From WGUNTHER@UTMEM1.UTMEM.EDU Wed May 27 11:53:11 1998
Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 15:05:15 -0500
From: Wendy Gunther
Reply-To: Aikido List
To: AIKIDO-L@LISTS.PSU.EDU
Subject: Seminar review, off the mat
Mostly off the mat.
The first thing I want to tell you folks is about the huge hoax that has
been perpetrated on us all these years. You don't expect to meet Max Headroom
on the mat, do you? Well, you shouldn't expect to meet Ivan, either. Ivan is a
not a man, as we are men and women. Ivan is a *concept*, a virtual aikidoka
construct. Who constructed him I don't know, but it must have been a couple of
totally brilliant, deviant, evil hacker geniuses who didn't get out to date
much; personally, I suspect a longago collaboration between Gerry Santoro and
Bill Gates.
What happens at an aikido-l seminar is that various people *channel* Ivan.
You can tell when they are channeling because they start to cuss and flame and
act mean and talk dirty. Also, they rear back and get this strangled look and
gasp hard just before it happens. While they are possessed they do really hard
aikido, slap girls on the ass, argue about ki and everything else, diss women
and people in other arts, go around boasting in a more than humanly loud
voice, and whirl to attack total strangers with flame guns. Afterwards they go
back to being themselves, unaware of what they may have said or done. Mike
Bartman has a lot of these on tape, and boy, Janet, Jun, Maria DeRosa, Tim,
are *you* going to be surprised what you said and did while you were
channeling!
By the way, I have these two weird gaps in my memory. In one of them, I
was taking Sensei Escobar's class and working out with this shy skinny guy
from Atlanta with a head of frizzy hair that looked like the spikes on the top
of a pineapple, and it all went dark in front of my eyes. When I came back to
myself, I was lying on the mat wrassling with this poor stranger, with Jim off
to the side yelling "Matte! Matte! Ippon!", and I had my foot up just about to
impale him in the groin. I got up and apologized and got off the mat, and had
to drink about half a gallon of Gatorade to get rid of a weird feeling that
kept haunting me. There was another one of those when I came back to myself
standing in front of Kjartan with the shoulder of his gi in my hand, and it
was starting to rip away from his tunic. I had to apologize for that one too.
I don't know what could have come over me.
Now for the awards. You will be seeing the actual awards posted soon.
These are not the actual awards that were given. These are the awards that
SHOULD have been given, that weren't, chiefly because we the committee didn't
know about what the seminar would be like ahead of time:
Janet gets two awards. One is the Ethel Merman award, that goes
to Smallest Person with the Loudest Voice. I swear it was the sound of
the Brooklyn in that San Franciscan girl that got us thrown out of the
hotel room. And it was also how she handled all events and
arrangements: she just turned around and shouted at people, and we
jumped up and stood obediently in line. When she really gets to
laughing (remember when Jim was pouring out the water jug behind the
car door, Janet?) it sounds like the walls are going to come down.
Speaking of walls, she also gets the Gojira Award for Person Most
Likely To Contribute To The Destruction of Western Civilization If her
Personality, Aggressiveness, Style, and Aikido Madness Are Ever Sucked
Out of her Tiny Body and Accidentally Implanted in Mike Bartman.
(Not another award, but a mere comment: She has utterly gorgeous eyes.)
Mike Bartman gets the Puppy Behind The Car Window Award, for
the most hours spent longing while staring at aikido he couldn't
do. It's a good thing he's tall, because otherwise he would have
looked just like one of dose cute liddle puppy kitty paintings with
the real huge eyes. Incidentally, he's quite terse in person.
Jun gets the Elastic Boy award. It was seriously suggested
during one of those drunken parties that we get hold of a long wood
stave, tie Jun's head to one end and his feet to the other, and use
him as the string to practice kyudo. We could use just about any
beginner for the arrow.
(This is true: while Wendy's Jim and Jun were working out during Dennis' class
on something like suwariwaza ikkyo, and Jun was taking the fall and the pin
and extending into various nonhuman positions without tapping, one of the
sensei's from the sidelines yelled out to Jim: "Give you five bucks if you can
tie him in a bowknot!")
Cady gets the Most Humble Apologies by a Truly Kick-ass Martial
Artist award. She was always saying, "I can't really do this, but
next year..." By the way, y'all shoulda seen her dressed
up. Mle too. Wowza. And *Jill*! Wow! Sheesh! Where's
she get those CLOTHES! And the spunk to wear them!!!
