Aug23

Saturday morning Jiu-Jitsu

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Saturday morning Jiu-Jitsu
Her Royal Highness (HRH) letting me know I’d be flying solo.

She kept me company while I got ready for class then…

The Saturday morning Fundamentals class was white belt-heavy. I texted HRH, “I’m the highest belt here. Someone else better show up stat, or I’m in danger of being demo partner.” A few minutes later: “Surfer Dude to the rescue!”

Then someone requested Instructor teach the Berimbolo, a somewhat complicated move, though I’d learned it before. I wrote up but never posted that story. So let’s do a flashback to January, shall we?

Before class started, Pirate was trying to teach me this ridiculous roll-over into a back-take move that left me thinking, “What is this, calculus?” As in, “When am I ever going to use this?” I later learned this is called a Berimbolo.

Surfer Dude observed my attempt, which went awry, to put it mildly. He did a little “piff-ff-fft” laugh and said, “I don’t know what that was, but it wasn’t it.”

As you can see, he’s an expert sugar-coater.

“Here, try it on me,” he said. And so I did, successfully, for the most part.

The move ends with you rolling over to wind up behind the person, then climbing their back to choke them, or whatever you want to do at that point.

I got the roll down, but when climbing his back, I wound up smacking him in the butt.

“Excuse me. Pardon me,” I said as I continued climbing. He just laughed, thankfully.

This Saturday’s class had five females and three males, not including Surfer Dude and Instructor.

I love this picture of the two of them. This photo is probably courtesy of Her Royal Highness.

Of the four other females, two pairs were already standard training partners, so, odd woman out, I chose Mohawk. When I later told HRH I was the one to partner with a dude, she said, “How Upper Belt of you.”

I was a little trepidatious of Mohawk but ought not to have been. Turns out, he was a great partner. Next highest rank after me, he knew the Berimbolo pretty well and helped dust off my foggy brain cells. We rocked that roll. The Brothers Instruction spent a lot of time with the other students and only did a quick drive by, “Nice job,” for us.

After class, there were an uneven number of people for roll sessions, so I sat the second one out and texted with HRH. Then SD came over and sat down, letting me take the next roll. I said, “Ooh, I was just texting with HRH. You should keep it going, but be weird to see if she notices it isn’t still me talking.”

“Go do your roll,” he said. So I did, while looking back at SD on his phone.

“Party pooper,” I told him after my roll.

“What do you mean?”

“You wouldn’t text HRH weird stuff from my phone for me.”

“Is that what you said? I thought you were going to show me a reel or something, but it was your turn to roll.”

“Oh.”

“We should work on our communication.” And he fist bumped me.

I thought that was rather nice of him. Despite me having smacked his rump eight months ago.

Old Q: On East 109th Street between Second and Third Avenues is the honorary Hall of Fame street for the New York City game, stickball.

New Q: Her breakout role was as Stephanie Zinone in Grease 2.

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44 responses »

      • I thought you writers had more imagination that!

        I figure you’re feeling guilty about not baking me brownies and airmailing them overnight to me every weekend. I don’t do that for me either and I’m dying by inches because of the guilt.

        Liked by 1 person

      • The brownies will come with a book, however. And if the book isn’t opened, you’ll be the one with the crushing guilt. OH NO, I WILL NOT LET IT GO, BOOKY!!!

        Okay, kidding, but it’s fun to be dramatic at times.

        Liked by 1 person

      • Oh, high drama is the lifeblood of blogging. Otherwise we’re just normal, boring regular people.
        Who wants that? Not me!

        and my ego is so tough, baby writers could write on it in blood and it would just laugh. That horrible, screeching, kind of laugh too. Not the nice deep kind like Santa Clause.

        Like

      • All the normals get weeded out pretty quick. When they realize they can’t get rich in 30 days and make millions off of their followers.
        It takes people like you and me to put the starch in blogging.
        (As long as you don’t put the starch in the brownies)

        Liked by 1 person

  3. Berimbolo? Somewhat complicated? Wowza. Thanks for the video. I am not worthy. Not of reading, viewing, commenting on your skills, posts, trivia. Nada. But…thou art quite amazing! 😎❤️😎

    Liked by 1 person

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  4. ah, the burdens of being the expert in the room … now you know what it’s like to be me … 😉

    Berimbolo?!? Sounds like either calculus or a subatomic particle. I’m feeling like I’d end up in the hospital just watching it done.

    and you might not believe this, but I’ve never watched Grease or Grease 2. When they came out someone told me they were about auto mechanics so I never went to see them. I was told that the character Stephanie Zinone was a transmission expert. Whoever played that part.

    Liked by 1 person

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  11. Berimbolo is a very fun word to say. It rolls off the tongue. Berimbolo. I could say it all day. Berimbolo.

    Figures that I know the answer to this trivia question but, of course, someone else already has the answer. Berimbolo.

    Liked by 1 person

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  12. So these moves, such as the berimbolo, are preparation for when you are attacked in the suburbs and someone’s trying to steal your toilet paper? You can perform this move and crawl up their back in order to chock them. I think you just give them the tp and work on your sprint. No idea about the trivia question, I might be a decade too old. I do love the friendship you all enjoy, maybe turn it into a book club, bring cheese and wine! Hugs, C

    Liked by 1 person

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  14. Standing O for throwing “trepidatious” into your post as casually as one of your Berimbolo rolls. As for the “Grease 2” trivia, I’m not even gonna look it up. The original movie stands alone. I mean c’mon, what guy wasn’t seriously crushing on Olivia back then?

    Liked by 1 person

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