You Did Great! I Mean It!
Originally uploaded by x the pitt x
This is Aikido.
O.k., they’re not actually doing Aikido, just “cutting it up” for the camera. This pic was taken down in Birmingham, AL by Brian P., another student at Aikdio of Madison on the occassion of Kerry’s (he’s on the right) San Dan (sp?) test. The one doing the strangling is Robin Sensei, one of the two lead instructors at AoM.
I wish I could have made the road trip with them down to UAB (I visted there last year with another friend of mine), but things were just too busy. However, I did get to hang out with Kerry on Monday, after his test; we took another road trip to Rufus King H.S. in Milwaukee to do some demos and classes for Seniors and Juniors in the theatre classes.
Anyway, congrats, Kerry on your test; maybe now that you’re San dan, Robin Sensei will teach you how to thwart that belt-strangling attack (how do you say that in Japanese?)…
Add to the ever growing list of wonderful minds/work that I’ve been exposed to thanks to PBS, architect William McDonough.
He was one of four (I think… math never was my strong suit) designers/architects profiled in the fourth installment of the series Design: e2 looking at construction and the environment. His thinking is really clear, articulate, intelligent and thought-provoking.
A quick search on YouTube turned up a talk of his from the TED conference 2005:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=IoRjz8iTVoo. It’s about 20 min. but worth the viewing…
The “take home” quote: “How do we love all the children of all species for all time?”
Sounds like a species mission statement to me…
{addendum: currently reading Cradle 2 Cradle, a fascinating book. They are also building a community website}
So, no doubt you will notice that there’s been a real lapse in postings here. I know, I know, a blog is supposed to be a daily commitment (ah… men, and their committment issues…); I promise to be more, uhm, faithful.
I’m also trying to be better about Montyland (http:www.montyland.net), where I’m re-launching the content with my own design (based on a great open-source CSS template by Andreas Vulkind (http://andreasviklund.com/). I’ve decided that iWeb, while a fine product (if all you want to do is construct a simple page and sync it with .mac), really doesn’t lend itself to frequent updates – and what’s the use of creating web content if it’s not current?!
Speaking of web updates, I did a little tweaking and rebuilding for my friend, Joseph Weinberg’s site, Teaching Sexual Ethics (http://www.teachingsexualethics.org) – be sure to drop by and visit.
And stay tuned here – Montyland Productions, your one-stop shop for affordable, freelance media and communications consulting – will be launching soon…
In other matters – I’ve been doing a lot of house cleaning lately, and I need to tip my hat to Zen Habits (http://www.zenhabits.net) a great site with tons of tips about pairing-down and simplifying your life. I’ve set up a master list for my life (five items only) which has helped me focus my time and work habits; I’ve also begun clearing out the deadwood (so to speak) from front to back in my apartment; I’ve got a huge pile that will be St. Vinney’s or Goodwill’s in the next twenty-four hours or so.
Deep breaths…
- monty
Dick & Jane 9 (I think we’re up to nine now…) commences tomorrow, and I can’t wait. It’s one thing that MUFA Summer League is right around the corner, but nothing compares to the test of frisbee fortitude that is the five games (unless you’re lucky enough to have a bye) in a row of the Dick & Jane Tourney.
Just a pity that we can’t be at Olbricht this year – not even sure why – but I have to trek all the way out to Manchester tomorrow morn.
But, talk about a great crew! Pat and Bern, Jane, Jen, the Grimmers – and more!
Well, with all the different blogging pathways to choose from, is it any surprise that someone with ADD finds himself changing horses and checking out if any of them will feel like a better fit; yes, if you google “montyland” and/or blog, you’ll find my actual Homepage, as well as perhaps the long-ago abandoned blog on Blogger…
But I’ve always admired stuff I’ve seen done in WordPress; up until recently, I was confused and thought the only way to get something going in WP was to have the darn thing running on your own server. I’m pleased to have cleared up that confusion.
At any rate, please accept this as the most recent iteration of a Montyland blog, and please accept my humble promise to actually… well… you know, blog here… regularly… I promise…
