Green Hell

Gettin Medieval on Yo' Ass

Here's one for y'all to check out.

He's a bro of mine from "across the pond," and he takes his sharp, pointy objects very seriously.

His site has the "Green Hell Seal of Approval."

Fun With Shelving

Being a meandering relation of the thoughts to which teaching one’s wife the fine art of “wowing” the rubes gives rise. 

"OK, hon. Just do it – now.”

Mags took a deep breath, inhaling through her nose as I’d told her. Suddenly, her hand shot downward. She lowered her hips, twisted into the blow, and exhaled with an audible hiss. The next sound was that of the board -- now neatly halved – clattering to the pavement. Her pinched, apprehensive facial expression disappeared, replaced by wide-eyed astonishment and then childlike delight in the space of a few heartbeats.

“Honey, I did it!” she said, clapping her hands together as wonder sparkled in her eyes.

“You sure did,” I replied, laughing. Well, indeed ye’ did/ don’t ye’ know ye did/ too-me-right-fol-loo-ra-lassie/ well, indeed ye’ did, I thought, as I stepped forward and hugged her, nearly lifting her off the ground.

An hour earlier, we’d returned from a gun show at the North Atlanta Trade Center, and the now-broken board had still been part of a 1”x12”x6’ plank we’d purchased from Home Depot on our way home.

We’d gone to the show in hopes of selling jewelry and generating advance interest in Maggie’s forthcoming TEOTWAWKI novel by handing out “teasers” from the opening chapter. In other words; we aimed to erase the word “starving” from the term “starving artist.” Given the present states of the economy and the publishing industry, both were ambitious undertakings, but –to my mind, at any rate – reasonably successful. She’d sold enough jewelry to cover the fee for our table and defray the cost of the “toys” upon which we invariably load up whenever we attend a show. And while reading for pleasure isn’t a preferred pastime of the gun show crowd (or of the younger members, at any rate), she’d managed to give away most of the promotional material, as well. Needless to say, I was very proud of her, and of the opinion that she’d earned a treat of sorts.

A week earlier, we’d rented a passel of movies from Blockbuster (as neither of us has watched television in well over two years, books, movies and music have become our primary forms of passive entertainment), among them an indie release entitled The Foot Fist Way -- a literal rendering of the Korean term Tae Kwon Do, as the astute reader will note. In a nutshell, the Foot Fist Way chronicles the misadventures of a typical, not-too-bright strip-mall martial arts instructor from North Carolina. It’s a comedy with a “documentary” feel, and is to martial arts what This is Spinal Tap and A Mighty Wind were to heavy metal and folk music, respectively; or what Best in Show was to the AKC crowd: an affectionate kiss of death.

Having trained in various martial arts -- on and off, mind you -- since 1994, I’ve met the “real world” counterparts of the dramatis personae more times than I care to count. (Embarrassingly enough, I’ve actually been a few of ‘em at one time or another, but that’s neither here nor there.) As a result of this “interesting” background, I was laughing my ass off (literally rolling on the floor in convulsions of compassionate scorn and self-mocking mirth) from beginning to end. Mags, on the other hand, didn’t get much of it. I can’t fault her for that, as her martial arts experience is confined to “playing” with me when I’m in a good mood, and to a few hours of top-notch, down-to-earth instruction at two Animal List BBQs.

In short, she’s never been exposed to the KKK (“killer klown krowd”), as I’ve dubbed martial artists who don’t exactly have a “kung fu grip” on reality. TFFW being, in essence, 90+ minutes of inside jokes at the expense of said lunatic fringe, much of it simply didn’t register with her. She has, however, seen a few photographs and videotapes of Yours Truly during his “tofu-eatin’ Buddhist hippie” phase, as a result of which she mentioned that she’d like to see yer humble, Hillbilly narrator “do some Karate stuff.”

Paradox time.

As the Gentle Reader may have gathered, I have serious misgivings about the “puir bit crathur” that substitutes martial arts for a real life. Robert W. Smith (a.k.a. John Gilbey) and others have examined the phenomenon in greater depth than I could; ergo, I’ll steer the curious towards their observations/comments and continue with my own.

Having expressed my suspicion of those who maintain a “fear/flirt” relationship with Thanatos (and I’ve walked a mile of two in their boots -- poorly crafted, uncomfortable, and ridiculous-looking, they’re the spiritual/philosophical trappings of a platform-soled, ‘70s pimp, and indicative of the same level of consciousness), I’ll now reverse myself and posit that “do[ing] some Karate stuff” without a good reason denigrates both the art and its practitioners.

To be sure, I’ll willingly and cheerfully “play” with my wife (in the absence of genuine joie de vive, the “sword that preserves life” rapidly deteriorates into a nicked, rusty, blood-caked instrument of state-and caste-sanctioned murder – an overpriced version of a pipe, ice-pick or suppressed SMG), but I won’t amuse her.

I respect the art, the men who taught it to me -- and the men who taught them – too much to cross that particular line.

In modern America, landing a weak, ineffectual blow a fraction of a second before one’s opponent lands a weak, ineffectual blow guarantees an electroplated trophy. In medieval Okinawa, by way of comparison, not pulping a samurai’s knee, breaking his neck, rupturing his eardrums, or gouging out one or both of his eyes guaranteed that the karateka would be killed, and his wife and children raped, murdered, and/or sold into slavery. In its original form, Karate was the “final word” of the (presumably) powerless against the powerful – the ultimate kinesthetic expression of the modern Special Forces motto: De oppresso liber.

And not a whit of entertainment value to any of it.

I’ll admit to having taken up martial arts for all the wrong reasons. In nutshell, I’d planned to track down an ex-girlfriend and send whomever she was shacked up with at the time to the emergency room. Nothing personal, mind you (I’d neither met the guy nor done enough digging to determine his position in the “lineup,” as it were), just a bit of catharsis via anti-chivalry. After a few months, though, training became an end in itself. It also helped me to calm down (I’d been in full-bore psycho mode for nearly five years when first I threw on a pair of white pyjamas) and put things into perspective. As I’d benefited from it so much, it occurred to me that using it to trounce some gobshite I didn’t know from Adam would exhibit profound ingratitude on my part.

Before I continue, let me state – in no uncertain terms – that I’m neither an angel nor a stranger to violence and human nastiness in general. And I certainly won’t claim never to have misused the art. I’ll readily admit to having provoked many a poor, less-than-brilliant (and less-than-sober) bastard into “escalating” -- solely for the pleasure of seeing him back down and/or run off. Naturally, I only subjected the overtly aggressive ones to this particular treatment, as a convoluted chain of rationalizations allowed me to don a halo of righteousness (to these eyes, at any rate) when doing so. I was only acting in “self-defense,” after all. N’est ce pas?

Yeah, right: “And the bull rolled off the nickel!” as my great grandma often said. The Gentle Reader certainly knows better; and I suppose I did, as well – even then. Beyond the fact that intimidating obnoxious fuckwits is an unsavory pastime (and one that -- as historian John Garraty observed of slavery -- degrades the practitioner as much as the victim); beyond the fact that the “thrill” wears off very quickly; and beyond that fact that abusing a method of self-cultivation eventually gnaws at the conscience, my training ultimately changed my attitude towards violence.

I’m not repudiating it, by any stretch of the imagination. It has its uses, and the notion that it “never solves anything” is sheer idiocy. Try telling the Swiss otherwise – if you don’t mind being laughed at. As it happens, the intelligent application of violence in a narrow defile near Morgarten (15 Nov. 1315) solved their problem with the Austrians for quite some time…

As history abounds with similar examples, there’s nothing to gain from belaboring the point. Sometimes, violence (or the credible threat thereof) does indeed solve problems. End of story. This, unfortunately, brings us to a veritable amphisbaena of a problem: the double-headed “fight fallacy” that has become so irritatingly commonplace in modern America. One head of this singularly loathsome reptile hisses that violence never solves anything – while the other hisses that it solves everything.

In the case of a clear-cut bully/aggressor, violence is often the only solution. When last I checked, entreaties to morality and common decency had rather a dismal success record against megalomaniacs, sociopaths and rabid dogs.

Unfortunately, life isn’t a Zoroastrian battle between the irredeemably wicked and the incorruptibly saintly. (Having never met an incorruptibly saintly person, by the way, I categorize them as I would unicorns, flying horses and fairy godmothers: charming superstitions).

When the “magic wand” of actuality dispels the glamours of media mythology and propaganda, pissing contests between the irredeemably wicked and the irredeemably wicked (I no more doubt the existence of this particular class of critter than I do that of the IRS or FEMA, for the record…) or groups of “just plain folks” with conflicting interests are more evident than epic contests between opposing moral archetypes.

Jackals fighting vultures for scraps of carrion. Two groups of “the great unwashed,” both with legitimate grievances against (and equally illegitimate demands made of) each other; both sides egged on by ersatz godlings and minor-league Machiavellis.

“Only this and nothing more,” as Poe wrote. 

In these cases, violence seldom, if ever solves anything – except the short-term problems of a third party with interests of its own. Backing one side or the other is tantamount to attempting to introduce “democracy” to nations, the occupants of which have yet to produce a “homegrown” Magna Charta; or to assay polishing turds in a rock-tumbler: At best, the would-be dispenser of “righteousness” (or economic expediency) ends up with ruined machinery and crude fertilizer. At worst, he ends up with post-colonial, Sub-Saharan Africa.

In either case, he learns to ignore the “human cost” of his decisions and behavior.

This, incidentally, is at the root of my fondness for the Asian martial arts. Paradoxically, their emphasis on subduing the ego and controlling the id also demands personal and social responsibility of the practitioner -- accepting that actions have consequences, and that violence has a readily observable “human cost.”

I can speak only for myself, but in my case, training in martial arts actually shook the dust from my long-neglected capacity for empathy. Studying the human body’s strengths and weaknesses (and learning to exploit them) served to elevate my awareness of and appreciation for both. As my skill increased and I realized how easily I could kick others’ asses, I simultaneously realized how easily my own ass could be kicked by a person with sufficient experience and/or training. The more I trained, the more styles I observed, and the more fighters I met, the more evident it became that ours is truly a “rock-scissors-paper” world. It was quite a humbling epiphany. It was also physically painful at times – another empathy builder. (Being on the receiving end of certain techniques does wonders for one’s ability to “walk a mile in the other guy’s shoes” before applying them. There’s nothing quite like being put into a “tap out now, or lose the use of the limb for a few weeks” submission hold to encourage questions like, “Does this asshole really deserve this?” when confronted with a jughead whose belligerence far exceeds his combative capability.) 

During my first two years of training, my late father worried that I wouldn’t bother to ask myself questions of that sort. Given my temper at the time, I can’t fault him for it, but luckily he was wrong. Da himself had more than a nodding acquaintance with violence. He’d been in the Marines during the ‘50s, as a result of which he’d learned the Corps’ pre-Tae Kwon Do hand-to-hand combat (read: the good stuff) and done his share of shore patrol. After passing the bar exam, he’d renewed his acquaintance with the hairy side of life via indigent defense work for Clayton County. This necessitated taking the cases of those whose aggression/assets ratio averaged, say, 10:0, and whose “anger management” skills made me look like the Dalai Lama, in comparison. Needless to say, for Da, the outcome of clubbing a man or bouncing an ashtray off his head was neither theoretical nor theatrical. In his world, the righteous hero didn’t light a cigarette and exit the local saloon unmolested, striding through the swinging doors (while the formerly rowdy crowd held their hats to their chests in reverent silence) after putting the local bully into a coma for shagging his wife. On the contrary: in Da’s world, the poor bastard usually ended up in the clink, facing a ten-year minimum mandatory sentence for aggravated whatthefuckever. It was a point he never tired of driving home, sometimes subtly and sometimes with the finesse of a rabid bull elephant.

One afternoon in 1995, whilst practicing kumite and randori with a friend, I experienced the unmistakable sensation of being watched. Turning around, I noticed my father staring at us intently. Eventually, he left and I thought no more of the matter. Later that evening, though, he approached me and said, with his characteristic bluntness: “You realize that if you ever use that stuff on anyone, you’re in a world of shit, don’t you?” He then handed me a copy of the Georgia Criminal Code, the relevant pages and passages conveniently bookmarked. Even had the training failed to impress the value and fragility of human life upon me, this abrupt introduction to the terms “aggravated felony” and “minimum mandatory sentence” motivated me to elevate my consciousness – or at least to abstain from ripping bozos’ arms off and shoving ‘em up their asses for no good reason.

