07-19-2016, 03:33 AM
Today we interviewed USFA Fencing Historian Andy Shaw, our youngest interviewee so far. I was primed for good stories and long answers. Let it be known, that before the interview, Andy stated many times that many times he did not know much about Piller or saber fencing in general. He's a foil guy. He knows foil stuff.
Shaw is full of opinions. And he is not afraid to share them. A good portion of the day that we didn't spend interviewing him, he regaled us with tales about the still segregated south and many of the people around here would vote for Trump. He also has dogs, which I approve of, but only one that will actually let you pet it. I don't approve of that.
The interview was good and it was bad and of course something went wrong during the course of it. We did warn Andy that we would not countenance any collapses or dying during the course of the discussion.
How was the interview good? Well, he told a really fun scandalous story about Giorgio Santelli and his wife. He's a very good talker. He brings lots of details in his stories. And he knows how to pace a story.
He was bad because he was against some of our questions or didn't want to answer them in a way that was helpful to the story. For instance, I thought it would be good to have someone describe the three weapons of fencing so someone watching the movie who had no background in fencing would have a basic grasp of the terminology. Who better to ask than Andy Shaw? Well, now I can think of a lot of people who would have been better to ask than Andy. He gave the oddest answer to that question that I have ever heard. It was almost like we were stupid to be even asking the question. He talked about blade profiles. He made a circuitous talk about which parts of the body were target. It was just strange.
The answer he gave to why was the Hungarian Team so dominant was equally odd. Again, everyone should know how dominant the Hungarian team because the Hungarian Team was dominant. Right? Don't you get it?
Finally, his answer to to why do people devote their lives to fencing was basically that they are losers and this was the only job they could get. Yet, that doesn't really help us sell the idea of how fun and exciting fencing can be.
But he did tell us the Petschauer duel story. It too was oddly told, but it might work. The Petschauer duel story is important because it talks about the invention of the stop cut in saber and the importance of that move.
During the interview, everything worked fine. There were enough pauses that I could conserve battery strength. I was using all the lights so, I think everything looked pretty good. Then inexplicably, one of the lights dies. Just fades off in the middle of a story. Great. First thought, I guess I should have brought the back-up lights after all. But I had four lights in the kit and I was usually using two with the occasional third when I lit the background.
So, I spent a few minutes scrambling to find the source of the problem. Now, these lights have two bulbs and they both went down at the same time, so I didn't think it was the bulb. I checked the fuse. It was fine. I swapped cords. No change. I swapped extension cords. Still no light. I grabbed the fourth light,relit the scene and finished the interview.
Later when I got back to the Hotel room, I took the light apart. I put the bulbs in another light. They worked fine. I put the fuse in another light. It worked fine. I swapped plugs again. It worked fine in another lamp. But everything I put into the bad lamp did not work. Something fundamental in the light refuses to do it's job.
We took Andy to lunch. The place we wanted to go to was closed on Monday's so Andy took us to one of his favorite restaurants, which was what we should have done in the first place. We should have just asked him where to go rather than choose a restaurant from the guide book. Superior was superior. Really good food.
The entire drive to the restaurant Andy pointed out the rich and the poor neighborhoods. That was probably my fault because I asked how much were home prices in Shreveport. I think Andy might have been letting loose a bit, which I told him, because he probably doesn't get to talk to bleeding heart liberals like myself as often as he wants. We might have been getting the release valve version of the conversation.
It was hot and humid in town. The weather report keeps going on about the dangerous heat index currently covering the entire United States. I think Shreveport might be the center of the problem.
For dinner, we went to Crawdaddy's kitchen for cajun food. HK needed to get some crawfish in him. The sign on the door to the restaurant promptly killed that desire by announcing that Crawfish were out of season. We still had a great dinner. I had a cajun roast beef po-boy. HK had some crawfish Alfredo that vanished very quickly. I didn't finish my dinner because of the massive lunch that was still filling my belly.
I contacted our next round of interviewees to tell them we were coming. I couldn't get a hold of Csaba Pallaghy because my phone wouldn't connect with his phone. I did get through to Gall once he finished screening my call. He reminded me again he never knew Piller. But I know he did escape from Hungary with Tomas Orly, so we can talk about that.
