21

21

BACK WHEN MARY SUE first approached me and suggested she give me some martial arts lessons, I naturally assumed it would entail washing her car and other tedious chores that would later grow into my becoming an instantaneous award-winning karate champion, after a motivational montage or two, underscored by an instant-chart topping ‘80’s pop-rock tune.

So, I was kind of disappointed to find training—with Mary Sue, at least—was nothing like the movies. She never made me wash her car even once. With Mary Sue, my training was more a series of alternating between attacking her, and defending myself from her. In the beginning, regardless of whether I was on the offense or defense, I always ended up flat on my back with my breath knocked out of me. Now, it’s more like five out of ten times I end up getting my ass whopped by the buxom Barbie, so yay for improvement.

We find a park on the outskirts of Dickson which appears to be fairly remote and unpopulated. Even though our training