“Do some karate stuff,” eh? Sure, hon. Lemme jes’ send some fuckwit to the ICU for your amusement…

Fortunately, they worked in concert, as a result of which the focus of my training changed. Certainly, I was still interested in the combative and self-defense aspects of the art, but the fear, pain, rage and desire for revenge that motivated me to train in the first place began to dissipate in proportion to my progress. I never succeeded in banishing them entirely, mind you (and I’m glad for that -- pain, fear and anger alert us to the fact that something is wrong, after all), but I’d learned to manage them in ways I never could before “taking the plunge” and tying on the obi. I don’t suppose it’s at all obvious (evidence leads me to conclude the contrary, as a matter of fact), but the more competent one becomes at violence, the less inclined he is to use it. Competence builds confidence, which, in turn, alleviates fear. And the sad truth is; like most of our species, I was a “fear biter” during my teens and early twenties.

As Dave, the man, reined in the frightened boy/animal formerly known as “Jeff,” however, he became less interested in what he could do to other people, and more interested in what he could do, period. As I’m not a particularly “spiritual” person (and don’t trust those who claim to be, for the record), the physical elements of the art still appealed to me very much. I enjoyed the “moving meditation” of kata as much as the next guy, and was (counterproductively, I might add…) proud of my growing ability to focus solely upon counting my breaths during seiza  -- the day I made it all the way to five without noticing that my nose itched, getting miffed at the guy next to me for giving me ringworm whilst practicing wristlocks, or wondering when I’d last changed my oil was a leg-wetter worthy of Old Faithful -- but the euphoria following a hardcore workout, during which my own sweat plastered my gi to my body and left my hair a mass of dripping, unruly tendrils was every bit as satisfying. Obviously, I needed to strike a balance of sort. But how?

The answer fairly screamed itself into my ear – even as my nerve endings did some screaming of their own -- the day I tested for my advanced blue belt. It was, as I recall, a clear and sunny afternoon in the summer of 1995, a little over a year into my training. I’d bopped into the dojo, at one with the universe (if still at odds with the government) and happy as a hog in slops; wanting only to increase my meager store of combative know-how, do the art justice -- and find a plausible excuse for copping a feel off a lady I found strangely alluring, for all that she wasn’t even a Celt. (Who knows? Maybe it was the pair o’ Grade-A “sweater cows” she sported. I’ve long been an agrarian at heart, after all…)

“Bean,” says I to myself, “who could hope for a lovelier day? The sun is shinin’, birds are singin’ in the high-tension wires (funny how wind whistles over and around pure carbon, now ain’t it?), an’ the air is as clear as Bill Clinton’s thought processes ain’t. Ah! And rear bear-hugs, by God! Bless her heart, she’s none too skilled at defending against that particular attack! Well let’s change that, shall we? It’s for her ultimate benefit, after all…”

After jamming my street clothes into my weather-beaten surplus duffel bag in an untidy wad (and jamming myself into my gi in an equally untidy wad), I flexed my muscles in the dressing-room mirror, faked a few punches and kicks at imaginary enemies, derived shamefully macho pride from the fact that adjusting my “cup” to accommodate my Johnson required both “real world” ingenuity and abstract mathematical formulae I’d not used since high school; and sauntered into the dojo-proper.

Only to find it completely empty. 

Now being the only one to attend class was nothing unusual -- I was a fanatic, and trained several hours a day, every day, rain or shine. When rain or cold reared their ugly heads, though, the dojo was often as deserted as a titty bar on Cheshire Bridge Road. Shugyo and kokoro – alas and alack – are alien concepts in the Land of the Day-Glo Satin Gi; so had it been rainy or cold outside, I wouldn’t have been at all surprised. As, however, this day was neither, I can’t account for the absence of would-be budoka – I can only recount it.

“Well just damn!” says I. “I ain’t gonna figure out if that heathen Chinee calf-pinch thingy works or not – not today at any rate! Piss up a rope! Now my whole afternoon’s well an’ rightly fucked!”

Had I been more observant, I’d have noticed that the dojo was not, in fact, completely empty, for all that it seemed so at first. Would only that it had been… As it happened, though, my instructor had quietly entered the room and begun leafing through a plastic box of index cards. Apparently, what he saw didn’t make him happy.

“Bean,” he said, “If we had a dollar for every hour on this card, we could pay off the national debt. You plan on testing any time soon?” He also mentioned that there were more respectable ways of earning a black belt than having one’s current color disappear beneath a layer of electrical tape (one stripe for every ten classes).

In truth, I had indeed been planning to test –someday. Having only passed my green belt exam by the skin of my teeth, though (doing fifty-eight pushups in one minute -- immediately after a two-mile run -- and spending the next ten “Ralphing” up my pre-test Amphetacarb™ energy drink were the high points of the evening…), I’d been playing it safe ever since. I wouldn’t even consider testing unless I was sure I had my rank’s requirements down, pat.

Brian, though, wasn’t having it, and in retrospect I can’t fault him. Confidence and courage are two character traits every karateka should strive to cultivate, and playing it safe develops neither. Without challenge, without the possibility of failure, there is no uncertainty. And I can think of no better definition of courage than the ability to remain calm when confronted with fear and uncertainty.

“You’re way overdue,” he said. “And it just so happens that we have the dojo all to ourselves today.”

Thus began my test, under the singularly evil grin of my instructor – whose mood seemed to have improved markedly.

Until that day, I’d hated testing in a large group. For some reason, I’d imagine that all eyes were upon me, scrutinizing every move and misstep. That day, though, testing alone seemed infinitely worse. There was nothing to distract my instructor, no crowd in which to disappear. Previously, I’d hated crowds, but I suddenly realized that they’re actually a very useful medium of camouflage. Now, however, I was in the open, with nowhere to hide. It isn’t strictly germane to the topic at hand, but this element of the test was very beneficial. I’d long had a near-phobia when it came to crowds, but after that test, it simply disappeared. Interestingly enough, the experience also reinforced my ability to “take care of business” when everything was up to me and me alone.

This came later, though. The test itself was absolutely harrowing. We went through self-defense techniques, rolling and falling, combinations, free sparring, six kata, and finally, breaking. My first two breaks were relatively easy: two boards (no shims or spacers) with a spinning side kick, and a “speed break” (board supported from below only – no top hand) with a reverse punch. The third break was the problem. At my belt rank, the sensei wanted to see what I could do, so he asked me if I thought I was up to taking out two boards with the same punch.  Being a cocky little shit, I answered in the affirmative, flipped my hair out of my eyes, and grinned as cavalierly as fatigue allowed. Assuming a front stance and summoning up loud kiai, I effortlessly broke the boards – and the middle knuckle of my right hand.

I passed the test and spent the next six weeks nursing the injury. The experience, however, had left me with a persistent urge to take breaking to the next level. On my next day off, I drove out to the now-defunct Century Martial Arts Supply outlet on Peachtree Industrial, and picked up a copy of “Hei Long’s” (an obvious pseudonym) Iron Hand of the Dragon’s Touch, which, despite its uh, “interesting” title, is not a B-grade kung fu movie, but rather a B-grade kung fu book. And not one I recommend.

It’s taken quite a while to undo the damage I inflicted upon myself whilst putting Goodman Long’s method into practice, but I didn’t know any better at the time. Besides, it was, in all fairness, far less punishing than traditional Japanese hand conditioning -- however frightening the implications of that statement. I’ve long since discovered Chinese iron palm training, and whereas I’m a half-assed, sporadic practitioner thereof, I’ll concede its undeniable superiority. I benefited more from my first month of practice than from six months of damn-near ruining my hands on a makiwara, but to reiterate, I didn’t know any better at the time. If nothing else, it was a start.

Fast forward to the present. Until last Saturday, I hadn’t broken a board in years; beating up inanimate objects having lost most of its appeal during my mid-thirties. I haven’t stopped conditioning my hands, mind you. I still practice iron palm (sporadically and half-assedly, as previously noted), confining the pounding to a homemade beanbag, and massaging liberal doses of dit da jow into my hands before and after each session. The canvas covered boards, however, have long since been put to more productive use, and corning my knuckles in first-degree-burn-inducing brine now seems like a surreal dream – a hazy recollection of a time in my life during which I wasn’t playing with a full deck.

My hands are softer and more flexible now, but they’re actually stronger and – oddly enough – more sensitive. My foreknuckles, while still slightly enlarged and roughened, no longer sport calluses. The tendinitis that plagued me until very recently has disappeared, and even the bone-growth on my wrist is shrinking. Not a bad tradeoff, to my way of thinking…

And yes, I can still break boards.

When we returned from the gun show, I took the plank into the garage and cut it into 1’ sections with the circular saw. Mags steadied it as I sawed, but her facial expression suggested that she wondered what the hell I was up to. Finally, she came out and asked.

“You’ll see,” I said, smiling as pleasantly as I could. As I’ve mentioned, she’d done a bang-up job of selling our jewelry at the show, and it had since occurred to me that I could “do some karate stuff” without hurting anyone or cheapening the art.

I crossed the driveway, stood two cinderblocks on end, and placed the board atop them. Kneeling before them, I raised my right hand and split the board with a shuto (referred to by the culturally illiterate as a “karate chop”). It was an easy break, really. Nothing to it. It’s purely a matter of form and physics at that level. I noted, though, for all that I hadn’t broken in years, it was even easier than I remembered. There was no pain at all – not even a mild sting – and in truth, I’d hardly been conscious of the impact.

“Oh my God!” gasped my wife, as if she’d seen Moses parting the red sea, and not her beer-guzzling ne’er-do-well of a husband halving a piece of lumber.

(I found this funny as hell, as on the day after our wedding, Maggie had seen me break a chopstick with a folded piece of paper, under the tutelage of my Bro, Justin Kocher. Justin had spent years trying to convince me that it wasn’t a mere parlor trick, but knowing his sense of humor, I suspected him of trying to put one over on me. Moreover, my late granduncle Jim was a superb amateur magician, and having learned a similar bit of legerdemain from him decades before, I was even more suspicious.

Jim’s illusion consisted of surreptitiously extending his index finger alongside the lower edge of the paper, and breaking a pencil with said digit. Justin’s feat, on the other hand, was no illusion. Emphasizing the importance of form, focus and – in this case – “snap,” he coached me along until, on my tenth attempt, I did it.

With the zeal of which only the newly converted are capable, I grabbed a chopstick and a piece of paper, and set out to spread the word. My first prospective proselyte was my friend Raja, who (being many years younger; more inclined towards regular practice; and unable to escape a certain crazed Hillbilly, owing to a freak accident of positioning) managed it on his fifth or sixth try. As Mags was present the entire time, I’m at a loss to account for her surprise.)

Next, I assumed a very low horse stance and broke another with a palm strike. If anything, it was even easier than the first break. The expression on Maggie’s face, though, was priceless. She was clearly off-balance, and being the mischievous SOB I am, I couldn’t resist taking advantage of it.

“How’d you like to try it?” I asked.

“Oh, I don’t know, honey,” she replied, looking doubtful and apprehensive. “It looks pretty scary. Does it hurt?”

“Not if you do it correctly.”

“Well…”

And with that, I gave her a crash course in Board Breaking 101. I’ve shown Maggie a move or two in the past, and when she manages to focus her attention on the task at hand, she does rather well. Now I’m no Tony Jaa, and the Gracies have nothing to worry about (I’m a far too lazy, indifferent, and out-of-shape martial artist to pose any threat to the big boys) but I usually hit what I aim at, and I usually hurt what I hit. So much for my qualifications. I am, however, a halfway competent communicator, and was therefore able to teach her the rudiments without seeing her hands in plaster casts.

Obviously, her physical safety was of the utmost importance -- she’s my wife, and while I was admittedly having a bit of fun at her expense, I love her and didn’t want to see her injured. This, needless to say, absolutely shitcanned knuckle-blows. I’m one of those chauvinistic bastards who think women have no business punching at all; but lest the militant feminazis in the audience take up pitchforks and torches and lay siege to my house, I’ll add that with my bone structure, I have no business punching at all.

And I usually don’t. However counterintuitive the assertion, I’ve noticed that open-handed strikes are faster, less likely to result in injury to the one throwing them, and actually more powerful than blows with the fists. The “hammerfist” is the sole exception to the rule in my experience, but it isn’t as fast as the shuto, owing to the tension in the forearm. It’s also less telling, as the force of the blow is distributed across a larger surface area. This narrowed the choices down to the shuto and the palm strike (teisho).

