Writing another lengthy post

Did lots of driving over the past couple days. LOTS of driving. And not much else. Today I'm training with Cassio Werneck in Sacramento, who won a world BJJ competition called the Mundial in 2003 (trained this morning and am going back in about an hour for the evening class) and Marcos Torregrossa, a brown belt under Cassio who posts on nhbgear.com. I sparred with Marcos this morning and he kicked my ass six ways from Sunday. Always a pleasure. And on Monday I got to train with Chris Woolford in Portland again. PLUS, I got to see James, another friend from nhbgear.com. He drove 2 hours up from Eugene to train with me. And he brought me Gatorade! How cool is that?

He is a great example of on-line friendships that translate well into real life. I met James on nhbgear.com, and after about 4 years of posting about complete ridiculousness with him and others, hanging out with him on Monday was the 2nd time I had ever seen him in person. And we had a ball! Here’s a pic of us, with him looking handsome and me looking like ass. That was after getting not very much sleep the night before and anticipating another 4 hours of driving that night.

Mon night after class at Chris' I drove 4 hours south to Medford, OR. Got to sleep around 3 and was on the road again by 9. I met up with my friends Nora and Jon, who live in Guerneville, CA, and it was about a 7 hour drive from Medford. We had a terrific dinner and I got to see their cute town, which is in the heart of CA wine country. Then I drove 2 hours to Sacramento and stayed up late again futzing. Why do I do that? It was a total of about 500 miles in 24 hours. Whoa.

Anyway, so I'm a little punchy and behind in my posting. And tomorrow I drive to LA to meet up with MORE forum friends, including Chrissy, Brian, Wu, Wen, HPF, and tons of others. It should be a fun weekend! And it won't be conducive to posting either! (Here's that dilemma again: I have to experience things to be able to write about them. But I also want to remember what I experience. Rock and hard place.)

I have pics from yesterday and Monday, so I'll get on that eventually. Right now I gotta compose myself and get back to Cassio's academy.