Hyperreal

JJ’s last night…

First time I’d been at a class for a few weeks… It was certainly worth it… I had a very good night.

I arrived a wee bit before the intermediate class, but didn’t manage to get a dance before it started…

Moves tonight…

• 2-handed yo-yo – straight-forward…

• “Spanish move” – These were a bit like ceroc spins, but you’re holding one of the girl’s hands above her head… Allow a bit of over-turn to give space to prepare back before the next spin…

• Butterfly – not sure if I’ve ever done this “classic” move… Involves stepping around and turning the girl so she’s facing the same way, but behind you… Step to the left as you lead her to the right. (Both RHs start on your R shoulder, then we move to bring LHs to L shoulder.) Bring her around and once she’s in front bring your LHs up over your head to return her. Keep close and do a hallelujah to go normal double-handed.

• Ducasi’s comb – my move. Being taught to me! Surprised though to learn some subtleties of the move I’d never thought about before – in particular the need for a strong eye-to-eye connection to keep the girl on the spot for the comb… Oh, and the sliding the wrist up the arm bit… All that said, the need to get into a crossed-over hold for the yo-yo as the next move got me every time. I’m used to coming out of the move R-L, or with a normal double hand-hold, so I had some problems trying to do it differently…

Really chuffed though to have a move invented by me taught to a whole roomful of dancers. I joked about licensing fees, but it’d be just cool if this move ended up being taught all round the UK – especially if it keeps the name.

So I’m a little bit famous… No-one asked me for my autograph though, or wanted to have their picture taken with me… I didn’t even get offered a lucrative movie deal…

Actually, if it doesn’t get called ducasi’s comb, I think it’d be cool to call it the Archer’s Comb. I call the move that I created it from The Archer, because the action of going from the double-handed facing position to a back-to-back position is a bit like an archer drawing back his bow, and so that’s how I think of in my head… the archer comb…

I’d still rather it got called ducasi’s comb though.

Anyway… what else happened last night?

Well I had a really good night’s dancing.

I was in a good mood, the up-beat music was matching my mood perfectly, and I had some lovely dancers to dance with… A few times I found my feet had gone into West Coast Swing mode, and I was triple-stepping a fair bit… But it wasn’t just the slower songs that were more obvious WCS tracks, it included “Reet Petite”, which I guess would make a good Lindy track…

It wasn’t all fantastic though… In recent time, maybe the last month or so, I’m sometimes finding it a little bit more difficult to dance to some of my favourite tracks with dancers I used to have a lot of fun with. It’s not that I’m (and hopefully she’s) having a really terrible dance – we still have fun, but I don’t feel it is as much fun as dances we’ve had in the past.

I don’t think it’s me getting bored – I really want to enjoy these dances… I think it’s something about the way I’m dancing at the moment… Maybe I’m trying things which are a bit tricky… Or just a bit different from the norm. I’m finging that as I diverge from “standard” moves, anticipation becomes a bit a greater problem, but I’m not so sure I want to be one of the dancers who are hard work…

On balance I did have a really good night. Even the not-as good as I’d like dances were still fun, and I enjoyed them all.

I was told I was a little hyper… Not sure why – more that one partner commented on me doing extra fancy footwork. Maybe that gave the “hyper” impression… I was certainly having a great time.

Oh, and I want to thank the birthday girl for a piece of her birthday cake. Yummy.

Afterwards I ended up chatting with Franck and a pal for ages. Lots of fun and I learnt some interesting things too…

Hope everyone else had a good night… Hope to see you all again soon.