So 167. That's the grim verdict, according to a scale, at least. Maybe that's not wholly accurate owing to the scale, but it feels at least one stone above what I should weigh, given my height, more or less. So it's time to get serious, which probably meant that I shouldn't have had five pan-fried wontons a whole plate of singapore chowmeifun, and a dish of ice cream just now. Crap.

So the other night at L&L we were watching the little Chinese kids pretending to do Hawaiian math. No, wait... Ummm... actually, no.. it was just Chinese kids doing two and three-digit multiplication, although I doubt they were more than single-digit in terms of age. This led us to reminisce about our Asian careers in mathematics on the SAT... as Wifey put it, "I remember trigonometry... sine, cosine, tangent, and sequins,...."

So because we had to cleanup after, this night's practice was accelerated, which meant straight from warmup into mensuke, followed by kirikaeshi four times, men x5 x2, kote-men x5 x3, and then four consecutive kakarigeikos!, which meant that the 90 minutes was split evenly between "kihon" and jigeiko. Exhausting, with people dropping like flies, but deeply satisfying. A shame it's the last practice of the year. I'll be jonesing for a while yet.

Kind of not enthused to be headed out to Flushing tomorrow, as I'd rather spend that time in my office catching up on projective geometry and technical analysis. But what can you do?

So I don't know where exactly last night's headache came from, but it was pretty bad. Maybe it was just the undereating and staring at a computer screen for so long. I don't blame the musubi or the Gray's, though. It was decent weather last night for a crawl around Manhattan with Wifey, and luckily the weather has turned bad enough today that my meeting has been canceled so that I can stay home and snuggle before leaving for practice later in the evening. Less clear is whether we'll be able to squeeze in a movie, or whether Wifey will just remain asleep the entire afternoon as is his wont. Meanwhile, I really do need to get this personal statement together for grad school. It makes sense in my head but looks rather silly when I put it down on paper, I'm afraid.

So what the hell is pelf?

So today was the official closing of my 2005 Roth, having finished a little early this year rather than extending all the way into mid-April like last year. Now I am not a big believer in New Year's Resolutions (though I used to have resolutions every time I started a new volume of the now-defunct Log), but I really should try and drop some of these additional pounds which I have accumulated--love-fat I can blame on Wifey. So I should really go on a strict diet of Halal chicken and dinner half-portions. And I should find some other sort of routine for the days I'm not at the dojo to add some more mass, at Wifey's request. Little things like this--I used to be more disciplined.

Today was a good practice, though perhaps inexplicably we were sweating and dropping like flies left and right. There were four Ricerivers at practice today, which was rather scary. I"m currently negotiating with Wifey--our country home should have both a training hall and an ice rink. Though of course the children should participate in both, regardless of gender.... I suppose tonight I also managed to finally get a flying sideways men against Sensei tonight. I'm sure there's a name for it.

So I keep losing this post due to unforeseen circumstances, but there's really not much to be lost, or much to be said. It's been a quiet break so far, though the last day before break was a little boisterous what with the return of all those students who'd been blissfully absent in the past days. Now it feels like years separates me from that reality, even though tomorrow I'll probably end up back in the office with this GRE looming and no motivation to really study, but the need to just get out. Laziness is wearying--I still need deadlines to function, and even this test Wednesdays feels like not so much of a threat.

Instead, I've just been playing Zork, watching the Jeffersons, and learning that Lexington on Gargoyles is probably gay. Just not in any implicit or explicit way. He just is.

So this mini-pseudo-vacation is over. It was actually remarkably tiring, half-teaching these half-classes, and also the entire walk to midtown and back last night, even though there was plenty of time to rest in seminar or at dinner with Rob Chin in Curry Hill.

So today only seven students showed. I'm not complaining. I just hope that I won't need to go to class tomorrow. Instead of practice, which I would have gladly walked to, though not from, I went and watched King Kong with Wifey, which was enjoyable except for when I was waiting in line for popcorn beyond the father who was clearly drunk and over-talkative and eventually yelling at his son for not being a man at the age of eight, and continually spilling the popcorn and soda. It was getting rather hostile.

So some notes on kata ipponme through sanbonme:

--If you begin with the bokuto in your left hand as you rei, it will be very difficult for you to change your sword and then draw your sword with the same right hand with which you are holding the bokuto with...

--Kakegoe for uchidachi is "Yah!"--for shidachi is "Toh!" "Yeow!" does not pass for "Yah!"

