Introduction and Orange County question

[Jason Taylor]

Hi all,

I just signed up today for the forum and I've been having fun poking around. I just wanted to be polite and introduce myself. I'm coming to the WMA after quite a long time in Asian systems, with a little fencing thrown in. Right now, I'm expecially interested in longsword, since it seems like a good sword work foundation, but I'm also very interested in rapier and all its variations (off-hand weapons, etc.).

Right now, I would love to find or create a study group in my area. I've tried unsuccessfully to contact ARMA OC, and their site is down, as well, so I don't know if they're a defunct group or not. Does anyone happen to have any information on this? Or, alternatively, are there any OC-local individuals willing to get together and form a new study group?

Any information on this would be appreciated. Thanks.

Jason

[Seth Halsell]

Hello Jason and welcome. I am part of the study group that meets in Tustin, CA in the oc. We are very much still active but you are correct about the offical site. It is not working at the moment. We use an alternative website to communicate. Here is a link to the site we use http://www.meetup.com/ . If you sign up for meetup.com and search for Orange County ARMA you will find our study group. We meet every friday and saturday morning at the Tustin sports park. Here is the offical address of the park.......

Tustin Sports Park
12850 Robinson Dr.
Tustin , CA 92782

We just had practice actully last week at the park. We meet every Friday morning at 10:00 A.M at the park and every saturday morning at 10:00 A.M at the park as well. I myself have not been able to attend the friday practices because I"m doing T.A work at a school at that time but I am going to the saturday practices. We meet at the baseball fields by the tenis courts at the park. If you go to the friday practices most likely you will see Steve warming up out there. If you have any more questions please feel free to pm here on the forum or just leave a post in this thread and I would be glade to help you we are always happy to see others interested in attending the practices.

[Jason Taylor]

Very cool. Tustins pretty close to me, actually, and I dont work Fridays, so I could make it then. Is it every Friday? Ill go ahead on meetup to check.

Thanks for the quick reply.

Jason

[Seth Halsell]

Your very welcome Jason and yes its every friday at 10:00 a.m and every saturday at 10:00 a.m that we practice. Tomorrow the guys will be meeting (At least they should be) and saturday as well. I wish I could make it tomorrow as it is when most of us show up and it is the day with the most attendance between the two but as I said I will be working doing that T.A work at the school. I'm sure either Steve or Gable (The organizers) will be out there though.

[Jason Taylor]

Thanks. I can't make it this weekend because I'm trying to get over a particularly nasty coalition of diseases (I really hate having more than one simultaneously ). But I'll try to be there next week.

Anything that I need to have, as in a baseline of equipment? I don't yet have a waster (I was hoping to get a nylon one) but I do have a rapier simulator. Any protective gear?

[Seth Halsell]

If you would like to do some contact sparring with padded weapons I would recommend bringing some head gear protection such as a hockey helmet or something along that line. If you have a padded sparring weapon of any sort definatly bring it. The group mainly focuses on longsword practice but by all means bring your rapier simulator if you would like to. If you plan to spar I DEFINATLY would recommend some padded gloves. Most of the time Jason we do various drills from the manuels (A lot from Ringeck's Knightly Art of the Longsword) and cutting exercises. Usually the sparing is just at the very end of our practice for like the last 15 minutes or so of the hour. If your short on equipment Jason don't worry we all share what we have and could lend you stuff to use for the practice. Gable and Steve have extra wasters and I have an extra one as well. I have a lot of old hockey equipment that I normaly bring to the feild that we all use for sparing so just bring what you can.

[Jason Taylor]

I'm going to go ahead and drop by tomorrow. I tried to add the meetup group, but it said that new members have to be approved and I haven't heard back yet. I hope it's going to be okay to just drop in unannounced.

Thanks again for the info. I'll bring by my rapier and my quarterstaff, at least, though I don't yet have a longsword made or headgear. Hopefully someone will have brought an extra waster along.

Hope I can meet you in person when you get through with your TA work and can get back on Fridays.

Jason

[Seth Halsell]

Your welcome Jason I loook forward to meeting you as well. It would be just fine for you to drop by on a practice day we would love that really the whole approval thing is just the way the website works hopefully gable (the organizer) will add you soon so you can check it out. I will start to bring the extra waster I have and another helmet. I should be able to start making the friday practices on Mar 30th.

[Jason Taylor]

As it turns out, I didn't make it today. I'll probably make it tomorrow, though, I'm pretty sure--so if you happen to get this, maybe you could bring the extra waster tomorrow.

Thanks again. See you soon.

Jason

[Lorraine Munoa]

I could maybe make a trip up there once or twice a month for that... All I can think of is how Hot it has to be doing practice outdoors at ten am in the heat of summer... Makes you wish for a fieldhouse..

[Max Lancaster]

Do you guys still meet?

I am interested..can I get a phone number to ask some questions?

[Jason Taylor]

Do you guys still meet?

I am interested..can I get a phone number to ask some questions?

You can message me personally, if you like, and I can answer whatever you'd like to know (within the best of my abilities, of course. )

We do still meet, every Friday and Saturday at 10:00 a.m. We have a meetup.com group (search for Orange County ARMA). Just go ahead and show up; sometimes it takes a few days to get you approved for the meetup group itself. But you can get all the info then.

Hope tou see you this weekend, or at least soon.

Jason

[Seth Halsell]

Again sorry about my late reply guys. Yes we are definatly very much still meeting and practicing out in Tustin, CA Max. We just had practice last week and will be holding practice like Jason said on both Friday and Saturday at 10:00 a.m at Tustin Sports Park in Tustin, CA. Again if you have any more questions just private message me or Jason here on the forum.

[Antonio Delgado]

Hey all, I've been interested for a while and am going to try and show up for the OC group for the first time either Friday or Saturday (mabye both). Are you guys practicing and is it ok for me to drop by?

[Seth Halsell]

Hi there Antonio. We did indeed pratice today and will be practicing tomorrow as well. I unfortuntly won't personaly be there for tomorrow's practice as I got some things to take care of but a few of the guys will be. Feel free to drop in any time on the practices we are always open to anyone paying us a visit either to watch or participate. Hope to see you soon!