Now I'm hurt....

Aries (March 21 - April 19): The corpse of 16th-century astronomer Nicolaus Corpenicus will rise from the grave this week to explain, once and for all, that the universe does not revolve around you, you self-centered prick.

Now you know what to do when you get one of those unsolicited phonecalls

The Telemarketing Counterscript

Cats

(stolen from various people)

You know you have too many cats when ...

Every time you open the bathroom door, a little furry creature races past you and perches on the toilet seat for a drink before you get there.

Your refrigerator door has its own groupies. *looks at puddingcat*

When you open the doors to your house, the cats coming and going resemble the famous Bull Run of Pamplona.

The rooms in your house are segregated for cats with good behavior, bad behavior, and I just don’t get along with anyone.

You can’t use the can opener or open a can without suddenly feeling like a giant foot and legwarmer has just engulfed you. (You certainly can’t try to turn around in the kitchen at this point without breaking a leg)

You can’t eat anything at all ever without your cats looking at you as if they are auditioning for a poster pet for a third world country.

In the farthest corner of your house and the most unlikely place to find it, yes, you find tiny grains of cat litter.

You hear so much hacking from cats trying to throw up fur balls, you think you have gone to an asthma clinic.

Walking from the kitchen to the living room with a bowl of ice cream, you muster your adrenaline because you know you will be running an obstacle course as your cats’ fling themselves in your path to the sofa.

You never watch television, work on the computer, or read a book without a furry creature inserting its little body in front of, on, or around you or the object of your attention.

You have an expense account to buy those roller brushes to remove pet hair from your clothes.

And, last but not least, you know you have too many cats in your house when you never feel unwanted, unloved, or alone at anytime day or night.

For surje, whollyrandom an

Ghost in the Shell 2 is still on at the Arts in the coming week.

[Cambridge] An odd last minute request

Does someone have a largish antiquish leather satchel/bag I could borrow? I guess something along the lines of a doctor's bag would be ideal.
I need something to hide my camera in during Tombstone so it's easily accessible but doesn't distract. My camera bags are a bit too modern for that.

ETA: Good something via the fine people who are going to be at Tombstone. Thanks.

Falsifying Statistics update

It's now at 24 communities and 500 users!

Google Earth

CNN are using it on their current program on the terror attack in Amman.

Tai Chi update

I haven't written about it in a while because it was difficult finding something interesting to say other than "today we practised really hard".

We're a proper regular class now and the group consists of about 15 people of varying degrees of experience. Currently, there are four (including me) beginners from last year left, everybody else are either members of the regular class that was discontinued in September due to venue issues and instructor availability or of Chris's ex-beginner's class.

Currently, a session consists of a set at the beginning, then intense practising of one or more of the foundation exercises (only tor-yu today). After the teabreak we practise the application of the previously learned foundation exercises in the set. Basically, we're starting from scratch again, looking at the moves from a different, more complex angle, paying particular attention to coordination and timing.

Today, we practised Push Hands, a partner exercise, for the first time. It's a great way of checking you're doing the whole weight/force shift correctly and helps coordination, too.
Other styles use this as the basics for martial applications but we only use it as a force application/sensing exercise. I apparently impressed my partner (a senior member and ex-instructor) because he asked me if I had done this before. And I had but only briefly at the big workshop earlier in the year (I watched some peole do it and Sam showed me).

The great advantage (and most likely the point why they were devised) of the foundation exercises is that you don't need much room (as much as you need with your arms outstretched in diameter) and practising them improves your Tai Chi as the moves in the set is just an application.
I'm quite pleased with my progress in some areas but in others I'm still lacking (e.g. squaring my hips). However, considering how badly coordinated and inflexible I was a year ago, I can be reasonably confident this will improve in the next months and years, too.