This week was a week of much adventure and fun, and I hope that you enjoy reading what I have to say about it. So here we go!
Saturday July 19, 2014
Parkour
On Saturday I went to my usual Parkour class at Breathe PK and was joined by a few of the people that I have known for a while. Here are the pictures of us looking goofy!!!
So from left to right it is me, Isabella and Spencer. Austin was there as well but he left before I could get him into the group picture.
I also have a picture of Brodie (the teacher) and me making goofy faces.
I am going to say this once and probably never say it again, hashtag let me take a selfie. (Sorry for the shake in the picture.)
Saturday was warm, but not too warm. I think the temperature in the gym was about 22°C (72°F), but that isn’t all that bad, still warm, but not bad.
We began the class by working on what are called wall splats. These are something that is used as both a safety measure and as a lead up to a cat leap. They are a safety measure in that if you miss your cat leap then you can do the wall splat to stop yourself from plowing into the wall face first. They are done in the same way as you see the cat leap done in the picture below, but instead of grabbing a ledge you plant the palms of your hands onto the wall and then you push off the wall like you are a frog bouncing off the wall.
Click on picture to go so source.
After practicing wall splats we moved on to doing cat leap, they are done as I have explained above and as you see in the picture above. We did these for a little while and had some good fun with them. The grip tape that they have on the wall now scratched up the insides of my hands, but that will give me great calluses, which will make Parkour outside that much easier.
Next we worked on what are called bar to cats. Basically these are swinging on a bar, letting go of said bar, and then grabbing onto a wall. They aren’t too hard when you are less than or equal to 2 meters (6.6 feet) away but when you are greater than 2 meters (6.6 feet) away it becomes hard to gain enough momentum to clear that large of a distance.
The next thing that we practiced was a series of movements that we slowly added more movements on to. We started this series of movements with a hip catch, these are a movement where you jump at a bar, grab the bar with your hand and then let your hips land on the bar while using your legs to slow down so that you don’t land on the bar to fast. After we had gotten that down we added in a cast, thing where you cast off the bar, to a precision, then we added a stride and we finally finished the series by adding in a vault. It was pretty awesome as it gave us the chance to work on not only a bunch of different movements, but it also gave us the chance to work on flow (making your moves flow together nicely).
That was my Parkour for the day, that next thing that I did was some something that I haven’t done for a while, and that is do something “constructive”.
Steampunk Construction
If you haven’t guessed by the title the thing that I was “constructive” with was an item for the Steampunk cosplay costume that I have been working on for the past few months. This item was a homemade air tank that is going to connect to the Steampunk style pistol that I am going to be making soon. I had a friend come over to give me some help putting it together. We had a good time talking while we cut, drilled and glued the parts into the masterpiece of amateur craftsmanship that you see below. We also enjoyed the construction part as well.
We works on the tank on my back deck in the warm air and hot sun, so I got lots of vitamin D, and I have more hot air in me than ever before. Wait…
Super Powers!!!
The next thing I did was go and get my super power for the week at the Super Power Distribution center. Never hears of it? It is a very popular place right on the corner of (square root of -1) Street and Imaginary Avenue. (In math taking the square root of -1 produces an imaginary number. So I am saying the corner of Imaginary Street and Imaginary Avenue.) make this note a popup box. So, that’s a lie, what I actually did was go over to a friend named Raeanne’s house for a games night. While there we played board games like Mancala, one version of it at least, Jenga, and Apples to Apples. After we had done these different games for a while we went to a playground that was nearby and played grounders. The game of grounders was awesome and I got the chance to break out some of my Parkour skills while we were playing.
Man, I really had a busy Saturday, and it went a little late, but it was super good though.
Sunday July 20, 2014
So on Sunday I went to church and I went to a presentation. The presentation was on sex inside and outside of marriage and what some of the important effects that you, your partner, and your possible children, will have to deal with. The presenter also talked about there is this one woman who thinks that we don’t need to feel guilty about anything because Gophers don’t feel guilty. I find it funny that this lady compared humans to a species that does not have sentience and is unable to reason, and then thought that it was a legitimate argument for why we should never feel guilty for things.
That was my Sunday.
Monday July 21, 2014
Monday begins the work week, and that means I need to wake up at 5:40 in the morning again. How many of you groaned when you heard the time that I wake up in the morning? After I finished work I went to a get together at the Parkland Community Hall (don’t ask me why they call it a hall, because I have no idea) to play Ultimate WHICH WAS TOTALLY AWESOME. We played for about an hour and a half, and had a great time with the super competitive friendly competition. It was pretty humid out for Calgary, but it wasn’t as humid, or nearly as hot, as it was in Brazil during the World Cup so I didn’t complain. I don’t really remember who won but, I think it was the team I was on, and we won because we had some awesome players on our team, I don’t remember their names, but they were really good! After we finished the game we all had ice cream sandwiches for our snack, you know, nothing like processed sugar after you have been running for an hour and a half… I had two… What?! They were really good!
Tuesday July 22, 2014
On Tuesday I went on a bike ride with a friend of mine named Tuan. We went on our bike ride through a park in Calgary called Fish Creek Park, and we started our ride at a little after 7 and rode for about an hour and a half.
We stopped twice along our bike ride to look around and talk. On first stop we went to the river and skipped some stones while we talked, and then the second time we stopped we walked along one of the bridges that goes across the Bow river that got partially taken out by the flood that Calgary had last year, here is a picture of the bridge.
I also saw a picnic table that had gotten ripped up but the flood laying upside down near the path, so I mounted it and got Tuan to take a picture, see below.
I had a good ride on Tuesday, and I had a good talk with Tuan, so I’m really glad that he in it me to go rising with him seeing that I am moving to Edmonton for school pretty soon.
Wednesday July 23, 2014
I went to work on Wednesday, that’s it. No I was the guy you saw on TV flying through the air, that wasn’t the super power that I picked up for the week.
Thursday July 24, 2014
On Thursday I was in a two hour conference meeting for ABB Inc., it was pretty good and I learned some good things about the business. I also went to see my sister at the end of the day, it was good to see her again.
Friday July 25, 2014
On Friday I had Szechuan for lunch, and it was really hot because one of the guys that we were with wanted to get the “medium” spice level. If you don’t know anything about Szechuan, know this, what they consider “mild” we here in Canada consider extra hot. I was fine personally because I eat spice frequently, but the medium spice level pushed me to my limits.
I also made this on Friday, with my Neodymium magnet balls. In the first picture you can see that I had three of them left over at the very end.
The End
So that was my week everyone, I had a good week, and did a number of great things, and I am happy that I had the ability to have such a great week.
Now for a quote.
Quote of the week
It is the greatest of all mistakes to do nothing because you can only do little. Do what you can.
– Sydney Smith
You can find an artistic representation here on Zen Pencils.
Remember any little thing you do is still something, and that is what matters.
Be good people, and always learn new and interesting things. Bye!
– Nathan Aris
An Engineers Parkour 