Liralen's Adventures Through Life

Okay, I found this cool quick reference for all the Chinese Dynasties on Wikipedia . The best is that there's a graphical representation near the bottom of the page as well as the table at the top. Most people don't actually start listing these until the Qin Dynasty (the sixth one down) because they don't actually consider all of China united until the Qin Emperor (for all that it only lasted 15 years because of his excesses, obsession with immortality, and having a son whose sense of entitlement was way beyond his means of influence). The Ming Dynasty was the one just before the last Qing Dynasty, and overlapped contact with European powers. Most of the dynasties that lasted several centuries did well by art, literature, and the whole country made all kinds of progress because of their stability and treatment of the people in China. There were seventeen Emperors of this Dynasty and thirteen of them were buried, with their concubines and wives and one eunuch, in one valle...

The morning began with a wake-up call at 7:30, we were supposed to meet up with everyone by 9, and Hawk had told us about the 9 am meeting in the lobby, but hadn't told us there would be a wake-up call. Luckily, it coincided with John's alarm going off, though it startled the heck out of us. It gave us plenty of time, however, to contemplate the wonders of the Crowne Plaza's breakfast buffet.

We picked Jet up from school, with his backpack and everything, and headed for DIA. We'd already planned it that way, even to packing his lunch in a disposable bag for once. He was happy, content with being out of school a little early, and we were all pretty relaxed. DIA was as efficient as ever, the cheap parking shuttles rumbling by regularly, and we made it with plenty of time to spare as our flight was leaving a little late. It seemed like any other flight, until we got our luggage tags. (Sliced here for length and lots of pictures.)

For those who are interested in a very detailed history and step-by-step descriptions and pictures of the various kata for Bartitsu, Tony Wolf has compiled a two volume Compendium of all the historical sources for the art along with a number of sequences they've pieced together through magazine articles and everything else. The first volume  contains the complete history along with all the canonical documentation. The second volume , titled "Antagonists" contains all the kata along with all the magazine articles about how to respond to an antagonist. I have bought the second one. *laughs* Admittedly, Tony himself said that it's less than useful to do these kata by yourself, as half the practice of the art lies in responding to the person you're up against. However, they make fascinating sources for those who write or game.