Delivering the former from a kneeling position can be rather tricky for a complete beginner, so I opted for the latter. First, I ran her through some deep breathing, to relax her. When she was no longer visibly nervous, I had her assume a horse stance, and taught her to coordinate her breathing with her hip movements. Then, I showed her the basics of the strike, and had her put all three elements together during a few “dry runs.” Finally, I ran her through some “woo-woo” mental exercises I won’t recount, reminded her to aim three inches beyond the board, and asked if she was ready. She nodded and said, “I think so.”

“OK, hon. Just do it – now.”

Bam! The heel of her hand struck the board, which fell to the ground in two equal pieces. After congratulating her – and I can’t express how proud I was of her -- I picked up the remains and had a closer look. She’d done a fine job by any standard, but for a rank amateur, she’d performed it wonderfully. The break was as neat as if she’d split the wood with a hatchet, the lack of splintering indicating that she’d struck it dead center and directly along the grain.* For her first break, it was doubly impressive, as was the fact that she’d succeeded on her very first attempt – with a mere ten minutes’ prep-time.

I’m not terribly worried about 1’x1’ squares of shelving attacking Maggie, Gentle Reader (we’ve no resident poltergeists, to the best of my knowledge), but if ever they do, I know she can handle them. The most important thing to me was seeing her do it – even though I knew she could all along. Watching a person accomplish something he/she would previously have thought beyond his/her ability always leads to a feeling of great satisfaction –especially when that person is my wife. If ever she is hassled, though, it’s nice to know that an equally forceful strike to a skel’s nuts, floating rib, kidney or jaw** would give him something to ponder while she made her escape.

Next week, I think we’ll play around with the knifehand…

G’night and God bless.

* I’m almost loath to admit it, but the wonderful world of pugilism is actually home to a species of critter best referred to as the “breaking geek.” The “breaking geek” is the martial arts equivalent of the Star Wars fanboy – the kind of guy who actually knows that Han Solo’s name is the Norwegian third person singular male pronoun (han) welded to the Latin word for “alone” (solo). (No, I’m not a Star Wars fanboy, for the record. I just happen to speak a bit of Norwegian, and I’ve studied elementary Latin.)

His trademark is using his terrifyingly intimate knowledge of various woods (at times, one suspects him of actually having sex with certain trees) to “one up” other breakers – making them want to kill him in the process.

“Hmm. Very impressive. But have you ever tried breaking the rare Tunisian tundra redwood? It’s close-grained and very curly – a true test of skill. Of course (polishing his fingernails on the front of his shirt) it’s also twenty dollars a square foot, and you need the right connections to get it. So I’ll understand if you haven’t…”

“Uh, Clarence? Could you jus’ set that there Georgia white pine down for a second? I’m fixin’ to test my fuckin’ skill on this here dipshit’s cranium.”

**Back in ’85, my late father (who was forty-seven at the time) sent a twenty-something, “urban cowboy” punk to Northside at the conclusion of a very short barfight. Not understanding that fucking with ex-marines isn’t terribly bright, he sucker punched my father and knocked him down – but not out, to his eventual sorrow. The kid ended up having his jaw wired for his pains, but avoided going to the pound for assault, as Daddy -- being a magnanimous sort -- reckoned the injury and medical bills were punishment enough, and opted not to press charges.

Charges or no, I (being a seventeen-year-old, borderline hood at the time) was very curious as to how he’d managed to put the guy on the ol’ soup-and-Slurpee diet. (God knows, I’d certainly tried to break other boys’ jaws in the past, but could never quite pull it off.) One evening some weeks later, I came downstairs for a snack and found Da sitting at the kitchen table, slightly in his cups. Taking a seat, I told him how cool I thought the entire episode had been (he disagreed emphatically, by the way), and asked him how he’d managed to rearrange the asshole’s face. He flipped the ash off his cigarette, took a sip of beer, shrugged, and answered: “Hook punch.” He then resumed staring out the kitchen window, at which point I hauled ass, posthaste. The story, however, stayed with me.

At forty-one, I’m in much better physical condition than my father was at forty-seven. I’m no less prone to excess, but I exercise more often, consume a more balanced diet, and actually practice hitting things. My open-hand techniques are (and have long been) more powerful than my punches, and whereas I’ve yet to break a jaw (to the best of my knowledge, that is: being as allergic to jail as is a typical, modern American kid to legumes, grains, seafood, meat, vegetables and dairy products, I’ve never actually stuck around to assess the damage after landing a “stunner”), I’ll still take ‘em over fists, any day.  

Firecrackers!

Note: The following piece is presented solely for information/entertainment purposes. The author assumes no responsibility for would-be pyrotechnists putting this info to use and/or blasting themselves into bloody gobbets thereby.

There are a few inherent drawbacks to living in the "freest country on earth." (I'd love to know what the second freest is, for the record, but I digress...) One of said drawbacks is the fact that making one's own fireworks is a no-no in most of the forty-eight contiguous states.

This wasn't always the case, mind you. From the colonial era until the early twentieth century -- when we began exporting our rather unique (and ever-so-slightly contradictory) notions of "freedom" to the rest of the globe, manuals and formularies on the time-honored art of pyrotechny could be had at any newsstand, for pennies a copy.

Certainly, many of the formulae were sketchy (and some downright dangerous), but the odd gent who decided to try his hand a making a few Fourth of July salutes wasn't even considered eccentric -- let alone a "terrorist," quite unlike his contemporary counterpart.

Ain't "progress" lovely?

Pardon the dripping sarcasm.

On with the show, then.

The ultimate impact of the last century's "progress" upon the typical Georgian is made manifest in his/her need to drive to Tennessee, Alabama, or South Carolina in order to buy halfway decent "boom booms" for New Year's Eve or the Fourth of July. (Ain't it great to have less freedom than the Chinese? Dude, ye' jes' gotta love th' bitter irony...) Admittedly, certain pyrotechnic devices are now legally available in our once-great state, but the selection is limp-dicked at best. Then there's the fact that purchasing them does little or nothing but pour rapidly devaluating greenbacks into the economy of an enemy nation, the leaders of which have actually threatened to nuke California -- within the last fifteen years.

Had the Chinese government threatened Israel, one suspects that necons from coast to coast would long since have imposed a trade embargo a la our crumbling nation's current (and eminently sensible, for the record) sanctions against Cuba, or the phenomenally successful economic "bitch slapping" to which we gleefully and self-righteously subjected Rhodesia and South Africa during the 'seventies and 'eighties, to the ultimate benefit of both nations. (Let freedom -- and yet more dripping sarcasm -- ring, y'all...)

So much for politics and insanity (two words which I'm increasingly inclined to consider synonymous).

As our government assures us that Al Qaeda and other badguys have access to "suitcase nukes," "dirty bombs," and other, truly scary items from the NBC menu, I have little reason to suspect that they'll try to blow up the Lincoln Memorial with really big ol' muthafuckin' firecrackers. Therefore, I'm completely justified in revealing a few items of "forbidden knowledge" that men of my grandfather's ilk took for granted.

The Gentle Reader may know (as did he, to be sure) from bitter and disappointing personal experience, firecrackers made from commercially available and/or homemade black powder suck and give change. Hell, rumor has it that they even accept American Express...

Even those made with smokeless powder leave much to be desired, and ain't anything to write home about, either -- for all that they cost and arm and a leg (metaphorically speaking, of course).

Enter flashpowder. Yep, it's the glossy, silvery stuff one finds in really good firecrackers -- and it's well and rightly different from any gunpowder, whether black or smokeless. During the 1880's, it was deemed (and rightly so) too powerful and unstable for use in conventional firearms. Therefore, nitrocellulose -- for various eminently reasonable and practical reasons -- was chosen, worldwide, as black powder's de facto heir.

For the home pyrotechnist, though, flashpowder's ability to rupture gun-barrels is far less important than its ability to rupture hand-rolled paper cases -- the entire point of making a fucking firecracker, afer all...

Unfortunately, many modern pyrotechnists continue to use potassium- or sodium chlorate-based mixtures when assembling their "party favors." Since this silly, archaic practice often results in death or serious physical injury to the poor (however well-intentioned) fuckwit who "gets in over his head," I'd humbly submit that potassium perchlorate-based mixtures are safer than any chlorate-based mixture, more stable, and actually more effective/powerful, owing to their higher oxygen content. Compare potassium chlorate (KClO3) to potassium perchlorate (KClO4)...

"But Bean!" squalls the Gentle Reader, "Where am I to obtain chlorates or perchlorates? Skinny, balding closet-case, Michael Chertoff, has illegalized them -- the constitutionality of the aforementioned act notwithstanding!"

Let not thine heart be troubled, O disciple of the pyrotechnic faith!

Hie thee unto a garden shop and buy a bag of "soluble potash," then check the label. If it reads "muriate of potash," "murate of potassa" or "potassium muriate," it's the same fucking thing as the so-called "salt substitute" for which you pay a buck or so per ounce at the supermarket -- i.e., potassium chloride (KCl).

I won't give the exact process for converting it into potassium perchlorate, as I learned it from two men -- neither of whom I can ever repay for the knowledge they've passed on to me, and from a very old formulary.

I will mention, however, that sulfuric acid plays a role, and that hydrogen sulfide ("rotten egg gas") is potentially lethal when concentrated.

KCl + H2SO4 ----> KClO4 + H2S

Have fun, and piss on "Cinco de Mayo," me buckos. As Winston Churchill once said of Mohandas Gandhi: "You have no idea of how much it costs us to keep that man in his 'poverty'."

Just think about it -- and keep yer fingers, fer th' love o' God!

Snoopin' Made Easy

Damn, but do I ever wish I'd had access to something of this sort twenty or so years ago (or even more recently...)!

In those days, digging for info was a matter of making long, dreary road trips; endless pilgrimages to various city halls, county courthouses, and other gub'mint facilities; and spinning one's wheels, as often as not.

This is no longer the case, thanks to zabasearch.com. Unlike other "free" online snooping sites, this one yields actual results -- not just "teasers."

Wanna hunt down and beat the shit outta that guy who gave you a wedgie during your freshman year of high school -- long before you took to lifting weights and training in silat, jujutsu and Fairbairn-style CQC six days a week? Wanna find the pukechunk who burned you in a dope deal back in '92, and still owes you fifty bucks (adjusted for inflation)? Wanna have a little "chat" with the asshole who sold you a hot piece (swearing on his mother's grave that it was clean, all the while...) during the dark days of the Clinton regime? Wanna prove that that pompous baw'bag of a county commisioner you so loathe and detest doesn't even live in the ward/district he/she/it represents?

If so, this is your site.

Terrorists 'R' Us

The astute reader may have noticed that lately, quite a few very useful chemicals have become very difficult to obtain. Potassium and sodium nitrate, for example – once used as stump removers, fertilizers, and in the home-preservation of meats such as corned beef and ham – have become nearly impossible to obtain over-the-counter. One assumes that this is because the Powers That Be have discovered both substances can also be used to make nitric acid, and various explosive and pyrotechnic compounds.

Potassium permanganate, once used for cleaning swimming pools, as a disinfectant, and as a very convenient emergency fire starter (it ignites upon contact with glycerin) has likewise become scarce, presumably because it can be used in flash powders and other explosives.

Searching the shelves of various supermarkets and hardware stores this weekend revealed that sulfuric acid and plain, old-fashioned lye have become increasingly difficult to obtain (only two chains out of seven carry either product in this area). I assume that this is because lye (used in the home manufacture of soap) can also be used to separate glycerin from fat. Sulfuric acid when added to potassium or sodium nitrate can be used to make nitric acid, and a mix of the two acids can be used to make various nitric esters, aromatic nitro compounds, fulminated metals and other explosives.

Naturally, the national media has made no mention of these chemicals disappearing from the shelves. Nor, for that matter, has the government. As a result of the growing trend towards secrecy and police state policies in this once-free country, the “shadow government” -- of whose existence the vice president informed us in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks -- hasn’t widely publicized the list of “forbidden” chemicals.

If pressed, one can be sure the bastards would cook up some half-baked line of bullshit about protecting us from “terrorists.” Never mind that home made IEDs – even the very best – are nowhere near as effective (or cost-effective) as the high-tech, military explosives with which they allege “rogue” regimes like Iran are providing various and sundry terrorist groups. Never mind that the collapse of the former Soviet Union and China’s recent economic “boom” have served to flood the world’s black markets with cheap, readily available small arms and other materials of war.