Shaw is full of opinions. And he is not afraid to share them. A good portion of the day that we didn't spend interviewing him, he regaled us with tales about the still segregated south and many of the people around here would vote for Trump. He also has dogs, which I approve of, but only one that will actually let you pet it. I don't approve of that.
The interview was good and it was bad and of course something went wrong during the course of it. We did warn Andy that we would not countenance any collapses or dying during the course of the discussion.
How was the interview good? Well, he told a really fun scandalous story about Giorgio Santelli and his wife. He's a very good talker. He brings lots of details in his stories. And he knows how to pace a story.
He was bad because he was against some of our questions or didn't want to answer them in a way that was helpful to the story. For instance, I thought it would be good to have someone describe the three weapons of fencing so someone watching the movie who had no background in fencing would have a basic grasp of the terminology. Who better to ask than Andy Shaw? Well, now I can think of a lot of people who would have been better to ask than Andy. He gave the oddest answer to that question that I have ever heard. It was almost like we were stupid to be even asking the question. He talked about blade profiles. He made a circuitous talk about which parts of the body were target. It was just strange.
The answer he gave to why was the Hungarian Team so dominant was equally odd. Again, everyone should know how dominant the Hungarian team because the Hungarian Team was dominant. Right? Don't you get it?
Finally, his answer to to why do people devote their lives to fencing was basically that they are losers and this was the only job they could get. Yet, that doesn't really help us sell the idea of how fun and exciting fencing can be.
But he did tell us the Petschauer duel story. It too was oddly told, but it might work. The Petschauer duel story is important because it talks about the invention of the stop cut in saber and the importance of that move.
During the interview, everything worked fine. There were enough pauses that I could conserve battery strength. I was using all the lights so, I think everything looked pretty good. Then inexplicably, one of the lights dies. Just fades off in the middle of a story. Great. First thought, I guess I should have brought the back-up lights after all. But I had four lights in the kit and I was usually using two with the occasional third when I lit the background.
So, I spent a few minutes scrambling to find the source of the problem. Now, these lights have two bulbs and they both went down at the same time, so I didn't think it was the bulb. I checked the fuse. It was fine. I swapped cords. No change. I swapped extension cords. Still no light. I grabbed the fourth light,relit the scene and finished the interview.
Later when I got back to the Hotel room, I took the light apart. I put the bulbs in another light. They worked fine. I put the fuse in another light. It worked fine. I swapped plugs again. It worked fine in another lamp. But everything I put into the bad lamp did not work. Something fundamental in the light refuses to do it's job.
We took Andy to lunch. The place we wanted to go to was closed on Monday's so Andy took us to one of his favorite restaurants, which was what we should have done in the first place. We should have just asked him where to go rather than choose a restaurant from the guide book. Superior was superior. Really good food.
The entire drive to the restaurant Andy pointed out the rich and the poor neighborhoods. That was probably my fault because I asked how much were home prices in Shreveport. I think Andy might have been letting loose a bit, which I told him, because he probably doesn't get to talk to bleeding heart liberals like myself as often as he wants. We might have been getting the release valve version of the conversation.
It was hot and humid in town. The weather report keeps going on about the dangerous heat index currently covering the entire United States. I think Shreveport might be the center of the problem.
For dinner, we went to Crawdaddy's kitchen for cajun food. HK needed to get some crawfish in him. The sign on the door to the restaurant promptly killed that desire by announcing that Crawfish were out of season. We still had a great dinner. I had a cajun roast beef po-boy. HK had some crawfish Alfredo that vanished very quickly. I didn't finish my dinner because of the massive lunch that was still filling my belly.
I contacted our next round of interviewees to tell them we were coming. I couldn't get a hold of Csaba Pallaghy because my phone wouldn't connect with his phone. I did get through to Gall once he finished screening my call. He reminded me again he never knew Piller. But I know he did escape from Hungary with Tomas Orly, so we can talk about that.
As a matter of fact, my anger does keep me warm