Week 25 - Winden Down

This week started off with the ALS Ice Bucket challenge thing, so it was a slow start to class. I volunteered to film, but knew it wouldn't get me out of it. Luckily, I'd been saving milk jugs for months. They are tons easier to cut than stupid pool noodles. After we'd all been properly doused and recorded, we did a group warm up and review, then had a quick demo of the winden before we had to pair off to practice. 

Poor Ezio... both of us trying to learn the first four winden, me trying to do it all bass-ackwards since I'm lefty but not allowed to be, neither of us getting it at first. I was always really good at assembling those box drawings in my head on the stupid aptitude tests in high school, figuring out where the shady sides would be and such. But I cannot for the life of me seem to figure out what to do with my feet when sword fighting. Either they stay still entirely, or I step with the wrong side, or I do the fairy foot thing. The Professor, Lee, Mr. ZeusSquatch, RJ, and half a dozen others at Longpoint have all told me I just need to relax. Unfortunately, that has the same effect as when the gynecologist tells me to relax- it's the absolute last thing that happens. (Yup, I tossed in a lady doctor. You're welcome.) Maybe once I've figured it out enough that I don't have to think about every little thing, then I'll be able to relax. For now though... not so much. Basically, I could not figure out how these winden eins, winden zwei (1&2, really?) were supposed to go, and Ezio was terribly patient while we tried to work it out. The Professor had to come over and walk me through them a few times before finally I got it straight, then showed us the windens 3&4, which made EVER so much more sense. Then Ezio had to figure out the reverse, because my lefty ones made sense finally and his were the ones that were bass-ackward.

One of our numbers who doesn't come much any more showed up for the ALS Challenge thing, and wanted to do hand to hand-to-hand and staff work, so we did a bit of those after the winden. Well, the guys did the ringen stuff- that's not one I'm keen on learning. We had stations though, so I ended up with Ezio again, using quarterstaves this time. Quarterstaffs? Whichever. We were using big sticks. I was a huge Robin Hood fan as a kid, and always wanted to learn how to use a staff. New stuff! Yay! Only problem was, I had never even picked one up before. Well, one that wasn't attached to a bristle broom anyway. Ezio grabbed his and started spinning it around like he was Gambit or something. Suddenly I was feeling a bit intimidated.

I have discovered that I do NOT like the 'sink or swim' method of learning martial skills. (Apologies if this paragraph sounds disjointed, but I've re-written it like three times because it keeps sounding sketchy.) I grabbed hold of the staff with both hands, and tried to follow Ezio's lead while the other guys called out 'helpful' comments. They said it was like a really big sword, so I tried to treat it that way, and ended up catching a schielhau to the mask that knocked me back and had me staggering a bit. I saw him coming, but couldn't manage to duck out of the way before I caught it full in the face. I always thought that cartoony image of stars and twittering birds was just done for effect... yeah, no. I saw stars. And shooting comets. Several supernovas. I kept at it for another few minutes, but honestly couldn't report another thing that happened. I think I got in like one or two decent shots to Ezio's side, but kept forgetting the stick had two ends and no pointy bits. Mostly, I just remember the stars.

So homework got postponed again last week, and we're for really this week supposed to find a play in the manuals that can be furthered or countered with zwie hangen. As the Professor put it, were someone to say "Hold up, Siggy (Sigmund Ringeck)- what if I did this..." at the end of a strike, what would it look like? But it rots- I had my example all ready to go for last week. I'd been looking at plates, found my doorknob absetzens and thought if you pulled back into a high hanger after thrusting you'd be all protected and ready for another strike. Then the Professor describes the assignment again in class since not everyone remembered to do it, and STOLE MY EXAMPLE! Then he said we couldn't use that one.

Rude.

