Abyss

I managed to pick all all 26 ep's of Cowboy Bebop on three dvd's for $50 bucks, if you look hard enough you should be able to find it. Well worth the money, a great anime. Make sure to buy the movie along with it "Cowboy Bebop: Knocking on heavens door"

I'm no expert but I wouldn't go abusing anything that's already injured, you should let it heal before you kick any more hard objects.

At my dojo we train hitting the makiwara, pads, and a heavy bag. For my first few weeks there the only thing I was hitting was blackbelts. While I still get to hit my sensei alot, I tend to work on the makiwara and the heavy bag more. At least they make some noise when you hit them, my sensei just smiles at me. I think he knows it's a great way to make me train harder.

This is my first post here, but I've been lurking around for a while, reading the threads that interest me. I felt this was the first thread I could contribute anything useful to. Anywho... The only time I ever force myself to kiai is when they are in a kata I am practicing, I find that if you throw a attack with enough "commitment" for lack of a better word they come out naturally. We were practicing some kicks against a padded "shield" another student was holding, every time I did a kiai I would manage to push that person off a few steps, if I didn't they just sorta stood there. I didn't force the kiai, it just seemed to follow the intent of the strike.

May not be board breaking, but it was still Impressive. I'm afraid I don't know the name for it, but the practice sticks used in Kendo, is what my Sensei was hit with, you can adjust the tightness on them from loose so they make that nice cracking noise or very tight so they just make a twak or thud noise. This one (judging from the noises made) was tight and was used to hit my Sensei while he was doing sanchin. He didn't even seem to notice, almost like he was elsewhere when he was doing the kata. I can't know the actual power of the strikes but they were fast and looked clean.