The Assassin's Path

[@mu]

On 2/12/2020 at 6:20 PM, KB Girl said:

I hope the specialist was able to do something for you and E. 

 

Specialist prescribed pills and that was it. His talking skills were poor. But I don't think it affected E. negatively. I mean it was to a point that you just let go of the idea that it will be of any help and it's just fine to ignore the noise really. That poor.

 

Monday

Flexibility + HS

Bent arm series /done

 

Tuesday

Press to HS

Bent arm series /done

Consistency on blocks: 8/20, meh

Press @3cm but I kept doing the slight pup leg, or the frog. Rabbit also came up. Press is a ZOO these days.

The good: I managed a 4 step walk on my parallettes: with the first 2 controlled, and the last 2, quick ones before falling out of balance.

 

Wednesday/Thursday/Friday => pharyngitis

Pretty dead. On Thursday, I had the voice of a little mouse.

I started recovering on Friday. I still went to work because right now I'm learning how to talk to a cryptographic module, and while the crypto lib is not exactly user-friendly, it's oddly attractive in its harshness (that's a nerd thing I guess).

There was no circus class because it's school holiday. I had initially planned to do parallettes instead but I was a bit too under for upside down fun. Today is much better, so I should be able to get on with my usual HS.

 

[KB Girl]

13 hours ago, @mu said:

pharyngitis

Such a fancy word for a throat infection I had to google it. 

Glad you're on your way to recovery. 

 

13 hours ago, @mu said:

Specialist prescribed pills and that was it.

it's a start hopefully! 

[@mu]

On 2/15/2020 at 10:47 PM, KB Girl said:

Such a fancy word for a throat infection I had to google it. 

 

Haha that's the word the doctor used. I do get a fair amount of little throat infections because I vape... And I usually get strep but this one was a bit different. I guess I'll keep sampling local viruses and bacteria for a little while until I get used to them.

 

I only had one session this week-end. Mood was rather low and I was kinda feeling tired but weird tired, a mix of physical and mental fatigue I guess.

 

Sunday

Press to HS... warm-up with ball / Cirque Physio / bent arm series. I added some elbow lever to keep a hang of it.

Press was tough. The first few reps were good and then I started messing up again with technique, puppy-ing it, frogging it. It was particularly frustrating.

Consistency on blocks was better: 12/20.

I wanted to do some aerial as well but I was done, too tired + nose still feeling like a cauliflower.

 

 

Monday

Cat woke me up at ~4:30am... That said, I slept a lot over the week-end, so I felt fresh enough and got on with a longer training session than usual (for a Monday morning):

 

Ball / Bent arm series

Hips and pancake flexibility

HS entries + head position

Shoulders and backbend work

HS seven, flags (straddle, diamond) – flags are still very small in ROM, I can't go back up otherwise, it's tough

HS walks, I managed another 4 wee steps backward that I got on tape:

 

 

Next goal: balance the last 2 and start working on moving forward, yoohoo! (HS life...)

 

[Mad Hatter]

On 2/15/2020 at 10:17 AM, @mu said:

Press @3cm but I kept doing the slight pup leg, or the frog. Rabbit also came up. Press is a ZOO these days.

?

 

Hope things will get a little easier for both you and E soon.

[@mu]

On 2/17/2020 at 9:37 AM, Mad Hatter said:

?

 

Hope things will get a little easier for both you and E soon.

 

thanks!

 

Monday

 

I tried to read some Persian, but I'm kind of a bit weary of reading the news these days. I ended up listening to an audio book in bed.

That said, I had put a sound timeout at 20mn, I did not even get there. Until I was woken up by some noise around 1am, it was E. trying to handle a quite big water leak in the bathroom, we had to cut off water. Plumber came the next day and replaced the whole water tap...

 

Tuesday

 

Press to handstand starting with some Cirque physio, ball rolls and flex foot work + bent arm series.

 

I nailed my first HS of the day with 10 straddle to straight reps, holding well over 30s, it was great!

Some progress on neutral / looking at my feet. I did a new thing: twisted holds, it's a funny stretch.

L-sit was also good. The beginning of press felt good and then I LOST IT AGAIN.

 

Damn. I think I gained strength and I'm trying to brute-force it from the bottom, and IT IS NOT WORKING. So I spent more time pushing in floats @3cm, and when the frog came up, I went back to 8cm. I had a case of banana fish somewhere as well. Meh

Block consistency was also hard: 9/20.