Now I have to go find another. Most probably I should be finding one now, because this is the only free moment I have this week since school is starting again and I'm supposed to be focusing on getting the little darlings to read. Ooh, wonder if any of the picture books I have with knights have illustrations with hangen opportunities?! I know there's a book with an armored squirrel by Jacques. Surely that'd count! I'd love to do a big display on medieval warfare, but we only have like two books left. I had a group of sixth grade boys enamored last year- I ordered five beautiful new books on swords and weapons in January, another three on battles, and every one of the new ones was stolen before the end of the year. So on one hand, grrrr, lousy thieves! On the other, yay! I bought good stuff! At least someone's going to read them.   :-)

Week 23 - Dr. Seuss Must Die (& Week 24 - Hangen Out at Home)

One bruise, two bruise, red bruise, blue bruise. Bruises big and bruises small, check me out- I've got them all!

School starts in two weeks, and the first kid who asks me for a Dr. Seuss book may find himself crowned with it. Geisels galore this week, again. And every single time, I saw it coming and thought to myself "hmm, I should go for an ober lauOWWW." Three times I got caught with that stupid geisel, and I never did get the ober lauffen around in time.

This week we got a new student to join us. New Guy seems very sweet so far and is familiar with harnessfechten, but the blossfechten stuff I think is new to him. We started off reviewing the zwie hangen, and had an assignment to go find illustrations of them somewhere in a manual on wiktenauer, to explain to everyone next week. We practiced with our partners the ober lauffens again, and did more reviews of the basics to be sure New Guy had them down.

We also spent a while doing more of the spar/coach/judge exercise. The Professor had us switching off again, this time mixing up our partners more so that we had a chance to coach everyone at least once. We're getting better, I think, about being specific with our criticisms, which truly does help a lot more than "don't get hit!" It's a lot easier to spot openings when you're not the one getting pounded on. It was also apparently the week of Bill channeling. So many hand shots! But if people are going to leave their hands out there, they're going to get whacked, I guess. I caught one shot to my pinky, but it was on a thrust- can't block with hands. Holy crumbs did it hurt too- much worse than my ring finger getting crushed at Longpoint. That one is still achy too. And still a little crooked. It's all weird now :(

Cuteness overload occurred at the end of class. New Guy's family came to pick him up, and his two kids spent the last hour or so watching us practice and do our cutting. Last time I was at the pool store for noodles, Mitch the pool guy showed me some little cutlass handles they'd gotten in, specifically to use with the pool noodles to make swords. They just screw into the end of the foam, and the little pieces that are left after cutting practice are perfect to make swords for little guys. Or to use for dagger practice. Anyway, after we'd finished, I grabbed the noodle swords and let the boys go at it. They seemed to have more fun swatting at the Professor than they did at each other. Yay, new recruits in a few years :D

* * * * *

Week 24

SOOO much fun! Triangle of Death drills! This week was all about getting the muscle memory to actually become memory rather than "OMG stop hitting me like that!"

After a review of each of the wards and the ways to counter them, we practiced with a partner to be sure we actually could match them up and successfully use them in sparring. This is where those flashcards I need to make really would come in handy. We had to practice each from both left and right, and using left-handed and right-handed stances. (I sort of hate to admit it, but the Professor not letting me use my lefty stances actually really made this one easy. And his not letting me be lefty helped me see how I'd been opening up my right side, which is why I'd kept getting stabbed in the chest. Happily, this week I have NOT ONE SINGLE NEW BRUISE to add to my collection! Kind of nice to prove him right, I guess.)

Once we had the basics down again, we moved to a new game. There were only three of us left at that point, so we had to triangularize (don't care if it's not a word, I like it) ourselves. Each of us had to pick a ward, then we circled to the left, using the appropriate meisterhau to break each guard. Starting off, I picked my backwardsnonleftyweirdfeeling pflug, Ezio (formerly known as T) chose vom tag, and C (who still needs a better nickname) went with alber. So we zwerch, scheitel, schieled our way around the triangle to the left, and as soon as the one guard had been broken, we had to pick a new one, and continue going around and around, taking turns and breaking guards. Then we had to do the same, but it was two vs. one- two of us would guard, the third would break them both. Then the Professor popped into the middle, and we went round robin again, this time with him breaking all our guards- which got really funny when he started calling them out as he'd break them. After a while, the schietels started getting schieldy and the krumps were going wild, and I think he got a little dizzy. It was cute.

