Ow.

My ticket? Oh, just wait a second, I've got it here somewhere, I just can't swing my bag forward to look in it, because my sides -- yes, I understand you've heard this all before, but really, you could be a little more understanding, considering what kind of -- now is that necessary? I'd really like to search for my ticket, but considering that hot knives are being stuck into my sides and my arm muscles are being fed through a thousand tiny paper shredders, I'm kind of at a disadvantage here. Search for yourself, I know it's somewhere in my bag. There, you've got it! See, Mr. Conductor? "First class carriage on the pain train." I knew it was around somewhere. No, thank you very much. Sheesh.

Last night I finally went to my first real taekwondo class, and wouldn't you know it, I picked the hottest, muggiest day of the year to start. The combined body heat of 20 people was enough to steam up the mirrors AND the floors, so that people were able to slide around on the wooden floors on their bare feet.

Kinda gross, huh? However, because of this, I didn't feel SO bad when I slipped and fell on my ass during a kicking exercise.

The lesson was fine -- a good workout, even just the warmup part of it -- but as the only white belt in the class, I stood around and watched other people a lot. Oh well. I've finally learned over the years that whenever trying something new, it's advisable to have low expectations for a while. I'm an unknown entity to the students in the class, they're basically unknown to me (though I observed them twice last week when I was making up my mind about the studio), I know nothing about taekwondo while most of the other students are black belts, and so of course it's going to be a bit weird and awkward at first.

I did learn that there is a family of mother, father, daughter and son all taking the class, which might make them the deadliest family in the world.

On the way home, Mia called me from Toronto, and said she was a little Korea-sick. "Helen, there are all these white people here," she said. "It's weird."

A last booknote about Harry Potter: Was it just me, or is the detention that Harry is assigned by Umbridge lifted straight out of Kafka's The Penal Colony? That short story gave me nightmares. And the whole High Inquisitor stuff -- Spanish Inquisition, or Brothers Karamazov? Or just broader persecution history?

Ha ha ha. I'm so literary.