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redfishieI spent yesterday morning cleaning and doing other important things and then went off to catch the afternoon portion of the East Kingdom Academy of Rapier, in Westford, which was not as I thought at the Madrigal site, but at another park nearby. I had a pretty darn good day. I ran into Griff, who I hadn’t seen since war, talked with the Tadcaster militia group, saw a bunch of other nifty people and wandered into classes.
The best part was probably actually seeing people whom I normally fence with whom I haven’t seen much of lately. I think I’m going to head back down to practice again. I may be able to do some footwork drills, etc, and the company would be good.
The classes were cool, I sat in a class on how to analyze your opponent and their fighting style…which really starts from the moment you first see them, how the prep before the bout, stance, the way they hold a sword etc. Lots of nifty tricks. I also went to bits of a buckler class, period sword hanger class, and a fashionable fencer class. Good source materials, some good tips.
I stayed for feast, and finally met![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jpicon in person. The food was great but I couldn’t get myself to try the strange poached eggs.
The best quote from this was of course “Isn’t it a shame we lose our ability to breathe urine?” said somewhat seriously by a fellow LJer who shall remain nameless ;) and the look on Kayleigh’s face when she overheard this part of the conversation. As per usual, we were the bad table at feast.
Afterwards, there was a gross anatomy class which included using sharpened swords on a piece of meat on a stick. The meat was wrapped in several layers of saran wrap to simulate flesh, duct tape to the stick to secure it, and then lovingly sacrificed to science. The idea was to see how little or much resistance there was to a sword.
There was almost none. I didn't expect much but there was even less than I thought there would be. When I used an epee on it and did a fairly weak lunge into it…the blade went straight through the meat and I didn’t even feel the penetration on either side. When a tip cut was done on it, something that many people claim isn’t a damaging cut, a several inch hole deep appeared on the meat.
The entire thing was fascinating and disturbing. There was no resistance. The meat became incredibly cut up as everyone tried cuts on it, like some weird meat pinnata.
Eventually the meat got hacked up enough that it couldn’t be re-duct taped onto the stick…and bits of it were collected off the garbage bag below for cooking.
The best part was probably actually seeing people whom I normally fence with whom I haven’t seen much of lately. I think I’m going to head back down to practice again. I may be able to do some footwork drills, etc, and the company would be good.
The classes were cool, I sat in a class on how to analyze your opponent and their fighting style…which really starts from the moment you first see them, how the prep before the bout, stance, the way they hold a sword etc. Lots of nifty tricks. I also went to bits of a buckler class, period sword hanger class, and a fashionable fencer class. Good source materials, some good tips.
I stayed for feast, and finally met
jpicon in person. The food was great but I couldn’t get myself to try the strange poached eggs. The best quote from this was of course “Isn’t it a shame we lose our ability to breathe urine?” said somewhat seriously by a fellow LJer who shall remain nameless ;) and the look on Kayleigh’s face when she overheard this part of the conversation. As per usual, we were the bad table at feast.
Afterwards, there was a gross anatomy class which included using sharpened swords on a piece of meat on a stick. The meat was wrapped in several layers of saran wrap to simulate flesh, duct tape to the stick to secure it, and then lovingly sacrificed to science. The idea was to see how little or much resistance there was to a sword.
There was almost none. I didn't expect much but there was even less than I thought there would be. When I used an epee on it and did a fairly weak lunge into it…the blade went straight through the meat and I didn’t even feel the penetration on either side. When a tip cut was done on it, something that many people claim isn’t a damaging cut, a several inch hole deep appeared on the meat.
The entire thing was fascinating and disturbing. There was no resistance. The meat became incredibly cut up as everyone tried cuts on it, like some weird meat pinnata.
Eventually the meat got hacked up enough that it couldn’t be re-duct taped onto the stick…and bits of it were collected off the garbage bag below for cooking.
