Today was so much fun. Brian (bugeisha) and I headed over to the dojo for open mat training. Open mat is just a block of time that members may come in and train on their own. Sensei is there to offer some guidance as well, but it's not class. Since Brian and I just passed our tests, it isn't really time for us to cram yet, but it never hurts to train. Since Brian just took the test that I'll be taking (six months away or more), I have a bit of an advantage. After we were done training, we went out to eat with Sensei and his girlfriend (and fellow student) and then played Mario Kart on their Wii for a few hours. Oh, the smack talk. Oh, the rivalry. It was brutal... and a hell of a lot of fun.

I am pretty sore and a little worried about how I'll do in tomorrow night's class. On Saturday, I got my elbow wrenched pretty bad. I iced it for an hour Saturday night while Brian and I watched four hours of UFC. Then during open mat today, I jammed my fingers into Brian's hand. My left hand ring finger knuckle is cranky now. It was swollen for a while, but I also iced it and I can almost get my wedding ring back on. It hurts to grip things very tightly in that hand though. Ouchies.

On to the sketches and drawings...

I hate to have to do this, but I have to give my little disclaimer. These drawings cannot be used for anything without my permission, not even on personal websites. My aikido-related art is frequently used by our dojo (tshirts, brochures, student manual, etc). The last one is the design of the front of the tshirts for our members. The kanji reads Kyoseikan Dojo.

If you're interested in seeing more, you can jump over to my art site, Broken Tao.