 

I finished with ups and down from the blocks against the wall.

 

Wednesday

 

Still Circus holiday so no class. I read headlines on BBC Persian, better than nothing I guess.

 

Thursday

 

No class tonight either. I might have a pbarz session tomorrow morning with some aerial. I have the aerial workshop on Saturday and with the Circus holiday, I feel like I haven't done anything in ages. I should probably prepare some figures.

 

[Mad Hatter]

3 hours ago, @mu said:

Damn. I think I gained strength and I'm trying to brute-force it from the bottom, and IT IS NOT WORKING. So I spent more time pushing in floats @3cm, and when the frog came up, I went back to 8cm. I had a case of banana fish somewhere as well. Meh

Maybe it's worth going back to your notes from the press course, even go through all the progressions from square one, just to see if you've forgotten a missing piece or a clue?

[WhiteGhost]

Finally getting on board this train

[@mu]

3 hours ago, WhiteGhost said:

Finally getting on board this train

 

Hellooooo!

 

19 hours ago, Mad Hatter said:

Maybe it's worth going back to your notes from the press course, even go through all the progressions from square one, just to see if you've forgotten a missing piece or a clue?

 

Excellent idea! I went and had a look again. I think I may have lost a bit of posterior pelvic tilt, I'm push straight up rather than curling it. Today I added some of that training against the wall and I focused on curled floats @8cm.

 

It's not easy to tell from videos because I curl some but not all the way. It feels like that instead of curling out vertebra by vertebra and pushing while doing so, at some point I want to jump directly 3 vertebra up or something, and it messes up the whole thing.  Maybe it's the push transfer from shoulders to trapezius and whatever comes next in the chain as you straighten up. I can definitely feel a moment of muscle confusion somewhere.

 

I suspect this is coming from my new practice on blocks. With blocks, I learned to straddle kick slightly over my shoulders (more than usual), and then elevate the shoulders in a straighter line. I watched a video by Yuri M. some time ago that explained that indeed it's fairly natural on blocks because fingers are below the palm so there will be more wrist flexion forward compared to say the floor (parallettes are a different animal because the grip is sideways).

 

But because I do those after press usually and I'm quite tired, I think I just got into the habit of planching it a little. Nothing wrong with that per se, but I started picking the habit on press as well and it's just not efficient for a full press. I mean I'm not strong enough to planche it all the way. (With blocks, the slight planching is helped by momentum).

 

So there is that, and I have to watch my ribs again and how much I bend from the back. That bit I think is coming from training seven. These days I will easily sink in my lower back. I still maintain a decent shoulder open angle so it doesn't look like a banana, but my ribs are not exactly where they should be.

 

So today was hard work. And consistency on block was just 9/20 because I started watching out for that little planche moment to to curl it a bit more and it's hard. A lot of rabbit HS was involved too.

 

But I think I got my finger on something. Let's see how that goes.

 

[Mad Hatter]

Ah interesting stuff about the block positioning. I hope you can figure out what's happening.  

[KB Girl]

Very interesting read- it's such a process learning these skills! 

[@mu]

So I went to the dance / creative aerial workshop and it was absolutely brilliant. Much more in the lines of the types of stuff I was doing back in Scotland. The teacher was really good. Very peaceful guy,  humble but not subdued, very good methodology / approach to improvisation work.

 

He made me connect a few things in my head.

 

Like, why does a movement sometimes feel or look unsatisfying? Because it's not finished. Why is it not finished? Because the energy initiating that movement has a resonance, that resonance has to be respected (e.g. duration) and framed (e.g. if you want to cut it short, it needs a proper halt, very much like a piece of music I suppose).

Example: arm extension => I need to extend as much as I can, even further (as an intention). If I don't, the movement looks “unfinished”, a bit “confused” (did I really want to extend that arm?).

This is why I think improvisation is such a great practice because you can't really tell the "resonance" of your different types of energies if you don't let them go out freely in the first place.

 

We did a lot of improvisations on the floor with different movement qualities and transposed on aerial apparatus. It was not as low level as say, Laban's grid (8 efforts + direction/speed/weight/flow variables), there were just 2 modes, roughly yin/long/continuous and yang/short/broken. But that was good I think because it was not too constrained conceptually and easier to remember.

