Quiet.

Half the office are out on vacation today. Poor fools, the weather sucks to travel in, and it's one of those days where no actual work is going on (seriously, socializing in the halls appears to be the order of the day for those who are actually here).

I forgot to bring music today, which is a big Arrrrggggghhh!. I should just rip a bunch of my CDs and keep them in my home directory. I did put myself on a 73GB drive with only one other home directory on it (which is an administrative user account holding only software images for things we use to build systems, so it's pretty much a fixed size) so space is a non-issue. Ah the joys of holding root.

Our in-office 'Holiday' party starts at noon, so the other half of the day is pretty much a total non-work time as well. Tomorrow is a paid holiday for us, which is nice, I know a lot of places are open for a half day on Christmas Eve.

I've taken the entirety of next week off, just because I can. I earn four weeks of vacation and two weeks of sick time per annum, so time off isn't a precious scarcity; it's a cheap commodity. I love that. I'll probably have to come in one day after we get back from CT and change the tapes out in the library, but that's a ten minute job, and I could avoid that if I did a little tape shuffling before I left today. I'll probably do that if I don't get sidetracked.

Quiet.

Half the office are out on vacation today. Poor fools, the weather sucks to travel in, and it's one of those days where no actual work is going on (seriously, socializing in the halls appears to be the order of the day for those who are actually here).

I forgot to bring music today, which is a big Arrrrggggghhh!. I should just rip a bunch of my CDs and keep them in my home directory. I did put myself on a 73GB drive with only one other home directory on it (which is an administrative user account holding only software images for things we use to build systems, so it's pretty much a fixed size) so space is a non-issue. Ah the joys of holding root.

Our in-office 'Holiday' party starts at noon, so the other half of the day is pretty much a total non-work time as well. Tomorrow is a paid holiday for us, which is nice, I know a lot of places are open for a half day on Christmas Eve.

I've taken the entirety of next week off, just because I can. I earn four weeks of vacation and two weeks of sick time per annum, so time off isn't a precious scarcity; it's a cheap commodity. I love that. I'll probably have to come in one day after we get back from CT and change the tapes out in the library, but that's a ten minute job, and I could avoid that if I did a little tape shuffling before I left today. I'll probably do that if I don't get sidetracked.

Quiet.

Half the office are out on vacation today. Poor fools, the weather sucks to travel in, and it's one of those days where no actual work is going on (seriously, socializing in the halls appears to be the order of the day for those who are actually here).

I forgot to bring music today, which is a big Arrrrggggghhh!. I should just rip a bunch of my CDs and keep them in my home directory. I did put myself on a 73GB drive with only one other home directory on it (which is an administrative user account holding only software images for things we use to build systems, so it's pretty much a fixed size) so space is a non-issue. Ah the joys of holding root.

Our in-office 'Holiday' party starts at noon, so the other half of the day is pretty much a total non-work time as well. Tomorrow is a paid holiday for us, which is nice, I know a lot of places are open for a half day on Christmas Eve.

I've taken the entirety of next week off, just because I can. I earn four weeks of vacation and two weeks of sick time per annum, so time off isn't a precious scarcity; it's a cheap commodity. I love that. I'll probably have to come in one day after we get back from CT and change the tapes out in the library, but that's a ten minute job, and I could avoid that if I did a little tape shuffling before I left today. I'll probably do that if I don't get sidetracked.

Woooooohooooooooo!

My instructor gave me my forms stripe on my belt tonight. He told me to be ready to test for Brown next month. Tonight was the last night before the school closed for the holiday break, so if I hadn't gotten my stripe tonight, I wouldn't have done the following:

I met a goal I had set for myself back in January: to be ready to test for Brown by the end of the year.

I'm going to ask to wait until February in all likelihood for two reasons. I don't think I'm good enough to graduate Outstanding (that's a secondary goal, to try for Oustanding for the remainder of my belts), and I don't think Evan will be ready in time for January and I want to keep on his schedule. Black belt is not a race, and we should be able to test together. If we can get our Black belts together, that would be The Coolest Thing Ever.

I'm that much closer to having to refer to Master Lightfoot as Kwan Jang Nim (the Black belts don't use the Korean title in lower belt classes, but always refer to the instructor of a Black belt class in Korean as Sah Bum Nim or Kwan Jang Nim (instructor or master instructor).

