Necessary Expense

I went back to Aikido last night. There were only two other people there, plus the sensei, my friend and a woman who is a brown belt. It worked out really well because I worked one-on-one with either the sensei or the brown belt pretty much the whole time, which is good since I still have basically no idea what I'm doing.  

Anyway, we learned this one move that requires you to lift the other person's arm up behind their back and them swing it down and forward "like a sword." When the sensei told me this, I informed him that I hadn't worked with swords yet. So he got out one of their training swords and showed me how to do the basic movement. This was really cool because 1-I've always wanted to learn how to use a sword (you know, because it's such a practical skill to have) and 2-I may have ordered a pair of training katanas on Amazon, for my Typhoid Mary photo shoot, and now I at least know the proper way to hold them. 

I couldn't help it, the shoot just wouldn't have been right without the swords. Plus, these were a good investment because they are wood instead of metal so I can use them when I get to that point in Aikido. I'll just have to paint the blades for the shoot. Plus, this set was cheaper than most of the single steel swords.