Nope. Rather than take advantage of these developments, the badguys are wasting their time and money cranking out homemade ordnance in some seedy, abandoned warehouse in a rundown section of Cleveland…

If the “enemy” is that fucking stupid, Gentle Reader, I’m not terribly afraid of him. Are you? I didn’t think so. And I don’t believe the US government is afraid of them either.

Rather, I believe they’re afraid of you and me. They’re afraid that some time in the near future, the American people will tire of globalism, outsourcing, offshoring, open borders, “welfare/warfare state” policies, extortionate tax rates, trade imbalances, domestic spying, draconian “hate crime” laws, public schools that indoctrinate rather than educate, and a host of other abuses.

They’re far less worried about some wild-eyed raghead howling, “Allahu akbar!” as he hoses down the local Piggly Wiggly with a submachine gun than about the American people saying, “Fuck you, Uncle Sambo. Enough is enough!” This, I believe, is the real reason for the usapatriot act (I refuse to capitalize it, so don’t bust my balls) and similar homegrown tyranny.

Beyond ensuring that no effective resistance can be brought to bear against the brainless, jackbooted thugs who enforce their increasingly authoritarian dictates, overtly outlawing or covertly discouraging the sale and manufacture of various once-readily-available chemicals stifles the spirit of creativity and exploration encountered, for example, in the pages of Popular Science and Popular Mechanics until the middle of the last century.

Given this sorry (and to my mind, deliberate) state of affairs, America won’t be producing many more Mr. Wizards, let alone Thomas Edisons. What was once the sick pipe dream of a half-crazed gang of “progressive” elites a century ago has now come to pass; ironically, on the watch of an ostensibly “conservative” administration.

Moreover, the very ignorance engendered by such conditions serves to make the individual increasingly dependent upon government and its handmaidens/handlers (depending upon what flavor of “conspiracy whackjob” one happens to be), corporations, for life’s necessities. Rest assured, Gentle Reader, that when stooges and shills like Sean Hannity pay lip service to “rugged individualism,” they certainly don’t mean the kind of rugged individualism exemplified, for example, by making one’s own custom-scented, all natural soaps and selling it at local flea markets and farmers’ markets, or from a roadside stand.

What can be used to make soap can be used to make nitroglycerine, after all, and the “war on terror,” the so-called “issue of our time” comes first. In order to fight terror – thereby preserving our putative “freedom” -- we must surrender said freedom, our spirit of inquiry, and any and all means of resisting homegrown despotism, hence the need for arbitrary, draconian laws and meta-legal “policies” implemented by the un-elected heads of various cabinet-level departments.

Eminently logical, isn’t it?

Only to a citizen of Orwell’s “Oceania”…

As the founding fathers were well aware, the more arbitrary and open-ended any given law; the broader and vaguer its potential interpretation, the more it lent itself to becoming an instrument of tyranny.

Tyranny, gentle reader, is what we have today. When a government can perform warrant-less searches and similarly warrant-less surveillance; when it can seize and indefinitely detain its own citizens upon mere suspicion or allegation; when it can torture “terror suspects” and POWs, the people it governs are no longer “free” in any meaningful sense of the word. If you think this is funny or exaggerated, Gentle Reader, let me “lay one on you.” Under sufficiently loose interpretation of “bomb making materials,” you, I, and our pets and livestock are all likely “terror suspects.”

Why?

Because we piss.

Yes, you read that correctly. Please continue.

According to the Department of the Army’s own TM 31-210 (pp 36-39), the explosive known as urea nitrate can be made by boiling ten cups of urine down to a tenth of its original volume, adding 1/3 cup of nitric acid, filtering and washing the crystals, and then drying them.

Congratulations, Gentle Reader. You are now a likely “terror” suspect. Your very metabolic processes have ensured that at any given time, you’re in possession of half of a two-component explosive. If you’ve taken up a "sinister" hobby like engraving or etching, you’re probably in possession of both.

Have a nice fucking day, and chew on that for a while.

Confessions of a (Former) Teenage "Terrorist"

Being Part the Umpteenth of as inchoate and un-crystallized a saga as ever was composed; wherein our boy expoundeth upon matters of great import, maketh mock of his foes, and, generally conducteth himself after the fashion of a rogue, rapscallion, rascal, and all-around arsehole.

Well, another year is about to bite the big one. In a few weeks, New Year's Eve will roll around. As, in my opinion, New Year's just ain't New Year's without fireworks, I think I'll take a stroll down memory lane -- with a few M-80s in my pocket.

To this very day, many of my fondest memories of my childhood, adolescence, and early adulthood involve setting things ablaze and/or blowing them up. I don’t suppose it’s any secret to those who’ve known me for any significant period of time, but during my wayward youth (the 1970s and 80s), I was one of those kids who simply didn’t know what to get into next – although if, by chance, that “what” went “crackle,” “whoosh,” “boom,” or all the above, it had a better-than-average chance of attracting my complete and undivided attention.

The less socially acceptable any given pastime or field of study, of course, the more attractive I found it. The barest insinuation that any given subject was “forbidden” or “off-limits” was quite enough to send me on a single-minded quest to unearth its deepest and darkest mysteries.

I first learned about “the birds and the bees” at the tender age of ten, courtesy of the World Book Encyclopedia. By twelve, I had a leg up on the subject, courtesy of Sidney Sheldon’s Bloodline, Milton Machlin’s Atlanta, and a buddy’s dad’s stash of skin mags. I was far too shy and socially awkward, for the record, to put said knowledge to good use until some time later, but at least I didn’t approach the subject “blind”…

I never went blind, either, but that, as I suppose, is neither here nor there. By my early teens, however, it became readily apparent that sex – while unacceptable to the Baptist/Catholic “Axis of Evil” that was my immediate family – was anything but unacceptable to society as a whole. Since gratuitous sex was everywhere, I came to regard it as little more than another commodity – albeit an enjoyable one. As a consequence thereof, I never considered “tearing one off” a revolutionary or subversive act. Quite the contrary: Said act proved little more than indulging a private vice, but with tacit public approval.

Where, I ask you, is the fun in that, Gentle Reader?

Far more importantly, I was, in all probability, the first kid in my neighborhood to discover that Estes model rocket kits had definite – if limited – antipersonnel/harassment potential. I was also the first kid on my block to make his own gunpowder, if not the first to make his own IEDs and – uh, I guess you’d call ‘em “IPDs” (improvised pyrotechnic devices).

All of this, as if you hadn’t guessed, Gentle Reader, is an unpardonably verbose way of saying that I was the kind of kid who put fireworks, model rockets, my chemistry set, and damn-near anything else upon which I could lay hands, to uses for which they were never intended.

Aside from my senior year of high school (had I not forsaken my first love – pyrotechnics and improvised weaponry -- for one far less true, I’m sure mine would have been a happier life), I was a relentlessly determined experimenter with all things combustible and/or explosive.

During my boyhood in Georgia (in which great state, “the good stuff” was and still is illegal), I was rather dependent upon friends who were fortunate enough to take the odd vacation in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, for a steady supply of “bang bangs.” The sheer volume of revenue the Great State of Georgia allowed (and still allows) to flow into the coffers of Alabama, Tennessee, and the Carolinas, in the interest of ensuring that no Georgian child ever enjoys a proper Fourth of July or New Year’s Eve without his/her parents risking misdemeanor charges and fines is a rant in and of itself. I will, however, defer the short-term gratification of bashing the premier “nanny state” of the Deep South, in the interest of not veering too far off-topic.

“Dangerous fireworks are, young Jedi!” croaks the odd, outraged liberal observer. “Must not youngsters them have!

To which I respond: “Tae fook must ye’ git, ye’ – ye’ – ye’… fookin’ git! Fun they are, and to utter fuckwits harmful only!”

I hate to piss on anyone’s parade – ok, that’s a bald-faced lie. I love doing so even more than I love good moonshine and bad cigars – but please do have a gander at the leading causes of death among the chiiilllldrennn. Methinks thou shalt find that the lives of more ankle-biters would be saved by outlawing automobiles, bathtubs, Ritalin, and household cleaning solutions than by banning fireworks.

Certainly, I risked (and sustained) the odd injury whilst playin’ with ‘em, but not a single of the “dings” I acquired was even remotely comparable the injuries other boys received from – just to list an example or two -- a nasty “pileup” whilst playing football, or even a bit of poorly-aimed “chin music” whilst playing baseball.

I can actually imagine myself saying, “OK, so I picked up a third-degree burn. It’s only ¾” in diameter, though, and I’ve already scraped the ashy skin from around the edge. It’ll heal shortly, and meanwhile, I still have the use of my arm. You, on the other hand, have a staple in yer scapula, a pin in yer humerus, and a broken collarbone. I’ll stick to the fireworks, thankee kindly. And just ‘cause it needs to be said: I think that of the two of us, you’re the one who ain’t got both oars in the water, Bubba.”

Having rambled thus far, I think it only fair to get to the “meat” of the post. The Gentle Reader is, I’m sure, just all broke out with gratitude.

Playing with imported Chinese fireworks was one thing. Making one’s own, however, was another entirely. I still remember – with the fondness only time can lend a “hairy” experience of this sort – an afternoon in early 1982, on which my best friend (as a DOD “brat,” I went through a veritable revolving door of best friends: The god known as “PCS” is rather an implacable bastard, after all. Thunderbolt-wielding Croneidês could, in all probability, learn a thing or two about steeling one’s resolve from him…), Sammy, and I damn-near wound up in the ER of the 130th Station Hospital, when one of our experiments went dangerously awry.

Being a pair of inquisitive little shits, we had assiduously picked and scraped the filling out of what must have been several thousand “black cats,” “lady fingers,” and other fireworks. We’d been researching gunpowder formulae since autumn of ’81 – the first quarter of his and my 8th and 9th grade years, respectively – but couldn’t, for whatever reason, duplicate the effects of the commercially produced stuff to our satisfaction.

In order to figure out what we were doing wrong (and, in all honesty, because we meant to make a big ol’ MoFo of a homemade firecracker) we’d carefully funneled all the powder into a glass jar, as (chuckle) we figured there was little or no spark hazard, compared to that posed by a metal container. Unfortunately, we neglected to cap the jar.

One afternoon, we were experimenting with homemade black powder. Ours, unfortunately, was poorly mixed, and chock full of unforgivably large lumps of unincorporated saltpeter. In order to test the burning time, we poured out a small line of the stuff onto a piece of plywood, and touched a match to it. To say that it burned unevenly would be an understatement. It fizzled and flared, popped and crackled, and did damn near everything but what a trail of black powder does in the movies. All of a sudden, a burning lump of potassium nitrate shot up into the air like a kernel of popcorn in an air popper and went – you guessed it – straight into the open mouth of the glass jar.

Somehow, Sammy and I had the presence of mind to hurl ourselves to the floor, just as the jar exploded. (I can actually imagine Moose reading this and muttering: “Too bad you weren’t killed, you despicable bastard,” by the way…)((Snicker)). After the initial shock wore off, we brushed the glass frags off our clothing and began whooping and hollering to beat the band.

“Dude! That was sooooo fuckin’ cool!”

Well, perhaps it wasn’t that cool, but to two guys who weren’t exactly pursued by crooning, swooning mobs of the fair sex (and altogether too obtuse to imagine that there might be a causal link between our eccentric choice of pastimes and the conspicuous dearth of female interest in us), it sufficed.

Damn! Just damn, if you’ll pardon the digression. Here I am, writing about days gone by, when what should pop up on Pandora Radio? “Knocking at Your Back Door,” by Deep Purple. Jeez. That one brings back some memories, as it was released during my senior year of high school. That particular cut, the Gentle Reader will recall, was the title track of the Mk II lineup’s first reunion since 1973. Damn, but I loved that album!

Ah, the ideas to which hearing it gives rise! Perhaps my old Heidelberg cronies and I could reunite and “compare notes,” as it were. Nah, that probably wouldn’t be a very good idea. These days, we’d probably be declared a “rogue nation.” My back porch would then be invaded, and we’d all be sent to Guantanamo – or turned over to the Roswell City Council for a show trial. President Monkey Boy would then deliver an impassioned (and characteristically inarticulate) address, to the effect of:

“My fellow Ameros: This is, indeed, a momentary occasion in our nation’s historicism. As the ancient Grecian philosophizer, Play-Doh, said, in his magnum offal, The Republication: ‘Then it seems that our first business is to supervise the production of stories, and choose only those we think suitable, and reject the rest.’

