Hawaii

Hello!! we are back from Hawaii had a great time and discovered a new appreciation for "trade winds". Apparently they have nothing to do with "trading" which was great because we were a little worried that we had nothing to trade!

Except our socks. If I go again I'll probably pack a little different and I WON'T take a pair of socks for every day of the week.

Also, you don't need to take a shower while you're in Hawaii (really!) so all personal items along those lines need not be taken with you. Perhaps you need toothpaste however.

Really all you need is a pair of shorts, a couple of shirts, a swimming suit and sandals. That's it!

Here is a list of things we saw whilst on the island of Kauai.

1) a place called the "Bull Shed".

2) a restaurant called Lemongrass something. If you go here, DO NOT be a sucker and go for the romantic "dinner for two" that is "pushed" on you by the remarkably likeable caucasian waitress who says that they serve them "until they run out of them". And if you do go for the romantic "dinner for two" be sure and find out how much it costs.

3) white pickup trucks. EVERYBODY has a white pickup truck. We had a white Ford Focus which was a pretty nice car. However, you start to realize that practically all the cars on the island are rental cars and you start to realize that every car looks eggs-actly like yours. I had this great idea to start a rental company where you rent our cars that look native, like a beat up old van or something. That way, you feel more a part of the community and you are not "at risk" for having your car broken into. So like at the rental counter when you pick up the car they have an option in the rental agreement to "add a quart an oil upon return or have us add a quart of oil at $4.75 a quart".

4) Cops tailgating us. I think that everybody who visits the island are assigned a policeman who tailgates you around the island and makes sure that you travel at 25mph. 25 mph if you've ever driven that slow (I hadn't) is very slow especially with one of Kauai's finest on your bumper. After a few miles of this (which Julie can attest to) I would throw up my hands in frustration (Julie would grab the wheel) and say in frustration, "just get it over with -- just give us the damn ticket!" Perhaps I should make a suggestion to the Kauai Chamber of Commerce that the police issue traffic tickets on the first day of your stay that are good for your entire visit that you would post visibly on the dashboard of your car.

5) the BEST Christmas decorations ever. Kauaians seem to love to decorate their houses for Christmas and they have a very unusual style that was very attractive. The key point being to get as much on your house as possible, and to include a big blow up Santa Claus on your front lawn, one of which selfsames that wasn't quite working out correctly causing Julie to utter the classic quote, "Claus is down!"

6) Oceans can be very noisy. Both Julie and I remarked on before sleeping like a log last night upon our return at how quiet it was in Seattle. Kauai, for being a paradise, is as noisy at night as standing on airport tarmac while a 757 takes off. What with the ocean surf and what people on the island call roosters who crow like there's no tomorrow (or they crow like there IS a tomorrow) at all times of the night. And it isn't this cock a doodle doo thing either, I'd call it more of a screech. I guess ever since some Hurricane hit Kauai about ten years ago, roosters and chickens are all over the island, everywhere. The place is lousy with them and people alternately love them or hate them. I tended to be on the hate them side (but not really) and didn't sleep well as they screeched at each other. FYI: most people know about the roosters who crow when the sun rises but there are other roosters who crow when the sun sets, others who crow to announce that it's getting pretty hot out, others who crow that the sun is about to come up in about 4 hours to be sure that you're ready, others that crow because they're practicing, others that crow because they saw something interesting, others that crow because they're a little mad at the rooster down the way who tried to steal their chicken, others that crow who missed the sunrise and feel terrible about it and others that always have to have the last crow. It's a regular crow fest out there.

7) Nice weather is a lot less stressful. It's SO EASY to get up each day and not have to worry about dressing warmly...each day is as nice as the day before and after awhile you don't even think about it. It's just going to be nice and you can concentrate on other things, like boy did you see how leathery that person's skin is over there and boy that was some good bacon you just made don't care if it isn't good for me. Your hair (especially if you concentrate on never taking a shower) starts to look GREAT and you start to look relatively healthy with that nice tan (but not too much!) . That little breeze that is constantly lapping your face like a little puppy is about the nicest friggin' thing in the whole friggin' world and you begin to speak a kind of frigginpidgin whatsamatter wit your leatha facehole English that ever'bod can unstan itsa miracle!

8) Swimming in the ocean is the best! The water was cold but not too cold and it's salty! Who would've thunk it! There were a bunch of snorkelers out there looking at fish that were swimming around I guess around me which I didn't want to know about necessarily although I was told about them repeatedly by people from Wisconsin. Wow take a look at that one right by your thigh with the big teeth was NOT something that I wanted to even know about so I would not listen to them although I did hear that if the guy wasn't here in Kauai looking through water in paradise he would have been looking through ice in East Racine.

9) Snorkel Depot is the best name for a store ever although there was a place called Hair-rageous that I think is in the top ten. Ring Ring. Ed picks up the phone. "Snorkel Depot. This is Ed."

10) we saw one whale and three seals and a couple of mouses. The whale just jumped right out there on the horizon line he jumped a few times and that was great. The seals would come up on the beach and sit on the sand and Julie got a little worried, thought they were dying or somepin. After we saw it a few more times we got less worried and also we saw that they (the lifeguards, not the actual seal) actually had little signs that said stay away from the seal and would rope him off on the beach that we thought this must happen a lot. We saw a couple of mouses on our hike on the Na Pali coast (wow!) and a woman in a bikini next to me on the beach one day made this rooster like screech ACH! I just saw a mouse walk over your hand! kind of thing meaning me and my hand.

11) that's about it, now we're back in Seattle and longing for the portly shores of the west side of Kauai and thinking that our thin Hawaiian blood just can't handle this cold cold rainy weather.

12) the people who surf in Kauai are the nicest people.

13) Julie near the end of the week had seen and registered all the people on the island and at the airport as we were leaving told me where we had seen each person that was waiting for our flight.

14) Beer tastes good on Hawaii.

15) They've got a good fries recipe on the island. The french fries were the best we ever had.

16) You have to wait for the hostess in every restaurant you go in. No just sitting down.

17) Ono tastes like chicken.

18) The lobsters were flown in, they aren't native.

19) The Honolulu Advertiser is a great paper.

20) That's about it.