The Glowing Edge

Tag: schemes

  • Boxing Update: Curiosity Killed the Cat

    Ok, when I first posted about learning to box, I promised to keep you up to date. Those of you who see me regularly in real life have trouble getting me to Shut. Up. about it already. I even convinced one of my instructors to let me film him for 12seconds.tv (he’s a machine).

    Up until now I’ve been working on a heavy bag, the focus mitts (a little) and that’s about it. So yesterday I stepped in to talk to the woman who runs LA Boxing here in Cary, Bonnie “Queen B” Mann, professional boxer for 13 years and world championship title holder — the first woman from NC to take home the Big Belt. And it IS a Big mamma-jamma Belt. I actually stepped in to talk to Bonnie about coming with me to a networking event for which I was the keynote speaker; I planned to use boxing as an illustration for how to get started with social media.

    As we were chatting, I mentioned my intense curiosity about what it would be like to actually get in the ring and throw a punch at a real person.

    You know what they say about curiosity and the cat?

    Now it’s on, baby. I’m getting special dispensation to miss church on Sunday (gasp!) in order to show up for her class, after which she’s gonna gear up and put me in the ring with her. Understand, now — Bonnie will not be throwing any punches. I’m supposed to punch her. Never fear, there’s no actual chance that she will be injured in any way. Please worry about me, however.

    I was fine fine fine on the heavy bag. Fine, I tell you. Aaargh.

    It gets worse. Remember the speech about boxing and social media? Well, Bonnie DID come when I spoke at Cisco about social media, and she brought her giant championship belt, too. I politely introduced her, raved about boxing, told everyone I was having my debut with Bonnie in the ring on Sunday, ha ha, ended my happy little speech, and started Q & A.

    And a woman in the back raised her hand and asked if my bout with Bonnie was going to be broadcast on video. I may have reacted somewhat strongly with my “Absolutely not!” because I saw a dozen sneaky grins light up in the room.

    People, this is NOT something you want to see. If you’ve gone out clubbing with me, you know how dorky and ridiculous I look when I dance. It’s not like Elaine bad, but it’s bad. I’m probably at least that dorky looking when I box.

    I hope for your sake that it’s not bad enough to be viral.

  • How eBay solves sibling rivalry, eliminates need for parenting!

    This week the Husband emailed me an update on his productivity:

    So far this morning:

    1. Finished reviewing two reports, sent final versions to Bob
    2. Called two piano teachers I found online, left messages
    3. Sold “Blue Eyes White Dragon” card to the Ice for $3.66 (my cost)

    To which I responded:

    I’m baffled by #3. WT..?
    Otherwise, uRock.

    And he elaborated:

    You may (or may not) recall a scene a few years ago in which the First and the Ice decided to purchase and share a set of 40 or so YuGiOh cards. I was concerned that they’d fight over who got which cards, but they assured me they had a system by which this would be avoided.

    As soon as they bought and opened the cards, they began fighting over who got which cards, and the fighting centered on one particular card, the famous “Blue Eyes White Dragon” card, which is apparently the greatest YGO card ever created. After much yelling, accusations, and tears, I took the card away from them and said neither one of them could have it (and made a note to myself to never let them do that again).

    Rather than tearing up the card and throwing it in the trash, I put it in our closet thinking at some point in the future, everyone would calm down and maybe they’d figure out a way to share it or something. YGO eventually fell out of favor as an activity, so the problem went away.

    Recently, however, YGO resurfaced as a cool thing to do, and the Ice and the First began playing YGO duels, gaping at each other’s cards, and, eventually, arguing over ownership of particular cards. One such argument erupted over a BEWD card which the First claims to have bought from a friend at school (I can’t find the one in our closet, however, so I remain suspicious.). The Ice came to me in tears a few weeks ago, claiming that his big brother actually had not one but two BEWD cards and had promised to give one to him but later reneged. The First apparently offered to sell it to him for $20.

    Tamping down both fury at the First and annoyance at the Ice, I went on eBay, immediately found several BEWD cards for sale, and purchased a total of five, average price $4.00. I walked the Ice through the process with me and explained to him that it probably wasn’t a good thing for his big brother to be his only source of information on YGO cards, much less his only source of the cards themselves, and that if it was really important to him to own one of these cards, he should find out how much they cost and buy one from someone who is not his older brother, and that eBay was a good place to do this.

    Anyway, after I bought the 5 cards online, I told the Ice he could buy one from me if he wanted, and he had told me a few days ago that he was thinking about it, and today we finally got around to it.

    ******

    Lord have mercy and thank you eBay. (Plus, if I can get the Husband to buy some stuff I want there, then sell it to me for even less than he paid for it…)

  • just cutting the grass (with scissors)

    A couple days ago the Husband saw the Maker out in the lawn with scissors, cutting the grass. To be fair, the lawn did need cutting.

    Today the Husband was out mowing when the Maker requested that one particular section of the lawn – the scissored part – NOT be mowed. Upon inspection, it was clear that a rough path had in fact been scissored into the clover under the oak. The Maker delineated the section, and once the boundaries were understood, the Husband politely, if resignedly, mowed around it. He even mowed the path formerly hewn by scissors, much to the satisfaction of the Maker, who spent the next 20 minutes hopping delightedly through the clover square on his path.

  • catapillers

    “50¢: If you find a catapiller come to 144 or 152 and dorp it in the box”

    I was slightly alarmed to find this sign on our door. Thinking for a minute, I went out to the garage and sure enough, there was the boys’ all purpose plastic frog hut and bug box, holding approximately 8 “catapillers,” at least two of which seemed to still be alive. I couldn’t figure out whether they had been bought or sold, but they’d certainly been “dorp”-ed.