Kendall Giles

Today was a perfect day for the 93rd annual National Cherry Blossom Festival in our nation's Capital. Our group, the Capital Area Budokai, put on a martial arts demonstration in downtown Washington D.C. for the festival. The skies were blue, the blossoms were at their peak, our stage had a great view of the Capitol, and lots of people came out to see us.

Here are a few photos from the demo. Note that though my wife took lots of great pictures, by the time we went on, the sun had moved us into shadows. Thus, I had to wrangle with the brightness and contrast in the pictures to make them even partially visible.

The intro however was in bright sunlight. Here you can get a feel for the crowds, the stage, and the stage floor - it was a squishy gym mat that soaked up the sun's rays. Also, note that this image shows things as they should be: the jo player standing over the defeated swordsman:

For the tanjo set, here I am doing Kote Migi:

followed by Sutemi. Note that I got a good strong block on my opponent's strike, though I really should have caught both elbows:

For the jo set, here is the group at the beginning of Tachi Otoshi. Note how small the stage is: I had to pull a lot of my suigetsu strikes to prevent my opponent from sailing off the stage:

In the first part of Tachi Otoshi, I strike at my opponent's head: luckily (for him) he was able to block my strike:

He tried to counter by striking my neck, but the photo shows me just before my kuritsuke catches his tsuka for a block:

All in all it was a fun demonstration and a lot of people got to see some traditional Japanese martial arts. Maybe next year, if the stage is a little higher (so more people can see) and a little larger (so we can move around without worrying about falling off), it will be even better.

Technorati Tags: culture, fitness, martial arts, virginia

Perhaps you can say it's because it has something to do with Earth Day (22 April 2005), or perhaps you can say that we just like well-designed products that provide utility with style, but we thought we would try out the Voltaic Backpack.

I haven't yet had much of a chance to take it for a test-drive, but just out of the box, it seems to be made very well. The solar panels ( 10V peak voltage, 400mA peak current, and 4W peak power), which charge a 2200mAh @ 7.2V lithium ion battery pack, are well-integrated into the bag itself. Cabling is provided throughout the bag, and there is even a phone/MP3 player pouch on the right shoulder strap.

In addition to being able to charge the battery by the solar panels, there is also an AC charger as well as a car charger. And a variety of included adapters allow for charging a multitude of electronic gadgets.

Maybe this solar backpack will encourage me to get out more, or at least work on my laptop outside...

Technorati Tags: review, technology