While we took a break, he pointed out that nobody ever actually stays very long in a guard, once they know what they're doing anyway. But in the middle of combat, you hit those guards while moving from one cut into another, or while parrying a strike and moving to guard yourself, and have to be able to recognize when one of those meisterhau might be useful. So next up on the practice field, we had to do some sparring, trying to break the guards when we saw them. We did the coach/fighter thing again, and the coach gave us a sequence of guards that we were supposed to use, always watching for the moment that we could break the other fighter's instead. I went first, but had apparently totally missed the finer details of the exercise. I got my orders from my coach, and when the match began, went into my sequence of guards, looking for my opponent to do the same. But none of his guards showed up as such. There'd be something that looked a little like an ochs, but in the wrong place, and while I was trying to figure out what was going on, he'd throw a strike I had to parry, or end up getting hit. I got creamed that first one. Apparently I'd misunderstood, and we were supposed to just spar and look for opportunities to break the wards if we saw them in the midst of the fight. Makes a big difference when you actually understand what you're supposed to be doing.

We finished up with another review of the zwie hangen, and a reminder to do the homework that we hadn't reviewed as we were supposed to. So I spent a few hours getting lost in the Wiktenauer this week, looking up plays where you might find hangen, along with every other thing that caught my interest along the way. "Here's a great illustration from Pseudo-Peter von Danzig's blossfechten gloss... hmmm, why's he called Pseudo-Peter anyway? Cool, he might be Ringeck! Yikes, that one must be a cataloguing nightmare. Oh what's this rossfechten stuff? Ooooh, horses!" This is why librarians know bits of everything.

Then some random notes on swording, learned thus far from practicing at home:

a. Practicing indoors no es bueno. Aside from the previously created gouges in the ceiling (only one was mine thank you- the Professor made one too), it is far too easy to damage furniture. I was practicing my stucken and managed to clip the piano. Took me twenty minutes to buff out the mark.
b. Nephews are heartily impressed by an aunt who keeps swords in the house.
     c. Corollary to b- When speaking of swords with nephews, be quick to mention that some are sharp.
          d. Addendum to c- Be sure to have sparkly, girly band-aids on hand, in case one's tongue is too slow to remark upon the sharpness of swords, and nephews decide to test the aforementioned on their own skin.
e. Practicing outdoors is no good when furry beasts are about. Especially when the furry beasts are the kind that like to stay right at your feet.
f. Practicing durchwechselns with the evil cat with one's fingers no longer works. She is evil, but smart, and is amazingly quick to counter. Sparkly band-aids will be required to continue.
     g. Corollary to f- durchwechselns work surprisingly well with the cat when using a blunt- the four foot length of steel is just barely enough to keep one out of claw range. It actually gets her evil chubbiness some well-needed exercise as well.
h. Triangle stepping is interpreted by puppies as an invitation to play.
i. There are a lot of crummy videos out in the interwebs about footwork. (How do you triangle step by moving your feet only once?) Definitely gives one an appreciation for folks who actually look to sources to figure it out.
j. Passing steps are interpreted by puppies as more invitations to play.
k. When ordering the fifth box of pool noodles in one summer, the pool guys come to really appreciate visits, and seem to enjoy asking about how the noodles go with swords. Especially when one brings cookies.
l. Practicing cutting on a pool noodle tied to a weather gauge works great... once.
m. Manuals are difficult to interpret, even after you get past the guy who can't seem to draw human limbs correctly and makes them bend in seemingly impossible directions.
o. Motivators are interpreted by puppies as a definite invitation to play.
p. Getting blogs out in a reasonable time period is directly proportional to the amount of time spent at home. I'll try and be quicker next week :)

Week 22 - Green Eggs and WHAM!