 

We worked on a couple of figures in the air to explore what was available there, because there are a lot more constraints in the air obviously, but you also get to do things that are not available on the floor. I will get heavy DOMs from that exercise...

 

We also did some group and duo stuff.

 

And one exercise was amazing: we all closed our eyes. He approached each of us and made us smell an essential oil. We had to find a choreographic signature for that smell (how it comes to you, how it changes overtime and how you react to it). Something short, a pattern. We had to repeat it and let it evolve if need be until we get a consistent signature. Then we transposed that signature in the air. It was super interesting. And I wish I could have seen everybody's signature on the floor and their transposition. I just spotted a couple. It was really amazing. Only 3 essential oils were used (cedar, geranium, coriander). I absolutely loved the idea. It's just amazing to see someone doing their own coriander smell on trapeze

 

At the end, he asked for written feedback and he gave some as well. It's the first time I get written feedback and I was very surprised! It was short and focused on the overall day. It was only positive though. I would have liked to have had something maybe like: the point of strength and the point of attention. But that's European/French me, I can't take only positive feedback, it doesn't feel real

 

My main keyword was intensity in presence. I have had that comment before about stage work so I know roughly where I stand on that one and what it's referring to.

Another thing he said to me orally was that I was conveying something about “identity”. And I wish I had asked a bit more details about what he meant by that, but I blanked for a moment. Because the meaning of that word for me is pretty loaded. Maybe I'll ask him by e-mail after all because there is the possibility that we are not putting the same experience behind that word, and I'm curious exactly about what he sees that makes him think of that.

 

[Mad Hatter]

This all sounds fascinating.

I’ve only done a teeeny bit on pole, but for me it’s much easier to freestyle at home, without an audience and where I can choose music and where there’s no risk of crashing into anyone. In class I always found it a bit more stressful and harder to let go. It’s very interesting to read about how the teacher facilitates  (not gas ululates thanks auto correct ?) a safe space to get the most out of the learning experience.

 

It’s also really cool that you got feedback from the teacher, I’ve never come across that either. Your feedback (plus the stuff you’ve posted in videos before) makes me really want to see you perform now. ?

 

 

[KB Girl]

Oh happy to hear you had such a great time! The teacher sounds excellent. Such a good idea to do a bit of written feedback.. I'll have to steal that. Brilliant

 

[@mu]

On 2/23/2020 at 11:57 AM, Mad Hatter said:

the teacher facilitates  (not gas ululates thanks auto correct ?) a safe space to get the most out of the learning experience.

 

Auto-correct is having its own creative improv, that was a good one

 

 

Monday

 

Flexibility (hips, shoulders, back) + HS. (and bent arm series was done)

Shoulders were still a bit tired, I didn't push it.

 

In HS, there is an exercise where I work on moving my head side to side. I was looking at one wrist and then the other, now I'm trying to extend that gaze further to the side (if I'm filming, looking at the camera, or at the wall on the other side). Not easy at all. Barely manage 2 reps in a row.

 

But I did manage a full routine pretty cleanly twice (the one that goes: straddle kick entry → straight → leg rolls → straddle → seven → close tuck → open tuck → straight).

I mean the cleanest I have been able to get so far. I'll try to see if I can add a little something to make it a full 30s routine at normal pace.

 

 

Tuesday

 

Press to HS (Cirque Physio / ball / bent arm series)

I worked @8cm on press and it was better, entries were getting consistently smoother after a couple of frogs. I did some for reps (coming down feet to elbow and going back up, I managed 3 but not more).

On the other hand, blocks were a pain in the ass: 6/20, I kept falling over and over, or not jumping high enough. I don't know if it was fatigue or confusion about sorting out my kick up.

I started pbarz walks after that but I was too tired to even get in HS, so I called it a day.

 

In Persian, I'm reading news headlines but not much more these days. I still speak / chat often enough, but I really need to find a trick to read more often. Maybe if I could get my hand on a graphic novel or an e-book... I still have Saadi stories in a corner but I'm just not into that style of writing at the moment.

 

[Mad Hatter]

Your routine looks great! Need to find the time to start working on balance again and not just strength.

[KB Girl]

wauw, that looks very much in control! 

[raptron]

I lovedddd reading about that workshop!

