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Birthday Weekend

On the Saturday I went to an Iaido seminar in Saint Catharine's Ontario. It began with a buddhist ceremony to honour a man that helped grow the martial art in Canada. We did some neat warm-ups including doing Ippon-Me Mae across the gym floor. We ran through Zen Ken Ren Iai a couple of times. We broke into level specific training groups. My level only did Mae. We did Omori-Ryu in the afternoon. I think Omori-Ryu is the next iaido set I will focus my home training on. I need to remember how to do them all and their names and numbers. I learned a key tip that helps me better understand how to apply what Hatakenaka Sensei told me about my grip. She said I was too tense, which I knew, but not how to fix it. Jorgenson Sensei demonstrated the difference in how far back one can move their arms if they're tense in the shoulders vs if they aren't tense. It might take time to rid myself fully of the tension, but at least I know what having relaxed shoulders should feel like now.

Sunday was my birthday. My friend took me to a pho place to grab dinner. I got a tasty curry dish. We went for a walk in the woods at the Trent Nature Sanctuary, which was nice despite the bugs and my lack of hiking footwear. Hiking in sandals gave me with a lovely blister. That night, I made good friends with Tito's corn vodka from Texas as I played Magic the Gathering with a friend and his son. I'm pretty awful at the game, but he gave me some good ideas on how to get better.

Monday was spent hungover and driving from Peterborough to Ottawa. I got back home at 6:10 p.m. and took a breather before heading to a meeting with my writers group. It was a pretty relaxed meeting. We don't normally meet in the summer, but we're planning our future and all that.

I recently picked up an adult colouring book. It's addictive. I should have a finished piece soon. Perhaps I should have waited until after I finished my editing to get one. I got the Japanese one from DeSerres. I find it forces me to disconnect from technology, which is something I find difficult to do on my own.

I'm now editing chapter 17. I'm aiming to finish editing by the end of July. I need to work harder on this to make that happen.

I might hit up G-Anime this weekend with a friend. This weekend is also the annual Japanese festival where people can watch all sorts of neat Japanese things from martial arts to musical acts and eat hot dogs with seaweed on them. If you're in Ottawa, you should check it out. I'll be there swinging my sword around noon.

Well, off to edit.

Ciao,
R~
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