I do fumble in my bag, I realise. I am definitely not straight into the car. And I fumble the most leaving krav, because I usually need a parking ticket to get out, and I end up finding that before I sit down. There probably isn't anywhere safer, though, considering.

Tell me again about the attractions of living in Southern California.

I can't imagine enjoying living somewhere it wasn't worth living despite the weather. Made it through hellacious winters in Montreal for that reason, love Jamaica to pieces despite the earthquake/hurricane thing.

Can't quite characterise the area by torrential rains, though, otherwise it wouldn't be such a big deal.

No, I do have an awareness of people around me in public areas that the SO does not have. And he feels no compunction about just talking to random people on the street, and the reason I don't doesn't just have to do with being introverted, it also has to do with being female.

I'm so rushed and slammed at work that I'm not able to do more than intermittently lurk (hoping to have stuff to say later if the conversation hasn't drifted), but it occurred to me that I've known exactly two men with just this same awareness of others around them and wariness about speaking to strangers. Both of them are absurdly Nice Guys who look like threats -- both hit by massive growth spurts in puberty that turned them very tall and very large, and they've both talked about being aware of women's awareness of them from puberty on.

They put a lot of conscious effort into smiling but not holding eye contact, ducking, bowing, slouching, gauging whether any particular woman is going to be more comfortable going in or out of the elevator first or last, having the door held or not, being greeted or being ignored. They're acutely aware of their physical personae, and aware of how odd this awareness is, that it's a sort of freak funhouse mirror image of the hyper-awareness that most of the women in their lives go through the world with.

JZ, you just described Laura's DH, as well as several oversized--or physically "ugly"--men I know.

I can't imagine enjoying living somewhere it wasn't worth living despite the weather.

I suppose it's the enormity of the things that happen. As in OMG EARTHQUAKES! MUDSLIDES! Etc. that grab my freakish Midwestern sensibilities. We usually only get a bit of snow (some ice, too) and the odd tornado. Not much else.

The scenery isn't much, either. Having never lived outside the Midwest, what would I know?

Both of them are absurdly Nice Guys who look like threats

This is my ex-linebacker bud, right down to the hyperawareness of his own hyperawareness of his physically imposing self.

Running depends on your instructor -- some never warm you up that way, others (which now seems to include me) will get folks running the second there's enough space.

Is it possible to do krav without the running? I've done no running whatsoever after a bad knee injury 13 years ago. And now with my bad ankle injury four years ago I have another reason to not run ever.

Also, I have just about the shittiest sense of balance in the universe - to the point where I failed a sobriety test while completely sober.

I can't imagine enjoying living somewhere it wasn't worth living despite the weather.

Prague was like that for me, hater of all things below 50. I didn't mind it because NEW!EXCITING! But also: End In Sight. I'd not move there year round.

Is it possible to do krav without the running?

By running I mean "around the room in circles" -- I'm an avid non-runner myself. And it really depends on what your teacher likes to do to get you heated.

There are also fatigue drills we do that involve running -- but they're not more than the length of the room. Most fatigue is generated by kicking or punching.

I failed a sobriety test while completely sober.

Oh, that's rough. Maybe you won't need to be dizzied up for some of the exercises.

We usually only get a bit of snow (some ice, too) and the odd tornado. Not much else.

Yeah, but I'm a native Californian, and tornados scare me much more than earthquakes. I've also lived through some really nasty snowstorms and even a firestorm when I lived in Spokane. I'll take my earthquakes.

A winter that involves driving on ice or packed snow more than, say, three times better have one hell of a wonderful city to make up for it.