[@mu]

Wednesday

 

Circus class: first half was “physical preparation”. Lot of squats variations, abs, pushups, core and it was intense. I'm having the worse QUADS DOMs RIGHT NOW.

In the second part we were free to do whatever so I did some silks and some HS alternating. On silks, I practised a few figures including a belay entry from catcher on one silk. In HS, my quads were still shaking from the prep so it was a bit difficult (funny how legs are actually quite important in HS).

 

Thursday

 

Aerial class. Some prep work and then the teacher gave me some help for hip lock roll-ups on rope again and this time I managed, at least on the right. That's what it looks like: https://youtu.be/Sh1JyK2ihuc?t=77. It looks small and easy but it's not There is so much tension in the rope (or silks) that it takes either good momentum or a lot of flexibility to catch the pole. We say “pole” to refer to the bit of silks or rope above you for that very reason, because it's holding the weight, it's as hard as an actual pole and pretty tough to roll up around.

 

I will need to practice some more and on both sides. I think I got the pathway now. Previously I was too vertical to reach out.

I was otherwise very tired from Wed's class and worked on some other little figures but my endurance was super low.

 

We need to start preparing for the Circus' school fest in May. We will perform as a group under the big top, yoohoo. So at the end of every class now, we will have half an hour of free time to rehearse a routine. I like that idea much better than the floor rehearsals he made us go through in November...

 

I think I will stick to rope. My main concern at the moment is endurance. I need to work on it at home because once a week is not going to cut it. I have a rough idea of what I want to to. I need to find transitions to accommodate my current level of endurance e.g. let's forget about a dynamic entry into s-wrap after 2mn in the air, so maybe do s-wrap and windmill first – or find an easier entry. Stuff like that. On my rig, I'll have to make endurance work on a rather small height and not dropping my drops... it will be a pain but I don't have much choice.

 

[WhiteGhost]

Oooh, a performance under the big top!  Exciting!

 

I love reading about all of your classes, sounds very interesting

[Mad Hatter]

Wow, big top! That’s so frickin’ cool! ?

[@mu]

On 3/1/2020 at 7:52 AM, WhiteGhost said:

Oooh, a performance under the big top!  Exciting!

 

I love reading about all of your classes, sounds very interesting

 

On 3/1/2020 at 8:58 PM, Mad Hatter said:

Wow, big top! That’s so frickin’ cool! ?

 

Yeah! ? that will be my first time performing under a big top!

I trained there once for Chinese pole, and actually tonight's class is there as well (Chinese pole again). It's awesome. That's the kind of house I'd like to have.

 

Sunday

 

Press to HS, still doing my bent arm series in warm-up

Press itself was a struggle bus but I suspect it was worse than usual because of quads DOMs and starting classes again (shoulder fatigue).

Consistency on blocks was a bit better: 12/20

I tried to some aerial but I was just too fried.

 

Monday

 

Flexibility + HS (bent arm series also done)

Overall a bit tired.

 

Now we have a sport coach coming at work once a week (for free, I mean it's a company's cost), today was the first day so I went to see. We did a sort of tabata (HIIT) circuit with jumping squats, some rowing movement with scapular retraction, burpees, some ab training where you sit and move a bar under and above your feet and extends legs each time (to hollow basically), mountain climbers, jumping jacks. Then some core stuff and stretching. The whole thing took an hour. I did some HS on his push-up bars in a corner.

The cardio bit got to me eventually but it was really unlike struggling with press to handstand or hip key roll-up. And I have to say it felt really nice not to struggle that way for once you know. I like that he really paid attention to form.

He is willing to adapt to wants and needs so I think I will push towards less cardio and if I could do some bent arm training there, it could be useful.. Let's see how it goes.

 

Tuesday

 

Press to HS (ball / Cirque physio / bent arm series)

Worked @3cm on press and struggled with form again. Consistency on blocks: 12/20 again

I did not have time to do any aerial but I re-figured out the wraps for a salto to windmill.

 

Little blurp if you are into Assassin's existential questions about knots

 

Spoiler

I realized that you could actually salto on either side down to a windmill that runs say on the left. It doesn't look like it matters. I will have to check during class with actual drops. I feel like a chimp doing maths by counting everything instead of using higher level equations...