I swear, I think our club owes more bruises to Captain otherJake than any set of techniques or people combined. Ever since Deadpool saw him pull a geisel on the Professor at the Short Point event, it's been the most obnoxiously popular move since. At least, I think it's geisel- like Dr. Theodore Seuss Geisel? Or maybe Gazal? Guesel? Gaizel? No idea. Professor said it was geiselhau, I think. Whichever it is, I have a lovely purple and black bruise across my knee from getting whacked with one. I think we've all been nailed with one at some point lately. Luckily, this week one of the maneuvers we learned can sort of counter it and maybe save our shins and kneecaps. Oberlauffen. When he comes in with a mittelhau or that nasty geisel or some other low cut, cross your wrists and rotate your sword down to parry it, then use the momentum from that to snap the blade around in a circle to pop your opponent on the head. More or less anyway, I think that's it.

We also learned Schwert nehmen. 'All your swords are belong to us.' It looks snazzy, and seems to work well when you can do it, and you end up just taking the other guy's sword away from him. I rot at this one, partly because I can't seem to let go of my sword. If I remember rightly though, when you're bound at the strong, you're supposed to take your dominant hand off the pommel and reach around to grab the other guy's sword, lift up to lock his pommel behind your quillions, then pull down and twist the whole mess up and under your arm. The other guy either has to let go or risk breaking bits off his hand. First time the Professor illustrated it on me, my glove got stuck and I kind of clung to my sword while he twisted around, and I got to experience the 'risk breaking bits' part of that little exercise.

I also got tips on what to do if I get charged in a match again, so next time I don't do panic splits in an attempt not to get shoved out of the ring. I'm supposed to pull back and drop my stance and sword down so the bull charges himself up onto it. I can't ever seem to remember that though, and my default "OMGwhatDoIdo?!" move when I get charged or someone tries to disarm me seems to be to turn lemur and just hold on to my sword and whatever's trying to push me over, no matter what. Apparently my tenacity COULD pay off when that happens, because I've been told two or three times that I've had the perfect opportunity to pommel someone in the head. That just seems like cheating for some reason though. Plus... mean!

After the new maneuvers, we worked in pairs on what ended up being a really fun drill. One of us went sparring while the other acted as coach. As coaches, we had to watch our fighters free spar for a minute or so, then offer suggestions on weaknesses that we spotted, or things that we noticed weren't happening with our fighters. We also were to watch the opponents, to look for openings or mistakes that could be exploited. After a round like that, we then had to pick out something our fighters were not doing, some move they hadn't tried, and work out a secret code. When we shouted out the code word, our fighter was to immediately try and work the move into his attack. Part of the idea was to point out the delay between the shouted command and when the fighter's brain actually processed the request and allowed it to happen. Part of it I think too was to realize that if you made a bad call as coach, you could get your fighter clocked. As a fighter, after the first time you heard the other guy's, you just knew what was coming. I came to dread "rice balls" or whatever the call was (C. was hungry), because it meant Dr. Seuss was visiting again. 'I do not like that whack to knee! I do not like it, C! You see?'

Poor Deadpool had me as a coach. While watching his bouts, I noticed that his opponent was constantly crossing his steps, leaving an opening where Deadpool could rush him and likely knock him off balance. It worked a bit too! (Thanks Lee, for the 'exploiting weakness' class- it's helping a lot!) We switched it up a bit, and I noticed one of our guys wasn't covering low very much. Apparently I'm better at noticing stuff when I'm not the one in the middle of the ring. It kicks over to just survival at that point, and I swear everything I learned falls right out of my head. Or maybe getting hit in the head knocks it out my ear and all over the ground. Regardless, I can't remember squat when I'm in the ring. Hopefully things will get ingrained enough that I'll be able to at least think while I'm in a match, and not just react. That passes, right?