My flexibility has noticibly improved over the last few months as well. I can chamber my left kicks and actually keep my target mostly in my field of view. This means my posture is improving, which also shows up as improved balance. I still need to work on kick height. I'm good enough now to meet the Black belt minimum, but that's not good enough.

Oh, and my legs fucking HURT. This week was brutal. The instructors know that having a week and a half off means we're not going to get the level of workout we normally do, and have definately been prepping us for it.

Hopefully Evan and I can spend some time working on his sparring. His form for Red is solid, but being six, he still doesn't quite get sparring (and that's normal, most of the six year olds at any belt level don't). I still don't think he'll make January, but come February, he'll be more than ready and he gets really excited if he thinks he can make Outstanding.

Woooooohooooooooo!

My instructor gave me my forms stripe on my belt tonight. He told me to be ready to test for Brown next month. Tonight was the last night before the school closed for the holiday break, so if I hadn't gotten my stripe tonight, I wouldn't have done the following:

I met a goal I had set for myself back in January: to be ready to test for Brown by the end of the year.

I'm going to ask to wait until February in all likelihood for two reasons. I don't think I'm good enough to graduate Outstanding (that's a secondary goal, to try for Oustanding for the remainder of my belts), and I don't think Evan will be ready in time for January and I want to keep on his schedule. Black belt is not a race, and we should be able to test together. If we can get our Black belts together, that would be The Coolest Thing Ever.

I'm that much closer to having to refer to Master Lightfoot as Kwan Jang Nim (the Black belts don't use the Korean title in lower belt classes, but always refer to the instructor of a Black belt class in Korean as Sah Bum Nim or Kwan Jang Nim (instructor or master instructor).

My flexibility has noticibly improved over the last few months as well. I can chamber my left kicks and actually keep my target mostly in my field of view. This means my posture is improving, which also shows up as improved balance. I still need to work on kick height. I'm good enough now to meet the Black belt minimum, but that's not good enough.

Oh, and my legs fucking HURT. This week was brutal. The instructors know that having a week and a half off means we're not going to get the level of workout we normally do, and have definately been prepping us for it.

Hopefully Evan and I can spend some time working on his sparring. His form for Red is solid, but being six, he still doesn't quite get sparring (and that's normal, most of the six year olds at any belt level don't). I still don't think he'll make January, but come February, he'll be more than ready and he gets really excited if he thinks he can make Outstanding.

Woooooohooooooooo!

My instructor gave me my forms stripe on my belt tonight. He told me to be ready to test for Brown next month. Tonight was the last night before the school closed for the holiday break, so if I hadn't gotten my stripe tonight, I wouldn't have done the following:

I met a goal I had set for myself back in January: to be ready to test for Brown by the end of the year.

I'm going to ask to wait until February in all likelihood for two reasons. I don't think I'm good enough to graduate Outstanding (that's a secondary goal, to try for Oustanding for the remainder of my belts), and I don't think Evan will be ready in time for January and I want to keep on his schedule. Black belt is not a race, and we should be able to test together. If we can get our Black belts together, that would be The Coolest Thing Ever.

I'm that much closer to having to refer to Master Lightfoot as Kwan Jang Nim (the Black belts don't use the Korean title in lower belt classes, but always refer to the instructor of a Black belt class in Korean as Sah Bum Nim or Kwan Jang Nim (instructor or master instructor).

My flexibility has noticibly improved over the last few months as well. I can chamber my left kicks and actually keep my target mostly in my field of view. This means my posture is improving, which also shows up as improved balance. I still need to work on kick height. I'm good enough now to meet the Black belt minimum, but that's not good enough.

Oh, and my legs fucking HURT. This week was brutal. The instructors know that having a week and a half off means we're not going to get the level of workout we normally do, and have definately been prepping us for it.

Hopefully Evan and I can spend some time working on his sparring. His form for Red is solid, but being six, he still doesn't quite get sparring (and that's normal, most of the six year olds at any belt level don't). I still don't think he'll make January, but come February, he'll be more than ready and he gets really excited if he thinks he can make Outstanding.