Epee and buckler tonight, both bouts...I need more breath, more suppleness, more muscle...but it was SUCH fun. R- and J- were having more thoughtful and scientific bouts....I just let go and attacked my instructor, because he isn't intimidated by anything and knew I needed to let off steam. Sometimes it works...he kept trying to throw oblique outside attacks, and I made inaccurate but fast attacks up the middle, so hit his right arm several times. OTOH, he got a good one (as in, will bruise) to a part of the body I wish I'd worn armor on, and one blow skidded across the front of my mask...would have been fatal (by opening a cut on the forehead to blind me) if we'd been fighting sharps without masks (which no sane person would, these days.) It was warm enough I didn't want to sweat in leather, so...tomorrow should show a nice bruise in front.
Stiffened up a lot on the drive home. Climbed out of the car at the grocery store like someone ten years older. Climbed out of the car at the pizza place (to pick Mike up from work) a little less stiffly, but was back to the Elder Hobble by the time we'd come the next fifteen miles.
I expect to be really stiff in the morning when the farrier comes to prune equine toenails. But it's worth it. Such fun...I feel more alive during and after.
E.