate? I'm gonna do muay Thai.
And so on.
But when they did Hapkido, holy shit! I was in awe. I'm alone here in this room, watching these guys do Hapkido techniques very, very well after just a few days of training, and I'm jealous. I'm jealous because after doing Pencak Silat for two years, I can still barely do the kinds of throws and disarms they're doing, which are basically the same as Silat throws and disarms. And when they fought in the Hapkido episode, they were fantastic, and even used the techniques they were taught with great proficiency. Jimmy, the MMA guy, was still doing his MMA stance, though, and that was annoying. I see a pattern forming, where I assume he's always going to do that through the series.
With the free time I've got, as I've mentioned, I've been reading and occupying myself with various exercises and stuff. One of the things I've been doing is going through all the "watch instantly" things I'm interested in on Netflix. One of those things is Avatar: The Last Airbender. And holy shit: It's fucking great. I finished the first season, and the last episode in that season alone is heartcrushing and great, and not really good for kids who might be emotionally sensitive. And because I'm impatient, I watched the final battle in the series from Sozin's Comet and shit! It gives me goosebumps. That show is so retardedly well animated for an American cartoon, and done even better (stylistically and otherwise) than most anime series I can think of. Shit.
After I finished Avatar, I was at a loss. I watched all of season 1 of Man vs. Wild, all of Avatar season 1, and noticed that most of the stuff to watch instantly on Netflix is the kind of stuff I'd want to enjoy with [despondent loneliness] somebody else [/despondent loneliness]. So I started watching some episodes of Fight Quest, of which I'd only ever seen two episodes. And those guys are really, really bad.
I mean: Really horrible. They're really awful at the stuff they do.
I understand they're only training for a five days at a time, and it's really cool to see the martial arts and learn more about them, and to see how they train, but Doug and Jimmy are just terrible. It's a wonder that they ever win a single round of any fight. I imagine that their opponents go easy on them.
And it's not just that they're not skilled; it's that they don't use the styles they're taught; at least in the episodes I've seen so far (with one exception that I'll discuss in a second).
You're teaching us Kali? I'm gonna do MMA.
Shaolin kung fu? I'm gonna do boxing.
Kyakushin karate? I'm gonna do muay Thai.
And so on.
But when they did Hapkido, holy shit! I was in awe. I'm alone here in this room, watching these guys do Hapkido techniques very, very well after just a few days of training, and I'm jealous. I'm jealous because after doing Pencak Silat for two years, I can still barely do the kinds of throws and disarms they're doing, which are basically the same as Silat throws and disarms. And when they fought in the Hapkido episode, they were fantastic, and even used the techniques they were taught with great proficiency. Jimmy, the MMA guy, was still doing his MMA stance, though, and that was annoying. I see a pattern forming, where I assume he's always going to do that through the series.