I've spent a few hours honing so far. I'm starting to develop a feel for it and am currently working at removing a smile from a hollow ground blade. Fortunately, this is the same blade that I've spent a few hours grinding to remove some pretty serious pitting. I doubt that this practice blade will ever be truly shave-ready, because I'm probably going to use it to practice removing and re-attaching scales. But I got it for practice so it's serving its purpose. I can tell that really getting good at honing is going to be a fairly long journey, but it's sort of hypnotic. I put a story tape in my pocket cassette player and start in and before I know it, it's two hours later.