tkd stuff this may

Sorry I haven't posted in a while.  Had to take the last one down, and I've managed to get a bit busy lately...

Actually, this month is a really nice mix of busyness.  For the moment, work is actually going really well.  I'm trying to finish off an internal document that gives all the details of my analysis.  Currently it's sitting at about 120 pages or so, and I've got a bit more work to put into it.  Once this is finished, it'll go through review here and I'll write a paper intended for publication.  Thankfully, that one will be shorter.  While my analysis is going through review, I'll be writing my thesis and looking for jobs.  The good news this month is that I'm making (what feels like) a lot of progress.  Pieces are starting to fit together, I think.

Outside of work, I've been pretty busy, too.  May is a really busy month for the Stanford TKD club.  This weekend I helped referee a red/black belt tournament at CSU Hayward.  It's a big change moving from judging (scoring) the match to getting in the center and being a referee.  As a judge, there are two other people scoring along with you, so any mistakes you make can be cancelled out by the other folks.  As a referee, it's just you.  There's also all sorts of little things that players can do to cheat (holding, pushing, etc.) that are easy to see from the corners when you are judging, but are sometimes really tough to see as a referee (a good competitor knows to grab with the hand the ref can't see).  Lots of new stuff to think about, but it's a lot of fun.  Up to this point, I've mainly been a ref for kids' matches (where I am a lot bigger), or color-belt matches (where they don't know what they're doing and it's easier to call things).  With black belt matches, the action can be faster (so you've gotta know where to be, and get out of the way if necessary), and so on.  Pretty fun, plus I got a nifty t-shirt to say thanks for helping.

Next week, the Stanford club is holding an in-house tournament.  I would fight, but I've been nursing a pulled muscle for a couple of months now.  Pretty much only hurts when I kick, which is really annoying.  Anyway, I'll get more referee experience this weekend, too.  Should be a really fun day.  Then two weekends after that (Memorial Day weekend), Stanford is hosting an Open tournament.  I'll be reffing and judging for that one, too.  Should be a lot of fun.  The nice thing is that Stanford gets to hold a referee clinic, and I could actually get certified as an "official" referee this month.  I'm not sure what benefits go with that, but I'm sure I get a certificate or something. :)

Finally, two weekends from now is the "Night of Wushu" at Stanford.  I'll have to talk a bit about the wushu club later.  It's a really fun martial art, but the emphasis has switched from fighting (like with TKD) to demonstration.  Wushu is basically all the cool movie-fighting that you see.  Jet Li stuff.  Anyway, I just started up with that club.  It's a little (ok, a lot) too early for me to do anything, but it'll be good to go to the event and get some motivation.