Today my daughter is sick and I got a day off. While she was having a nap, I got a chance to prune one of my prospective bonsai trees. It is a small Trident Maple. I got it on sale from a hardware store about a month ago (left image). Since then I planted it in a bigger pot, bent its lower trunk and cut its entire upper crown (right image). Now, one of the former side branches is the new apex. I am yet to wire and bend the branches, but it will take a couple of years of pruning and wiring for it to become a bonsai. When my daughter woke up, she felt much better and her temperature came down.
P. S. To see what I did with this tree 3 years later see the following entry: http://lomov.blogspot.com.au/2010/08/root-graft.html