The whole day was kind of neat, actually. We advanced that exercise, and the Professor told us we had to add in a two-step combo that the other had to do on command. I can remember the durchwechselns and absetzens and abnehmen stuff perfectly well when I'm sitting here writing, but on command I can't seem to recall anything useful. But I like zwerchs and can remember the meisterhau, so unfortunate Deadpool had to follow my directions, and when I yelled out, he had to unterhau into a zwerch. I don't even know if those two things go together at all, but it WORKED! That may end up being my strategy- whatever crap I can remember gets strewn together when fighting, whether or not it's actually in the right place. Maybe the combination of weirdness will work to my advantage. Regardless, Deadpool managed to pull it off, so yay! When it was my turn, I was fighting T., who is at least a foot taller than me. Deadpool told me to durchwechseln him when he came in for an oberhau, which is kind of T's favorite strike these days. I know the durchwechseln thing, that's the one I practice with the cat, trying not to get my finger sliced up. But for some reason, it translated into a duplieren in my head. So when I went out to meet T., his oberhau came down as expected and I tried to double it over. The problem was, with the sword way above my head to meet his, I couldn't angle it right to double over anything, and ended up just like halving it instead. Or something like that. So it's no wonder that it didn't work.
After a quick break, we each took turns either sparring with the Professor, being marshal, keeping time, or acting as coach for whoever's turn it was to get beaten. That lesson was on providing specific, useful information to your fighter- something beyond "don't get hit." The idea was for the coaches to watch their fighter and the opponent, and try to provide specific tips on what to try, weaknesses or openings that were spotted. "He leans forward when he's about to throw an oberhau, so watch for that, get ready for nachriesen," that sort of thing.

It was awesome. On my turn, the Professor channeled some of the fighters we'd seen at Longpoint: Captain otherJake with his pretty footwork that looks like dancing, Axel's constantly moving and tapping the ground, Mr. Marsden's seemingly disjointed and laid back style that's amazingly effective, Roberto's incredibly low stance... There were others too, but those I recognized right off. My coach during the round was giving me advice on each pass, but pretty much summed it up with: "ya, I don't even know what to say about that." Hehe. I know I get more carried away with the fun than with the proper techniques, and I think my lack of seriousness exasperates the Professor sometimes.  I totally admit I was fascinated by the mimicry enough that I barely even tried any attacks of my own during my match. I just wanted to see who'd come next, so pretty much got horribly beaten in every pass- but it was such fun! When the Professor decided I'd had enough, he even rode his sword-horse off to the sidelines in homage. 

After practice, the Professor laid down some ground rules for next time. C. isn't allowed to start in pflug ever again. T. isn't allowed to throw oberhaus unless he does an unterhau or a thrust or something else first. (Ya, they need better nicknames, I know.) I'm not allowed to use left-handed guards or wards any more. Apparently I guard my left fairly well, and the shots from that side work as they're supposed to, but I may as well paint a bullseye on my right side, because I get nailed in the chest every time I miss. I'm not showing you people, but I've got the most colorful breast you can imagine- glorious shades of purple streaked with blue, ivory giving way to green-tinged gold speckled with brown, pale pink blossoming into giant red starbursts... pretty sure the whole rainbow is represented at least twice over. I bruise easily, apparently, which doesn't help either. Anyway, the Professor said I was getting too comfortable using my lefty advantage with the boys, so now I have to practice the off side, which feels all weird and wrong and makes me all twitchy. Hopefully that will get easier too. 

In the meantime, I'm trying to stifle my sinister superiority and am practicing my right-handedness. I'm working more on my cutting, because I was seriously impressed with the cutting tournament at Longpoint, and I want to do that someday! When I go out, I'm tending to wear longer sleeves to hide the bruises, so that I don't get concerned advice from little old ladies who worry about my choice in men. Oh! If you ever find yourself confronted by Jehovah's Witnesses, as I was this morning while practicing, you can actually render them speechless when you answer the door with a sword in your hand. Just a tip. :-D