Apr28

Oh, you’ve gotta be kidding me

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Oh, you’ve gotta be kidding me

I finally finally FINALLY made it to a legit Class 20, the one I conned cajoled kindly asked Surfer Dude to give me an X on my card for after I demonstrated mastery and played 5,000 rounds of rock, paper, scissors.

I returned the next day for class 21, and what did I see on my card????

No second X for class 20!

I approached SD at the desk and pointed out the problem. “Of all the classes for me to miss getting a second X. The one for which I worked so hard to get the first X.”

“Let’s do rock, paper, scissors,” he suggested.

“No!” I fake-yelled and walked away as he marked my card.

“Not even for fun?” he asked.

“Well, okay.” I returned to the desk. I shot rock. He threw down

scissors! His eyes went wide and his jaw dropped.

My face mirrored his, but I added a triumphant set of jumps, arms in the air, with only slightly less exuberance than Rocky when he reached the top of those stairs in Philadelphia.

The tides, they are a’turnin’.

SD stayed working at the desk so Instructor asked me to be his demonstration partner. In front of everyone. That is, in front of all the rest of the students. Doing the moves with Instructor. Did I mention in front of everyone?

I was honored to be asked and somehow made it through without freaking out and losing my mind. I didn’t remember the set up for the second slice, so, as I was about to sit down wrong, Instructor quickly and easily flipped me around to position me properly. Heh heh. Oops.

Other than that, if you’ll notice on the card, class 21 is Elbow Escapes, so I did okay. In fact, after my turn to be good guy and demonstrate the move for the class, he said, “Nice job.”

I demurely said, “Thank you,” like it ain’t no thang.

Meanwhile, back in pesky triangle choke land…

He’s tapping before I break his arm. Next comes “triangle transition,” where I let go, he pulls his arm out, and I triangle choke him. Unless he escapes because I didn’t maintain head control…

Once again the Arm Bar from the Guard class came around, and I breezed through it like nobody’s business until I heard a quiet voice say my name.

I turned to Mrs. Instructor, unobtrusively taking pictures like the one above.

“You let your balloon escape.”

Arrrgggghhh! I flopped backward onto the mat, my arms falling limply to my sides.

“Why? Every time. Why?”

“Sometimes it’s the simplest things that are the hardest,” she said, which did make me feel a bit better.

Then Instructor invited me to do a rep with him. Overcompensating, I grabbed head control before it was time.

“Block the arms,” he said.

Right, right, right. THEN I kept a firm grasp of his balloon/head and held on as though my life depended on it until the task was complete.

Instructor sat up, made what I call his “legit” expression: a head tilt and nod, which he often does when describing something as being “legit,” but this time he said, “Your technique is on point.”

That’s a new one for me to savor the flavor of.

Back to class 20 for a moment.

Before this one came around again, I fell asleep doing mental reps of it to be sure I still had it down. The next morning, Hubby sat on my side of the bed to wake me.

I turned toward him, half asleep, eyes closed, and said, “Get the angle.”

Turning sideways to “get the angle” is step 5 of class 20.

Yep, pretty much eating, sleeping, breathing Jiu-Jitsu now.

My gym posted this gem on social media:

Doing Jiu-Jitsu makes me happy. Let’s hope me being happy makes others happy. Unless I accidentally attack Hubby in my sleep.

~~~

Last post’s trivia answer of America’s number-one favorite piece, excuse me, work, of architecture (wink, wink to Dave) was indeed Empire State Building. Y’all are so smart. Let’s see if you can get this one:

Alongside her boyfriend, she was killed in an ambush in Bienville Parish, Louisiana, on May 23, 1934.

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47 responses »

  4. Congrats! I don’t REALLY know what I’m congratulating you for, since I don’t “speak” jiu jitsu, but I can tell you did something(s) good. Well done, you! No idea on the trivia question, so I’ll throw our Molly Ringwald I (Molly Ringwald’s grandma).

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  9. Can you get a black belt for rock-paper-scissors? I’m thinking you’d win that in a heartbeat or three. I’m sure that if I tried one of them fancy jiu jitsu moves you’d have to call an ambulance for me. Actually, my elbow hurts just thinking about it.

    Easy – Bonnie Parker died next to her boyfriend Clyde Barrow. Now if they’d just take some Jiu Jitsu classes instead of taking up a life of crime, things would have turned out much better for them.

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    • Wow. Last names and everything! Elite level trivia master Andrew!

      Your elbow hurts just thinking about it. Ha! Yes, usually it’s the elbows, but now I have bruises on the back of my knee. I couldn’t help but think, “Huh. That’s a new one.”

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  10. What’s better than hearing “your technique is on point” – about anything?!? Way to go, Betsy. You’ve got the moves…err…not like Mick Jagger…but someone famous, I’m sure that I don’t know about from Jiu-Jitsu land! Go, girl, go! 🥰😁🥰

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      • You can call me anything you like! I don’t mind Viki, but I usually go with Vicki…such a pain to have a name with too many variations. Does anyone call you “Bets”? And thanks for the song lyric recognition…my brain DOES go there! 😜

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      • Vicki! Got it! Yes, I get Bets on occasion, and I love it. In grade school I was known as Elizabeth, so I got more variations from that. (Liz was my least favorite.) But Betsy is sometimes spelled as Betsey. So, I hear ya… especially when you’re singing a song I know. 😉

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  12. Bonnie, of Bonnie and Clyde fame. I’m sure somebody has already correctly answered since, unlike you, I’m commenting so late. Sorry about that! One of these days I’ll be first on your blog again!

    I’m happy that jiu-jitsu makes you happy. It obviously makes Instructor happy too, even though it looks like he’s taking a big ol’ bite out of your shin.

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  15. Pingback: Surfer Dude has abandoned me | Motherhood and Martial Arts

  16. “Piece” is just so “Lego” when describing architecture. Gotta be “work” to give respect to the person behind the design. But you already knew that right? (unlike your source 🙂 ) Meanwhile, the record says I’d tap the moment you ever touched me. Something about chokes and breaks. “You let your balloon escape” reminds me of long-ago golf lessons, when my instructor told me to pretend I was holding a baby bird in an effort to relax my grip on the club. After a particularly bad swing he goes, “You killed the bird…”. Yep, I feel ya, Betsy.

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    • You killed the bird, dang! I sort of flung my partner down a couple times last night. I feel bad about that. There’s actually someone my size in class now! I need to learn I don’t need to put forth so much effort! I’m glad she’s not a bird.

      I hear you on work v piece.

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