Saturday, August 09, 2008

Fencing Is A Sexy Skill To Have

Super Sweep: US Is Now a Fencing Power

I've always wanted to learn fencing. I even bought and read a book on the subject. But I never had the opportunity to take classes, which I think is essential for a martial art.

I think it's great that we're starting the Olympics off with some good medal wins. I've never been wild about the summer Olympics, and I'm definitely not paying a lot of attention to the Beijing Olympics, but I think it's good that we can get together with our fellow nations and have some friendly athletic competition.

I should define what I think a "sexy skill" is. A sexy skill is a skill that might come in handy if you were a super-spy, with a sufficiently low probability that an average citizen would have that same skill. Like piloting a helicopter (fixed wing aircraft is kind of sexy, helicopters are much more complex to control and, therefore, much more sexy). Fencing made my list of sexy skills.

The ultimate sexy skill is the skill of observation. All the "spy stuff" I read point to this. A good spy is supposed to see/notice something and remember it to the greatest detail. What a target was wearing on a particular meeting. What people's voices sound like. Phone numbers, addresses, important dates. You can't write it down, because that leaves a paper trail.

So now you know.

5 comments:

don said...

We used to have fencing in highschool gym class. It was a lot of fun and I loved it. We held our non foil hand up behind our head. There was one guy who was 6'8" He was really difficult to score on.

So far I think the coverage has been great for a change. Less human interest stories and more sport.

Women's gymnastics is going to be great.

Diane Lowe said...

Definitely blog on women's gymnastics! I want to read what you think about those events!

I saw some of the swimming events at the gym yesterday - I don't watch TV at home and I have so many other things to focus on I'm not really paying a lot of attention to the Olympics this year.

I bet that 6'8" guy was tough to score on! He probably had a further reach than anyone else in the class!

don said...

That guy was the center on our HS basketball team.

In gymnastics, from what I understand Shawn Johnson got short changed on her beam routine yesterday. Everyone in the know was saying this. It's hard for viewers like me to know as you have to understand the new scoring and what all of the moves are worth, but it looked flawless and really difficult.

So when they go for the medals, watch Johnson on the beam.

I watched last night. We will see what happens. It's really too bad that Chellsie Memmel got injured.

Time Traveller said...

Haha! that's really funny :)

The olympics are boring me this year too :( although I do have a new found interest in show jumping :| I might take it up ... does that qualify as a sexy skill?

Anonymous said...

I think the Olympics have been wonderfully done, a fair spread of medals generally.
The sexiest skill to have, based on an Olympic sport, would have to be those gymnasts who thrown that ball about. Lovely ball control is always sexy.