THE STORY GOES that Pablo Picasso was approached in a café one day by a woman who asked if he would do a drawing on her napkin. He agreed, made a quick sketch on it and said, “The cost will be 20,000 francs,” or some such enormous amount (some versions say $1 million). “That much!” …
Continue reading The Workout of a Lifetime: Would Picasso Have Been Proud?
Leaving the gym recently, I ran into a former classmate in an Aikido kenshu (advanced study) class. We spent a few minutes catching up, and he asked me if I was still training in Aikido. I’m not taking any classes at the moment, in part because the winter Rec & Ed session was cancelled, and …
This morning I went to the semi-annual Dan (black belt) test at my Aikido school's main dojo. It was a long test, with three people each testing for shodan (1st degree), nidan (2nd degree) and sandan (3rd degree) rank. But it was also an exciting test to watch. At Dan level you see everything from …
WAY BACK AT THE dawn of history (around 2007), I was on the mat at the start of a weeknight Aikido class. Our instructor worked us through the warmup routine until we got to the wrist stretches. Then he stopped for a moment. "I was asked recently how far one should take a wrist stretch," …
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