words, words, words

Goodluck Jonathan

bkoplitz — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 09:59:04 +0000

I was just reading about Nigeria. Turns out the vice-president is named Goodluck Jonathan. I like that.

End of message.

Stella!

bkoplitz — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 11:10:06 +0000

I haven’t written anything in a while, and I’ve got a good excuse… I’m a Dad!

Stella arrived a week early!

Send me an email if you would like to see photos. bkoplitz@gmail.com

She is incredible! We are so lucky!

I’ve been busy learning how to change diapers and give baths and just staring for hours at a time.

The Decline of Western Civilization.

bkoplitz — Tue, 26 May 2009 00:14:46 +0000

I found a video of an exercise on youtube in which you use a sledgehammer to bang on a tractor tire. I had this fairly snarky and (if I say so myself) relatively clever blog post to write about it. But then I felt a bit sad. It is just too much wasted energy. Perhaps a metaphor for our times.

Now people are doing what used to be called “work” in their leisure time in order to get in shape. Being in shape used to be a means to end, i.e. if you were strong you could break more rocks and get paid more. Now people are using their precious calories banging on tires.

Get a job doing some kind of manual labor. Then instead of paying $100 a month of gym membership, you can get paid $6.55 an hour.

Back from the BJJ Brasileiro Championships.

bkoplitz — Tue, 12 May 2009 02:09:09 +0000

I returned today from the 2009 Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Brasileiros’ in Rio.
I wound up getting second in my division.
This made me pretty happy as it was a huge competition with a lot of talent. The first fights went very well, but in the final I ran into problems with a very strong fighter.

Other than that, it was a good trip, short, but with a lot of really good training.
(Full results of the competition are here.)

BJJ Brasileiros

Campeonato Brasileiro de Jiu-Jitsu

bkoplitz — Wed, 06 May 2009 13:50:11 +0000

What have I been doing?

I’ve not been writing on this blog, but I’ve been training a lot as well as preparing for the new arrival.

After the South American Championships, I’ve fought in two other tournaments and won my division. It makes me a bit nervous, though, since tomorrow I am going to Rio for the Campeonato Brasileiro de Jiu-Jitsu. I feel like I have been on a bit of a roll, and I don’t want it to end.

But that is what I’ve been doing, training BJJ twice a day, running about every other day, and lifting weights.

Wish me luck!

Campeonato Estadual Gaucho 1st Stage.

bkoplitz — Tue, 05 May 2009 00:06:35 +0000

This was a small competition in Porto Alegre, but I managed to get my winning fight from the final recorded!

This doesn’t happen very often.

Usually, if I win, there are technical difficulties or nobody to film it. So this was nice. The video is very large. In fact, for the quality of the video it is way too large. I’m going to figure out a way to compress it.

Training Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu in Porto Alegre

bkoplitz — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 12:52:54 +0000

I have had a couple of emails from people who want to train Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu in Porto Alegre. If you are coming here for a short period of time or for an extended trip, and want to train BJJ, feel free to send me an email. bkoplitz@gmail.com
My instructor is happy to have people come by and train BJJ with us at the academy. Visitors are welcome and received with open arms.

Back in POA

bkoplitz — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 16:11:37 +0000

We are back in POA after a nice long break. It was really good to see more of South America, and now I have an alpaca jumper. The baby is growing fast and kicking a lot and with great force. She is going to be quite a little athlete. We still don’t have a name for her.

La Paz

bkoplitz — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 18:02:23 +0000

We were in Arica, chile for a few days but the waves were small and there was virtually no surf infrastructure. It wasn’t “flat” but not what I expected. It was not the pumping barrells of Puerto Escondido. But it is summer here which makes for smaller surf. There isn’t too much to do in Arica. So we decided to travel to Bolivia.

After a nightmare border crossing where I was informed that my entry visa was 135$US. This came as a shock as it wasn’t in the guide books, and nobody told me. The main problem was that I was travelling with Brazilian Reis, not dollars. Luckily, some kind bolivians lent me the money until we arrived in La Paz. The border crossing was in the middle of nowhere in the Andes. So anxiety was running a bit high.

So now we are in La Paz. This place is lightyears away from Porto Alegre. All the people are in incredible multi-colored traditional clothing. Complete with bowler hats on the women. They crowd the sidewalks of the cobblestone strets selling all manner of unrecognizable objects.

Not sure where we are going from here yet. But there are lots of options.

I bought an alpaca sweater, both because it is cold and it feels really soft.
And we are almost acclimated to the altitude.
More soon. Crap it is hard to write on an iPhone. All typos belong to Steve Jobs.

December Grudge Match.

bkoplitz — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 20:27:53 +0000

Put up your dukes Bernard Madoff.