Hyperreal

Yup, it’s true – I’m alive!

Haven’t been blogging for a while – busy life and all that….

But I was dancing at JJ’s tonight and I though I’d write a quick blog for those that missed it.

I haven’t been doing many classes of late – not so much as a result of hotshottery, as self-preservation.

I’ve had a sore finger for a few weeks now – something going on with one of the joints or a tendon or something – so I’ve been avoiding classes where I am no longer in control of what I do, and whom I do it with. It pains me to say it, but there are a few grippers amongst the regulars of Jumpin’ Jak’s…

So I turned up towards the end of the class – didn’t see much of particular note in the routine beyond the use of the guy’s leg to control part of a comb. I’ve not been good at that kind of thing in the past when I’ve tried it, so a suggested focus workshop on the topic would be useful.

I also heard the announcement that the Thursday night is going to be moving to JJ’s from next week. Sounds good, though it is my regular night for seeing my non-dance friends, but maybe I’ll be able to pop along for the freestyle from time to time…

Anyway, onto the dancing!

I’d like to report that I had a very good night of dancing tonight. Better than I had expected. A couple of my favourites were missing, but another was back from a holiday, so it was good to see her.

Besides simply missing people tonight though, these past few months I just haven’t enjoyed my dancing as much as I once did. I’m told this happens, and there are various suggestions on how to get over it, mostly revolving round going and doing something else for a while… But I don’t think I could do that for long. Even at my lowest night of dancing, I don’t see anything else coming near in comparison.

Anyway, given the absence of some notable friends, I danced with a few people I don’t very often get the chance to, and even though these dances tended not to go especially well (I guess it takes a little time to get used to my style) I still enjoyed them very much. The dances with all my other regular partners were also a real joy.

Maybe one of the reasons I especially enjoyed the night though was discovering a few nice new things to do out of some moves which I do quite often. Funny that all three are based around combs…

Actually, I think I’ve done a couple of them before, but this time I was more aware of what I was doing, so better remembered them in order to repeat them later.

First, a LH comb caress – only to be done with good friends. Normal LH lady’s comb, but let go and caress with the back of your hand across her collar bone/neck area and find her right arm. Lead on from there in whatever way feels natural. The girl may also improvise something at this point.

Second, and this is the hardest one to describe, is an accordion basket comb. I have been playing around with a move where I go from an accordion-like position into a a basket-like position. Hard to describe as I’ve never really sussed out what’s going on… Anyway, a couple of weeks ago I did a comb from this position, and sure enough, in more extensive tests tonight, it really worked. Can’t remember the exit though… Perhaps it would be possible to do something like the new exit I found for the Ducasi comb (aka Archer’s Comb) which is my third discovery…

So, third, and this one really is new – I think – is the Archer’s Comb Walk-Around Turn-Out. Aka “Claire’s Move”. This starts off from the comb position of the archers comb, but rather than letting go of the girl’s (RH) comb hand, and keeping the left, we discard the left, hold onto the right and walk around towards the back of the girl. As we do so we lift the hand to turn out the girl (ACW, I think) for a turn and a half (again, I think!) so that we end up facing the opposite directions compared with where we were for the comb. (If I’m a little vague with the details, it’s cos I did it once, and was then forced to try and remember what I did, so the exact move hasn’t really solidified in my head.) Due to the amount of space needed to get into the comb and then do the walk-around, this move probably can’t be done on very busy floors.

Hmm… I wonder how well it would work in the reserve position, when I’m doing a reversed Ducasi comb (undocumented, but not hard to figure out – it’s the ducasi comb in the other direction.)

Anyway, a fruitful night of fun dances.

Looking forward to the next time… Which could well turn out to be on Saturday afternoon…

Cheers guys!