Category Archives: Martial arts

About the martial arts I teach, practice and research.

A martial artist looks at the White House party crashers

Tareq and Michaele Salahi, in hot water for crashing the White House party, are now saying they had applied for invitations and showed up, “to just check in, in case it got approved since we didn’t know, and our name … Continue reading

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Tameshigiri on YouTube

This is an experiment with embedding a YouTube video on my blog, so have patience and bear with me. This is me doing tameshigiri, straw mat cutting with a samurai sword. The mat was bought at a garage sale, the … Continue reading

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Martial Arts research: part 3, Combatives and Martial Arts

I went over something of the history and origin of combatives training in parts 1 and 2. Modern combatives originated from the necessity of teaching military recruits something useful of close quarters combat in a minimal amount of time. What … Continue reading

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Martial Arts research: Combatives, part 2

Review and History In part 1 I mentioned that close combat training needs for military, police and civilians are different in focus. Military personnel need training to quickly kill or incapacitate an enemy at close quarters when their primary weapons … Continue reading

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Martial Arts research: Combatives, part 1

Some time ago I published a post on my study of Pekiti Tirsia Kali here:http://rantsand.blogspot.com/2007/08/my-martial-arts-study-pekiti-tirsia.html A few weeks back I flew down to Dallas for training with Grand Tuhon Leo Tortal Gaje – an opportunity I try not to miss. … Continue reading

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Keeping Fit at a Certain Age

I am 60 years old, and have two small children and a sedentary lifestyle. This is not the perfect formula for fitness. In my youth I had one of those metabolisms that never stored fat. I was the same weight … Continue reading

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Self-Defense, the ethics politics and practicalities. Part 1

In my last post I wrote about martial arts, and pointed out that self-defense is only one of the reasons for studying them. But what about self-defense? I mentioned in my post ‘Virginia’ http://rantsand.blogspot.com/2007/04/virginia.html that self-defense involves firstly, a comittment … Continue reading

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My martial arts study – Pekiti Tirsia Kali

In this age of mass-produced cheap firearms martial artists are often asked, “What good is that stuff? Why don’t you just get a gun?” This is a fair question and deserves reasoned consideration. To begin with, it is often neither … Continue reading

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Religions that never were – but might be

Hymn to Mithras, sung by the XXX Legion stationed at the Wall (Hadrian’s) north of Eboracum (modern York). Mithras, God of the Morning, our trumpets waken the wall!Rome is above the Nations, but Thou art over all,Now as the names … Continue reading

Posted in Book reviews, Literature, Martial arts, Philosophy | 2 Comments