Weekend Dump

Let’s see…..where to begin….

G and his girl friend went out of town to a Steampunk event.  Cool stuff. They both looked great with their projects for their costumes.

The girls and I spent most of Saturday morning and afternoon at DJ’s taekwondo testing event.  She is a black belt, and was testing for the first level on her first degree of black belt.  It was a long day of sitting and watching the rest of the testing. Why? Because they start testing the yellow belts first, and then the belts in order until they get to the black belts which are last.

The testing was mostly the little kids. By little, I mean under 8 years old.  They were pretty funny to watch sometimes as their kicks usually landed them on the floor.  And when the master of the school called them out on behavior things, their responses were pretty funny too.

I did like one thing thought – how the master introduced the black belts who were testing.  They sat in a row at the back of the classroom, legs crossed, sitting up straight, no talking like the black belts should do.   They did this for hours.  When he got to them, he asked the rest of the kids who had already tested “Are you ready like I am to see the black belts test??”  The kids cheered.  The smiles on the black belt students spread wide – and when he gave them the command to stand up, they all together lept to their feet, straightened their uniforms and stood at attention.  The pride they showed and the respect was a perfect example to the others.

There were 8 black belts testing.  And they performed their forms in unison with a crispness that was great to watch.  And the little kids sat there entranced.  When they did their self defense moves, they did it with power as they tossed their partners on the floor.  I was wondering what kicks they would have to do when the master announced they had to do speed breaking.  Unlike regular breaks where the boards are held with two hands, these boards are held with a single hand.  You must have speed and power to break the board – not just power.  If you don’t have the speed, you won’t break the board – just kick it out of the hand.

The choices of kicks were a flying ax kick or a 360 round house (aka: the tornado kick).  DJ was one of three girls testing.   The other two girls chose the ax kick.  Not a bad choice, just a pretty easy one in terms of lining up the kick and all.  The boys were mostly doing tornado kicks. Why? Because the board, when broken, would go flying across the room.  I knew DJ would choose that kick. It’s her favorite.

She was the last one to do the kick.  And she nailed it perfectly – breaking the board into 4 pieces – and sending three of them across the room and into the crowd.  I was happy I caught it on my camera.  So many parents of the other black belts were like “OMG – she is amazing!”  My response: “She is, isn’t she?” Proud mom.   And the look on her face was perfect.  Definitely my kid, trying to hold back the laughter at how happy she was with herself.

She went back to retrieve her board pieces, got high fives from a few of the boys, and sat next to the boy who clearly has a crush on her.  He was beaming for her.  It was quite cute.  (Sorry G, but it was.)  After they got their patches designating their level achievement, they were dismissed. I caught up with her while that boy was chatting her up.  DJ is at least an inch taller than me now.  She put her arm around me and introduced me to him as “her short Moe”.  His response was “Yeah, you are short”.  Not a good move on his part, but he’s young.  They said goodbye to each other – congratulated each other again – and we headed out.

Poor G…..she has another one after her.  I should also mention that this boy was her partner for self defense demonstration.  DJ barely touched him when he launched himself to the ground like she had tossed him hard.  The master laughed at him – and called him out on it.  Then, made someone else be his partner to make sure that DJ wasn’t doing the same thing.

The rest of the day was spent cleaning the house and napping.  We made pizza and watched TV and hung out.  DJ told us stories about what was making her laugh randomly. Indigo made artist cards.  I edited pictures. And dealt with a drama that happened while the rest of the day was going on.

I am on an art committee at our local sex club.  Every two months, we do a new show.  The guy who leads the committee fancies himself an “erotic art expert”.  He has chased a few people from the committee already because they don’t feel he comes from a place of “yes” but a place of “no”.  And if he says no, you spend the rest of the time trying to convince him.  He and another member got into it.  While I’m at testing, I’m getting texts from both of them.  I was able to answer most with a word or two answer when he asked me for a further explanation.  I responded with “it will have to be later, I’m watching my kid test in taekwondo”.  I reply back was “It requires a big response huh. Guess that’s telling.  Sorry I bothered you.”  I did not like the pissy tone, so I said “no, it doesn’t require a big response. My kid is more important than this discussion.”

Later, I sent him my response in email.  At the end, I said I needed to give him feedback.  I told him that  he needed to be more open to ideas. That I did not like feeling like I had to referee two adults when I don’t referee my kids’ arguments. I also told him I did not appreciate what came across as a pissy response when I told him my priorities.  I respect the guy, but told him we will continue to have a hard time staffing the committee if people don’t feel like they can be a part of the committee.  This is the second time in six months where I have gotten an earful about how frustrated someone is with this guy. And the first person left the committee.  The current person is talking about it.  I’m not doing this anymore.

I made sure my reply was well balanced and not overly emotional or anything.   And he replied like he was doing nothing wrong – but the issue was me misunderstanding.  Yeah, that’s it.  My favorite comment was “if you didn’t have time to have a text discussion about this topic, you should have ignored my first text.”  So because I am not rude and didn’t ignore the message, but replied very briefly and with a caveat of I’m busy – it is my fault he got pissy?  A friend of mine who knows this guy really well read the discussion and said “yeah, I could have told you he would have tried to make this your fault.”  Monday hanging art is going to be fun. Cause I don’t take being patted on the head very well.

2 Comments Add yours

  1. This comic is hysterical!

    And how awesome is it that you caught that kick on camera?! So cool! 🙂

  2. Love the comic and G better watch out- He has three feisty woman at home.

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