Thursday, November 04, 2004

Ok, Enough Already



Henrietta the Hound has diarrhea because of having to live around my emotions, and I have decided to put my rose-colored glasses on!
Nothing but good stuff for a while.

So I'm going to write about my bagua practice. Bagua is an internal martial art like tai chi, but at the same time very different. It looks weirder, for one thing, and it's done very fast, indeed, on high levels so fast that the opponent can't see how you got behind him, around him and back to his front. The name reflects bagua's dependence on the Chinese I Ching, and also bagua's purported ability to make the practitioner capable of fighting eight enemies simultaneously (ba=8, I think).

In the initial stages of practice, the moving isn't very fast. It's ridiculously slow and awkward and your knees creak and hurt a lot if you're not careful. But after a while it becomes interesting and then suddenly you go fast.

Bagua is done in a circle. The energy it creates is a spiraling type and the movements of the art reflect this spiraling nature of the energy. It's very invigorating, yet at the same time quite meditative and peaceful.

I try to practise every day, but Hank also likes to practise, so I often have a chocolate Labrador between my legs as I shuffle around a small circle. This makes my form bad: you are supposed to keep the legs very close together as you walk, but mine tend to bend out into a Hank-space. These are the necessary compromises in life.

In other good news, I have lots of Halloween candy left. I eat the chocolate outside of the candy and then throw away the insides. Aren't you glad I shared that?