My Fifth Wrestling Session

Today was the second session with Faerydae, the woman with incredible strength. Thanks to 12 years of wrestling experience, Faerydae picked up all the techniques I showed her and applied them with devastating force.

I decided that it was time to string some holds together and showed her how to transition from a cross body pin to a crucifix and then figure four headscissors. She did it easily the first time. We then went over a couple of takedowns and then I had her show me traditional wrestling takedowns that she had learned previously. Within 1 minute, she had combined the takedown and then pinned me. I couldn't believe how fast she was. Her takedowns were unstoppable.

At that point, I realized that this woman was way more skilled than I had originally thought. I then decided that it was time to wrestle her and see if she could bring me down with resistance. We started out standing in a clinch and I tried to contain her but it was impossible. She immediately pulled me to the ground in a quick takedown. I tried to squirm my way away from her but she held on like a vice and moved up on me quickly from behind. In a last ditch effort, I held my arms together but she pulled me over with ease and then moved to the cross body pin. I began to panic as I felt her body flex on mine as she pulled my arms apart. I couldn't move at all at this point no matter how I struggled. She then quickly transitioned to the crucifix. Again I struggled but she had both my arms trapped. Finally, she nimbly wrapped her leg around my neck and clamped down in a figure four choke, leaving me gasping for air. I quickly tapped out.

Needless to say, Faerydae is by far the most talented of all the women I have wrestled with. She is both beautiful and incredibly strong. Her legs are not to be messed with and I already issued her a challenge to beat me at arm wrestling which I have no doubt she will be able to do in a short period of time.

My Fourth Wrestling Session

CC arrived a little late but that wasn't a problem. Like JC and FD, she did all the holds I asked. She was a quick learner and mastered the triangle choke from guard and mount the first time. Her legs were toned and strong and when she squeezed, I couldn't breathe. She had a great personality and enjoyed the entire session.

My favorite part of the session was when she had me in a schoolgirl pin with my arms through her knees. I instructed her to squeeze her legs against my head while I struggled to get free. I fought like my life depended on it but I couldn't budge her from the hold. Finally, drenched in sweat, I gave up.

My Third Wrestling Session

This time I found a woman a little more desperate for money than the other two women. I picked Joy Catherine up near her house and drove her back to my house. Joy was very strong. Her legs were not quite as strong as Faerydae but still but me in a hell of a squeeze. She did everything I asked and laughed as she saw me turn different shades of purple as she squeezed. What was amazing though, was that she beat me in arm wrestling, both left and right handed. I asked her how she got so strong and she told me it was from carrying around her son all the time.

One of the memorable holds of the morning was the crucifix transitioning to headscissors. Once I was trapped, I couldn't move any part of my upper body. Both my arms were trapped while she was choking me. I struggled to get free but began to lose energy as the pressure around my neck increased. I started to have trouble breathing. At that point, I couldn't even tap out to let her know I had enough. The room started to spin a little as I managed to squeak out an "I give".

My Second Wrestling Session

Unbelievable. That is all I can say to describe how well my second wrestling session went. I found a young woman named Faerydae Douglas from Model Mayhem. She is about 5'7 and when she came to the door, I was amazed at how solidly built she was. Her arms and legs were thicker than mine and I could tell that she was very athletic. We went through the different holds and unlike the first woman,  did all the holds I asked of her, headscissors, triangle chokes, etc.

Faerydae Douglas

Her strength was incredible. When she put me in a body scissors, I instructed her to feel my stomach moving as I breathed and squeeze as I tried to inhale. I could barely catch a breath as she clamped down. It was incredible the amount of power she had. She was an extremely quick learner and I am sure it was all the years of collegiate wrestling she had that helped. When she put me in a triangle choke from guard, she performed the hold correctly the very first time. I was seeing stars and she wasn't even applying any pressure. I struggled to escape and she started to squeeze harder. I couldn't take it anymore and quickly tapped out. The same was true of her figure four chokes. With just her legs around my neck and no pressure at all, I could feel myself getting light headed. I then proceeded to try and escape and with her applying only a little bit of pressure, I had to give up.

I am so lucky I found her. She is really excited about learning more and practicing with me. After it was over, I tested her upper body strength by arm wrestling with her. I struggled to beat her. Most women have weaker arms but she was really strong. Finally, I managed to pin her after much effort. I then asked her to give me a piggy back ride. When I got on her back, I asked if it was hard and she said I felt so light she could run without any difficulty.

