Day of Bad Judgement

There were some signs that I shouldn’t go to Karate training today. [Meaning, a year ago, when this post was written. —Luke] Starting from the morning on…

#1

We were doing our traditional sunny morning exercise at the beach. After Yoga, the family did Tai Chi. I, on the other hand, decided to try full front flips.

I did many successful ones, but the thing with doing flips is you have to be 100% committed and sure that you can do it. Any shred of fear will probably land you on your head. a few times I’d start running to build up speed but just at the moment of launch (if you know what I mean), I’d get a small feeling of uncertainty, which means I’d have to start over. Well, after a few times of that, I thought, “Kyle, I’m just gonna do it no matter what.” So I ran and jumped. As you’d expect from blindly jumping, I didn’t get enough spin and landed partially on my head/shoulder (fortunately, more on my shoulder than head). I’m glad I did some neck stretches beforehand. Anyway, that wasn’t good. Strike 1!

#2

Later that day, we were stringing up up network cable from our house to our Grandma’s house. We had to get up on the carport. Luke took the sensible approach by using a ladder to get up onto the carport. However, I had the brilliant idea of jumping up, clinging onto the edge of the ‘port and hoisting myself up. Hey, it worked a few years ago.

But not today. It was extra challenging this time. But I pushed through, climbed up, and bloodied both of my elbows in the process. St-eee-rike 2!

#3

Finally, I noticed that the chicken scratch (which the ducks eat, along with lettuce, snails, and other fine delicacies) trough was running low so I went to the bucket (where we store the scratch) to fill it up. However, the bucket was empty, so I got a big bag of chicken scratch and a knife to open it. I went into the greenhouse to get the knife we have there. It’s a small 2.5″ blade (roughly same length for handle) used for cutting apples, tomatoes ‘n such. It is sheathed in a small piece of rubber water hose (the green kind). I took the knife out of the sheath and cut open the scratch bag. After pouring the food into the bucket, I slipped the knife back into the sheath. I was just about to smartly tap the knife into the sheath to kind of, you know, lock it in. But then I suddenly realized that 1, the end of the sheath was facing my palm. 2, the the knife was already fully in place, which means a sharp tap would send the blade into my hand. I caught myself just in time so no harm done. But still, strike 3!

And to top it off…

I woke up on the wrong side of the bed. That’s never a good start.

So, after all that, I realized that it probably wasn’t the best day to go up to UCSC for Karate training.

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  • Well done for spotting the warning signs....!! I do the same thing myself, if I feel too many things are going wrong! If it's early enough in the day I have been known simply to go back to bed and start again from scratch!! :D Hope that helps for next time!! :D LOL!!
  • unclebob
    yeah but are you pressing down on the earth or is the earth pushing against you?

    it was a good flip, I'll give you a 8.5 for it

    how far a run for the network cable? any attenuation?
  • dan
    hahaha! smarty-pants...
  • dan
    geez, you're in great shape, big K! so exactly how tall are you and how much do you weigh-in at these days? the flip was cool, as was the climbing, minus the bad scrapes.
  • Well, I'm tall enough to reach the top shelf, and I'm heavy enough that I don't defy Netwon's Law of Gravity.

    Ya can't get more exact than that! :-P
  • Russell from New York
    Sounds like your lucky day. Woke up on the wrong side of the bed and had three very close calls - you could have cracked your cocoanut twice and stabbed yourself - but didn't. To top it off you realized that the odds against continually averting disaster on this "odd" day was catching up with you, so you rather prudently decided to lay low for the duration. It is always good to see the writing on the wall, but being able to read it makes you not only lucky fella, but a danged clever one too. Nice going.
  • Toni
    I was cringing at #3 ... whew!
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