Category: Sports and Fitness

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Straight out of a comic book!

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When I was a young child growing up in Harlem there were very few people that looked like me in the media. And when they were people that looked like me presented in the movies, or on the small screen, they were almost always portrayed as unintelligent or docile. This is the rare exceptions to these rules made a seismic impact on me and many other impressionable black children. Yesterday I saw that one of my earliest heroes as a child, James Milton Kelly, had passed away at the age of 67. He was better known to the world as Jim “The Dragon” Kelly and was one of the prominent stars of the 1970s martials arts and Blaxploitation film era.

Jim Kelly was a martial arts legend to many of the brothers that I grew up around. He inspired many of us to start training in the martial arts just as much as Bruce Lee, and maybe more in certain ways. Being a young Continue reading “Straight out of a comic book!”

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Prepare for the Smackdown!

A few months back I was interviewed on the occupational activities of former LaGuardia Media Studies student and Cannes filmfest participant, Girard Tecson of Dayside Productions. The interview appeared in a new documentary on Girard’s unusual decision to make a career shift from independent Filmmaking to professional Wrestling. I wish him luck in his new endeavors. At 5’5″ and 150 lbs, I think he is gonna need it.

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RIP Aaron Banks

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This is sad news for the martial arts community. Master Banks was a very popular figure in the NYC martial arts scene during the seventies. He helped to pioneer the dissemination of the martial arts by helping to promote the “Oriental World of Self-defense” shows that packed Madison Square Garden during that time. I remember meeting Aaron Banks back in 1973 as my father was signing me up for my first martial arts class. This must have been only a few weeks after Bruce Lee’s “Enter the Dragon” premiered in the US. I don’t know about the rest of the country, but in NYC, that movie had kids dragging their fathers to any establishment that offered instruction in the martial arts. Unfortunately for my father, he was no different.

Aaron Banks was sitting at the front desk as my father and I walked in to Continue reading “RIP Aaron Banks”

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2013 Five Boro Bike Tour

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Today was an excellent day for our annual Five Boro Bike tour family outing. The wife and I have done this every year together for a least the last ten years. My son started riding with us in 2010. This was his fourth trip with us. This year was very different because this was the first major public event since the bombing of the Boston Marathon a few weeks back.

The police presence was overwhelming. There were numerous checkpoints throughout the course. I even spotted a few police snipers Continue reading “2013 Five Boro Bike Tour”

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Thai Cooking Lessons

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The wife and I continued our Groupon and LivingSocial addiction. We decided to take a Thai cooking course at The Institute of Culinary Education (ICE) instead of doing another archery, motorcycle riding, or NRA pistol certification class. In truth, I have recently become totally fixated on cooking related shows. Anything with Gordon Ramsey is an immediate season pass selection on the TiVos. So when I saw the Groupon offer a couples thai cooking class I thought that it would be another great opportunity to get out for the night with my girl.

Chef Vicki Caparulo was our instructor for the evening. She was absolutely amazing! She seemed to have that Continue reading “Thai Cooking Lessons”

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No sleep ’til Brooklyn

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I recently participated in a sleep study to correct my nocturnal habits and longtime insomnia. Most of my friends, especially those on Facebook and other social media sites, have noticed that I am active online very late in the night. I have been like this for many years. I rarely sleep more than a few hours at a stretch. This has never been a problem for me, until about a year ago when I started feeling tired and rundown. My docs, after ruling out  Continue reading “No sleep ’til Brooklyn”

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Archery Night: Zombie Apocalypse training

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In light of the “Avengers”, the “Hunger Games”, and the new Green Arrow TV series, both of my kids have been interested in trying the sport of archery. So when I came across a Groupon deal for the Queens Archery Range I decided to take the whole family. We had an amazing time. My wife even enjoyed it, and I didn’t figure her for the archery type. We shot recurve bows that first night and I was shocked at how much fun I had getting my inner Hawkeye on! While the girls enjoyed themselves, they didn’t think that archery was going to be something that they would want to do on a regular basis. My boy on the other hand was hooked.

A few weeks later I took my boy back Continue reading “Archery Night: Zombie Apocalypse training”

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Here we go again

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It is a damn shame that we are having this discussion yet again today. The murder of 27 people in Connecticut, 20 of them small children between the ages of 5 and 10, once again highlights a unique problem with American society. I have been watching the television coverage for most of the day with a mixture of sadness and calm acceptance of the reality of the world we live in today. I wasn’t sure of whether or not to add my two cents since I have recently become NRA certified with a pistol and have taken up range shooting as a hobby. As a child of the 70’s and a a resident of NYC, where we have some of the most strict gun laws in the country, I would be a Continue reading “Here we go again”

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Throw ‘ya guns in ‘da air!

It appears that my Groupon and Livingsocial addiction continues onward. My wife and I spent the day at the New Jersey Firearms Academy taking the NRA sponsored Basic Pistol certification course. We had the opportunity to work with some great instructors. I hadn’t been to a gun range in nearly 20 years but the instructors at NJ Firearms made me feel very safe and comfortable. They introduced us to 9mms, 357s, 45s, 40 Calibires, 38s, and 22s (revolvers and semi automatics).

So overall it was a good day and I confirmed a couple of things that I always suspected. One, Chow Yun Fat and John Woo are absolutely full of crap. Two, shooting ranges are radically different than the paintball competitions that the family and I use from time to time. And three, my wife is a much better shot than me and definitely not the person I want to piss off. However, while my wife  once again showed me up, I did much better at the range than I did on the motorcycle training course from a few weeks back. Plus I had a really great time and met a bunch of really cool people.

Midlife crisis – 1, James – 1.

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Weekend in Sweden

Last weekend I went with the family to Sweden for a retreat with some of our scandinavian peeps. This was the first of a soon to be annual event held at the Björneröds Ridcenter. The wife and kids have been going to horseback riding camp at Björneröds for a few years now and this was a good time for us to socialize with good friends.

And to top it off, my crazy wife was covered in a local Swedish newspaper for participating in an annual swimming race across the Fjords. The water she swam in was freezing too. We were having a mini triathlon with some friends that weekend and with the exception of one other person, my wife was the only one of us to opt in for the swimming part of the competition. I on the other hand stuck to the biking portion of the competition because black people don’t like participating in freezing ass water sports.