bye bye japan

Papa and banAna came back from a few days in Kyoto and we had a final dinner at our place. They got us a wicked cool kairagi dish -- looks like tree bark and is perfect for a big grilled fish.
They took lotsa photos with Papa's sweet camera, so I expect to see some good stuff soon.
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late night kumitachi

Feels like I hadn't been to the dojo in weeks because...I hadn't. Big turnout, lots of beginners, so spent most of the time on the basic basics, and thinking in three dimensions, trying to keep balanced front-to-back, left-and-right, and up-down. After class, ran through the kumitachi with Salty a number of times. We're practically the same height which is good. He's better than I am at a couple of the kata and I'm better at the others, so we train well together. He's smooth and trying not to muscle through his cuts, and his maai (distance and timing) is excellent sometimes, but he also sometimes doesn't commit, or gets too anxious. I guess anxious isn't really the word; one of the problems with knowing the kata is you know what you're partner is going to do, so you move understanding how he will move. But that's different than moving with him or in reaction to him. If I change up the speed or angle or timing a little bit, he gets totally thrown off, which is excellent practice for him so I like to keep him on his toes.
He trains alot and somehow manages to remember all the different variations of the kata, so it's good to go through them all and play around. Still not feeling particularly threatened, but I think if we keep practicing a few more times he'll loosen up and really start swinging for the fences. First time he clips me in the head will be good (for him at least) as that will show him were the timing and connections are. We played a bit with the habiki, but one of them is so beaten up it's about to snap in half, so we stopped and went back to wood.
After we trained, we went with Karachan to get some late-nite food and smacktalk until the wee hours. Sleepy at work today, but it was good to get out and do some training for a while.

wake up!

The Tonchanbeast has a new game. At 8pm, when P puts her to bed in the crib, she goes to sleep fairly easily. Then, several hours later she gets all grumpy and wakes up and will only fall asleep again if P puts her in the bed.
Then about 3:30 in the morning Tonchan is awake. And bored. And wants to play. So she reaches out with her meaty little palms and starts smacking me in the face. And she reaches out with her meaty little feet and starts kicking me in the neck. If I roll over, the assault continues on the back of my head. If I open my eyes facing her she stops, smiles her evil little princess/angel smile, and gurgles something like "Daddy! You're awake! Play with me!"
I love my little Tonchasaurus. But I also need to be reasonably functional at work. So I give my little smiling bundle of love a kiss, grabbed my pillow and alarm clock, and went into the other room to sleep.
Sorry P, I am sure the ninjaTon launched a full throwing-stars attack that kept you up, but at least you can nap when Tonchan naps -- I have to stay awake (mostly) at work!

sun day

Another beautiful day, so we headed to Shibuya and walked up through Harajuku. Checked out the crazy kids in front of Meiji Shrine, then walked down to get some gyoza for lunch. Did some shopping at Oriental Bazaar and picked up a nice indoor kimono (thick soft cotton, more like a robe) whilst papa got some knicks and knacks. Tonchan was gettin' hungry so we went to CrayonHouse for dessert and took a wee break on the patio. Hiroko had the tomato fantasy, and then we walked back to Shibuya, loaded up on supplies for dinner, and headed home.