My First Wrestling Session

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The Business Partnership That Fell Apart

I probably should have posted something last year around this time about my ongoing involvement with Custom Development. So before I begin relating this saga, I should fill in a few historical blank spots. On a sunny morning in May, I agreed to meet Dino at the Denny's on Sunrise Blvd near CFF. Yes, the same gym where I encountered the young woman wearing grandma perfume. Anyways, the meeting was an opportunity to hear Dino and his old friend, Joe Sandino offer up a proposal to become partners in a relaunch of Custom Development. You see, up until that point, Dino and I had been operating CDC in survival mode, with both of us working out of our homes. I handled the accounting while Dino pounded the pavement looking for morsels of work to do. It was enough to get by but by last year, the economy had improved, housing prices were going up and things in general were looking pretty good for the home improvement industry. Just getting by wasn't good enough and I was up to moving on to something better. Over a breakfast of eggs and countless cups of coffee, the idea for a fully operational version of CDC began to take shape. Both Dino and Joe had gone through their own respective personal bankruptcies and stellar credit was not their forte. I, on the other hand, while sometimes scraping close to the bottom in my personal finances, always made sure that my bills were paid, giving me something valuable that they didn't have - a good FICO score.

The plan was for Dino and Joe to provide the experience and some initial start up costs and I would help get the company setup with vendors on my good credit. I was a little hesitant at first but I had known Dino long enough to know that the likelihood of me being left high and dry was pretty slim. Joe, on the other hand was an unknown. Dino introduced me to Joe and explained their connection. Joe owned a company called Weatherite which focused on residential window replacement. The crash of 2008 wasn't very kind to the home improvement industry and Weatherite came crashing to the ground. But 5 years had past and it was time to jump in the pool again.

Back to our meeting: Joe came prepared with his job profit and expense ratios. Jobs sold around 3X the cost and after deducting all direct expenses including commissions of 10% and lead fees of 16%, there should be about 24% left. Admin costs take away another 10% so by Joe's calculation, each job should net something like 12 - 14%. The idea was to divvy up this remaining amount as profit sharing with Joe and Dino splitting 80 and me taking the remaining 20. Sounds pretty good. According to Joe, anything over a hundred thousand a month would be gravy. After the meeting ended and my stomach couldn't hold one more sip of coffee, I agreed to go home and think about it.

The truth was I wasn't making much doing little piddly accounting work for Dino so I figured that nothing ventured, nothing gained would doom me to a boring existence and I was ready for a change. We rented an office/warehouse space in a seedy section of North Highlands on the cheap. I would have preferred something close, like that little space on Pyrites Way that Dino and I worked in for a little over a year beginning in 2009. But Gold River rental rates are a few notches above North Highlands and we were starting on a shoe-string budget.

At first things went pretty well. Joe seemed knowledgeable at least when it came to bathrooms. He brought over his crew consisting of Vasile and Nikolay. We gradually increased our volume. Joe's main job was to oversee the lead generation aspect of the company and insisted on receiving his fee no matter his department was productive or not. This began to place a strain on our arrangement since there were times that a job was a real loser and everyone else sacrificed in response except for Joe.

As for me, I handled the accounting like always and tried to save some cash for emergencies by transferring some funds into a savings account. Joe interpreted it as me hiding money from him which was really stupid and paranoid of him.

Looking back at this time period, that paranoia no longer seemed too out of character. As a general rule, I avoid politics, especially people with strong conservative views simply because they tend to be very difficult people to reason with. Joe began emailing me stuff about Obama - the typical crude, stuff you might expect from an Obama hater, i.e. communist, born in Kenya, socialist, etc. At one point, I was talking with him and he showed me an email on his computer and asserted that Obama was actually the devil. WTF? This is coming from someone who I assumed was intelligent, graduating from college with a degree in chemistry.

From that point on, I began to suspect Joe had a few screws loose and when he accused me and Dino of hiding money, the pieces began to fit together.

Finally, one day in April, 2014. I received an email from Joe saying that he wasn't coming in for the Monday meeting we usually had. In his long diatribe, he once again accused me and Dino of deceit and hiding money, both complete lies. In any case, the next day I walked into the office and it was nearly completely empty. Over the weekend, he had cleaned us out. To top it off, in his email, he demanded $10,000 as a settlement for outstanding amounts owed. After analyzing his ledger, Dino and I decided to pay him what he wanted since it turned out to be quite a bit less than what what was actually owed after all the jobs went through.

What an ordeal! I am so glad he is gone. He really was quite an asshole and since he left the company has been doing quite well without him.

Proposition 8: Justices illustrated how the Constitution works

Published: Thursday, Jun. 27, 2013 - 9:06 am

Last Modified: Thursday, Jun. 27, 2013 - 12:25 pm

Re "Gay Marriage is on a roll" (Page A1, June 27): Voter-approved initiatives do not carry absolute weight or protection from scrutiny and testing for constitutionality, as some letter writers may think. If it were the case, then slavery could be made legal again through voter-approved measures.

Checks and balances in our system are designed to guard against the tyranny of the majority. The powers of judicial authority and ability to overrule voter initiatives are enshrined in the powers of the U.S. Supreme Court.

People who complain that their votes don't count anymore or that democracy is dead should re-read the Constitution to learn more about how U.S. democracy works.

-- David Brotman, Gold River

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2013/06/27/5528919/this-is-how-democracy-works.html#storylink=cpy