 

Then I also remembered that there are 2 types of s-wrap. This I knew years ago but I had kinda forgotten? The one I have been doing lately is the first type with a simple wrap over, that's the one my body remembered first for a windmill.

I think with the second one you can rolldown with it but you have to fiddle with the tail when it goes behind you while with the first one you don't need to bother, you can just keep pressing the wrap on your belly. But  I don't remember for sure about that second one   ? . I recall there is a rolldown with an extra wrap that allows you to rolldown hand-free but I'm not sure it's the second one, I think it's the first one with an extra loop around the pole that simply adds enough friction to slow down the roll ?

 

I made a new aerial doll to practice my knots:

 

 

I also found an old video of myself doing that salto + windmill (just one roll) unfortunately the video does not include the prep, but I think it's a salto to the left down to a rolldown to the left in the first type of s-wrap. I hope I can still manage it.

 

 

Anyway so mostly theoretical work but I'm all excited about getting into knots again, I hope I can check it out in class tomorrow.

 

[Mad Hatter]

17 minutes ago, @mu said:

That's the kind of house I'd like to have.

Pretty cool, but a bit draughty in winter no?

 

I can't visualize any of the knot questions, but the video is cool and I'm sure you'll figure it out with the help of paper man. And a crash pad.

[KB Girl]

On 3/4/2020 at 7:56 AM, @mu said:

Now we have a sport coach coming at work once a week (for free, I mean it's a company's cost)

It's cool that they're doing that and especially nice if he's willing to adjust towards preferences  

[@mu]

On 3/4/2020 at 8:18 AM, Mad Hatter said:

Pretty cool, but a bit draughty in winter no?

 

Ha yes. There is a heating system but it's probably not the most environment-friendly system for a dwelling. Probably just good enough to train in southern France winters. I'm wondering if northern / very cold countries have specific big tops, like super isolated ones, because even for temporary use it might be too cold? I have no idea.

 

On 3/4/2020 at 8:18 AM, Mad Hatter said:

I can't visualize any of the knot questions, but the video is cool and I'm sure you'll figure it out with the help of paper man. And a crash pad.

 

Crash pad definitely a +

 

13 hours ago, KB Girl said:

It's cool that they're doing that and especially nice if he's willing to adjust towards preferences  

 

Yes, it's cool, I was wow-ed. Although I'm always a bit suspicious about gifts to employees (like Raptron unlimited holidays things you know). But I'll take that one. And to be fair generally speaking I do really appreciate the little extras (fruit basket, fancy hot drink machine, kitchen, creative room, table football, afterworks etc). CEO trained with us as well and it was funny because I'm not sure he is really enjoying it. I suspect he set it up to force himself to have a regular physical activity

 

Ha and corona virus has reached our little town, we have 6 positive cases. People are fine and recovering though, no death. Some guidelines have been put in place (we went to see E. neurologist, he said no hand-shaking for now), ads about washing your hands etc, but life mostly goes on the same way for now.

 

Wednesday

 

Chinese pole at the big top. Nice class, like the previous one. I managed a little sequence with a climb, a sit and an invert to a little ball shape round the pole from which you can slide down.

I made an effort to not kill my shoulders for the aerial class (the 2 classes back to back are sometimes a bit tricky to handle). In the last 45mn I had huge headache though, it was hard to do anything. Not sure what it was for. Lighting was really full on. Maybe that was that.

Here is a pic of the inside:

 

This is not the rope I usually train on unfortunately. This one is a modern covered rope, very comfortable and supple. The one in the other studio is more of a ship rope seriously, thick, hard and painful. You can see one of the Chinese poles on the right. On the left, there is a space for floor acro.

 

Thursday

 

During the day at work, I got an allergic reaction again, the same with red rashes that look like hives and are pretty itchy. I did not have any anti-histaminic and most of it disappeared after an hour or so. It's just weird. It may be food again or stress, I don't know. I have a specialist appointment for it but I couldn't get one before July... Anyway I was pretty irritable the whole day too.

Aerial class: more hip key roll-up practice with no much success on my own (I managed just once on the right) and s-wrap + windmill practice. I was a bit tired though and did not do as much as I wanted.

 

Friday

 

REST, a bit of Persian

 

[Mad Hatter]

11 hours ago, @mu said:

I suspect he set it up to force himself to have a regular physical activity

Brilliant call! ?

 

Big top looks coooool ?