Well, here’s one for you! Recently, the rogue nation of Green Hell, and its president, Dave “Chemical” Bean – who has repeatedly threatened to convert to Discordiofascism and launch bottle rockets at Israel from his backyard – were taken to task for their refusal to abide by certain top-secret UN Reservations. The invasion of Green Hell revealed that Bean and his council of ministries – the secretive 'Milton Mullahs' – were producing and shipping homemade fireworks to Iran, from where they were sent to Iraq, Syria, North Korea, and Molly Ivins, to be used in the confabulation of roadside bombast.

Moreover, the daring raid, undertaken by a joint military-civilian strike force, (flyboys who seldom stray below 5,000 feet, and Jerkwater Security employees, who are all heroes and should be paid twice as much as the ground-pounders who do the actual grunt work) revealed that the Milton Mullahs were, in fact, in cahoots with the remnants of Alabamastan’s Tali-Waqqir regime, and were seeking to develop bottle rockets of mass destruction.

There was a single causality in the raid, but fortunately, no fatalism. Today, this fine young man – the very same causality of the Discordiofascist terror we seek to illuminate – will provide firsthand testudination of the harrowing ordeal. Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to present Rolf Eric Magnus Folger (his buddies call him 'Shitburner'), of the Minnesota Civil Air Patrol.”

(Thunderous applause, accompanied by sporadic bursts of pre-recorded Country music.)

“Thanks, Mr. Presidential. It’s an honor to be here, youbetcha! So, like, without further ado: Me and the boys was, ya know, doin’ this mission thing. Ya fight the war with the army ya have, right? And Great Northfield’s always willing ta send her very best, youbetcha! Hey, we may be a 'blue' state, but that’ because we all got blue you-know-what’s – wink, wink – from all the feminazi rug munchers up here, if ya know what I mean.

(Laughter.)

So we was, ya know, kinda understaffed. I mean, there was only, like, a company of us, to take a whole acre-and-a-half, defended by four or five hardcore Discordiofascists! No fun, youbetcha! So me an’ Sven Hjalmarsson – who gave me a wedgie in ninth grade, but we’re, like, friends now – so we, like, go runnin’ across the lawn, when this weird guy with really thick glasses throws a whole strip of “black cats” at us!

(The audience gasps.)

“So anyway, Sven is wearin’ those tactical gloves, the ones with no fingers? And one of the “black cats” pops, like, so close, he almost got burnt on his pinky. I hear John Kerry is awardin’ him the Lilac Heart! It’s a new one, for guys who, like, almost get injured in the line of duty, but not quite.

(Hesitant applause. The audience isn’t quite sure what to make of that one.)

“So anyway, we bust through the front door, only to find that these terrorists have removed the entire floor from the vestibule. Now Sven’s a bit ‘big boned’, ya know? So he gets stuck between a pair of joists, and is hangin’ half into the basement. He also got the Confederate flag hangin’ over the door all wrapped around his face, so he was definitely in the hurt locker. Me? I’m skinny, so I fall all the way through, right? Well, the first thing I see is this Styrofoam Pillsbury Dough Boy that’s got something stuck in its hand, so it looks like it’s flippin’ ya off, right? Well, for all I know, it could be some kinda artificial suicide bomber, like, packed with bombs and stuff, so I shoot it before it can blow up.

(At this point, the Vice President, clad in a titanium exoskeleton and accompanied by fifty fully armored Jerkwater Security associates, crosses the stage, brandishes a stun gun, and whispers into “Shitburner’s” ear.)

“Oh, sorry! It was Osama! He just looked all short and pale ‘cause he was wearin’ special shoes and stole some stuff from Michael Jackson’s plastic surgeon. And no, it wasn’t one of my bullets that went through the styro- uh, I mean 'al Qaeda mastermind' and hit Rambo Quixote of Jerkwater Security, it was an M-80, hurled by the evil Mullah Sammy, whose picture, is, like, somewhere in this seriously collectible deck of playing cards! So anyway, Osama’s dead, youbetcha!

(Here, the tale degenerates into a “random access nightmare," worthy of the pen of a Ballard or Kafka. Thoroughly confused, the members of the audience begin to murmur among themselves. Order is restored only by several dozen beatings, the odd on-site waterboarding, and the onstage appearance of a dirty-faced girl, clad in moth-eaten kangaroo and wombat hides. In a thick Ocker accent, she addresses the throng, gesticulating wildly, her eyes as big a saucers.)

“Then came the 9-11!” (Pronounced: “ðin kime th’ noyn a-livin’!”)

(The audience begins hooting like a band of frightened howler monkeys, at which point, yer boy realizes that this digression is really getting out of hand.)

So let’s get back to the knowin’ an’ the doin’, shall we?

One of the first things we noticed was that the powder we extracted from commercially manufactured fireworks was of an entirely different appearance from our own. Whereas our “black” powder was actually of a medium grey shade, the Chinese stuff was quite a bit darker, with an oddly metallic luster.

This left us baffled for quite some time, and it wasn’t until my senior year of high school (during which year I also redoubled my efforts towards acquiring foreign tongues, and became quite the cunning linguist... Sorry! It’s that perfidious influence of that damned Deep Purple tune!) or thereabout; that I figured it out.

As I discovered, the stuff that put the “bang” in commercial fireworks wasn’t gunpowder at all, but flash powder, very similar in composition to the old-timey photoflash powder. Having solved this mystery, I found it much easier to crank out homemade fireworks that actually functioned like -- well – fireworks.

OK, the rest of the post contains information that is potentially dangerous, is probably illegal in countries whose citizens enjoy fewer liberties than those of the People’s Republic of China, and should only be acted upon – if at all – by wise, benevolent, neoconservative, adult EOD experts, with advanced degrees in chemistry and phrenology.

I include it for information and entertainment purposes only. Heaven forefend that it should fall into the hands of Kim Jong Il, and his henchmen, as they’d undoubtedly construct an immense whistling squib (code named “the No-Dong N***** Chaser”) and launch it into Japanese airspace, thereby leading us to the brink of Armageddon.

How’s that for a disclaimer?

Anyhoooo…. During the heady (as in: “blackheads”) days of my misspent, pizza-faced youth, I discovered that the most easily constructed “firework of mass destruction” was the good, old-fashioned smoke bomb (a.k.a. “smudge pot”). The composition was among the safest, the materials among the easiest to obtain. The basic formula was 75 parts (by weight) potassium or sodium nitrate, 15 parts charcoal (ground from ordinary briquettes), and 10% garden sulfur. I was later told that some use a mix consisting of 5 parts saltpeter, 70 parts ammonium nitrate, with the charcoal/sulfur proportions unaltered, but I never got around to trying it: Ammonium nitrate, after all, had other, more impressive uses…

I used to ram the powder rather loosely (smoke, and not an explosion being the desired result, after all) into toilet paper tubes, the ends of which I’d sealed by gluing discs of scrap wood into them. One of the discs was drilled to take a fuse, needless to say. Unfortunately, toilet paper tubes are rather flimsy, so as often as not, the entire mess would go up in flames, producing far less smoke than I would have liked. I solved the problem at the tender age of 21, by scavenging the cardboard rolls upon which printer labels are spooled, from the trashcans at my place of work. They were easily obtained, but damn! Let the winos even think you’re after cafeteria scraps, and you’re in for the fight of your life, let me tell you!

These rolls were much sturdier, with walls nearly a quarter of an inch thick, so they were much less likely to catch fire. I used the same configuration, but with a few modifications. I found that filling the case from half to three quarters of its capacity worked every bit as well as filling it completely, and that the smoke seemed to issue forth far more energetically, was well. I tried drilling parallel rows of holes along the sides of the case, but found that doing so diminished the pressure inside the tube too much, so I stuck to the original design ever after.

Now smoke is all well and good, but for a kid like me, if it didn’t go “boom!” it just didn’t make muster. Remember the flashpowder I mentioned a few paragraphs ago? Good. This is where it comes into play. The metallic luster to which I referred is the result of powdered aluminum in the composition.

Before I go any further, let me add another caution. There are hundreds of old flashpowder recipes out there, most of which contain potassium chlorate, as a result of which; they’re extremely dangerous. The danger stems from the potassium chlorate itself. I don’t like potassium chlorate, as the stuff is generally as unstable as the people who play around with it. It’s extremely sensitive to heat and friction, and when mixed with sulfur, antimony sulfide, or red phosphorous, is subject to spontaneous decomposition.
For this reason, messing with these compounds is an invitation to experience decomposition of an altogether different sort, dig?

Good.

Suffice to say that as I’m not especially keen to reduce the number of digits on either hand, I avoid the stuff (and formulas that call for it) like the plague. I’d advise others to do likewise. It is, after all, entirely possible to have fun without courting death or mutilation.

As pushing up daisies at the local skull orchard didn’t appeal to me, I stuck to less sensitive compounds. These, for the record, are the formulas that make “the M-80 from Hell” (as I call it) the crowd-pleaser it is. The first consists of 8 parts (by weight) potassium permanganate (the same stuff used for cleaning swimming pools –more about this chemical wonder in an upcoming piece on emergency fire-making) one part powdered aluminum, and one part sulfur. The second is made of two parts potassium perchlorate, one part powdered aluminum, and one part sulfur. For safety’s sake, I always powdered the ingredients separately, on a flat surface; then mixed them by stirring them together with a paintbrush.

And I suppose that’s it for today. In an upcoming post, I’ll discuss rockets and crackers, among other things, and post a few of the more interesting (and safer) pyrotechnic formulas from days gone by.

PS - Happy Thanksgiving, Clan Baw'bag. Now make like turkeys and get stuffed.

A "Militia Wingnut" Airs His Views

The Gentle Reader – undoubtedly somewhat dismayed by my marked habit of denouncing damn-near everything in my rants-- may very well find himself asking the following questions:

“Does this grouchy asshole actually like anything?”

“Does the aforesaid grouchy asshole actually stand for anything, or is he just 'anti-everything'?”

Foulmouthed curmudgeon that I am, my initial (and principled, if reflexive) answer to both questions is, “Get bent, pencil dick. Ye’re ugly, an’ yer ma dresses ye’ funny. Why, I oughtta do the ‘Wah-Watusi’ on yer nuts just fer havin’ the temerity an’ effrontery ta ask.”

That, however, would be rather uncouth of me, now wouldn’t it? As I’ve no desire to be uncouth – not at the moment, anyway—I’ll simply answer the questions as politely and succinctly as possible.

The simple answer to the first is, “Hell yeah! I’m fond of a great number of things!”

I like music, especially traditional American, Scottish, and Irish music; classical; hard rock; punk; country/western; “oldies,” and quite a few other genres.

I like alcohol, tobacco, firearms and explosives; for all that I loathe and despise the bureau of jackbooted thugs charged with keeping them out of my grubby little mitts.

I like cooking, gardening, shooting, history, philosophy, martial arts, making things I’d otherwise have to purchase, and acquiring new skills and knowledge in my (already eclectic, admittedly) fields of interest.

I like real literature – for all that very little has been written in the last seventy-odd years.

I like well-rendered, representational art.

I like good movies – not that many good movies are made these days.

I like being a Christian (if somewhat lapsed, in that respect), White, largely Celtic, Southern, individualist/populist (the two aren’t irreconcilable opposites), politically conservative male -- however distasteful others may find me and mine.

In the interest of remaining un-gelded, I oughtta mention that I like my fiancée, too. There. Now my ass – err, make that m’ baw’bag -- is covered…

So there you have it. “These are a few of my favorite things,” as Mary Martin and – some years later -- Julie Andrews sang.

Now let’s tackle the second question, shall we?

I stand for a great number of things, actually. I can’t possibly list them all in a single post, so I’ll opt for brevity – not that doing so will be especially easy for a motormouth like me, mind you.

“Standing” for something means exactly dick if one can’t open a can of whupass on the opposition, should said opposition wax uncivil. Therefore, I stand for the right to keep and bear arms. Try jailing me for expressing an unpopular opinion, and I’ll blow yer fuckin’ head off. Diggest thou, sirrah?

As a well-regulated militia is necessary to the security of a free state (emphasis mine), I advocate individual ownership of modern military weapons, up to and including machineguns, grenades, and anti-armor weapons.

No, I’m not kidding. The armed citizen –provided that he has the gumption to use his weapon and not merely wave it about like a surrogate pecker – is any country’s last line of defense against tyranny.

Bolt-action rifles are things of great beauty. In terms of accuracy, even the midline models perform as well as, and in some cases, outperform the more expensive semi-autos. My Parker-Hale .30/06, for example, may not be in the same league as a tricked-out M21, but it’ll eat any load I choose to feed it (unlike a few chicks of my prior acquaintance, more’s the pity), and at 500 or fewer yards, makes quite a serviceable sniper rifle.

