tokyo national museum

tokyo national museum, originally uploaded by renfield.

Well crank an egg on my head and call me a frying pan it is HOT today! But never mind the heat, we had some culture to be gettin'! P and I cruised up to Ueno, got lunch at Hard Rock, and checked out the Meiji Era art from the Joe Price collection at the Tokyo National Art Museum.
Extremely cool. We wandered the rest of the museum and saw the permanent collection as well -- lots of great swords, pottery and other artifacts of Japan-ness.

After the museum we took a wee break at 'bucks, then headed back to Shiroganetakanawa station, did some shopping for dinner, and wandered back home through the Shinohashi local shopping street summer festival.

museum in ueno

museum in ueno, originally uploaded by renfield.

pikachu

pikachu, originally uploaded by renfield.

More birthday silliness. Went up to Kanda to enjoy some fried meat and beverages with the mostly-British gang from work, and pikachu announced my birthday as the ladies surprised me with another birthday cake. Then we wandered Kanda a bit and ended up in a salaryman standard standing bar for some late-night bits and bobs.
A good time was once again had by all and a fine way to become 34 (if a day late, but who's counting?)

happy bday to me!

happy bday to me!, originally uploaded by renfield.

I thought I had escaped the birthday gremlins, but they caught up with me at work!

dragon fruit juice

dragon fruit juice, originally uploaded by renfield.

Okinawa Festival at Isetan in Shinkuju again, so P took me to get some quality noodles and then we grabbed a couple of bento and other goodies for dinner.
And of course P got her traditional dragon fruit juice ("pulpy!") and I got an acelora juice ("tart!")
Then we walked over to Bic Camera and got my birthday present: my very own bloodpressure monitor! It's a little jobby that goes on the wrist and measures blood pressure and pulse. I will collate data from daily morning and evening readings and see what's what. So far so good -- I think my bp's better when I test it at home. Then again I can make my bp go down 30 points just by zoning out and relaxing for 30 seconds, so I'm less interested in the exact number and more concerned about keeping it stable or even dropping, not rising.
Cause I'm an Old Man now, eh.

2006 taikai photo

IMGP1295, originally uploaded by renfield.

Some photos from the 2006 Taikai in Tokyo.

yoshida party

yoshida party, originally uploaded by renfield.

Went to Yoshida's for a birthday-is-a-good-excuse-to-eat party. Spent most of the time playing with Marin:

At the station waiting for the train, there was a salaryman in a messed up black suit who sat down on the bench. Then lay down. Then fell onto the floor. Then somehow got back up onto the bench. by the time we got on our train he was lying on the bench again.

And then at Shibuya station we saw this fellow:

ginza nap

ginza nap, originally uploaded by renfield.

Snuck out of work early and headed down to the dojo. I ended up practicing noto (sheathing) for almost 2 hours. Details man, it's all about the details.

After practice it wasn't too terribly hot so I walked 45 minutes through Ginza down to Shinbashi station, and found this salaryman having a wee nap after what I assume to be a quite a few beverages with the boys. Ah, the reserved and conservative Japanese!

happy b-day & bye-bye ky!

happy b-day & bye-bye ky!, originally uploaded by renfield.

Yotsu's birthday and her last day in the office -- she's off to join her new husband in NY. Good luck KY!

my back hurts

I think I tweaked my lower back sitting all day on Saturday judging for the tournament, and of course I ignored the pain for the next few days, running around with the guys and training and not getting enough sleep and working and not really sitting zazen very well.
Now it hurts. I don't think I totally threw my back out or anything, but bending over is truly unpleasant, and sometimes if I move badly I imagine I know what it's like to have red-hot iron stuck into my body. I can't exactly figure out what kind of movement hurts. Lying down feels fine, walking is okay, but sometimes it's like the strain of supporting the weight of my legs is too much for my hips/lower back, and it just hurts.
I went to the dojo last night but thankfully it was closed -- don't think working out would have been a good idea.

turnip

turnip, originally uploaded by renfield.

the girls

the girls, originally uploaded by renfield.

