Tai chi demos & today's to-do

Last night was the Magic Tortoise Taijiquan school's annual new year potluck with demonstrations. I was in 4 of them. (If I remembered crap about san shou, I would have grabbed a partner and done that, too.)

James and Dan led an abbreviated Chen style, which I learned at the Friday morning Chen practice (which, dammit, I'm going to attend every week I can.) The Chen style repeats so much that it's fairly easy to say, "OK, after the first single whip, go into cloud hands, then switch feet and hidden hand punch, rising dragon stretches claws into death ground on one side only, then from the press into black dragon serves tea, single whip then dragon enters its lair (aka snake creeps down) to the ending."

Then it was the stick/dao demo. LaoMa learned it from TT Liang, who based it on a praying mantis weapon form. That went fairly well, though Violet led faster than I'm used to.

Fan demo was... well, Violet dropped her fan, I had trouble balancing for the one-legged lean forward part, then I dropped my fan, and Mrs Ma dropped hers. Fans are the easiest weapon to drop, since you flip them open a lot, and if you're nervous (and your hands are sweating), it can fly right out of there. But we had fun, and people were impressed *anyway*. So.

Right after fan, I had to lead Chen dao, since Chen is my main style and LaoMa wanted me to. He introduced it as something he'd learned and liked to teach to Chen stylists. It was surprisingly unstressful! I'm not used to practicing with music, and when we did it in class, it threw me off, but I managed to ignore the music, and did my pace, and it was fine. Dr Jay told me I looked good, so that's cool.

(Other demos included Wudangshan, Wu Hao, Yang, tangquan, baguajian, cane, and tassel sword. Plus san shou, as mentioned above.)

Today's to-do list:
-laundry
-Isis poking
-help Ben take the last set of lights down
-finish line edit on yhibiki's story (on p 5 of 22...)
-go for a walk and enjoy the weather
-take Isis for a walk
-register for ReaderCon and Anson Co writers workshop
-register for women's health symposium (and 6 hrs of CE credit)

That's probably enough, since the line edit is going to take most of the day. This nice, sunny, 60-degree day. ;_;

Mission accomplished

I got through my entire to-do list, except registering for the CE. I have another week or so for that. And it's like $170 for a day-long CE, which includes continental breakfast (coffee, tea, and pastries) and a rather nice lunch. It's at this fancy-pants resort/spa in Greensboro, which is part of the reason it costs several times as much as the day-long CE with continental breakfast and box lunches at the Friday Center in Chapel Hill. (Which I won't be able to make this year, unfortunately, because I'll be in BERLIN instead. Hahaha. It's the first day of my language class, even.)

I learned that David Drake got a JD at Dook, and he was the town attorney for Chapel Hill. Now I feel obligated to read his books. I bet they have some at the library, and there are some free on Baen's Webscriptions. (Baen has offices down here. Did you know that?) But he has written space opera with mercenaries, and I feel doubly obligated to read more in the subgenre.

After dinner, Ben's gonna play the last bit of DLC in Assassin's Creed II, and I'm gonna crochet. I have a shawl I need to finish. I'm on row 12 or so of a projected 80+. -_- (At least it's worked entirely in half-double, so it's quick.)

Quick beer review: Picked up a 6-pack of Dead-Eye Jack (Lone Rider Brewing). It's a seasonal (Outlawed Release) porter. As I've mentioned before, porters are hit or miss for me. This one is a hit, I think. It's got a decent balance between malt and hops, and a hint of chocolate. Recommended! (I prefer stouts over porters, as far as dark beers go. Except the Breckenridge Vanilla Porter, which is amazing.)

I probably mentioned how much I liked Shotgun Betty, which is Lone Rider's hefeweizen. I'm going to mention it again, because it's so damn good, and I haven't had any since my halloween party, because it's only available in growlers still, and I can't drink 4 pints by myself. :P

We should make a field trip to Big Boss and Lone Rider, but possibly not the same day. I wonder if Triangle Brewing in Durham offers tours/samples/etc... (Ooh, I can send a SASE to Lone Rider and get labels and coasters...)

Which reminds me of another quick beer review: Triangle Brewing's Belgian golden: Nice, drinkable. Not quite as good as Duvel, but probably cheaper.

Holy shit, clicking around TBC's website shows a Black Friday cask festival. Too bad it's impossible to get Ben's family here for Thanksgiving. :P (Not that they'd want to do it, of course. Except his bro.)

OK, dinner's ready. Time to eat!