Speculation, Fact and Fiction

I'll get to that in a moment. My Sunday was spent doing four hours of aikido in 26C heat - well, that's what it was in the sports centre car park, according to the car when we left. I'd bet it was a good bit hotter than that in the sports hall serving as dojo for a Kai Shin Kai course with visiting instructors from Aosta, Italy.

It was a really good course. The Italians' style is fluid and gentle - for values of gentle in an aikido context which means the person doing the technique correctly applies very little physical strength to throw/pin/control an attacker, regardless of how strong that attacker happens to be. The trick is doing the technique correctly.

As always, I came away with some things I will definitely incorporate into my own aikido, saw some things that I tried and thought 'nah, not for me' and got to practise with a range of different grades, some of whom I knew, some of whom I didn't, which always turns up new things about my own technique as I practise and/or as I explain something to a lower grade.

It was fabulous to see husband Steve back on the mat at a course, after so long when he just couldn't practise intensively on account of the knee. I saw him and some of the other senior black belts off in a corner really enjoying themselves.

As of this morning, I'm not stiff as such. Leaden of limb, yes, I'll admit that. It was definitely the hardest workout I've had in a goodly while. We spent most of the rest of the day rehydrating, had an early night and both slept like the proverbial logs!

Anyway about that alpha werewolf. Having done the domestic admin and few work related bits on Saturday, I sat down in the afternoon to read Blood Bound, second of a trio of urban fantasy novels by Patricia Briggs. (The first is Moon Called and third, forthcoming, is Iron Kissed). The first two books have been thoroughly entertaining as solid urban fantasies in the current mainstream of that particular sub-genre. At the same time, and crucially as far as I'm concerned, the plots and characters have originality and individual quirks respectively giving the books a distinct identity all their own.

And one of those individual notes? The alpha werewolf does aikido. "Running a security business with a bunch of ex-soldiers, I've found it necessary to do a little sparring once in a while. Clears the air,' he said. 'Aikido lets me take them down without hurting them, or - before this year* - advertising that I'm not exactly human anymore.'

Sounds fair enough to me.

*coz in this universe, the Fae were outed a while ago, with increasing implications for the rest of the pretenatural community...