Shirts!

Thank God Vince managed to design the St Thom Judo logo before his shoulder konged out. I did the rough drafts earlier on in the week, (brushing up on my rusty drawing skills - as an entirely average guy i am only good at drawing big robots or trees >.<'''). Vince did the final draft, Wilson enlarged it and i coloured. Garrick ran it through a scanner and presto! Flickr status!

For those who don't know, its a tai-otoshi imposed over the thomian badge. Vincent insisted on putting a cross behind, and it was all sufficiently abstract for my taste. Now that we've the logo (and if that ****** forgetful Desmond finally remembers to bring his digital cam) we can have some pretty high def photos of us throwing. I am sincerely happy with my Osotgari - the lower level black belters have nothing to say, coz its near as perfect for my (their?) level.

In other news, i can't wait to retire as a prefect and go back to couch potato/studious nerd status. Cikgu Yusof now knows about Thomian Online, and i recently took the opportunity in f2o free registrations to apply for a tentative Undergroundsquare blog. And i can't wait for a blasted session with a certain bloody rude student - took all my self control to not throw him and break his arm/wrist. I couldn't even concentrate in Add Maths for two days - pictures such as the one below keep resurfacing in my mind, and i continously remind myself i looked like a coward.

I've been training for one year for situations like this. If he had gone all out and kicked me i might have second thoughts, but c'mon - he friggin pushed me! That's my territory! We push every single week in the dojo, and then we throw!

I am a total idiot.

Ish.

PS: This blog post was actually intended to ask for help on how to design and produce t-shirts. Need at least 25-30. Please post comments.

Bad, bad news.

Garrick met up with me outside 5s2, me on the way back from tugas. The initial recruitment of lower 6 judokas had gone smoothly, but the last training session had seen a few bad things happen, with all of them watching. First, I go knocked off my feet by a way-off morote gari by Garrick. Then i couldn't last five rounds of sparring. AND then i forgot how to do a proper arm breaking technique.

Okay, that wasn't bad. This is:

Vincent broke his shoulder. Again.

Tang is feeling bad, because it was his Tai-otoshi that injured Vince. The St Thom Judo Club compassion machine is in full drive, with everyone counseling Vince and Tang and wondering who the heck is going to represent Sarawak in Vince's place. I, for one, am more worried about his current state, and the inter-team comp coming up in September.

I am also slightly unnerved that something like that can actually happen. With all the safety clauses built into our techniques, its very easy to forget that Judo, while a sport, is a martial art at essence. I'm also slightly guilty - although none of them know this - since Anderson asked me to throw Vince with my Osotogari, without the protective action at the end.

This meant full competition/self defense force. The throw was powerful and beautiful, but what if it loosened or set up the later injury? How can i forgive myself? I mean, Vince has been training for two years to represent the state in the Nationals. If there's anyone who deserves it it's him - he's been the most dedicated student in any sport i have known personally. He has worked so hard.

And now he can't go.

Life can be so unfair.