I have not updated this site for a few days. I did do push-ups, sit-ups and squats last Thursday and Friday. Friday evening, we had karate, as well as Saturday morning. Sensei had hoped to have a beach work-out, with appropriate social distancing, but the beaches are not yet open for group activities. He had to cancel it and hold class over Zoom.
The kids, husband and I did go to the beach Saturday afternoon. We tried Will Rogers State Park Beach, but the lot was full and we were unable to stop. We drove on to Point Dume. The kids swam. D and I were cold. A strong, chill breeze kept our ears sore. I wore a towel over my head and pinched the towel closed under my chin to protect my ears.
Once the kids finished swimming, we hiked along the trail. On the way back, we saw seals! Not many, but we could see a cluster on the rocks, close to the shore, from one of the look-out areas.
On Sunday, we had our dojo community planning meeting and managed to agree on a letter to send out. We need to run the letter by Sensei for edits.
I have been keeping the paper journal every day, though finding time to update this site is sometimes challenging. So since this should be the Monday entry, I’ll jump to Monday.
I did push-ups, sit-ups and squats this morning. Sensei posted a black belt training work-out for those of us testing on his Facebook site. He’s suggesting one hundred push-ups, sit-ups and squats. This week, I am still doing ninety. I’ll be at one hundred pretty soon. I do these exercises twice daily, on week days, and presumably, Sensei’s workout is for a day. Hopefully I’m good. This morning I could only do about seventy push-ups on my toes. That’s fifty “tricep-style” on the ground, and twenty “chest” ones on the mat, before I have to go to my knees. I know I’m allowed to do them on my knees, but it makes me feel “less than,” if I cannot do the requirement on my toes.
Senpai H, who tested last year, told me that we only have to do sixty for the black belt test if we do them on our knuckles. I do do them on my knuckles. Sensei likes to mix it up, however. The last time I discussed exercises with him, he’d suggested reaching the point where I could do sixty on my knuckles on the ground. Given we may not be able to do a ten man kumite round, however, or if I end up simply fighting my two children for ten rounds, he will have to make other parts of the Shodan test more difficult, in order to make up for the lack in that area.
He also recommended jump rope intervals for cardio this week, so I did that today instead of jogging. Also included: drilling Sanchin back to back with Tensho, so I practiced those as well. I was rusty on Tensho, but watching a video of Bobby Lowe helped bring it back.
I wrote outside this morning, and, while writing, the squirrels were all over the place. They are in the lemon tree now. I’d never seen them there before. Normally they like the loquat tree.
