Whatta Fiasco

It was a very small crowd this year. We only had eleven in the mixed epee. The good news is that a lot of that can be chalked up to so many of our area epeeists having earned ratings high enough enough to disqualify them from competing in a D and Under event.

Sadly, I’m still not feeling that great nor fencing all that well. And add to that a slight lack of air conditioning in the gym. It wasn’t very warm in there, but my heat tolerance is currently down from it’s already normal abysmal level. Overheating Sam = stupid Sam = bad fencing. I knew going in to the event that I wasn’t likely to fence well and that I wasn’t going to put any pressure on myself. And I got at least one touch on everyone I faced, and managed at least two touches on nearly everyone. But finding myself sucking wind after my second bout was demoralizing. At this point I realy don’t know if it’s just the heat or my body’s way of complaining about the medicaiton for the hives. Stupid stupid hives.

My direct elimination bout was against the other veteran in the event, and someone I hadn’t had a chance to fence before. That was fun. By then I was warmed up and ready to go, and the score was, I think, 9-7 his favor at the end of the first period and I had some idea of what I needed to do to beat him. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to recover enough during the one minute break and it ended up 15-10 for my opponent. I’m looking forward getting another chance to fence him when I’m feeling a little better.

I finished the event 10th. Looking back over the stats for this season, I’ve finished last or next to last in nearly every single local event. Depressing. Then I think about all the time I spent injured or ill this season while still making progress. Even if it isn’t showing much in my results yet. I still have a chance to fence in Des Moines in mid May and again in KC in early June, but I haven’t decided if I want to compete in either one or not. Either way, I need to spend the summer getting back to a solid foundation so I can begin using what I’ve learned this past year. Oh, and I need to rememebr to have fun too.

I like insant gratification. I like walking into the book store (or library) and walking out with the book I want to read. Ordering from an online retailer is not as satisfying in that I have to wait. I know it will only be a few days, but still. It irks. (Until the package arrives.) Then I saw that I could get some books I really wanted by preordering them direct from the publisher, months before they would be printed. I had a feeling that the delay would just make the arrival that much nicer. Long after I’d paid off the credit card bill, I’d find a happy surprise on some happy day. Yes, yesterday was my first Subterranean Press induced Happy Mailbox Day. The short story collection, Getting to Know You by David Marusek has been unpacked and is waiting on my shelves. It’s sitting in line right behind Charlie Stross’s The Jennifer Morgues, and some time in the next month I’ll have another happy mailbox filled with Elizabeth Bear’s New Amsterdam. Happy happy. (Except for the book shelves which are filling up again. Time for some more cleaning and decluttering.)

It’s been a stressful week at work. We had our big client conference again, with people flying in from four continents. Of course they wanted some new stuff pushed to production before hand. We just made it in under the deadline, but it was done. And now all the oher stuff that piled up during the preparation period is starting to loom over my schedule again. I’m keeping it penned up so far.

Then, alst night, I drug myself off the gym. Because there’s a fencing tournament here this weekend, I wouldn’t normaly go to the gym on the Thursday before. But I’ve been in full regression mode for almost two weeks now, fencing like crappe. And Monday was opera night, so no fencing for me. And Friday practice has been canceled because they’re prepping for a big school fundraiser in the gym. I needed more activity, so I decided to focus on lower body and try not to get my shoulders and arms tightened up. If it means I fence worse than I would have, well, it can’t be much worse than I’ve been doing in practice lately, so what the heck.

Lower body work? Right now, for me, that means leg press. I did a few sets at a warm up weight, and then loaded it up to 360 lbs. I don’t consider it a huge weight, because I can still comfortably do three full sets at that weight without getting wiped out. But when I first pulled the supports I must have been distracted, because the next thing I knew, all that weight was coming down. Adrenaline kicked in and did it’s job, even as I had visions of getting squished like a bug. (Dummy, pay attention.) I finished my three sets at that weight and felt good. I had racked the weights from one side of the machine and was heading for the other when a guy stepped up and motioned for me to stop because he wanted to use the apparatus. No problem. Then he looked again at the side that still had the weights on it and said, “Whoa, that’s a lot of weight.” I just smiled. Inside, I did a little happy dance. even though the guy on the other leg press machine was doing three rep sets at over twice that weight, slow and controlled. Very pretty.

