Skeeter Fu: The New Martial Arts
Not only have I found a good exercise program, but I’ve also discovered a new form of martial arts. Just live in a southern state, keep the door open (thanks to Hubby-Poo) and invite all the skeeters into your house that happen by. You will spend loads of time jabbing, slapping, hopping, jumping and waving your hands around, flipping around, beating the ceiling with a t-shirt. It’s quite energetic, and when you get really good at it, you can actually jab a skeeter out of mid-flight with a quick finger thrust. Skeeter Fu burns calories, gets your heart rate up, and builds balance and coordination. Advanced Skeeter Fu practitioners even have a skeeter-swatting version of a flying drop kick. It’s not as graceful, but it works…well, okay, admittedly, the Skeeter Fu drop kick only works after about forty tries. It typically takes twenty minutes to Skeeter Fu a single mosquito. They are devilishly good at avoiding Skeeter Fu jabs, thrusts, kicks, somersaults, and pokes.
There is an easier way, however. A flame-thrower.
Now before you panic, this method has been used, on the largest wolf spider my husband has ever seen in his life. I better not tell the tale, I might get put in jail by the ASPCA. Suffice it to say there was a lot of screaming (on my part), the heavy sound of gargantuan wolf spider paws running against drywall, the crackle of burning spider hair, and a spider that refused to die, not to mention a growing concern of accidentally burning the house down. I never knew a spider had body armor quite that solid or protective. I’d always been told that spiders were rather delicate. Of course, when they’re the size of a can of beans, maybe delicate goes out the window. The big can of beans, by the way. The one that feeds four cowboys and their horses. (For bean-eating horses, see my novel Blackwater.)
Anyway, the only downside to Skeeter Fu, in my house, is that it terrifies Mooch. Mooch knows I’m a little wiggy, but when I start swatting frantically at things she can’t see, she has a tendency to slink out of the room looking concerned for her owners. My husband doesn’t know this, but I like getting him involved in Skeeter Fu antics. My husband is very repressed, what one might call ultra proper, starched. (Makes you wonder what he sees in me, huh?) It takes a lot to get him to loosen up. I’ve spent up to an hour begging him to wiggle his butt like a fish, but he won’t do it. He won’t sing silly songs with me, won’t dance, won’t pretend to be a rock star. Nothing. Skeeter Fu, however, is another story. I can easily engage him with a simple, “didjoo hear that?” Pause. “Grab a t-shirt, it’s over there.”
Then I just sit back and watch him prance around like an idiot. Skeeter Fu keeps us limber, too. You’ll find your body moving in ways you never imagined were possible.
Yup. Definitely the up and coming thing.
Copyright 2008 C. D. Blizzard www.cdblizzard.com
C. D. Blizzard is the author of the novels Blackwater, Broken, and Profile.
