The Crane Kick

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One of the most exciting things ever to happen in my adult life occurred in the gym this week. During my Tabata class one of the sessions was dedicated to …. wait for it … The Crane Kick from The Karate Kid.



Finally! Here was my chance!! Never in my wildest dreams did I think this would happen to me as an adult. I’d all but forgotten it but my love for The Crane Kick has never left me. It has been woven into the very fibre of my being since I was a child. Make no mistake - when I was a kid I was The Crane Kick fucking master. For real! At the height of Karate Kid fever I discovered I could do The Crane Kick and from there on you couldn’t tell me I wasn’t great. 

I busted that move out at every opportunity. The Crane Kick to me was like singing is to Jamie Foxx – I was ready to unleash my talent on the world every time I had a captive audience whether they were even remotely interested or not!

Alas, as with many of youth’s immense pleasures (cartwheels, Coke spiders, sticking your fingers in your ears when someone is saying something you don’t want to know about) I stopped practicing The Crane Kick many decades ago.

Actually, I think I may have rolled out a revival performance in the kitchen late one Saturday night but my memories of this are hazy at best. 

So here, last Wednesday morning, was my chance at 41 years old to resurrect my old party trick. After a hiatus of many a decade, The Crane Kick wasn’t just a calling deep within me; it was a direct order from my TATABA instructor. Its execution was my mission for a dedicated 20 seconds on, 10 seconds rest, repeat – alternating legs – for eight full on sets.

So, on her signal I unleashed hell. It was an all-out, continuous Crane Kick assault. Until I made two important revelations:


      1. While my right leg Crane Kick was still in top nick (all things considering), I’d never really refined my left leg technique. It took a lot more concentration and by the end it was looking less like a highly specialised martial arts weapon of death and more like an unco attempt at prancercise.


   2.   After the first 20 seconds, all-out continuous Crane Kick aint much fun.
 
The Lesson:
Look, practice may make perfect and all that bullshit, but too much practice is a pain in the arse. And the legs and the knees and you get the picture.

Upon reflection, I’ve also realised that there are a lot of fabulous things in life that aren’t much fun when you experience them unrelentingly repetitively. For instance:

  • Eating tuna on toast for lunch
  • Using the word ‘we’ to begin a paragraph
  • GIFs
  • The phrase 'Whoomp! (there It Is)’
  • The song Flashlight (soz, not soz - that song is like, never off the radio)
  • Lengthy web pages
  • The words synergy; benchmark; guru; leading edge; regroup; actualise; operationalise; anything ending in 'ise' or 'ize' 
  • Calling a journalist to ask if they got your press release
  • Facebook posts/blogs/tweets that self-promote
  • Puns (my son will disagree)
  • Rainy days
  • Croutons (I can give you the data on this one – too many will leave you feeling really nauseous)
  • Blatant sales pitches
  • Checking Instagram/Facebook/Twitter in the company of others
  • Photos/stories of your children
  • Requests for information via fax


  • Leadership spills
  • Doing things the same way as they ever were
  • The breastfeeding debate
  • Drinking shots
  • Excuses
  • The same friend running late
  • Giving (accidentally) bad advice
  • Fucking up their, there and they’re and you’re, your and yore (Seriously. How hard is it?)
  • Gratuitous email Reply All
  • Beards on young, gorgeous faces
  • Allowing a huge team to individually provide feedback on marketing initiatives
  • Bronnie B wears Prada


                 
                  What about you? What have you had enough of already!?



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