Then I went over to the recumbent bikes to do a quick ride to stretch out, except that three minutes into my ten minutes timer, I discovered how much one of my calves had contributed to my not getting squished like a bug. Ow ow cramp. Which reminds me: I need to get some bananas.

Yes, it’s based on the Graham Greene novel. Music by Jake Heggie. Sung in English.

I had my doubts about the material, but I shouldn’t have worried. It’s classic opera fodder. There’s an unhappy woman who has an adulterous affair. There’s a jealous lover. A despondent nd bewildered husband. And bombs are falling on the city. Betrayals and ambiguities abound. There’s even a fair dose of levity and one sex scene to keep things from collapsing under the weight of the tragedy. I enjoyed it thoroughly, even if we once again had an example of Whispering Through the Overture (part two) syndrome. Ugh.

The good news is that they were taping all five performances in order to put together a complete recording. Heck, I wouldn’t mind just hearing the initial overture again. Gorgeous stuff.

What a sad thing that there isn’t more of this story to read. What a wonderful thing that what does exist has been put together like this. How can you not like Axus the Great? He’s an aging brigand who has retired to running a bar. And the supporting cast are every bit as good. And if this book feels a lot like the early Cerebus, that’s not a mistake. (And then there’s all that COnan stuff. Yeah.) The only problems I had with this book are a) the women all look the same b) there’s not enough of it c) I can’t get prints of some of those amazing full page frames. (If you go to http://www.barrywindsor-smith.com you can find some previews, but the only full page item is the cover. I love the camel.)

Krzysztof Kieslowski (yes, it’s in Polish and it was made in Poland in 1981… that Poland) plays what-if games. A man’s life is followed three times to three different conclusions following a pivotal incident in a train station. I didn’t care for the ending (it pissed me off with it’s hokey effects and rug yanking, feh) but I was surprised by how much I enjoyed the film as a whole, in spite of not being enamoured of the structure.

Second in a series, and it very much feels like it. Transitional. It was fun, but I wasn’t bowled over by it. I’ll be reading the third one, but unless it improves dramatically, I don’t think I’ll be seeking out any more he might due. (Even though I’d dearly love to see more gargants.)

Another punch in the gut book, with the added beneft of being a prequel to Bone. Some of the anatomy in the at work gets… surreal. But the over all effect is pleasant and memorable.

Beautiful and violent with the gut-punch ending that you already know. I made the mistake of cracking it open when I got back to my car after checking out a stack of books… and finished it before I left the library parking lot.

Yes, this is the book with the madeleine.

This one has been on my to-read list for a very long time, along with a bunch of other classics that I haven’t found the time for, yet. When I spotted an audiobook version read by George Guidall at the library, I figured it was worth a shot. Oh my, yes. The biggest surprise was that I felt any surprise at all when I found myself enjoying it so much. (I enjoy James Joyce and Anthony Trollope. The “boring” parts of Moby Dick are what make that book worhtwhile to me. It would have been more surprising if I hadn’t liked it.) And what I liked best was the very human flaws of his characters wrapped up in a gauzy prose that managed to bring everything into stark detail by softening the focus. It’s quite the trick.

And while listening to Marcel the narrator encounter Gilbert on the Champs Elysees, I suddenly realized how much the childhood portion of Jaka’s Story storyline from Dave Sim’s Cerebus must have been inspired by Proust. The episodes in the park with the loathed nursemaid are what really resonate. Such sacrilege! Using Proust to understand a funny animal comic! But the comparison is not just surface fluff. But echoes of Proust are found in many places.

Two regrets: That I don’t read French, and that George Guidall has not recorded the rest of Proust. Two things to look forward to: Reading all of Proust, and finally reading Virginia Woolf.

An East German playwright finds himself targetted by the Stasi. But it’s the mesmerizing transformation of the Stasi agent (played so very well by Ulrich Mühe) assigned to surveil the author that is the heart of the film. It’s a dark and gorgeous work, but be prepared for a heightened snese of paranoia when you leave the theater. It’s worth it.

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