In short, with the proper load, it could be used to punch neat, little 0.30” holes through blue (or black) helmets, and the empty brainpans of the mindless, imperial legionaries and gung-ho, deracinated, latter-day Praetorians who wear them.

Why?

Because it’s a damned good hunting rifle, and sniping, in effect, consists of hunting two-legged game.

The Second Amendment, however, doesn’t have shit to do with hunting. Rather, it pertains to the security of a free state, “free” being the key word. Just read the Federalist Papers, folks. Bear in mind, though, that it isn’t quite the “Bible of Liberty” some benighted souls consider it. Said collection of documents was, in fact, the slick, bullshit sales pitch whereby the Federalists suckered our ancestors into adopting their terribly flawed Constitution. For all that the Anti-Federalists were the real champions of freedom, the notion that an armed populace is the strongest deterrent to tyranny is confirmed many times within its pages. If you still aren’t convinced, read The Anti-Federalist Papers. Having a gander at both will answer any and all questions pertaining to the “founders’ intent,” and rather handily, at that.

Neither the Federalists nor their opponents, however, lost much sleep over the prospect of bears, deer, squirrels, or buffalo establishing a despotic, authoritarian state. The Anti-Federalists worried about a strong, central government doing just that, but the Federalists assured them that the militia would serve as a foil to any such tyrannical designs on the part of “The Man.” Unfortunately – and thanks to that short sighted, power-crazed arch-shithead, John Marshall and the horror known as “Judicial Review” – it took only a single, 1913 Supreme Court decision to place the “weekend warriors” under complete, de facto federal control.

Not only did this provide “Uncle Sugar” with a convenient way to circumvent/subvert the Posse Comitatus Act -- the National Guard, now expediently deemed “the Militia,” although under the command of the standing army, was still constitutionally empowered to perform certain law-enforcement duties – it effectively abolished the Militia, as defined in both the Constitution and the Militia Act.

I’ll discuss pathetic, un-funny, paramilitary jokes like the CAP and various so-called “State Defense Forces” in a future post. I’ll also discuss a few of the finer moments in the history of the “Land of the Free,” -- such as the Battle of Blair Mountain and Herbert Hoover’s unique way of “supporting the troops” – in the near future. For now, let’s return to those fabled days of yesteryear, and the abolition of the real Militia, shall we?

Said act of Judicial tyranny, needless to say, left “Joe Sixpack” defenseless and utterly dependent upon the emerging class of neo-Platonist “(would-be) philosopher-kings” and their obedient myrmidons for protection from foreign aggressors and homegrown scumbags. Worse still, it left him defenseless against and dependent upon the very “public servants” who were well on their way to becoming his masters. In a nutshell, yet another of history’s deliciously perverse “black comedies,” the effective disarmament of freedom’s strongest bulwark – the people themselves – was played out on the American stage just as the question: “Quis custodiet custodiens?” loomed largest -- during the first quarter of the twentieth century.

The founders, as it happens, were intelligent men – far more intelligent than the nose-picking morons who masquerade as “thinkers” in this sick, sad, irrational age of ours. Many of them were veterans of our infant nation’s eight-year struggle for liberty, against what was, arguably, the greatest military power in the world. Others risked – and in some cases, lost – everything they had in the name of freedom and independence. Therefore, they held no illusions insofar the natures of freedom, tyranny, and – most importantly – force were concerned.

The struggle to win and maintain freedom is an exercise in force, period. Establishing and enforcing the “law and order,” so dear to the shriveled hearts of would-be despots the world over, is likewise an exercise in force.

“But wait, Bean, you Paleolithic savage, you!” squeals the Gentle Reader. “We have courts! We have the Constitution! We have activists! Look at the great victories won by Martin Luther Anthony-Sonntag and others!

Bullshit.

The legal system is entirely based upon the “legitimate” use of force.

Need further clarification? No problem.

Let’s assume that you, the Gentle Reader, make the mistake of flying the Confederate flag on your lawn, in flagrant violation of the Freedom of Expression, But Only For Those With Whom We Agree Act of 2003. Your uptight wanker of a neighbor, his panties (ersatz “men” who become that “bent out of shape” over symbols are generally pantywaists) tightly bunched, then sees the dread banner while playing “Richard Gere Meets Alvin and the Chipmunks -- “Alvin! Alvin! Oh, GHAWWWWD! Alvinnnn!” -- with his crystals. He then inadvertently channels the spirit of Butterfly McQueen, becomes mortally offended, and decides to sue you for mental anguish.

The next thing you know, you’re being "served" – and not in the colloquial sense of the word.

“This is bullshit!” says you, wadding up the papers and chucking them into the roundfile. You then go about your business and forget the entire matter. A few days later, you receive a court order to appear before the local magistrate, posthaste.

“Fuck you, you despotic, black-robed nabob!” is the most cordial phrase in your reply to said order. Whatcha reckon’s gonna happen next, home-slice?

I’ll tell ya. The powers-that-be are gonna send two or more boys, armed with tasers, mace, bludgeons, and firearms by your “castle,” to ensure that you abide by the Imperial Senate’s wise and just law, and that you answer that summons. The law is force, period. Don’t jerk yourself off by believing differently, Gentle Reader.

As for the Constitution? Thanks to the earlier mentioned peckerhead, John Marshall, the Constitution means whatever the majority of a group of presidential appointees fucking well says it means, end of discussion. This, incidentally, is why the decision to terminate a fetus is a matter of “privacy,” but distilling one’s own moonshine isn’t.

As for “activists”? ‘Scuse me while I laugh my ass off. Most of ‘em have armies of lawyers, politicians, special interests, foundations and sympathetic media figures overtly or covertly backing them. As Winston Churchill once said of Mohandas Gandhi, “You would not believe how much it costs us to keep that man in his ‘poverty’.” Beyond this, their shenanigans are effective only if and when the society whose “injustices” they’re protesting is a relatively benevolent one.

If not? Two words for ya: “Tienanmen Square.”

The seeds of liberty may be planted through argument and/or persuasion. Injustices may be brought to the public’s attention through protest and pamphleteering. More often than not, though, liberty is secured and injustice righted only through the use of force, or the credible threat thereof.

To deny this is as much an act of intellectual and moral cowardice as it is an act of stupidity. Words scrawled on paper do not make a man free; the ability to kill those who would enslave him does.

This brings us to why I think the Militia of the 18th and 19th Centuries should be resurrected.

The political and social history of the United States of America during the 20th and 21st Centuries has been a dismal one, from a freedom-lover’s point of view. Both centuries have seen the ever-accelerating growth of government and corporate power, and the proportional shrinkage of state, local and individual autonomy. For the most part, these disturbing trends have met with little or no committed resistance from the general public. The average American has never had to fight for his freedom, so he really doesn’t care when it’s taken from him, bit-by-bit.

The mere, perceived “threats” of the Kaiser (completely imaginary), the Nazis and the “Yellow Peril” (both far more credible, but still grotesquely exaggerated by the “Most Gullible Generation’s” propagandists), and now “Terrorism,” have persuaded the mealy-mouthed, weak-kneed descendants of the country’s true “Greatest Generation”—that of 1776 – to abandon the legacy of liberty bequeathed them by their more vigorous and courageous forbears.

So easily terrified by bugaboos is the typical Post-American American; he consents to have his liberty, his money, and his neighbors’ sons (I’ve yet to meet a neocon with a son who has his “ass in the grass” – or “sand,” if you prefer) taken from him, rather than assess the credibility and capabilities of the so-called “threat.” As for facing it himself? Forget it! There’s money to be made, leisure time to be enjoyed, and – most tellingly and damningly – someone else to do the fighting, the bleeding and the dying for him.

Rather than take up arms, train in their use, and take positive steps towards safeguarding his own liberty, the emasculated piece of shit who presumptuously styles himself and his talk-radio idols “great Americans” prefers to cringe in abject terror, and beg George and Rudy to protect him and his, when a few ragged, rag-head fanatics pull off a predictable and tactically useless (but strategically brilliant) strike against the most sacred symbol of his god – the Almighty Dollar.

Reviving the Militia of old might actually reverse this potentially lethal trend. “A man’s a man, for a’ tha’,” as the old Scottish tune runs. However pathetic, however effete, however decadent, however greedy, however “pussy whipped,” and however “politically correct” the Post-American American eunuch may be, I’d like to believe that some ember of the fire that burned within the hearts of his manly ancestors still smolders within him. I’d like to believe that training in arms beside his kinsmen, his friends, his neighbors, might reawaken within him the warrior spirit – and warrior wisdom – of his progenitors. I’d also like to believe that doing so might rekindle the flame of resistance and defiance, the sense of community, and the love of hearth and home that motivated the “Old American,” long before his descendants made a habit of licking up the ludicrous, pseudo-intellectual vomitus spewed by the scions of tin-horn, immigrant Euro-shite whose wretched progenitors descended, locust-like, upon this country, after the “dirty work” had already been done.

“In your veins the blood still flows/Of brave men who once arose/Burst the shackles of their foes/ Honest men, and free,” as a long-forgotten song goes. I’d like to believe that those old, forgotten lyrics are factually correct. A man can dream, can’t he?

All the same, I’m a realist, and not much given to jerking myself off.

You boys go play video games, watch televised sports, and hide under your beds whenever a few Paynim fanatics wave their dicks at you.

Me? I need to get a good night’s sleep. Then -like the last few real Americans; those who aren’t sufficiently pretentious to dub themselves “great Americans” – left in this country, I’ll put in some time with the fists, the feet, the sticks, the blades, the pistols, the rifle, and the bayonet.

As we’re approaching an election year, I’d like to close with two quotes, the former from a truly great American, the latter from a very astute Welshman:

“And let history forget that you were our countrymen.”

“They’re all the same/You’re all to blame/You’re dogs.”

Son of Chop Socky!

I’ll be the first to admit that at times, I’m rather an irritating sonofabitch.

Nails on a chalkboard. Chewing aluminum foil. Me.

Yep, I’m that irritating.

My fiancée claims I’m giving her grey hair, and as a matter of fact, I’m probably the only guy in history whose intended has actually had his photograph enlarged and then attached it to her heavy bag.

Not satisfied with merely assaulting me in effigy, Maggie actually threatened to kick my ass at the 2007 Animal List BBQ. As she’s somewhat forgetful, though, she forgot her boxing gloves. Rather than making good on her threat, she was forced to content herself by pounding on the MacYoungs’ heavy bag whilst everyone else was at the Castle Rock Rec Center. This afforded me a chance to assess – realistically – what kind of real or imagined “ass kicking” she’d be able to serve me.

When I realized that I was going to have to show her the proper way to punch -- I kept it confined to the jab and the good, ol’ fashioned, karate reverse punch (gyaku zuke) -- I stopped worrying, and said nothing more of it. I also found it necessary to correct her stance (hers was too high, by far) and breathing, and to teach her to generate power from the hips so as not to throw ineffectual “arm punches.” Needless to say, this kept us busy for a while. Still, by the end of the afternoon, she was throwing much better punches than she had been, so I was a reasonably happy camper.

Last week, Maggie came down from North Carolina to visit. This time, she’d brought her gloves, and was still determined to kick my ass. What I don’t think she realized at the time was that I’ve spent the last thirteen or so years learning ways of rendering my ass less “kickable.” Beyond that, I got into my share of scrapes during my wayward youth, had daily punchouts with my brother (and even one or two with my father) while I was growing up, and have had people attempt to stab and shoot me. In short, I’m not exactly a complete stranger to violence.

Before I continue, let me state – for the record – that I ain’t some “Kung-Fu Jones” tough guy who tears phonebooks in half to wipe his ass with, and knocks bullets out of the air with his dick. Because I know what to look for -- and avoid – I’ve managed to stay out of trouble for a rather long time now. Except for threatening to knock the teeth out of an annoying street-corner proselytizer two weeks ago, I haven’t had a violent encounter since 2003, when I was forced to pull a blade on a pushy scrote who was dumb enough to follow me when I opted to disengage.

Training or no training, there are legions of guys out there who could kick my ass, and I don’t claim otherwise. And my friends? Hell, Tristan Sutrisno, Marc MacYoung or Wim Demeere (just to name a few) could go through me like shit through a goose, and chances are I’d never even see whatever technique they used to floor me, coming in. I’d probably just wake up on a gurney with my teeth somewhere in the vicinity of my asshole, wondering if anyone had gotten the license number of the truck that hit me. Even in the case of my bros who don’t train that often -- Wayne and Sluggo, f’rinstance – I’d prefer to trust in the old adage “A pair of heels is worth two pairs of fists.”

