Hapkido
I haven't been going consistently as of late. Well, I've been going consistently as in "once every other week", but not consistently as in every lesson. Waking up early in the morning, driving 3 - 4 hours, and working takes it's toll. For the past two weeks concerts have been on which have both prevented me from getting sleep (and Angra was on a tuesday), so I've basically come home on the "hapkido nights" and crashed until the next morning.
Sometimes it just boils down to "I'm just too lazy". Tonight is one of those. That's not a big problem in itself, but I'm finding that even when I
can make it, I'm not exactly doing as well as I should. This is pretty much a fitness thing, but also partially a recovery thing. Me not being roughly active constantly, or not getting enough rest, or whatever, kinda ruins the "mojo", and stops hapkido from being fun. Lately, it seems more like I'm keeping up than improving.
Another thing is that the green belt is, well, hard. There are a lot more variables, and I'm just not dealing with them all that well. Remembering is hard enough, but I feel like I can't control the situation in free sparring, and basically couldn't deal with a real fight, because I think too slow. Kind of ironic that considering the rest of me, the slowest part is my
brain. Flow? Forget it! I'm a freaking robot. My stances are good, but I can't deal with wierdness.
The solution, basically, is going to be more fitness stuff during weekends, maybe try and do some things at work when I'm more comfortable. Eat less crap during weekends, since I always find I lose weight during the week and put it on again during the weekend. I don't know what I can do about my brain, though. Maybe zen training? Meditation and video games? I'm not really sure, but the only way I can think of is practise. The grading's coming up, so I
must be ready.
Satriani
One of the weeks I couldn't go to Hapkido was because of a Satch concert. This was on a weekday, so getting home at one-ish made me non good for work the next day, but I didn't fare too badly, just crashed on the thursday. I'm sure you've all seen the pics on flickr. Anyway, he was flawless. Great sound, great songs, great freaking everything. Also, you can't beat metalheads throwing up the horns, and then feeling a little awkward.
Since there was no opening band, the guy went for like 3 hours, and hyperextended his songs for like 10 minutes just jamming. It was way
savoury. He threw a plectrum in our direction. I "caught" it (after it fell to the ground), and gave it to my bro. He threw many plectrums in many directions, but he threw
one in ours, and I got it. Someone threw a hat on the stage. One of those souvenir "aussie" hats that say "Australia" on them. He put it on and played like that pretty much all night. Way cool. He said the hat had some serious "mojo". Thus "mojo" entered my vocabulary, and never shall it leave.
I'm thinking that we must bring souvenirs to our international guests from now on.
Angra (and Dungeon)
The Tuesday after, Angra came. It was at a tiny little place called the Marquee. The show was sposed to start at 7:30 but was postponed to 8:30 (due to "technical difficulties"). That day was all bad. Heavy rain made it so the drive home took two hours, ten minutes. Huge amount of time, and I would've been late except that the show was also delayed. We had to wait outside in the rain for a good half hour for the doors to open (a "good" half hour being an hour, seeing as the doors opened close to 9).
The first opener was "Jennifer will drown". They sounded bad, like high school band bad. My bro bought the album thinking that'd sound decent, but apparently their album sounds worse. The aussie metal scene is small, though, so we still showed some appreciation. It was kinda hard after standing in the rain for ages, though. It was cute though, since their parents were there. It's awesome seeing 80something year olds rock out. Anyway, hopefully it'll become a decent band eventually.
Of note was their bassist: he looked a
lot like Moh. So much so, that I really had to hold myself back from doing the mohammad chant.
Internal dialog: "Don't do it man, these people don't even know Mohammad, much less the fact that the bassist looks like him, much less the chant itself. They'll think it's racist or something, just keep your mouth shut".
At this point, I noticed (where "I" means "one of Hurshy's friends") that this concert had everything. There was a midget and a guy in a wheelchair. This concert officially had young and old, abled and disabled, tall and short. All the extremes... to the extreme.
Then Dungeon came on. This is the fourth time we've seen em: Strapping young lad, Opeth, Metal for the brain, and now Angra. This time we figured we should probably hear some of their songs. After all, they're a good aussie band, and they're big in Japan. I thought: "Hey, there's Japanese people out there who've gone to Children of Bodom like four times, but still haven't heard Dungeon four times. They're aussie man, time to put down the cheese." I bought the old album and a shirt at a nice price.
Did they rock out? Not so much. It was raining and stuff. It's hard to maintain that kind of excitement when you're thinking "I'm gonna be fucked for work tomorrow". Anyway, I know just one of thier songs, and joined in like Mr Bean's "Hallelujah" bit. Upon leaving, Dungeon informed us that Angra would "kick our arses". I was skeptical at that point, seeing as how the night was going. I was wrong. Incidently, The members from Dungeon were just walking around that night. We could've just walked up and said "hi", or "I like your music, man". I didn't know their names or anything, so I didn't do anything. My bro. & co. did the awkward "you guys are cool" thing.
Anyway, Angra came on, and our arses were prompty, royally booted into oblivion. Awesome. I've never thought I'd be moshing so hard to such nice sounding music. They played all but a couple of their best songs. I guess they could only stay for so long. I touched the guitarist's hand (wow). I got home at 3, and was screwed for the next day's work, but well worth it.