Which brings us to the Wendy award, which has been suggested as
(my blushes) "How Can You Have Seven Foot Long Legs If You're Only
Five Foot Six?"
And Chuck Gordon gets the Bad Timing in Fashion award for
wearing flowing garments of all black the day AFTER the official
awards. He has also been proposed for Official Smartass Remark of the
Year for the following moment: as all the senseis lined up against one
wall of the dojo for their photograph, CG XXXVII called out, "The room
is tipping."
(An unidentified local TASA aikidoka, looking down the line of bellies
hanging over hakamas from George Simcox all the way through my
very own Jim, said to me in quiet desperation: "You know, I joined
aikido to lose weight!")
Ross and Dave tie for Nicest Surprise Guy Unguessed from
their Posts. What a coupla great guys in every sense. Ross is also up
for the Good Champagne Award for Dryest Humor. If you are a sensei,
ask him sometime about his Secret Techniques for Covering Up Moments
When You Are Successfully Resisted By Uke.
Mike Burke wins the Country Song Award for Worst Week But Still
Made It To The Seminar. His car died Monday, his boss made him miss
the train Thursday so he had to ride all night on a bus to get to San
Antonio, he didn't get paid in time on Thursday... and he had just
gotten out of jail when his ma was run over by a pickup truck.
Mle wins for Baddest Best Texas Chick hands down (sorry,
Lynn). "So the lady asked me, 'Why don't you ask your husband
if he knows where to install the filter?' And I told her, 'Because *I*
taught him to install air filters!'" And the fuel line story...! And
the other thirty-two stories! Man, oh, man, want to see you rope and
brand longhorns sometime, mle! The gentlemen would like to see you
doing it wearing that little white vest and low-cut black dress from
the awards ceremony.
Maria DeRosa wins Most Acrobatics Performed Across
Kjartan's Back. Don't ask if you weren't there.
Maria and Lee Escobar win the Hemingway Grace Under
Pressure award for making hosting this extravaganza look EASY!!! and
almost ENJOYABLE!!! At least, I could have sworn Maria was enjoying
it! And there should be some kinda Saint Nicholas award for two people
who go, "Geez, we took in more money than we needed to break even; why
don't we TREAT THE WHOLE SEMINAR TO DINNER instead of keeping it for
ourselves?"!!!!
Kjartan wins Best Felony for smuggling in w---e meat. Looks
very odd sitting next to a plate of oranges at a seminar. No, I did
not taste it. Because it had all the appeal and perfume of cold fried
blood. Nothing to do with Greenp---e. I personally would also like to
award Kjartan: Best At Resisting Techniques. With you around, K-man,
nobody under the rank of Grand Dan can complete anything. Of course,
you can't either....
Wendy's Jim gets a dual award. One, for his evil side, is the
Letterman New York So Called Humor Award, for the most comments and
stories by any given human being associated with the event. And the
other, for his (vanishing sliver of a) good side, is the Thrust Myself
Between Two Duellists Award, for trying to keep Janet and Cady from
murdering eachother on the mat. I notice he didn't get on the mat to
intervene between that poor Atlanta guy (what was his name?) and
myself, though....
Rocky Izumi wins not only the Weirdest Aikido Metaphors award
hands down (cornwhatio?) but also the Best Judo Used To Throw
Aikidoka. And we are trying not to tell you, Rock, but you kept making
us jump because we keep thinking we're seeing Yamada Sensei walking
past the mat.
Chuck Clark has to win for Most Ignored Beautiful
Aikido. Sorry, Chuck sensei, but while your son's around, no one is
going to look at you. Except him, and that's only because you can
still always paste him any time you try.
Dennis the Dog God wins All Around Most Impressive Sensei Story
for the tale of the beautiful Corvette that includes the phrase, "No,
you're too ugly, but your boyfriend looks kinda pretty." If you didn't
hear the rest of it, eat your heart out! We're not telling!
George Simcox has to win for Most Impressive Total
Decompression of Ivan On The Mat. There is no funnier teacher in the
WORLD. I swear. And, yes, he can do ki... kick ass!
And The Awards Committee in general (excluding myself, I didn't
do shit towards this) wins BEST AIKIDO LIST AWARDS EVER!!!
Better get this out quick before Jim sees it and stops me, so forgive me if I
haven't mentioned you: guaranteed I meant to,
Wendy, the Leggy Sultana of Slash
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