--In sanbonme, as with all kata, shidachi is in control even though uchidachi moves first. The pressure shidachi exerts forces uchidachi to attack prematurely, which shidachi counters and attacks to win. In this case, after shidachi uses nayashi against tsuki, uchidachi does not continue to press the attack, backing shidachi all the way back into the corner. It kind of makes sense. (Personally, I find that it helps to stop rather than rush as uchidachi after yielding.)


Always June, I suppose.

So I don't know: will anyone show up tomorrow? Turnout on Friday, with a transit strike looming, was low--less than 50%, I'd say. Here's to hoping, I guess. This last week is never fun, but that's what they made 70-minute long tests for.

So although I finally passed ikkyu today, I wonder what good that does me in real life--as I was getting off the train today some boarding black kids, a gaggle with Sunny D in plastic cups, flung a cup at my head, and it was unclear what I should do--what with being Asian and all, I wouldn't want to think that we just take cups of juice like that without a response. But then again, what is accomplished by yelling and fighting--it's the sort of thing I haven't learned enough kendo to really deal with in the right way. It's also the teacher's dilemma--the way a teacher in the city always feels the urge to tell the rowdies to sit down and shut up, but of course the MTA is not a classroom....

So I have noticed that somehow I have managed to integrate many of Wifey's mannerism into my classroom repertoire. It's kind of troubling, actually:

"Do you mind?"
"Too bad!'

And now the vaguely retarded:

'Ta-ra!'

So Beary crossed the line today in practice. We were between tai-atari and tsuba-zeri-ai when he fucking blew a kiss at me! That's just inappropriate sempai behavior and sexual harassment. Luckily, reigi dictates that you carry on, not in anger, but with the utmost courtesy. Still, annoying.

So in my attempt to expand Wifey's DVD collection of Will & Grace so that he won't feel lonely while I'm gone, I wanted to get Boystown, but instead I ordered by mistake (thanks to alldirect.com's unfortunate lack of graphics in their catalog), Boys Town starring Spencer Tracy and Mickey Rooney, as the "boy who was 'born to be hung'." Close, but no cigar.

Meanwhile, I don't know whom I've offended, but both Rob Chin and Alric have already seen or made plans for Bareback Mountain. Wifey rightly remarks, "I don't see what the big deal is... Isn't the entire world about a couple of gay white men?" What have I done wrong? Will no one rid me of this troublesome priest?

So 1480. That's what I'm worth on the GRE, which I just signed up for and which I'm taking over Christmas vacation. Granted, that was rather half-assed without any real checking and going back and at the same time there was both Medium and then Sex and the City in the background, but that's no excuse. It's sad when the verbal completions are so predictable that you don't even hafta read the choices completely. Meanwhile it's depressing to think about the gap between my students and this high-flown lexicon: they are still working on substituting "flower" instead of "fuck" which leads to what I refer to as flowery language and leads him to say things such as "motherflower!"

So I should confess that I've spent the better part of the last week glued to the screen watching Day 3 of 24 which may well be the best season--it's been a long time since I've seen Day 2, but there is definitely a coherence above that of Day 4, even though it's kinda distracting when Wifey screams "What's she doing there? She's like 12!" whenever Kim Bauer appears in her official capacities. Chloe is now officially my favorite character ever.

In going to the Strand today to pick up some books after practice and lunch with Rob Chin at Golden Snacks, I found myself depressed--there was a time when I would scour the basement for remainders and buy books obsessively--those days perhaps faded as my interest in comics grew, but ultimately I can't pinpoint exactly when I stopped reading regularly, when I shifted over from fiction into nonfiction, as few of the novels so thoroughly remaindered, and even far fewer of the books of poetry posed any real interest. Recently I've been reading for the first time The Princess Bride with great amusement--but I think I'm far far gone from the days when I might pick up something heavier--and when was it that I last browsed the OCP, for instance?

Intellectual decline aside, I think it's time to buckle down and take the GRE--back to grad school, and this time for keeps.

So many things have changed. For instance, my lenscleaning apparatus is fizzy. Today, I ended up skipping practice even though my kata needs a lot of work, but it was fine because it meant some extra quality-time with Wifey and some shopping at Target, which is ridiculous as there is an Isaac Mizrahi vinyl pump dog chewtoy. But reasonably priced.

Shinsa in just one week. And then I'll go into kendo-withdrawal with the coming of the New Year season, 1000 suburi notwithstnding.