Watching friends post from the Kickoff makes me a little sad, but really I couldn't do it. Not when I'm flying to Croatia Tuesday night. Instead, I packed my carry-on: Mask, shoes, socks, body cords, mask cords, lame, gloves, jacket, plastron, knickers, breast protectors, bike shorts, Underarmour singlet. In the weapons bag, I will put three weapons, some clothes, and those toiletries I can't carry on. I also carry a shoulder bag with electronics and money; I'm trying to decide whether to take ...

There were about eight women preregistered for the Start Your Engines Open at Medeo, only one of whom was highly unlikely to show, so I took a risk and drove up. Only three other women showed up, so they fenced it mixed, and though I had planned to withdraw in that case, it seemed silly once I was there to leave. My pool was Eric Shen, Tristan Quintin (who is cleaner than the last time I fenced him), Austin Ferrone, and Ian Pelton. Pelton was a nice smooth fencer. I beat Shen, lost 5-4 to Quintin ...

Yesterday I intended to lift, but had to run to the School Board to get public transportation passes for the financial aid high school students and by the time I was done I didn't feel like doing anything else.

This morning first thing I was stapling small posters in the hallway, just below the ceiling, and standing on top of a tall stool to do it. I could do maybe two posters before I had to jump down and move the stool. The funny thing was, it was easy to jump down. In fact, ...

After the workday, I headed over to the club for a bit of footwork. I wanted to at least get the membership thing worked out and do some footwork. Ahern suggested I hold off on the membership thing, as the club is revamping the whole system.
Gabby, a club acquaintance asked me if I wanted to do some footwork/distance drills with her. “Sure,” I said, “as long as you don’t think I’m going to be wasting your time.”
As we were drilling, she was offering corrections and advice.
...

There were a lot of assumptions underlying the first foil lessons that I received when I was young. Some of these assumptions were integral to the lesson, but others seemed to have been agreed upon as unspoken conventions. Here are some of the assumptions from my early foil days, off the top of my head:

• The arm will straighten before the final footwork action of the attack.
• The defender is obliged to parry the attack.
• The parry will be made as late as possible.

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