Havin’ thus established that I’m not a Bruce-Lee-wannabe-macho-man, I’ll simply state that I had damned good teachers, and that what they taught me works. This brings us back to the matters of Maggie and the BBQ. An Animal List BBQ is a martial arts/self defense aficionado’s paradise. The main “heavy hitters” have centuries of experience between ‘em, and the sheer quantity and quality of skill and talent on display is breathtaking. I’ve been rather lazy for the past couple years, insofar as training is concerned, and I’ll admit it. After seeing some of the demonstrations and classes at the BBQ, though, I was inspired to get off my dead ass and begin training seriously once again.

Maggie’s desire to kick my ass dovetailed rather nicely with my newfound motivation. Maggie, unfortunately, is what I call “awareness impaired.” There are certain warning signs given off by people and situations that she simply doesn’t perceive. As awareness is one of the key elements of any effective martial art, I though she might benefit from a little training. My reasoning was; either her awareness would sharpen, or she’d at least have a fighting chance to save her ass from the bad situations she’d undoubtedly continue to encounter if it didn’t.

The evening of her first or second day here, she broke out her gloves. Well, they weren’t proper boxing gloves at all, but rather a little blue pair of Century bag gloves. There was no way in hell I was going to drag on my 16 oz. TKO’s if those were all she was wearing, so I hied my redneck ass upstairs and fished my neon-red Century “Tracers” out of the closet.

By now the gentle reader is probably saying, “Uh, Bean? Are ya outta yer friggin’ mind? Ya’ve already admitted to being a fairly irritating sumbitch. Do ya think it’s a good idea ta teach yer soon-ta-be ol’ lady how to open a can of whupass on ya?”

My response: “Hey, what the hell? I’ve got thirteen years on her. I ain’t worried…”

I should have been, though. There’s a well-known saying in martial arts circles: “The white belts are the ones who’ll fuck you up.” On the surface, this might sound downright counterintuitive, but it’s true. In martial arts, as in any discipline, the student passes through four distinct stages of skill acquisition: unconscious incompetence (one has no idea what one is doing, let alone why one is doing it incorrectly), conscious incompetence (one is aware of one’s mistakes and working to correct them), conscious competence (one can now perform a given task correctly, provided that one concentrates upon it) and unconscious competence (the skill sets have become instinctive).

The first stage is the most dangerous to the teacher or senior student, as I’ll make clear a little farther on. At the time, though, I was simply looking forward to my idea of a good time – a total massacre, with the odds stacked completely in my favor. Heh heh heh… Dontcha just hate me sometimes?

If nothing else, I’m sure she found our initial encounter instructive. Owing to the lightweight protection we were wearing, I opted to “pull” my punches, but I gave her some incentive to defend herself, all the same. Certainly, she’s worked out on a heavy bag before, but I could tell this was an entirely different kettle of fish. By the end of the first round, she’d learned two very important lessons: 1.) The heavy bag doesn’t hit back, and 2.) One should never underestimate one’s opponent.

Rank amateurs tend to be rather excitable, and Maggie was no exception to this general rule. Among the first “white belt fuckups” she made was that of throwing a punch – while I was pontificating, no less – that knocked my left hand into my own eye. I’d been away from a formal training environment for so long; I’d forgotten just how much I’d come to dread coaching white belts through the basics. They tend forget simple rules such as: “Thou shalt not pop the instructor/senior student whilst he endeavoreth to teach thee a technique.”

After another round or so (my eye smarting all the while), it became obvious to me that she stood a snowball’s chance in hell against me, and was gonna need some work. I found it necessary to remind her to keep her knees bent, not to drop her guard, and to stop retreating on a straight line. During one round, I threw a relatively simple boxing combination at her – left jab, right cross, left hook, right uppercut – and received the “deer in the headlights” look for my pains.

The kicks seemed to confound her completely, for all that I kept them simple (front, side, roundhouse) and low. Ditto the backfists (uraken) and my tendency to “hook” “bind” and “clear” her guard. The highlight of the evening, though, was when I stepped in (twice!) and took her down with the most basic judo technique of ‘em all, o soto otoshi.

Needless to say, she was completely outmatched. She was a good sport, though, and a very eager student, so I decided to give her a break and start off with the very basics.

This led to an interesting set of problems. My primary concern is teaching my future wife to defend herself, so realistic self-defense is the very thing upon which I’ve been trying to focus. I’m a “peewee” in this field, but I still have thirteen years of experience, so much of what is now reflexive/instinctive to me is completely new to her. For a guy who writes, the question “How to communicate this stuff to her?” probably shouldn’t rear its ugly head, but it did.

Before I continue, let me state that I’ve observed quite a few schools that purport to specialize in “women’s self-defense.” I’ve also seen more WSD books and “Fear no man, and in a mere two weeks, even!” seminars than I care to count. Were it not for the fact that most of ‘em are teaching half-baked tournament karate by way of technique, and poorly reasoned feminazi bullshit by way of philosophy, I’d laugh at ‘em. I mean, really. When I see some tubby chick in a yellow belt, tottering and bunny-hopping her way through a Tae Kwon Do-style spinning hook kick -- thinking she’s learning self-defense, all the while – my nastier side gets a serious case of the gigglies.

Unfortunately, sincere, well-intentioned women pay good money to learn this shite – shite that’ll probably get ‘em killed someday -- and that ain’t funny.

So the task before me is to teach Maggie realistic self-defense – techniques that will work in a real, slam’n’jam, knock-down-drag-out. Here’s the first problem: I’m not qualified to “teach karate” -- or any other formal martial art -- per se. At the same time, in order for certain basic, “plain Jane” self-defense techniques to work, proper body mechanics must be applied. Otherwise, they’re worse than useless.

Anyone care to hazard a guess as to the system upon which I fall back, by default?

If you guessed “Karate,”, give yerself a see-gar. It’s “where I come from,” if I may be so bold as to employ yet another vulgar colloquialism. I still think it’s a hell of a fine style, provided that it isn’t adulterated with silly acrobatics and other cosmetic dross.

Problem number two: I refuse not to give credit where it’s due. If a given technique comes from karate or jujutsu, for example, I’ll attribute it to those systems. If I demonstrate a technique I’ve learned from a goju ryu, player, I’ll credit the goju ryu style. Ditto kenpo, boxing, judo, wing chun, or any other style from which I swipe something.

Unlike many modern martial artists, I have too much respect for tradition to scuff a technique from one system, rename it, and then claim that it’s something I invented myself, or that it’s always been a part of the systems I studied. Credit should be given where it’s due, after all. The techniques we learn and apply are the results of countless generations’ worth of accumulated knowledge and experience, tested, perfected and passed down by men who dedicated their lives to the pursuit of their art.

Enough about that. And fuck “fast food” karate, for the record.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

Maggie and I doffed our gloves after fifteen or so minutes of me toying with her in a manner so feline – for lack of a better word -- I’m actually still a bit unnerved thereby. She is my wife-to-be, after all, so it was clearly time for some serious instruction. Keeping the knees bent and the guard up are essential elements of fighting, so we worked on them for a while. Both practices induce fatigue in muscles unaccustomed to the strain, but Maggie is a real “trooper,” and stuck it out.

I explained to her that whereas one would seldom if ever assume -- for example – a full, karate-style front stance (zenkutsu dachi), in a “real world” violent encounter, the strength the legs acquire from practicing it makes it worthwhile. So there we stood in stances derived from what Bruce Lee unjustly called “the classical mess”, under the blazing Georgia sun, (95 degrees, with a comparable percentage of relative humidity), sweating like whores in church, throwing jab/reverse punch combinations.

Problem number three: I don’t think women should punch, period. This has nothing to do with sexism and everything to do with physiology. Hell, I’m a light-boned man, and I probably shouldn’t punch. Were a doctor ever to X-ray my hands, as a matter of fact, he’d undoubtedly cross himself and flee the room, muttering Ave Marias and Paternosters all the while. Yep, I’ve broken a few bones in said appendages time and time again, gentle reader. Unless one is a born mesomorph, with bones like railroad ties, conditioning the bare fist into a proper weapon takes years of time and effort.

Even the weakest among us can generate sufficient force to break bones – including his/her own – when striking an unyielding surface. In a nutshell, this means that anyone other than the Lost in Space robot who tries to hit a neocon, democrat, or similar street-rat in the head is in for a serious case of boxer’s fracture upon impact.

However…

As I’ve said, my instructors were top-notch. Not only could they kick ass, they had the brains to know why their ass-kicking techniques worked, and they were damned good at passing their knowledge on to their students. Among the many things they taught me was one oft-overlooked li’l gem: If one can only defend against a technique without being able to execute it, or vice versa, one doesn’t really know said technique. Just think about it.

As punching is the preferred form of weaponless attack in these United States of America, I thought it best to teach Maggie how to form a proper fist (women, I’ve noticed, don’t “grok” it as instinctively as do men), and the basics of the jab, cross, hook, reverse, lunge, and uppercut punches.

She did very well, especially as this was only her second lesson, and her first “serious” lesson, at that. Next, I decided to break out the focus mitts. Within twenty or so minutes, her jab/cross combination had improved considerably, in terms of both speed and power. As I’ve said, I don’t think women should punch at all, so I handed her the focus mitts and demonstrated the shuto (the so-called “karate chop”) and the Fairbairn “chin-jab” (the teisho palm-strike, for purists).

Being the skinny little fucker I am, the former is my favorite hand technique. When the hands are open, the arm muscles are kept under minimal tension, which makes the shuto a mothafuckin’ fast shot. Moreover, the edge of the hand is very well padded, compared to the knuckles, so one can employ maximum power with minimal risk of injury.

Maggie appeared rather surprised at the sheer power inherent in this “kung fu movie” technique, and made a remark to the effect of: “Wow! You could really mess somebody up with that!” This, of course, is the general idea…

Since she was very attentive and learns quickly (this makes her rather fun to teach), I decided to reward her with a little weapons training. Kobudo isn’t my area, and I’m no Friar Tuck, to be sure, but I didn’t see the harm in showing her a staff technique or two. I broke out my jo and found four feet of 1” hardwood doweling for her to practice with, as she prefers a narrower stick. We kept it fairly simple, but I think she had fun.

I showed her the differences and relative merits of the European and Asian grips; how to narrow her grip abruptly and land a solid, sword-like blow upon the skull or collarbone; basic thrusting attacks to the groin, solar plexus and throat; and a few blocking and parrying techniques. It was during the blocking/parrying drill, as a matter of fact, that White Belt Fuckup #2 occurred.

I don’t know what it is with some students, but I’ve noticed that when one tries to demonstrate a basic technique to them, they’ll resist, for some perverse reason. As I’d shown Maggie how to thrust with a staff, I thought it only fair to teach her how to “scoop” and redirect such a thrust. After the first few reps, she began trying to “muscle” my staff in the opposite direction – thus defeating the entire purpose of the exercise.

Now in many respects, my didactic style is very much like that of my primary teacher. Admittedly, Obi Wan Sluggo and I have never crossed weapons, but the “bastid” is indeed my teacher, and in more ways than one. Unfortunately, the Sluggo Method is more reminiscent of that of a very antisocial drill instructor than that of the fictional Mr. Miyagi. What follows is an actual Bean/Sluggo exchange:

(Dave) Whoah! Wait a minute, Sluggo. I don’t know if I’m up to this! I’m not even in your league!

(Sluggo) No, Bean, you’re not in my league. And you’re an asshole, too. Now get your ass in here and sit down.

Unfortunately, this isn’t necessarily the best way to teach a woman, especially if she happens to be one’s fiancée. I had to remind myself of this a few times, in order to avoid snapping, “Gimme five laps around the yard, newbie!” or something similar when she made what should have been completely understandable and forgivable mistakes of this sort.

By the time I got us started on our second bottle of Gatorade, I realized that we’d actually been at it for an hour and a half, so we took the rest of the evening off.

The next day, we reviewed a few of the things I’d shown her the day before, and moved on to new territory. Owing to my tendency to self-correct when teaching anything, it occurred to me that the only real defense she’d learned was against a thrust or an overhead or lateral swing, staff-to-staff.

I supposed that was fine, should she ever find herself set upon by Robin Hood and his Merry Men, who, having mistaken her for the Sheriff of Nottingham, were determined to rob her while she was working in the garden. A shovel handle would make an acceptable quarterstaff, after all. This scenario, however, seemed rather unlikely, so I decided to “keep it real.”

