Over the weekend, I saw a video on BoingBoing that drove me into a fit of childish envy. It was a recording of Shinji Saito, the 2011 Yo-Yo World Champion, performing his face-meltingly amazing routine, a double-fisted ballet of loops, tosses, and body tricks far beyond my limited yo-yo capabilities. Saito wielded his yo-yos like a cat might its claws, if a cat could break dance: not as foreign objects under his expert control, but as natural extensions of his own limbs. It was a bravura performance, and it pained me to know that I will never in my life be able to do anything even half as awesome with a yo-yo.
(Video after the break.)