Emails received in November.

Re: Exceptional

Should say, 'exceptional fast food fight.'

[Crackpot comments in brackets.]

James,

First, congratulations. One of your predictions came through: Brazil style motorcycle banditry has hit Manhattan. A couple of instances. Links to follow if I can find them from a few weeks ago.

[All that matters to me as a journalist is the ability to predict folly. Because it is so predictable, making it easy, and also rare, as most people are trained to see the world of reality through the prism of should and are hence constantly surprised and disappointed.]

Today's catalyst for an email is this exception fast food fight. It's like total spectrum comment-able, from the question of why are the participants upset and willing to fight, to the apparently ineffectual punches, to the show stopper: at a pause, when it's maybe all over, Bike Worker Man goes into his bag and PULLS OUT A HATCHET!!!

But he might be a worthy LaFond reader because he leaves some room, IMO, for any future defense attorney to argue on his behalf that all that's unequivocal is property damage; IMO he doesn't contact anyone with it and, ....well I'll let you decide but I think I'm seeing a guy who knows his criminal code, caselaw, and social/elite mood.

Hope all's well,

CC

PS my favorite comment in the Twitter thread was something to the effect of, 'this is when people should have realized they were in trouble' with a pre hatchet photo of the guys expression

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Crux Cross, thank you for making me smile on this foul day. I would like to point out that in New England, from Manhattan to Maine, from 1600 through the 1770s, that the most feared weapon of war was the hatchet. Perhaps there is a hatchet god buried somewhere back there, whispering to the feral primitives of Post-Modernity, "Take up the hatchet!" Indeed, a few years back a savage with a hatchet took it to some NYPD PIGZ.

Perhaps it is the ghost of Joseph Brant or of Metacomet [King Phillip]. I am beginning to believe in such things. For instance, the Gawdly shootist with the AR that was plinking PIGZ in Philly two years ago, perhaps he was awakened by the ghost of John Africa!]

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Follow Up to Your Boxing Training Response: LL

Hello Sir.

Thanks for the detailed reply, will do. I was mobbed by a couple of mid-size Morrocan dudes, so boxing to start it is. Might get some sticks & lacross gloves, and follow your agonistics approach w/a couple friends. We've been mulling the idea around for a minute now, this is as good a catalyst as any. Bang for buck, would you say The Punishing Art, Twerps Goons and Meatshields, and Being a Bad in a Worse World would be enough to cover most of what I need for the first couple years, or are there any other must-have titles of yours?

Take er easy,

M C

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MC, the best thing you can do is collect gear and friends and go at it.

Go slow with the stick hand speed, trying to score with a slower moving stick than your partner. This develops superior time and measure. Go full speed with training knives and have fun there. Once you have been doing this for a few months, use some light ½ inch rattan sticks and start doing a quick sparring set after the slow stuff at the end of the stick session.

When mixing weapons and boxing, go stick, then knife, then boxing.

Grab the free download of A Fighter’s View for some examples of how we did it.

The Combat Space and Solo Boxing are in print. The latter title uses a different approach to the same skill set as in The Punishing Art.

Check out our agonistics videos on that tag in the table of contents on this site.

As your training decisions have been held up long enough by my tardiness, I’m posting this straight away.

God bless,

james