Now this may come as a shock to feminists, and to those of you who failed Sex Ed. in high school (in which case you belong in Special Ed.), but men and women are different, physically. Aside from the obvious differences (rent a porno movie if you can’t figure ‘em out) in “plumbing,” women tend to be smaller, with more delicate bones and muscles.

Nowhere is this more apparent than in the structure of the neck. Women’s necks, generally speaking, are far more fragile than men’s are. Because of this “architectural” difference, the “Hollywood choke” (squeezing the throat with both hands, from the front), which will lead any man to laugh out loud as he pokes the choker in the eye, kicks him in the balls, gets behind him and applies a real carotid choke, then takes his wallet for his trouble, can be quite injurious to women.

Needless to say, assailants come in all shapes and sizes. Therefore, I decided to show Maggie a few different ways of defending against such a choke, whether the attacker was Gary Coleman- or Rondo Hatton-sized.

Now Maggie is a good-sized girl – 5’8”, and long-limbed – which gives her a slight advantage over her smaller sisters, in certain situations. As the average man in this country is 5’9” or thereabout, it’s conceivable that she might one day receive a front choke from a guy who isn’t much larger than she is. For this reason, I showed her two of my favorite ways of dealing with a choker of average size. Bear this in mind, gentle reader: if the guy is applying a “Hollywood choke,” he’s probably untrained. The “victim” also has the advantage of knowing exactly where both the scumbag’s hands are, so the situation isn’t as dangerous as one might initially assume.

My favorite two methods for dealing with stupid creeps of this sort are as follows: The first comes from a karate kata called Bassai. In a nutshell, one thrusts his arms up between the chokers, clears them, then drops and slams two hammerfists (or shutos, if in a really bad mood) into the douche bag’s floating ribs. The second is very similar, except instead of striking, the malefactor’s arms are locked at the elbows, leaving his would-be victim free to kick him in the shins, stamp on his feet, knee him in the nuts or headbutt his nose repeatedly. Ya can also hawk up a big loogie and spit it into his eye, whilst makin’ him admit to various and sundry deviant sexual practices.

Or, while the assailant’s hands are wrapped around yer neck, ya can just pull yer knife and commence to cuttin’ on the sumbitch. Whatever floats yer boat. Just don’t blame me if ya end up in the slammer. The authorities rather frown upon that kind o’ shit.

The next method is far more effective when dealing with a larger, stronger attacker. One simply raises one’s arm over the choking appendages, drops his bodyweight, and slams the raised limb down upon them. I like to smash my elbow into the radial nerve, but that’s just a personal preference, kinda like “Over 40 and Hot!” porn sites. Oops! Did I say that out loud?

Before I continue (just bear with me – I’m on a roll), I’d like to state, for the record, that none of these moves is a “sure-fire, works every time” technique. Ain’t no such animal, sportmodel. Just accept it. OK, ‘nuff ‘bout that. Now I’ll continue.

In keeping with my aforementioned (and justified, to my mind) inclination towards self-correction, I’ve decided to focus mainly upon environmental self-defense when teaching my gal how to inflict injury an’ discomfort upon unchivalrous peckerheads.

In the time I’ve studied martial arts and self-defense, I’ve made a few observations. Granted, many observations are subjective, and based upon the criteria to which we assign importance. Nevertheless, the tendencies I’m about to describe are so common that I can’t help but notice them. Observing a “bulletman” drill at the Animal List BBQ served only to confirm my suspicions.

Here goes: People train in various and sundry martial arts systems, but when the shit hits the fan, all their formal training goes straight down the crapper. With one or two exceptions, I’ve never seen anyone apply a move or combination of moves derived from any given system, when encountering an actual attack. What’s more, I’ve noticed that the “crude” self-defense stuff (see Fairbairn, the US Army’s pre-Vietnam FM 21-150, or the older version of the USMC’s NAVMC 1146-AO3), which depends upon gross muscle movements, tends to work quite a bit better than the “fancy” shit, in real-life confrontations.

Things become even more complicated when I take a look at sparring, as practiced in the dojos I’ve observed. Both parties in any given match are cautious, hesitant. They circle and “eyeball,” feint and fake, looking for an opening through which to sneak in a “proper” technique all the while, and then, when they do come to conclusions – they end up flailing away at each other like two booger-eatin’ feebs on crack.

This indicates (to my primitive, reductionist, Scots-Irish mind, at any rate) that the emphasis in most schools is upon “pretty” techniques rather than upon effective self-defense. That’s a “Well, duh!” statement, to be sure, but the question fairly begs itself: Why not do things the other way around? Most people’s sparring has nothing to do with self-defense. It’s about scoring points or impressing judges – for all that anyone taking their “circle and stalk” approach in a real-life fight would find himself before a judge, for the offense(s) of affray and/or disturbing the peace.

To a great extent, this “disconnect” is due to the very nature of sparring, so I’ve decided to minimize the use thereof in the future. I’ll teach Maggie what I know of “the classical mess,” in the interest of developing proper body mechanics, but stick to real-life self-defense for the bulk of her training. One thumb jammed into a nostril is worth ten “kamikaze backfists,” after all.

I’ll keep ya posted.

Nailed!

It’s a worst-case scenario. Like a consummate dipshit, yer drunken ass has managed to get into a slammin’, jammin’, "pissin’ contest" in the parkin' lot of the local waterin' hole. The ugly choice confrontin’ ya havin’ been “lose face or lose teeth,” ya opted fer the latter, and now the unthinkable has happened: the other bastard’s gettin’ the better of ya.

Now if ya get stomped (and that’s lookin' very likely, at the moment), that chick ya fell in love with ten minutes ago won’t be goin’ home with ya, and all yer buddies will probably laugh at ya an’ call ya a pussy, ta boot.

What ta do? It really sucks ta be YOU right now, doesn’t it?

Now some would advise backing down and living it down later. Not a bad choice at all. Others would say: “Fight the good fight! It isn’t whether you win or lose, after all!” Still others would say: “True, it ain’t whether or not ya win or lose, just that ya hurt th’ other sumbitch real bad-like!”

I can understand all three sentiments, but as a malfunctioning piece of heavy machinery came within inches (three inches, to be exact) of killing me (quite literally) yesterday, I’m kinda pissed off. When I’m pissed off, I tend to pick “Door Number Three,” so that’s what we’re gonna talk about today. Oh, and I guess Moose and the Baw’bags are probably calling up that Voodoo priest and demanding their money back, even as they read this.

Sorry. Couldn’t resist.

Now I’ll cut to the chase. When one is in a world of shit, some serious “dirty fighting” is not only excusable, but is actually necessary. The world is a dangerous place, and sometimes the danger is such (i.e., life-and-death) that truly drastic measures are called for: measures such as biting, hair grabbing, and “fish hooking.”

“Fish hooking,” for the benefit of the uninitiated, is the act of inserting a finger or thumb into the most readily accessible of the badguy’s orifices, and -- well – “hooking” it. My late brother’s favorite targets were the nostrils. Mine was the inside of the cheek or upper or lower lips (takes some practice to do without getting bitten), but for the true-blue, mean motherfucker, the eyes are the preferred target.

Now I won’t go into the legal or moral implications of such a technique, other than to say that it can permanently maim an assailant, and that in this state, if one eye-gouges without being able to prove that one’s life was in danger, one has committed a felony called “aggravated battery”; a felony carrying a ten-year minimum mandatory prison sentence.

Yes, you read that correctly. No, I don’t care what the article you read in last month’s issue of Dojo Psycho said, or what yer dumbass sensei told you.

Enough about that.

Fish hooking the eyes is clearly a “gravest extreme” measure, but fish hooking other orifices is a time honored way of getting an assailant’s attention. So effective is the technique, as a matter of fact, that many of the nastier lowlives one encounters actually go so far as to lend said move even more “authoritah” by filing their thumbnails.

Now since I know I’m not the only guy out there who files his thumbnails (Uh, c’mon, guys! Back me up here!), especially in the MA and SD communities, I thought I’d share a little something I learned from my Ma this week.

Imagine, if you will, the embarrassment (and physical discomfort) of breaking your filed nails whilst fish hooking an evildoer. I’ve had it happen while practicing, and can therefore assure the ungentle reader that not only is it painful, it means all that trimming and filing have gone completely down the rathole.

The first time it happens to you, you’ll understand why chicks become so pissed off when they break nails. The experience will really teach you to empathize with them. No, no, no! I mean really empathize with them, not pretend to, just to get them to put out!

Anyway, I was relating this particular set of woes to Ma Bean yesterday (broken nails, that is. Not scamming chicks into sleeping with me – Ma doesn’t approve of that kind of shit), when she turned me onto a neat product of which I’d never heard before. It seems that a company called Sally Hansen makes a product called “Hard as Nails.” It comes in bottles of perhaps an ounce in size, costs four or five bucks a bottle (depending on where one buys it), and actually works!

It goes on like the old-fashioned, bottled airplane glue (there’s even a brush applicator built into the cap), actually has a model glue/acetone smell to it (but don't huff the fumes, OK? That's so low class!), and leaves some kind of thick, clear, synthetic coat on the nails, a coat that really does strengthen them! I applied two coats to each thumbnail yesterday and today, and the difference in between the treated and untreated nails, in terms of strength and hardness, really is remarkable.

Uh, in case those of you who suffer from stress-related "male problems" are getting ideas -- Just forget about don't even think about it. The possibilities are too horrifying even to contemplate...

Bottom line: I recommend this stuff highly. See? Ya can learn something from the wimmenfolks, after all. And having written that, I probably won't be sleeping with my woman any time soon...

I’ll leave y’all with a snippet of history, so ya’ll can see just what time honored tradition this is:

A graphic description of “rough and tumble” came from the Irish traveler Thomas Ashe, who described a fight between a West Virginian and a Kentuckian. A crowd gathered and arranged itself into an impromptu ring. The contestants were asked if they wished to “fight fair” or “rough and tumble”. When they chose “rough and tumble,” a roar of approval rose from the multitude. The two men entered the ring, and a few ordinary blows were exchanged in a tentative manner. The suddenly the Viriginian “contracted his whole form, drew his arms to his face,” and “pitched himself into the bosom of his opponent,” sinking his sharpened fingernails into the Kentuckian’s head. “The Virginian,” we are told, “never lost his hold…fixing his claws in his hair and his thumbs on his eyes, he gave them a start from the sockets. The sufferer roared aloud, but uttered no complaint.” Even after the eyes were gouged out, the struggle continued. The Virginian fastened his teeth on the Kentuckian’s nose and bit it in two pieces. Then he tore off the Kentuckian’s ears. At last, the “Kentuckian, deprived of eyes, ears, and nose, gave in.” The victor, himself maimed and bleeding was “chaired round the grounds,” to the cheers of the crowd…Anburey described “a fellow, reckoned a great adept in gouging, who constantly kept the nails of both his thumbs and second fingers long and pointed; nay, to prevent their breaking or splitting…he hardened them every evening in a candle.*”

--David Hackett Fischer, Albion’s Seed

And that’s the way it was 230 years ago today.

Still think televised “reality fighting” is such badass stuff?

Now get out there like red-blooded men and -- uh -- do yer nails.

Wait. That just doesn't sound right, somehow...

*Note: I haven’t tried the candle method on my own nails – obviously -- as I just began treating them yesterday. I’m guessing, though, that it’s rather similar to a method I once employed while finishing faux “bear claws” I’d whittled from pine: The “claw” is run alternately through the flame and the melted wax where wick meets stick. The result is a hard, black, horn-like surface.

04/06/07 UPDATE: This is pretty friggin' funny. Having perused the contents of this post, Ma Bean upbraided me, saying: "Now all the shitbags out there are going to file and strengthen their thumbnails."

My answer: "Where do you think I learned it? Vacation Bible School? The shitbags are already doing it! Now, though, the good guys can, as well!"

Maybe I Will, Maybe I Won't

As New Year's Eve is rapidly approaching, I'm kinda sorta pondering banging out a piece on homemade fireworks, especially one of my own teen-age creations, which I've christened "The M-80 from Hell."

It's BIG.

It's LOUD.

It's also potentially dangerous.

I hate to see all that money flowing into the coffers of the Chinese, after all, but I don't necessarily want some bozo going off half-cocked and blowing one or more of his extremities off, either.

I'll sleep on it.

By the way, does anyone actually like fruitcake? I certainly don't. Come to think of it, a fruitcake would be just the thing to blow to Kingdom Come with a giant, homemade firecracker.