tournament

We got up early and out the door on time to taxi up to the Chuo City Sports Center. The place was already setup and so everyone got changed out and registered, then before you know it we were lined up and starting the opening ceremonies. We had the standard boring (and long!) speeches from the ex-Cabinet bureaucrat, the mayor, etc. and then we're off!
Started with the cutting demo; me and five guys took our places, faced our targets, and did our damage. I think five out of six of us made our cuts, so that was good. Then Gosoke and Yamada-sensei did a jo vs. sword demo, and finally all the Big Sensei demo'd iai kata. Always interesting to see the differences between all the big guys; very subtle in some ways and obviously different in others.
After the demos we started the competition: single-elimination pyramid, divisions based on rank. I judged for several divisions up to lunch and my back was pretty sore from sitting up straight in a chair for a couple hours solid.
For lunch I ate with the guests and other sensei; Hashimoto-san provided bento from his restaurant and it was damn fine eats. I stuffed myself and then got back down on the floor for more judging.
My division, 5/6dan was last. I was wearing my formal kimono, with long sleeves, and had my tabi (socks) on, so in my first round I couldn't see where I was cutting and I kept sliding all over the place. I barely won, beating Tominaga who has always kicked my butt since years ago, but only because he's a long-distance truck driver and hasn't practiced much. Got into better form in the later rounds and swept my way to the finals.
Then it was time for all the final rounds so I was back to judging for the first few divisions, and then ran back to do my final round for first place. Didn't feel too bad, just kind of cruised through it as I was pretty fried by then, but managed to get three out of three flags for the win!
Then we did the awards ceremony, handed out trophies and certificates, etc. and before you know it we were cleaning up and getting ready to head out.

seminar

Slept in and got down to Honbu to get haircuts and shaves then cabbed to the gym for some pre-tournament setup and seminar. Gosoke was running the seminar, and Yamada-sensei and Konishi-sensei couldn't just watch without helping out, so they jumped in with many pointers and everyone was most appreciative.
We trained for a couple of hours and then cruised to Miri's for some tasty burger and turkey dinners before heading home for a decent night's sleep.
I looked all over for my zekken (name patch) and of course couldn't find it at all, so decided to wear my kimono, as I should be dressing up formally anyway.

arrival

The Senpokan Crew arrived well on time so I met everyone at the ANA Hotel and helped the guys get cabs to the hotel. BigT and Father Neeley piled in with me to go home and inhale a massive pot of Hiroko's famous black chili.
I bought a new wireless router earlier in the day (as well as some slick remote-controlled Ferrari's that we buzzed around the trading floor) and got that setup as we turned to living room into a remote office -- four people, four laptops, lots of key clicking.

crabcake @ cicada

crabcake @ cicada, originally uploaded by renfield.

Went to Cicada for dinner with some of the guys from work. Quality food. Had kind of a Moroccan thing going on, with lots of fresh, organic goodness. Tangine, couscous, hummus, lamb. Oh, happy lamb. Fine seafood, too. And totally reasonably priced.
The clientele fell into three main categories: groups of 20ish/30ish Japanese OL women. Old, rich Japanese couples. Gaijin couples. Gay men. Considering we were a table of 5 guys, I would add to that list "cool and heterosexual gaijin dudes from Wall Street."

guzofski in japan

FH030021.JPG, originally uploaded by renfield.

During the massive dojo basement cleanup I unearthed a bunch of old photos and had them all dumped to CDR. Here are a slew of photos from when Guzofski was in Japan; some shots from the Azabujyuban festival and the going-back-to-the-USA/happy engagement party. I'll upload more as I go through them.

capt'n DD

The Gaijin Samurai Invasion has begun! Captain Double D arrived this evening and being the real trooper that he is, showed up for class. At least it wasn't die-of-dehydration hot; weather's dropped off a cliff the past few days and now it's just colder and rainy and humid.
We cranked the basics and did a few kata for a couple hours, and then he was lookin' mighty ready for a shower and some significant sleep, so we called it a night.
I went home and came to the painful realization that my internet connection wasn't just slow. It's worse than that, he's dead Jim.
After nearly three years of tireless service, my Linksys wireless router is d-e-a-d. Can't flash the firmware or hardboot or system reset. Can't ping it, can't trace it, can't do nothing much but plug in the power and watch the red error LED turn on and stay on. Indicating (hello!) an error.
Time to get me down to BicCamera for some replacement shopping.

clean dojo

clean dojo, originally uploaded by renfield.

I spent the day cleaning up the basement dojo. I threw away seven trashbags of old useless crap, cleaned out the small room and made it into my mini-sanctuary, moved my antique tansu and sword rack into the sanctuary, cleared out all the useless storage under the stairs, rebuilt the metal shelving unit into a narrow, tall rack for the sanctuary and a rolling clothes rack for underneath the stairs, and finally I rolled all the targets and stacked then nicely into the corner.
Seriously didn't realize how much space I have in the dojo, and now with it all cleaned up I realize how lucky I am to have a house with a basement. I can use it for training, and Tonchan can use it as a playroom.
This house has issues; too many stairs, too damn hot in the summer and too damn cold in the winter. But it's got a big basement and plenty of room otherwise, and for the middle of Tokyo I'll be hard-pressed to find such a fine space.

bbq!

bbq!, originally uploaded by renfield.

Akee came over and we fired up the Weber to cook some meats. Ah, BBQ! Please note the amount of food and the number of people. Yes, we made way too much. But meat is good. We also had corn and potatoes from the homestead farm.