Flying to Half Moon Bay for lunch

A co-worker of mine owns a helicopter. On good weather days he sometimes flies out to Half Moon Bay for lunch and this Thursday he asked me to join him. I figured that it's a pretty rare opportunity so I said yes.

It was a lot of fun and very interesting seeing all of the preparations that he had to do and the communications with the towers. I have only been in a helicopter once before this, and it was rather large comparatively. This helicopter only seats 2-3 people, and I had to move my leg around the controls, and make sure I don't hit them. :p

On the way back he did a hilltop landing, and even offered to let me try a slight turn. I lightly touched the control stick and said "That's enough for me!" :p Then we did a steep turn before heading back... to work.

Mushin (無心) Or kendo is not a flowchart

I received a very good advice from one of my sensei recently. He commented that it seemed like I was thinking too much, and I was lacking mushin (無心). (Lacking mushin, does that make sense? :) His follow-up was that kendo is not a flow chart. ^_^ That is very true, and unfortunately I tend to approach kendo with the "pressure, observe reaction, then attack" mindset. I have received a lot of good advice since failing my 4 dan exam, but I think I am trying too hard thinking about them and trying to do them, and not following the flow of the keiko (稽古) itself. 

More things to work on... :p

$79.99 per pound?!

Saw this at Mitsuwa today. At first I thought it was a typo, but it wasn't. So I had to take a picture. It's Wagyu beef (和牛) for shabushabu (しゃぶしゃぶ).

For the record, I ended up w/ a dry aged rib eye steak from Whole Foods, at $21.99 per pound. :p I figured I would try it. It's good, good steakhouse good, but probably not worth it except for special occasions.